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Foulis spare parts dealer kidnapping…Kidnappers reduce demand to $25M
– Soesdyke woman held
Kidnappers holding a Foulis, Enmore auto parts dealer Rajendra Singh hostage, have reduced their demand by half to $25M for his safe release.
This was conveyed by the captive businessman, who was allowed to speak to his wife via telephone early yesterday morning.
The kidnappers had initially demanded $50M minutes after snatching the 40-year old Singh called ‘Sunil’ from his business place on the Foulis Public Road, East Coast Demerara around 18:54 hours on Saturday.
Rajendra Singh
However, from all indications the money had not been paid up to press time last night.
Kaieteur News understands that the man also told his wife that the kidnappers are demanding too, the video recording from the CCTV cameras that are mounted around the business place.
While the businessman’s stolen car was recovered a few hours after the abduction, on the Goedverwagting Railway Embankment, a few miles away, police have widened their search, going as far as the Soesdyke/Linden Highway where they arrested a female.
Reports reaching this newspaper police were able to trace the cellular phone that is being used by Singh’s kidnappers to the 26 year old woman.
“The SIM card was bought by her. She is claiming that she bought it for someone,” a source told this newspaper, adding that the woman will be kept in custody to assist with the investigations.
Relatives of the businessman were tightlipped yesterday as they anxiously await word on his fate.
The early morning call yesterday was the last they heard from him and according to a source close to the family, Singh’s wife was warned not to report the matter.
However by then word of the kidnapping had already spread.
A source close to the family told this newspaper that on Saturday, Singh, his wife Heema and two employees were about to close his business to go home when two men pretending to be purchasers of auto spares came up.
“The men come and ask fuh ‘fat man’,” the source said.
They then pulled out guns and held their victims at gunpoint. They took away an undisclosed amount of cash that the business had accumulated from the day’s sales, while assaulting the victims with their guns.
Singh’s car which was found abandoned at Goedverwagting has been dusted for fingerprints.2
The source said that the kidnappers appeared to be well aware of Singh’s activities since the questioned him about the whereabouts of his 13 year old son.
The teenager had left to go to a nearby barber.
The gunmen demanded the keys to Singh’s car and when it was handed to them by his wife, they bundled the businessman into the trunk and drove away with the Toyota Ist.
Singh’s wife later got help and tried to go after the kidnappers but the men had disappeared with the businessman and his car, which was later found abandoned at Goedverwagting.
The car which was stripped of some of its interior parts has been dusted for fingerprints as police continue their investigations.
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