Byculla to Bangkok

by Hussain Zaidi

  In the midst of all this, Sautya drifted away from his friend. Thakur’s loyalty to Sautya also began to waver and he began distancing himself from him. Sautya, he felt, had found another partner in crime – and he had seen maryada being thrown out of the window.

  SEVENTEEN

  Mobster’s Maryada

  The mafia attracts all kinds. Men with temperaments that can shock even members of their own fraternity. Some who kill for pleasure, some who hone their skills but stick to their brief and just do their job. Some of them, like Subhash Singh Thakur, are religious, and take the high moral ground despite being killers, believing that if they give their word, they have to honour it, come what may.

  Thakur was single-minded. Rarely has the underworld seen a man who could pick up a Kalashnikov with one hand, leave alone shoot with one hand. Thakur, who was fond of his daily physical regimen and took pride in his physique, was capable of doing both. He became a deadlier and more dangerous shooter than Sautya in no time.

  The bright ones in the firmament always draw the attention of the big boss. Soon, Thakur began coordinating with Dawood and taking instructions from him directly. Dawood, who was in Dubai at the time, invited Thakur over for a visit. Thakur promptly got a passport made in the name of Raj Kumar, issued by the Mumbai passport office, and met Dawood in Dubai. He stayed in a hotel called Delhi Darbar for a week. At the White House, Thakur was introduced to the rest of his tribe in Dubai and he met everyone in the gang’s hierarchy. He was greeted with a mixture of envy, awe and plain hatred because everyone knew that if Dawood had invited him, he must be very special.

  The daggers-drawn looks came mostly from Chhota Rajan and his brood of Maharashtrian men, and Thakur immediately felt like an outsider. That he shared the same cotton mill background and faced the same problems that they faced did not matter to the Marathi-speaking boys. But Thakur decided he was not going to be upset. He simply shrugged off the cold vibes.

  When the big boss calls you to Dubai, the trickledown effect is amazing. Back home in Mumbai and New Delhi, people unrelated to the mafia suddenly noticed him and realized that if he had the boss’s ears, he was a man to be in touch with. They began approaching him whenever they needed help. Thakur had now become a power centre in his own right

  Gradually, Thakur began to capitalize on all the contacts that Sautya had introduced him to and started making them his own. He struck up a friendship with B.B. Singh, who was the MP for Gonda district in Uttar Pradesh. He also became friends with an industrialist from New Delhi. Similarly, he cultivated good relations with politicians in northern India; the fact that he was from Varanasi helped cement these ties.

  There was a palatial bungalow in the Randchor area of Kathmandu, which Sautya and Thakur had begun using as their base. As it was funded by Dawood, all his gang members, including Rajan, used it as a safe house whenever they were on the run from the Mumbai police after a killing. Kathmandu became a second home for most of the Mumbai underworld operatives, except for Gawli’s men, who were content to remain in Maharashtra.

  In the meantime, Dawood’s men in Mumbai began approaching Sautya and Thakur instead of Rajan. Rajan did not approve of this violation of gang protocol, but he could not do anything. A Shiv Sena corporator from Bhandup, Kim Bahadur Thapa, idolized Thakur. Thapa was close to the Sena bigwigs and boasted that his friendship with Thakur made him feel invincible.

  The safari-suited Thapa (he never seemed to wear anything else) held sway in the entire Bhandup area. At the time, Bhandup had a lot of hutments and it also housed international companies. There was a huge brothel area and a sizeable non-Maharashtrian, mainly Punjabi, population. Thapa was into extortion and every other conceivable racket that the mafia indulged in. But he was also very astute. He used his influence in Bhandup to get into politics. He contested elections for the civic corporation thrice and won each time. The Shiv Sena had no qualms about nurturing Thapa’s political aspirations despite the fact that they knew he was connected to Dawood. Politicians and the mafia make natural bedfellows. The Shiv Sena knew that Thapa could collect his own funds for the elections and he always contributed generously to the Sena in return for a party ticket. People within the Sena could never understand why Bal Thackeray overlooked Thapa’s Dawood connection. Some said it was his way of saying thank you to the Thapas of Nepal. (Champa Singh Thapa, his Man Friday, was from Nepal and served him till his death.)

  Rajan was quietly monitoring the growing clout of Sautya and Thakur, but preferred to lie low. Then, one day, he called Kim Bahadur Thapa and asked him to shell out extortion money and allocate a share in the properties that he was developing, but Thapa rebuffed him. Rajan could not take this slight and finally had to take action. After all, it was his job to keep the gang’s coffers full. He decided to eliminate Thapa and he didn’t hide his intentions.

  As for the Nepali strongman, he refused to be cowed down by the gangster’s threats, and told Thakur of Rajan’s threat.

  Thakur called Thapa to his safe house in Kathmandu and tried to placate him. He also got him to talk to Dawood, who promised him amnesty. Word spread through the ranks that Thapa was now under the protection of Dawood Ibrahim. Rajan had to beat a retreat.

  But Rajan’s men in Bhandup refused to be reined in. Avdhoot Bonde was a local gangster who had built a house similar to Thapa’s on a hillock, in an attempt at one-upmanship. Bonde’s men began skirmishing with Thapa’s men in the area.

  After Dawood’s assurance, Thapa had become so emboldened that he had stopped taking Rajan’s calls altogether. He also kept tipping off the police about Avdhoot Bonde’s activities. And if this was not enough, he began publicly ridiculing Rajan, which didn’t go down very well with Rajan’s men. It was bad for business. Rajan tried to tell Thapa that they had a truce and he should stop bad-mouthing him, but Thapa remained reckless.

  What followed changed the course of the Mumbai underworld. Friends turned foes, protégés rebelled against their mentors and cracks appeared in the most powerful mafia syndicate in the world.

  Thapa’s temerity gave the cue to others who felt they were closer to Dawood and need not kowtow to Rajan or his cronies. Rajan’s men, who were now increasingly finding themselves ineffective and ignored by the moneybags in the city, decided to make an example of Thapa.

  Petrol pumps or gas stations were a favourite with the Mumbai sharpshooters because they felt they had the advantage of space to manoeuvre their vehicles in and out, and the number of bystander casualties were usually low. Dawood’s brother, Sabir Kaskar, was killed at the Prabhadevi petrol pump and Gawli’s mentor, Ashok Joshi, met his end at the Panvel petrol pump. Kim Bahadur Thapa, the man who had been promised Dawood’s protection, was killed in broad daylight near the Mangatram pump at Bhandup by Rajan’s boys in May 1992. The killing sent shock waves through the city as Thapa was a known Dawood acolyte and he had been killed, not by his rivals but by Dawood’s lieutenant. The traders and businessmen who generally kept their ears to the ground were puzzled by this development.

  Dawood, though he had no fondness for Thapa, did not take the killing kindly. This was impertinence. No one was allowed to touch a person who had been given protection by the don. Dawood reprimanded Rajan, who tried to explain that his boys had got carried away and that he would punish them suitably by reducing their pay packets and incentives. But he could not bump off his entire team of hitmen – they were die-hard loyalists and useful to him, he said.

  Dawood did not want to end his relationship with Rajan because of one killing, but he seethed with rage.

  Things began to go from bad to worse after Thapa’s sister called Thakur in Kathmandu and broke down on the phone. Thakur could not forget that he had promised andabhaydaan (bestowing amnesty) to Thapa. He promised Thapa’s sister that she would have her revenge.

  Thakur then called Dawood and sought his permission for his revenge mission against Rajan’s men. Dawood gave the go-ahead. This is an established aspect of corporate management policy w
hich is equally effective in the underworld. The head honcho feels secure and powerful in his position when his second-rung managers fight with each other and try to outmanoeuvre their rivals. This way, they focus all their energies and talent on decimating their opponent and the man at the top remains safe. No one would dream of toppling the boss in such a climate. So, when Dawood heard that Thakur wanted to kill Rajan’s men, he could see several birds being killed with one stone.

  Thakur had already made elaborate plans to get even with Thapa’s killers. He may have distanced himself from Sautya, but he knew he would have to use his Maharashtrian friend to snare Thapa’s killers, who were all Marathi speaking, like Sautya was. He asked Sautya for help and Sautya promised to give him his targets on a platter; he was happy that his friend had thought of him in his hour of need. Also, Sautya had an axe to grind with Rajan. Like in politics, in the underworld too, there are no permanent friends and no permanent enemies. Alliances are forged, broken, mended and salvaged all the time.

  When Diwakar Churi, Sanjay Raggad and Amar Avtu, who were part of the team that had killed Thapa, reached Kathmandu to hide away until the Mumbai police’s manhunt petered out, Sautya squealed to Thakur. Thakur was in Delhi at the time, living in the house of B.B. Singh. Thakur and Sautya made a plan to kill the trio; he said he would bring them to Gonda, and that Thakur should also reach the house of Pradhan Singh at Gonda.

  Thakur immediately took the Vaishali Express from New Delhi station and reached Gonda in the morning. Guns and weapons had already been arranged by Singh. Thakur reached the place and even before the trio could say anything, he opened fire on them – and kept shooting until he ran out of ammunition.

  Having fulfilled his promise, Sautya returned to Kathmandu with Unita, while Thakur returned to New Delhi, again by the Vaishali Express. The dead bodies were left to rot in the compound of Pradhan Singh’s house, which was actually owned by a parliamentarian.

  After a couple of days, when Thakur called to ask Singh for an update on the incident, he was told that the bodies had been disposed of; all three had been stuffed into gunny bags and thrown into the nearby Sarayu river.

  The Sarayu is regarded as sacred and finds several mentions in Hindu scriptures. They say a dip in its waters cleanses the soul of all sins. But all the rivers of the world would not be enough to cleanse the sins of the mafia.

  EIGHTEEN

  Dons’ Divorce

  When Subhash Singh Thakur killed the three Rajan lieutenants in Gonda district, Uttar Pradesh, he did not know that he was laying the ground for Mumbai’s most violent gang war. Thakur had killed the gangsters for his personal satisfaction, not for the larger interest of the gang.

  Rajan was distraught when he heard about the killing of his three men in cold blood – and the way their bodies had been disposed of. Thakur and Sautya belonged to his own tribe, yet they had not shown the basic courtesy of giving his men a proper funeral.

  Rajan complained to Dawood, who remained as unmoved and unaffected as he had been by the earlier killings. This completely disillusioned Rajan.

  He felt that ten years of his loyalty and subservience had been disregarded by Dawood, who was backing a new entrant like Thakur over him. Rajan became a recluse and turned to drink. He was frustrated and demoralized. He knew that ever since he had joined the company, it had grown by leaps and bounds. His efforts had paved the way for its enormous financial success.

  Rajan had given the gang the structure of a business behemoth and he had watched it grow like a corporate, strengthened by the complex layers at each level of the syndicate. The exponential growth of the gang in terms of manpower and money was something that neither Dawood nor any of his other cronies had envisaged.

  Rajan had brought his own trusted men into D-Company and made it invincible. The syndicate now boasted over 5,000 members. Sadhu Shetty, Mohan Kotian, Guru Satam, Rohit Verma, Bharat Nepali, O.P. Singh, Mama and scores of others had pledged allegiance to the Dawood gang, courtesy Rajan.

  Rajan had also made new allies in the form of the Mohajir mafia of Karachi and the Turkish-Cyprus underworld. With Dawood at the helm, the Muslim mafia across the world had found it easy to strike up a rapport with D-Company. And, with Rajan calling the shots, the Maharashtrian boys had also began gravitating towards the gang.

  But the jealousy of a few gang members was enough to change Dawood’s attitude towards Rajan. Rajan, who sometimes drank too much, had failed to react appropriately to the killing of Dawood’s brother-in-law, Ibrahim Parkar, by their rivals. Parkar was shot dead in July but by September, Rajan was still to formulate a plan for retaliation. The anti-Rajan lobby seized this opportunity to stoke the fire. They pointed out to Dawood that Rajan remained heedless of the pain he had suffered since the death of his brother–in-law.

  This was when Sautya saw his chance and asked Dawood if he could avenge Parkar’s killing. What ensued came to be called the J.J. Hospital shootout.

  Parkar had been killed by Gawli’s sharpshooters, Shailesh Haldankar and Bipin Shere, both of whom had landed in police custody. A few people had caught hold of them at V.P. Road and given them a beating, and they were both arrested by the police and taken to J.J. Hospital.

  Dawood saw this as a litmus test for Sautya and Thakur. If they managed to kill those responsible for Ibrahim’s death, they had a brilliant chance of rising up the ladder. If not they could kiss their ambition goodbye and he made this clear to them. The two men got down to work on their plan for revenge.

  Sautya andThakur led the attack on J.J. Hospital on 12 September 1992. The audacious attack saw a blatant use of AK-47 rifles. It left Haldankar and two policemen dead, and injured a police officer.

  Rajan was not even remotely involved in this attack. It was becoming increasingly clear that Dawood did not consider him his aide-de-camp any more; Rajan might not want to leave Dawood, but his enemies in the gang had decided to write his epitaph.

  Their divorce was speeded up by other factors, as if by divine design. Before Dawood or Rajan could take a final call about their association, the world around them exploded.

  On 6 December 1992, the Babri Masjid was demolished by workers of the Hindu right-wing. This was followed by the worst communal pogrom the country had seen. Between December 1992 and January 1993, thousands of Hindus and Muslims lost their lives to the aspirations of a few men who were pursuing their own political agenda.

  Pakistan was waiting for just such an opportunity to fuel communal strife in India. A month after the Babri demolition, 30 young men were flown from India into Pakistan and trained in warfare, and the use of sophisticated guns and RDX bombs. They were shown videos of Muslim women gang-raped in Surat during riots in Gujarat. The young men promised to retaliate by launching a massive strike on Mumbai. The entire attack was planned and executed by Tiger Memon. Dawood had a peripheral role to play in it.

  During the planning of what would be the biggest attack on Mumbai during the nineties, Rajan was sidelined. He was surprised by the number of meetings Dawood was attending, and Shakeel seemed to be joining him in these meetings – which bothered Rajan even more. Tiger Memon and Mohammad Dossa were chosen to spearhead the whole operation.

  On 12 March 1993, Pakistani’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), in collusion with the Mumbai underworld, unleashed the world’s biggest terrorist attack so far on the city. The serial bombing, which included 10 time-bombs and two grenade attacks, ripped Mumbai apart, leaving 257 people dead and over 700 injured.

  The entire blame for the blasts that shook Bombay and the country in 1993, was pinned on Tiger Memon and Dawood Ibrahim. Shiv Sena leader Bal Thackeray wrote scathing editorials calling Dawood a deshdrohi, a traitor, in his party mouthpiece Saamna.

  Rajan was aware of the extent of Dawood’s involvement in the blasts. But he decided to use this incident to prove his loyalty to his friend and boss. He began calling up and sending faxes to newspaper offices, defending Dawood. He labelled accusations of Dawood’s involvement in t
he blasts as flimsy and motivated by a religious bias. In fact, he took on Thackeray himself and sent out the message that Thackeray should mind his own business and focus on politics, and that Dawood was no deshdrohi and needed no certificate from Thackeray. His daring defence pleased the don, but it was too little, too late. Dawood knew that Rajan was capable of handling the gang, but he would be faced with widespread mutiny within his own ranks if he tried to support him. Finally, he decided he would not pay any attention to supremacy disputes and called a meeting of his men to instruct them to behave maturely.

  The meeting was called in the conference room at the White House in Dubai. Dawood explained to everyone present how business was more important than anything else to him, and how it would suffer because of these pointless scuffles within the gang. Someone in the room tried to object, saying it was Rajan who had tried to create a rift among the senior members of the gang. Dawood said he would ensure that everyone had equal power and flexibility, and that eventually everyone would report to him.

  Rajan was pleased with Dawood’s intervention. However, Shakeel and Sautya were unhappy. The period following the communal riots in Mumbai and before the serial blasts had seen a flurry of meetings. These had continued even after the blasts, and Shakeel had taken on the duty of organizing them, purposely leaving out Rajan in the scheme of things. When people asked about his absence, they were told that he was a kafir and a misfit among Muslim dons.

  This hurt Rajan and he wanted to draw Dawood’s attention to the gross injustice. But Dawood was focused on consolidating his position as a don and a global power player, and didn’t want to be distracted by petty tiffs.