Police arrest ex-BUET student Masum for hijacking car on pretext of test drive

Police have arrested a man who allegedly hijacked a luxury car on the pretext of taking it out for a test drive in Dhaka.

Ahsan Ahmed Masum, 36, was arrested early on Tuesday morning from Gulshan.

Masum is an alumnus of the Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET). Police recovered the car he fled with and also seized a pistol with five rounds of bullets.

On Mar 7, a man called car dealer Mashroor Nair, owner of the car sales centre Wheel Deals at the Paribagh Garden Tower about buying a car, Ramna Division Deputy Commissioner Masud Alam said at a press briefing. Nair asked the man to come to the garage at his home to see the car.

The next day, the man went to Nair’s home along with two others around 7:30pm. They got in the car, accompanied by Mashroor’s cousin Piyal Mahmud, saying they would take it out for a test drive.

They drove the car and reached the Shahbagh Metro Station around 8:15pm, said Masud Alam. Two other people then entered the vehicle, claiming to be the prospective buyer’s friends. One of them pulled out a gun and forced Mashroor's cousin Piyal out of the car, threatening to kill him.

The criminals also sent a message to Mashroor on WhatsApp, threatening to harm him if he filed any case or posted anything about the incident on social media, according to police.

Mashroor filed a case with the Shahbagh Police Station over the hijacking of the car worth around Tk 8.5 million.

Police used technology to identify the location of the criminals during the investigation, said Deputy Commissioner Masud. Masum was then arrested near the “Amari Dhaka” hotel in Gulshan.

The suspect, who is crafty with technology, is a “professional criminal”, according to the police. He has been named in several car hijacking cases filed with different police stations.