Poonam and Ashok Kumar were arrested following a complaint by one Vinod Kumar Grover, a resident of Suigra Mohalla in Patiala, who was threatened by the accused.

According to the police, Ashok was in debt and he was not able to earn enough money from his grocery store. “The accused started making calls to his cousin from a PCO threatening him to eliminate his family members if he did not pay the Babbar Khalsa International Rs 1 lakh,” the police told Newsline.

DSP Sharanjit Singh who headed the team to nab the accused said Ashok was in touch with Poonam who used to live as a tenant of Grover and had shifted to Delhi following differences with her husband. “Ashok lured Poonam into the crime and they together planned to extract money from Grover. As Poonam was putting up in Delhi, she made some calls from there,” he added.

The police said, “We dispatched a team to Delhi and one team headed the operation in Patiala. On Saturday, Poonam called up Grover to deposit the ransom amount of Rs 1 lakh in a bank and hand over the ATM card to the duo.”

They further added, “We nabbed Poonam red-handed accepting the ransom money near Patiala bus stand, while the other accused was nabbed later.”

The DSP said, “The accused told us during interrogation that they had nothing to do with the dreaded terrorist outfit, whose name they were using in the crime.”