The story behind the daring escape of a history sheeter from a police van in Kherwadi has enough indication of love, loss, angst and other Bollywood paraphernalia to inspire a movie script. Three days into their hunt for Abhay Raj Saroj — who slipped away from police custody on Monday — cops have learnt that the 25-year-old, who is wanted in more than 30 cases of robbery, fled from the cops not just to evade the long arm of the law, but to salvage his failing romance with his long-time girlfriend.

The great escape: 1) Taking advantageu00a0of the distracted cops in the rear end ofu00a0the police van, Abhay easily pushed outu00a0the grill attached to the van’s windowu00a0
2) He then jumped out through the window.
3) Cops seated next to the van’s driver tried to get out of the van, but the door was jammed for a few minutes.
4) The other cops learnt of the escape later. Illustration/Amit Bandre