Kid­nap vic­tim As­raph Ali has been freed. A $3 mil­lion ran­som had been de­mand­ed for the safe re­lease of Ali, 30, who lives at San­ta Philli­pa Road, Ca­paro. Ali, a for­eign-used car deal­er, was snatched around 7 pm on Wednes­day at Lime­head Road, Chase Vil­lage. He had gone to Lime­head Road, with his 22-year-old wife, to view a car. Po­lice be­lieve he was lured from his Ca­paro home by the kid­nap­pers who of­fered to sell him a car.

Ali and his wife drove to the sched­uled meet­ing point where they were ac­cost­ed by a group of armed men. The men forced the cou­ple in­to Ali's Sil­ver B-14 and drove off. Ali's wife was pushed out of the car along Joyce Road, Chase Vil­lage. The men drove off with Ali. Ali's car was lat­er dis­cov­ered aban­doned in the Wa­ter­loo area. When the Guardian vis­it­ed Ca­paro yes­ter­day, Ali was at the home of rel­a­tives where a Hin­du poo­ja was be­ing con­duct­ed.

A male rel­a­tive of Ali de­clined to say if all or part of the $3 mil­lion ran­som had been paid. "That is in the hands of the po­lice," the dis­traught rel­a­tive said. Ali was re­leased in the Or­ange Field area some­time around 3 am on Fri­day and was dis­traught and shak­en. The rel­a­tive said Ali was roughed up by his ab­duc­tors, but showed no vis­i­ble signs of be­ing beat­en. He said fam­i­ly mem­bers were hap­py with the safe re­lease of Ali and feared that kid­nap­pings were on the up­swing again.

Coun­cil­lor for the area Paras Ra­moutar is­sued a warn­ing to peo­ple liv­ing in rur­al com­mu­ni­ties. He said he, too, feared that in the cur­rent hard times kid­nap­ping may be on the up­swing. Ra­moutar said there were a num­ber of af­flu­ent peo­ple in Ca­paro and sur­round­ing com­mu­ni­ties who may be easy tar­gets for kid­nap­pers. He said the area was poor­ly po­liced and a po­lice post should be set up in the area as a pre­ven­ta­tive mea­sure.