New twist to missing boy case

CHENNAI: The fate of an 11-year-old boy, who went missing in Abhiramapuram on May 2, remains unknown.  Sources said E Dinesh, a resident of Elango Street in Govindasamy Nagar, stepped out of his house to play cricket with friends and did not return home. A class IV student in a local school, he hailed from a poor background: his father Elumalai was a mason and mother Punitha a housemaid.After conducting a search, the couple lodged a complaint at the Abhiramapuram police station. They also placed an advertisement in a leading Tamil daily along with a cell phone number. On May 10, they received a call, demanding Rs 10 lakh as ransom for the boy. The parents demanded that they be shown their son and the caller asked them to come to Parry’s Corner first and later the Fort railway station.But there was no sign of the boy, sources said.After bargaining, the caller reduced the ransom to Rs 5 lakh, then to one lakh and finally to Rs 50,000. He asked Elumalai to bring Rs 50,000 with him to the bus stand in Vellore on Monday. The mason, accompanied by a police team, went to the spot at the appointed time. Four persons came to the spot below the bridge near the bus stop to collect the ransom, when the police team caught two of them, the others managed to escape. The apprehended men were brought to Chennai for questioning.Police identified the arrested men as Siva and Rajesh. The duo claimed that they did not kidnap the boy. They said they read the advertisement in the paper and hatched a plan to extort money from the boy’s parents. With the case taking an unexpected twist, the fate of the missing boy still remains a mystery.