College student arrested for abducting minor girl after befriending her on Facebook

An 18-year-old college student has been arrested for allegedly abducting a minor girl after befriending her on Facebook, police said on Saturday. Shoyab Khan lured the girl by promising to marry her and took her to his friend's place in Uttar Pradesh's Azamgarh and Muzaffarpur in Bihar. He later abandoned her in an auto-rickshaw at Badarpur border, they said. Khan, who is pursuing a degree in B Pharma from a college at his native place in Rajasthan's Alwar, was arrested from Badarpur border area on December 9 and subsequently the girl was also rescued, they said. A probe was initiated into the matter after the girl's father lodged a complaint on October 23, alleging that his 15-year-old daughter had been kidnapped by an unknown person, police said. Accordingly, a case of kidnapping was registered at Rajouri Garden police station on the same day and an investigation was initiated, a senior police officer said.

As part of investigation, call detail records and all the social media accounts, including Facebook and Whatsapp, of the girl were scrutinized, he said. The police found that the victim had received several messages from a particular Facebook account of Khan and its location was found to be active in Haryana's Mewat, Deepak Purohit, Deputy Commissioner of Police (West) said.

When a police team conducted a raid at Govind Garh village in Mewat to nab the accused, he was not there, he said. In order to find out about the accused and the girl, head constable Shaukat Ali of the Delhi Police also disguised himself as a local. Raids were also conducted at other places and footage of over 50 CCTV cameras were also scrutinized, he added.

The team finally managed to nab Khan from Badarpur border area. During interrogation, Khan revealed that he had 4,845 friends on Facebook. Khan further disclosed that he sent a friend request to the victim and she accepted it on July 5 last year, following which they started chatting frequently and became good friends. He also told police that slowly he started luring the victim, promising to marry her. On October 22 this year, Khan came to Dehli and pressured her to marry him, took her to Muzaffarpur and stayed at his friend's place for a day, police said. The next day, both moved to Azamgarh where they again stayed at the another friend's place, the DCP said. On October 26, Khan left Azamgarh with the girl and reached old Faridabad metro station from where he hired one auto-rickshaw to Badarpur border. However, he left the victim inside the auto rickshaw at the border and fled, the senior officer said. ''To trace the girl, more than 300 auto-rickshaw drivers and 'tuk-tuk seva' drivers were examined to collect details of the girl. CCTV cameras were also scanned and door-to-door checks were also carried out around the Badarpur border area,'' he said. ''Finally, an auto-rickshaw driver, who had dropped the girl at a house on October 26 identified the victim and she was recovered,'' the officer said.

The accused has been sent to judicial custody, he said..