Three Patna schoolboys go on Dawood hunt, return home

They hated studies but wanted to make plenty of money. So, they hit upon a wild idea to catch fugitive Mumbai underworld don Dawood Ibrahim, now believed to be in Pakistan, and claim the reward on his head.

For the three Class 9 students of St Michael’s High School, a leading Patna school, it hardly mattered that top Indian security agencies had not been able to nab the ‘D company’ boss.

The boys went missing on Friday. When they failed to reach home after school, anxious parents approached the police. When their mobile phones were put under surveillance, New Delhi was found to be their location.

Finally, the police managed to locate one of the boys with the help of Delhi police. He was brought to Patna on Sunday and under interrogation, spilled the beans.

“The boy revealed that the trio were not interested in studies and so they made a plan to catch Dawood,” said Patna SSP Manu Maharaj. Then he pieced together their unlikely story.

“They felt that by catching the don and handing him over to the Indian government they would get crores of rupees as their reward to enjoy life thereafter,” the police said.

The SSP said the students first went to Mokama, about 100 km east of Patna, and then reached Kolkata.

From Kolkata they went to New Delhi from where a Patna police team retrieved them with the help of local authorities and brought them to Patna on Sunday.

Such tendency among teenagers, said a police officer, was a matter of concern, because of their unrestricted exposure to films, Internet and social media.

“The parents must guard against this, as children often start believing in the make-believe world without thinking of the consequences,” the police officer added.