Lalitpur, March 16

In a late night drama, the Metropolitan Police Range, Jawalakhel yesterday freed an eight-year-old girl held hostage by man from a Chabahil-based guest house.

The arrest of the man also led to mastermind behind the kidnapping. The arrestees are Bhimsen Bhandari (19) and Binita Baskota Bhandari (20) of Kavre, currently working as a housemaid in Chyasal, Lalitpur-9.

Binita, the main accused, allegedly hatched the plot to kidnap the youngest daughter of Balaram Pandey, her own employer, for ransom.

SSP Pitambar Adhikari, MPR in-charge, said, “Binita was playing peek-a-boo with the girl in front of the house and lured her into going to Koteshwor by bus on Monday at around 6:00 pm.

As per the plan, she handed over the girl to Bhimsen, who is also a distant brother-in-law of Binita, to hold her hostage somewhere. She gave Bhimsen Rs 10,000 for the work.”

Bhimsen kept the girl at a guest house near the TU Teaching Hospital, Maharajgunj on Monday before shifting the victim to Chabahil-based Purbeli Guest House. On Tuesday, he took the girl to Gopi Krishna Cinema Hall to watch two shows of different Nepali movies and kept her in the guest house.

Grieving parents of the girl had filed a missing complaint after they could not find the whereabouts of their daughter. In response to the missing complaint, a special team deployed from the MPR launched an all-out investigation before rescuing the girl from the Chabahil-based guest house last night.

“The motive behind the kidnapping was to get a ransom of Rs 500,000 to pay bail for the release of Bishnu Bhandari (Binita’s husband), who is in the custody of District Police Office, Kavre on theft charge,” said SSP Adhikari.

As the defendant’s private lawyers told her to manage around Rs 300,000 bail for her husband’s release, she hatched the kidnapping plot. But police arrested Binita and Bhimsen before they could bargain with the girl’s parents for ransom.

Bishnu was arrested on the charge of lifting a motorcycle three days after their marriage last month. Earlier, Binita and Bhimsen had made two unsuccessful attempts to kidnap other children, revealed the police.

Citing a medical report, SP Adhikari said the rescued girl was sound and well. The duo has been charged with kidnapping.