Resh­ma Ra­goonath

San Fer­nan­do house­wife Melis­sa Bis­nath said she was lucky to be alive and praised God yes­ter­day af­ter she was set free hours af­ter be­ing ab­duct­ed from her Palmyra Vil­lage home on Sat­ur­day. Bis­nath, 21, was ab­duct­ed by three armed men who broke in­to the home she shared with her com­mon-law hus­band, Roland Jit­ta, 45.

The men de­mand­ed Jit­ta's ATM card and PIN. They took Bis­nath, a moth­er of two, with them as se­cu­ri­ty to en­sure that Jit­ta gave the cor­rect PIN. They al­so took Jit­ta's white B15 ve­hi­cle and an undis­closed sum of mon­ey. Bis­nath was dropped off a short dis­tance from her home around 4 pm on Sat­ur­day.

Yes­ter­day Bis­nath ap­peared shak­en but ex­pressed re­lief that she es­caped with her life. "I con­sid­er my­self lucky to be alive. I was re­al­ly, re­al­ly scared. I did not know what was go­ing to hap­pen," she said. She said she and her hus­band re­turned to their home be­tween 4 and 5 am on Sat­ur­day to find the men al­ready in­side the house. They made her lie face down on the ground and took Jit­ta in­to their bed­room.

"The blind­fold me and put a jer­sey over my head. I was re­al­ly scared. The man with the gun keep push­ing the gun on me. I was afraid for my life. I do what­ev­er they tell me to do. "When they take me I was beg­ging them, 'Don't do me noth­ing, don't hurt me'," she said. Jit­ta said when he went in­to the bed­room the men tied his wrists and feet with an elec­tri­cal cord. "I thought they were go­ing to kill me," he said.

Jit­ta said he was over­whelmed with re­lief when he saw Bis­nath com­ing home on Sat­ur­day af­ter­noon. Bis­nath said her ab­duc­tors took her to an ATM where they used the card to with­draw an undis­closed sum of mon­ey. One sus­pect has been de­tained and Cpl Sie­u­nar­ine and PC Singh of Ste Madeleine Po­lice Sta­tion are con­tin­u­ing in­quires.