“Devil Wears ‘Khaadi’ (The Unmasking of Romesh Sharma)” continues…

Mishra had earlier served in the Special Protection Group (the Indian counterpart of the Secret Service of the U.S.) and had often seen Sharma with political bigwigs and sometimes at the former Prime Minister’s residence as well. His advice was to get some current and clinching material against Sharma, which would keep political hurdles and interference at bay, should we decide to search his premises or arrest him.

Lady-luck came smiling to us when Inspector Ishwar Singh, who in the interregnum had caught Romesh Sharma on tape speaking with Abu Salem, a close associate of the notorious don of Bombay underworld Dawood Ibrahim. Both Abu and Dawood were wanted in the Bombay Bomb Blast Case of 1993. They were both absconding but kept their nefarious activities in India going by remote from Dubai and Karachi.

Of the various illicit rackets being run by Sharma in cahoots with the underworld, particularly with Abu Salem, were extortion and arbitration of disputes for a fee. In the course of technical surveillance on Sharma, Inspector Ishwar Singh overheard him settling a dispute between Anand Jain of Reliance Group and Rajendra Banthia, a Mumbai based stockbroker. On another occasion, Sharma had mediated the release of a leading businessman of Gujarat when he was kidnapped by the Bablu Srivastava gang. However, what clinched the issue in our favour was the intercept of a conversation between Romesh Sharma and Abu Salem with regard to settling a dispute between one Ramesh Malik, owner of a property in Chiragh Enclave in South Delhi, and his cousin Ashok Malik, a retired corporate executive.

It is not uncommon that when the cup of sins of an evil force runs over, destiny conspires in its own mysterious ways to bring about its doom. I have seen this happen with desperate offenders often times in my career as a police officer.

To be continued…