Mumbai: Kidnappers chase naked man with a syringe through streets of Kurla

On Thursday morning a Kurla neighbourhood woke up to the shocking sight of a man running through the local market stark naked as two men fully clothed chased him with a syringe While this might have come across as a comic scene to some as the police later uncovered it is more a horror story than comedyUnusual market scene The naked man ran past stunned onlookers in broad daylight as the two kidnappers chased him with a syringe with which they had threatened to inject him with HIV IllustrationUday MohiteAround 8 am the Nehru Nagar market in Kurla east was just warming up for business as the naked man darted past stunned onlookers who immediately called the police control room The police found the man hiding in a housing society in the vicinity and tracked his pursuers down as well arresting all three for creating public nuisancePlot laid barePeople might have assumed that the nude runner was merely streaking but upon interrogating him the police learnt that the man mdash identified as Panchnarayan Sahu a local transporter mdash was actually on the run from two kidnappers who allegedly stripped him beat him black and blue and were threatening to inject him with deadly HIVVictim Panchnarayan Sahu used to work for the transport business owned by one of the accused until it shut down Sahu never suspected that his former employer blamed him for the failure of the businessHis assailants were identified as Pankaj Dubey the owner of multiple petrol pumps in the city and his servant Rajkumar DevendrapratapExplaining the case background Senior Police Inspector Pramod Khoparde of the Nehru Nagar police station said ldquoThe victim Sahu was employed with Dubey since childhood and the two parted ways just two years ago Dubey owns several petrol pumps in the city and also had a transport business Sahu was his most trusted employee thenrdquoHowever Dubey later incurred huge losses and had to shut down his transport business Following this Sahu started running his own transport company often filling up on petrol from Dubeyrsquos pumpsldquoSahursquos trucks would fill fuel from the petrol pumps on credit he owed Dubey R665 lakh Dubey held two of his trucks in Kalamboli and asked him to pay the outstanding amount firstrdquo added KhopardeOn Wednesday evening the victim took the cash to Dubeyrsquos bungalow in Sahakar Nagar However Dubey wanted way more than money Since his transport business flopped he had blamed Sahu for the losses and planned to torture him in vengeanceOld grudgeldquoTune mujhe nanga kiya ab main tujhe nanga karoonga You stripped me of my business now I will strip yourdquo Dubey told Sahu as he and his servant proceeded to do exactly that ldquoThe accused blamed Sahu for the loss of his transport business so he had planned to torture him When Sahu arrived at his house the accused and his servant undressed and thrashed Sahu The duo recorded a video of the act and threatened to post it on Facebook to shame the victim They even threatened to inject him with an HIVinfected syringe and locked him naked in a room the whole nightrdquo said KhopardeIt was the next morning that Sahu made a desperate bid to escape as the servant opened the door to check on him running in the buff for nearly half a kilometre before he found sanctuary in a residential society ldquoThe victim pushed the accused and ran naked through the whole market at Nehru Nagar He hid in a housing society but the locals got scared seeing a naked man running followed by two other men so they informed the control roomrdquo said Police SubInspector Manisha PatilThe two accused were booked under Sections 386 extortion by putting a person in fear of death or grievous hurt 392 robbery 342 wrongful confinement 504 intentional insult with intent to provoke breach of the peace and 34 common intention of the Indian Penal Code They were remanded to police custody yesterday