Mumbai Crime: Police nabs gangster Anees Ibrahim's aide

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The Mumbai Police Crime Branch's Anti Extortion Cell (AEC) have arrested an aide of fugitive gangster Anees Ibrahim, who handles his finance and laundered his black money wherever he asks him to.

The arrested, identified by police as Mohammad Altaf Abdul Latif Sayyad, a resident of Navi Mumbai, was arrested from Kannur International Airport, as he returned from Dubai. The police had received a prior intimation of his arrival and arrested him . Sayyed used to handle Ibrahim's extortion money since 2001. His arrest is said to be crucial for the police as it would lead them to the money trail of underworld, said an official.

The crime branch officials informed that Ibrahim never came under the police radar as he never commits any crime physically and would work for the underworld from behind the curtain. He is known to stay in Dubai most of the time and work for the underworld.

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Ibrahim's name came up when Ramdas Rahane, 41, a member of his gang, was arrested. According to the police, he was planning to attack a hotelier after having received money from Pakistan to do so. The hotelier, in his complaint filed with the police, mentioned that he was receiving threat calls from Pakistan. Even Rahane would call to threaten him. The callers demanded Rs 50 lakh from him and had also told him to pay Rs 5 lakh immediately to Rahane.

During the investigation, the police official learned about a hawala operator named Harish Gyanchandani, 41 who is said to work for D-Company, and had transferred Rs 3 lakh to Rahane. He stays in Kalyan and owns an office in Bhuleshwar and has also helped Dawood's brother Anees to transport his Rs 3 lakh from Pakistan to Rahane.

Further investigations revealed that the money which was handed to Rahane had come from Pakistan via Dubai. According to police, Gyanchandani received a call from a member of Dawood Ibrahim's gang in Dubai, who instructed him to hand over the cash to Rahane. The man told Gyanchandani that Rahane had been assigned some work by the company, for which he was supposed to receive the money.

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After a long wait and some paperwork, the crime branch got custody of Danish Ali, another of Anees's aide, from the United States. Ali later revealed another name and in a secret operation, the sleuths from the crime branch arrested Ajju Rolex alias Azim Khan, another close aide of Ibrahim, who works as an accountant in the underworld from his hideout in south Mumbai.

Later on, the crime branch learned about Sayyad and issued a lookout notice against him. Sayyad has two passports which he used alternately to fly from Dubai to India and back to Dubai. "We have procured the details of both passports. And as he landed at Kannur International Airport in Kerala we nabbed him and brought to Mumbai for further information," said a police official.

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