Dongri to Dubai - Six Decades of the Mumbai Mafia

by S. Hussain Zaidi

  ‘Watch your step, there is a plank ahead’, someone instructed Mushir as he was nudged to move forward. Mushir raised his foot higher, climbed the plank. ‘There are stairs ahead, be careful’, he was instructed again. Mushir began climbing what seemed like wooden stairs as he held on to the wooden railings. He felt disoriented. Ironically, he never had any such scenes in his movies either. When he reached a landing, he was asked to turn and walk towards his left. As he was walking, he heard a chorus of children reciting some Quranic verses. Mushir had the sense of being in a building which was thickly populated. The realisation comforted him that he was not in some isolated spot. He was ushered into a room and the blinds were removed from his eyes. The first thing he saw was the photograph of the Prophet Mohammad’s green tomb of Masjid Nabavi in the holy city of Madina.

  The next few hours were very painful and intolerable for him. They threatened, abused, and slapped Mushir. They all looked serious and menacing. Mushir learnt that they were well aware about the business that Shakti had made.

  ‘Hamein sirf pacchis lakh chahiye [we want only Rs 25 lakhs]’, said Amirzada in a very polite manner and in a tone that suggested that Mushir owed him a lot but he was being considerate in demanding such a paltry amount. Mushir was forced to make a call to his brother-in-law and partner, Mohammad Riaz, and ask him to get whatever liquid cash he could organise and keep it ready to be delivered at a place which would be told to him. Obviously, he was not supposed to seek any kind of help from anyone, including the police. Riaz agreed and in the evening at around 9 pm, Riaz and Harish Sugandh delivered 2.80 lakh rupees in cash, which was what he could put together in the short time, to Amirzada and Alamzeb. Mushir was reunited with Riaz and a nightmare had ended.

  28

  Pathan in Patharwali Building

  Sub-inspector Ishaq Bagwan had just joined the Crime Branch. He had been in service for over half a dozen years now, being an officer from the 1974 batch. But he was restless and wanted to do something soon. He was still reeling with anger over the way Sabir had been shot dead at a petrol pump by the Pathans and the Crime Branch could not make much headway except for the intelligence that the Pathans, namely, Amirzada and Alamzeb, had killed him. For Bagwan, this was a blatant assault on the pride of the police machinery. The Crime Branch was known as DCB CID, Detection of Crime Branch, Criminal Investigation Department and Bagwan was faced with a fresh challenge; the latest kidnapping.

  Film producer Mushir Ahmed and his brother-in-law-Riaz Ahmed were big names in Bollywood. The daylight abduction of Mushir at the crowded junction of Worli seaface was a major blemish on the reputation of the Bombay cops. Not only did the intelligence of the police network fail, they remained totally clueless about the entire incident and the payment of ransom money, until thespian Dilip Kumar himself strode to the Crime Branch headquarters and met senior police inspector Madhukar Zende to register the filmmaker’s abduction.

  Dilip Kumar, along with Mushir, had visited the police headquarters and met Police Commissioner Julio Ribeiro. He apprised him of the whole incident and Ribeiro immediately summoned Zende to his office, assigning the case to him. Zende subsequently spoke to both the actor and filmmaker and respectfully escorted them to the Crime Branch, so he could take down their statement and launch the investigation. Bagwan was inducted into the investigating team and he sat in on the statements of Mushir and Dilip Kumar.

  Mushir gave a description of the whole incident; how his car had been intercepted and he was bundled into another Ambassador and blindfolded, then taken to the first floor of a building and thrown in an office-like place. Looking for some kind of clue, Zende and Bagwan tried to coax some details out of Mushir. As a filmmaker, Mushir was always alert to details, and as he recalled the incidents of that day, he gave some very vital clues to the cops. For example, he had managed to see through a slit in his blindfold a huge poster of the film Sholay, while he was being driven through the city. After he saw the giant poster, the car took approximately 10-12 minutes to reach its destination. Once he was dragged out, he stepped on a wooden plank on a small platform which led to a flight of wooden stairs. As he was made to walk down a corridor, he heard a chorus of kids reciting Koranic verses, giving an indication of a madrassa on the same floor.

  Bagwan meticulously took down details in his diary, but his mind had already begun working: ‘A theatre with a giant poster of Sholay... After that a car drive of 10-12 minutes... An old wooden style building... A chorus of Madrassa kids...’

  Immediately, he alerted all his informants and began working on his intelligence network in the city. At the time, Bagwan was known to be the most resourceful cop in town. As he sat, immersed in a file, he got a call on his direct line. Moving swiftly, he dashed towards the phone before any of his colleagues could.

  ‘Bagwan sahab, salam alaikum [greetings], ’ a voice said.

  Bagwan replied, ‘Haan bol, kidhar tha itna din [yes, tell me, where have you been all these days]?’

  It was Baagwan’s informant, Badruddin, known as Badr. Bagwan chided him for not keeping in touch. He was pushing him to help provide leads for an ‘opening in this case’. In police terminology, opening a case means solving a crime or detecting a felony.

  Badr said, ‘Sahab, ek khabar hai, ek pata likho [Saheb, write down this address]. That filmmaker Mushir was kept in Kadar building in Kamathipura, which houses the office of Alamzeb.’

  ‘Pakki khabar hai, ya… [are you sure, or...]?’ asked Bagwan.

  When a cop asks ‘pakki khabar’, he actually intends to find out whether the news has been verified.

  ‘Sahab ek dum sau takka [yes sir, one hundred per cent], ’Badr replied.

  Bagwan lost no time in replacing the phone, asking the orderlies to get the raiding party ready and leaving the premises of the Crime Branch. Before leaving, he informed his senior Zende that he was off to Kamathipura. The sight of police vehicles patrolling the seedy bylanes of Kamathipura is common to its pimps and prostitutes, so no one really raises an eyebrow when they see cops here. They could be seeking hafta (protection money) or executing a small raid. But this was no single cop on a bike or just one police jeep. Here were two jeeps and a police van. The police party seemed to be prepared for any eventuality.

  As the police fanned out over the fifth lane of Kamathipura and cordoned off the area, Bagwan himself barged into Kadar building, first floor office of Alamzeb’s headquarters. The well-furnished, gaudily-decorated office was empty except for Salim. Salim was a new convert, earlier known as Saniya Bhangi (sweeper), and had converted after his marriage to a Muslim girl. He used to look after the upkeep of the office and did errands for Alamzeb-Amirzada.

  Bagwan took Salim into his custody, driving him back to the Crime Branch. Salim was a tough nut to crack but as it is said among cops, Is patharwali building mein pathar bhi boltein hain (even the toughest nuts crack in this patharwali building in underworld parlance). Within hours, Salim had begun to sing. He admitted that this was the place where Mushir had been confined during his captivity. But he could not provide any leads to the cops on the Pathan duo’s whereabouts.

  He did say that Alamzeb’s father would know. Bagwan immediately went to Ali building on Duncan Road, where Alamzeb’s ageing father, Jangrez Khan, lived. Khan was placed under detention and finally, after realising his position, the old man cracked, giving the police an address where they could find Alamzeb.

  A police team led by Zende sped to the Kalupura area of Ahmedabad. They had only two important leads from Saleem and Jangrez: a white Ambassador with number plate GUJ-7999 and a matka (gambling) den behind a hotel. Even as the cops were sweeping the area for a matka den in Dariyaganj area, they found the white Ambassador, on the move. The police party began to follow the car. As Amirzada exited the car, the police party sprang on him and arrested him. The police also seized a huge cache of weapons which included three rifles of .12 bore, fourteen rev
olvers of Chinese and German Mauser make of all kinds .38, .32, and .22 and 300 cartridges. The police had not only arrested a kingpin who had engineered a filmmaker’s kidnapping, but they had also nabbed one of the culprits in the most sensational gang-war killing of the time.

  29

  Typewriter Thief: Rajan Nair

  Jails are supposed to detain people and deter them from further crime. In India, however, jails serve a purpose entirely opposite to what the criminal justice system purports to achieve. Sometimes, innocent people are turned into hardened criminals; people who are imprisoned mistakenly come out of jails with a crooked bent of mind, starting to think that the only recourse in order to move ahead in life is to commit further crimes. There are plenty of these examples in the annals of history of the Bombay underworld. The story of Rajan Nair alias Bada Rajan is one of those.

  In the mid-seventies, Rajan Nair was a small-time tailor in a readymade factory by the name of Hindustan Apparel in Thane. He was known to be very skilled. But after toiling fourteen hours a day, he could take home only 30 or 40 rupees. Despite working for five years, he realised that he could not even get a proper house in Bombay and was getting nowhere.

  In the meanwhile, he was trying to court a girl. The girl was interested in Rajan and thought of him as a hard-working, honest man. But many a girl has the mistaken perception that she must be wooed by a flashy lifestyle. So, Rajan also wanted to lead a luxurious life and throw his weight around, to drown her with gifts and marry her and settle down. But when he realised that his meagre salary would not be enough to woo his girlfriend the way he wanted to, he tried to moonlight in several odd jobs like waiting tables and running errands for offices, but he really could not do much with his limited skills.

  One day, with his girlfriend’s birthday approaching, Rajan became desperate. His salary was a long way off and when he asked for an advance, his bosses refused. Hopeless and despondent, Rajan decided he had no option but to steal. He stormed into the office and picked up the only valuable thing in sight—a typewriter. Rajan lifted the typewriter, put it in a gunnysack, and made off with it. He sold the typewriter in Bombay’s Mutton Street, known as Chor Bazaar, and got a good 200 rupees for it; with this he could get a saree for his girlfriend.

  Rajan soon realised typewriters were used in all offices in Bombay and that the better or more sophisticated they were, the more the money they fetched. He did not have big dreams. He could have spent a lifetime stealing typewriters and make money off them, in a small-time racket.

  But his luck was not to last long. When the police went to Chor Bazaar as part of another case’s investigations, they were told that all their typewriters were sold to them by a South Indian guy who came every week with two typewriters.

  The cops kept a watch on this Chor Bazaar vendor for a few days. When Rajan Nair came by with his weekly two typewriters, he was arrested. The Bhoiwada police made a very strong case against him, and he was convicted and sent to prison for three years.

  Rajan’s life changed completely after the jail sentence. When he returned to his house in Ghatkopar, he decided to form a gang. Within months, the Golden Gang was created. The gang ran its empire in the north-eastern suburbs of Bombay which consisted of Ghatkopar, Chembur, Vikroli, Mankhurd, Bhandup, and the nearby areas.

  They began with extorting money from shopkeepers, restaurant owners, taxi-drivers, rickshaw drivers, and others. Within a couple of years, Rajan became a formidable force and the Golden Gang became an entity. Rajan soon enlisted the services of a good man, Abdul Kunju. Kunju was a brilliant student of Anjum-e-Islam High School but he soon realised that his academic achievements would not be as rewarding as the support of Rajan anna (a South Indian term for big brother). He became a trusted aide and a right-hand man for Rajan, who in turn became increasingly dependent on Kunju.

  Smarter than Rajan, Kunju soon capitalised on his talent for scheming. He soon developed a subsidiary gang of his own in the Shell Colony near Tilak Nagar and became a force within a force. After a while, he grew so strong that he challenged his own mentor, Rajan Nair. In doing so, he chose the time-honoured way of proving his mettle; he courted, won over, and eventually married Rajan’s girlfriend, the very same woman who had supposedly inspired Rajan into taking up a life of crime.

  Rajan was distraught and utterly humiliated. He fumed and fretted and swore a bloody revenge on Abdul Kunju. When Kunju was detained under the National Securities Act (NSA) in 1979, he saw his chance; his gang attacked Kunju’s gang members and beat them up. Rajan also unsuccessfully attempted to abduct Kunju’s wife, his old flame.

  Kunju was helpless in jail and Rajan was slowly and effectively eroding his base. Kunju decided to take matters into his own hands. When he was being taken to Vikroli court, he threw chilli powder in the eyes of the policemen escorting him and escaped. After days of playing hide and seek with the police, when the matter cooled down, Kunju returned to Ghatkopar. Soon, he sent Rajan a message; he wanted to meet him now.

  Rajan and Kunju did not want a direct confrontation at this time, so the feuding stopped for the moment. Both of them waited for an opportunity to hit out at each other, when time would give them an advantage over their opponent.

  When Dawood, who had become a notorious underworld figure by then, met Bada Rajan at Musafirkhana to speak of avenging his brother’s death, the former typewriter thief was in awe of him. Rajan had visited Musafirkhana only with a couple of Dawood’s close cronies, who included his most favoured protégé Chhota Rajan. It was then that the two Rajans were exposed to the clout and power of Muslim mafia in the city.

  Rajan Anna could never have imagined that a don like Dawood would need his services. During the course of several meetings, Dawood opened up and revealed the nature of his trauma to Rajan Anna in an unguarded moment.

  It was never hard to understand Dawood’s motivation to destroy the Pathan gang. They had done the unforgivable. Sabir’s death was the death of a substantial portion of Dawood’s emotions. He was living a nightmare. Facing his parents after the wanton murder of their eldest-born was something even Dawood could not do. He was seething; he had always looked straight into everyone’s eyes and now he could not even face himself. He sought to calm himself down but here was only one thing he could do: kill Amirzada and Alamzeb.

  He turned to Bada Rajan for solace, and the man, honoured to be trusted with this task, soothed him and told him not to worry. He took it upon himself to find a man for the job. As the don of Tilak Nagar in Chembur, he did not have to look very far. He shortlisted two local candidates for the job; one, a small-time offender called Philips Pandhrey and the other, a wastrel and loafer called David Devasayan Pardesi.

  Pardesi was a 24-year-old good-for-nothing, without a job, family, or a life in general. He survived on alms or the odd job. Work as a means of living was an idea that did not seem to occur to him. Rajan’s eye was on this drifter, as the man for the job. Bada Rajan concluded that as Pardesi was pretty much expendable, he would be the man to shoot Amirzada dead in Bombay city court.

  30

  Pardesi Kills Pathan

  His heart was thumping loudly. His throat was parched, his breathing irregular. His legs were quivering and he felt as though he was going to collapse any minute. For Pardesi, everything was a blur, even if things were moving in slow motion. He was finding it difficult to focus and equally difficult to hold his gun.

  The brief Pardesi had was clear: he was supposed to shoot Amirzada and then jump out of the window. Pardesi clearly had no reputation as a sharpshooter. In fact, he did not even know how to hold a gun.Moreover, the thought of killing someone in broad daylight in a courtroom was preposterous. No one could imagine that someone could pull out his gun and shoot a gangster dead, with the tight security in place. Court shootouts were unheard of in India in those days, it was a willing suspension of disbelief usually associated with Hollywood melodrama.


  Rajan was fully aware that there was no way to escape the court after a shootout. He also knew that once the police got their hands on Pardesi, the story would end right there. Pardesi had no family, hence no one would come to collect the money, nor would he have to deal with a distraught mother or sister. And Pardesi would ensure that Amirzada was out of the way. He could not think of a more foolproof plan. Hence, Pardesi, expendable if inexperienced, was commissioned.

  Pardesi had been taken to Ulva village in Uran. Ulva was a community of Konkani Muslims who regarded Dawood as one of their own. Its hills afforded seclusion and the shots of a practising shooter were likely to go unnoticed here. However Pardesi, in his trademark style, had not done anything constructive at the range. He had just fiddled around with the gun long enough to get used to the recoil. He lived off Dawood Ibrahim’s money and rested most of the day, a life he was easily suited to. From time to time, Dawood Ibrahim would irritably enquire about the progress of the new trainee and Rajan would soothe him into silence. Dawood firmly believed Pardesi was no good and made his displeasure apparent on several occasions. However, Pardesi’s utility still served to seal the deal. Pardesi was a marked man with numbered days, but he was blissfully unaware of it.

  Finally, Rajan decided it was time. On 6 September 1983, David Pardesi was taken to the city court at the City Civil and Sessions Court. He was uneasy and sweaty. Wearing a loose shirt and trousers with his gun tucked in under his shirt, he walked around the courtroom ill at ease. The one thing that he did right was to evade attention. No one noticed the nondescript man walking around the courtroom. When the judge called for order and asked for Amirzada to be led into the courtroom. Pardesi took his revolver out.