Crying video, Rs 5 lakh ransom demand. Then a twist in Pune teen's kidnapping

A Pune teenager told his family he had been kidnapped and sent videos of himself crying. Police traced him to a Khadki lodge and found the ransom claim was fabricated.Om Prakash Gaurishankar, originally from Uttar Pradesh's Banda district, came to Pune to find a job. But he struggled financially after months of unemployment.A 19-year-old teen in Pune staged his own kidnapping and sent his family videos of himself crying before demanding Rs 5 lakh as ransom. Police, however, found him at a lodge.Om Prakash Gaurishankar, originally from Uttar Pradesh's Banda district, came to Pune to find a job. But he struggled financially after months of unemployment.As a result, he hatched a plan to extract money from his family, police said.Gaurishankar told his relatives and elder brother that he had been kidnapped and that his abductors were demanding Rs 5 lakh for his release. To make the claim appear genuine, he sent them videos showing himself crying.Alarmed by the kidnapping, his family approached the police in Uttar Pradesh, who alerted their counterparts in Pune. The Pune Police launched a search operation late on August 16, with teams from several police stations, night patrol units and other personnel joining the hunt for the teenager.Investigators were provided with the mobile number that Gaurishankar had been using. Police tracked the number and found that the phone was active near a hotel.A police team, along with night patrol personnel and marshals, then reached Crown Plaza Lodging in Khadki and found him on the premises.Preliminary investigation revealed that there had been no kidnapping and that the teenager had fabricated the entire episode to obtain money from his family.- EndsPublished By: Karishma Saurabh KalitaPublished On: Aug 17, 2026 14:16 IST