WhatsApp photo helps cops rescue trafficked 12-yr-old

The girl, who was kidnapped from south-west Delhi’s Kapashera on January 21, was beaten, burnt with cigarettes, and raped by men — some of who knew she was a minor — before she was rescued on Tuesday.

The WhatsApp display picture put up by a kidnapper, trying to convince the mother of a 12-year-old abducted and girl to not inform the police, was what eventually led to the cracking of the case and rescue of the child. The child had been kidnapped to be pushed into prostitution, investigators said.

A 3D printed Whatsapp logo is placed on a computer motherboard seen in this illustration. (REUTERS)

The girl, who was kidnapped from south-west Delhi’s Kapashera on January 21, was beaten, burnt with cigarettes, and raped by men — some of who knew she was a minor — before she was rescued on Tuesday.

The police till Thursday had arrested two men and two women who kidnapped and sold the minor and are probing if the gang trafficked more children, said Urvija Goel, deputy commissioner of police (west).

On Friday, the police arrested Robin, a 21-year-old man from Sonepat, who allegedly offered the girl a piece of birthday cake laced with sedatives, said DCP Goel.

The rescue and arrests were made by officers of Rajouri Garden police station while they were working to recover children gone missing. The local police in Kapashera registered a kidnapping case soon after her disappearance but failed to make any headway in the case.

On Friday, the Delhi Police top brass acted against the station house officer (SHO) of Kapashera, transferring him to the police lines. “There was negligence in the probe...there was lapse in supervision. The police did search for the girl, but there were certain shortcomings,” said Ingit Pratap Singh, deputy commissioner of police (south-west).

An investigator, involved in the rescue of the child, said that when Rajouri Garden police contacted the girl’s mother in a bid to trace her about a month ago, it was learnt that the kidnappers were in touch with her. They were trying to bribe her so that she stopped pursuing the case of her daughter’s disappearance. However, the mother did not want money. She just wanted her daughter back. “The kidnappers would call from different numbers and then switch them off,” the officer said .

But one of the callers slipped up. She put up her image as the display picture on WhatsApp. “The girl’s mother recollected that the woman in the picture was someone who lived in her area. She brought it to our notice,” said the officer.

The police were able to identify the woman as a local, Ayesha. That clue was enough for the police to identify and arrest her contacts.