Kaskar in net, police try to close in on Dawood

MUMBAI: The arrest of Iqbal Kaskar could turn out to be an important step in the government’s campaign to draw out from hiding his older brother and one of India’s most wanted men Dawood Ibrahim, intelligence and police sources said on Tuesday.

Kaskar was detained by Mumbai police on Monday night in what officials described as part of efforts to go after the assets and businesses of Dawood and his syndicate.

the rescue efforts after Hussaini building collapsed in Mumbai’s Nagpada last month, Iqbal Kaskar, the most famous resident of the adjacent Dambarwala building, broke his silence to the media. However, in the face of the tragedy, reporters refrained from asking him the question they would have loved to: Where is Dawood Ibrahim?

Now Iqbal’s arrest by former encounter specialist and old crime branch hand Pradip Sharma in connection with an old extortion case has led to speculation that it is part of an on-going task the government of India is seriously pursuing: squeeze Dawood out of his hiding.

Little was known about Iqbal, the fifth of Dawood’s 11 siblings, before he was deported from the UAE in March 2003. Unlike his brothers Anees and Noora, Iqbal never went to Karachi to join Dawood’s global crime syndicate.

In fact, crime branch veterans tracking Dawood would talk of how Iqbal, the youngest of the Kaskar brothers, stayed away from the gang’s activities throughout his formative years in Mumbai. He was the last of the Kaskar clan to move to Dubai in the early 1990s.

It is said the migration was triggered by the 1993 Mumbai serial blasts, following which the police tightened the noose around Dawood’s men and business interests in Mumbai.