A resident of Phase XI, Mohali, Lakhveer Singh, in his early 50s, was driving from Mohali to Chandigarh in his Maruti car with his brother-in-law Devinder Singh. A group of six persons, armed with baseball bats, hockey sticks and rods, waylaid them near Sector 48-C here around 9.30 pm on Friday. 

The assailants pulled out Lakhveer from the car without any provocation and started hurling abuses at him besides beating him mercilessly before forcibly taking him along with them in their Mahindra Balero car, Devinder told the police. 

Devinder, who was left with a threat not to report the matter to the police, managed to identify one of the accused as Pinta of Narangwal village in Ludhiana. 

Divulging details of the case, the SSP said that the district police swung into action on getting the information and a police team, headed by Phase XI Station House Officer (SHO) Sub-Inspector Deepinder Singh, raided Pinta’s residence, where he was not found.

The police followed the trail of the abductors and raided several suspected hideouts besides creating pressure from different quarters throughout Friday night, the SHO said. The abducted NRI was abandoned at a bus stand in Ludhiana early today morning. On receiving a phone call from Lakhveer, the police party recovered him from the Ludhiana bus stand at 6 am and brought him back safely to Mohali. 

Narrating the night of horror spent in the clutches of the abductors, Lakhveer told the police that he was driven to Ludhiana, where he was kept at different locations throughout the night. The abductors threatened and assaulted him to allegedly settle the scores over some dispute in USA, he told the police. 

Lakhveer further narrated that Pinta rebuked him for helping one of his (Pinta’s) relatives Pali in USA, who he was not on good terms with. The NRI family was scheduled to return back on December 31.  However, none of the abductors have been arrested yet.