[siren wailing]
[Sharma, in Hindi] There has always been crime in Mumbai.
It's ever present.
In the 1990s,
the underworld was fighting for control over Mumbai…
[in English] and they were very violent.
[in Hindi] A couple came to the police station.
They said, "Sir, we were tied up in our home at night
and two gangsters held us at gunpoint, emptied our house and left."
These two gangsters had many cases filed against them by the police,
from murder to rape, house robbery, everything.
They were contract killers.
[phone ringing]
One day, out of the blue, we get a call.
These guys are at a house evicting people…
[in English] forcibly.
[siren wailing]
[thunder rumbling]
[in Hindi] As soon as we got there,
one of them fires at us.
[gun firing]
The other one took out his weapon…
and attacked a constable.
[gun firing]
[thunder rumbling]
I shot both of them, three bullets each.
[in English] They were declared dead.
[in Hindi] That was my first encounter.
[siren wailing]
[reporter 1, in English] Police shot three gangsters in the business district.
[reporter 2] The Bombay police have shot dead
more than 40 gangsters in the last two months.
[reporter 3] Encounter policemen, heroes and saviors.
-[siren wailing] -[camera shutter clicking]
[in Hindi] The press called me "Fastest gun in the West."
[in English] Who chases after whom?
[reporter 4] Pradeep Sharma. 104 encounters.
-No, sir! -Stand up!
We have to clean them from our society.
[guns firing]
[reporter 4] Encounter specialists,
heroes with Bollywood films centered around them.
[in Hindi] People say you are bigger superstars
than the film stars who play you.
-[reporter 3] Dirty Harrys of Mumbai… -[Ribeiro] Criminals in uniform.
[reporter 5] Mumbai Police's Pradeep Sharma
charged with kidnapping and killing in cold blood.
[in Hindi] After killing 112 people, this is the reward I get.
[birds squawking]
[Sharma] I wasn't from Mumbai.
When I looked around, I found everything odd.
[horns honking]
Life in Mumbai is fast.
The biggest difficulty for an outsider in Mumbai
is that you sweat a lot here.
There is humidity
and, of course, crime.
[chuckles]
[horns blaring]
When I first joined the police…
MAHARASHTRA POLICE
[in English] …my father, he was not happy.
[in Hindi] He'd say, "Live a good life. Become a professor or a scientist."
But then,
I wouldn't have had such an adventurous life.
I didn't know anyone in Mumbai.
I had no friends or relatives in Mumbai.
MAHIM POLICE THANE, MUMBAI
That's why I stayed in the police station for 24 hours.
I lived in the police bachelors' quarter.
A police officer like me has so much violence in his life.
It's a painful job.
But if you have accepted it, then you have to do it.
-[traffic bustling] -[horns blaring]
[dramatic music playing]
[guns firing]
[Tejpal, in English] Films based in Bombay always had gangsters
and, you know, the bad guys
because we are the organized crime capital of the country.
For the criminal, this city is absolutely perfect.
Nobody is inquiring.
Nobody wants to know where you're coming from,
where you're going.
Nobody is fingering you in this city. They let you be.
[siren wailing]
Organized crime really exploded in the '80s and especially in the '90s.
That's when the rules changed,
when common people were fucking killed across the city.
This is an organized crime case. It's a serious incident.
He's been shot. I heard it from his son.
[reporter 1] The state government has been criticized
for not doing enough to control hits by the underworld.
The gangsters were doing anything they wanted.
They were getting away with it.
It was fear.
[gun fires]
Real fear.
[sirens wailing]
They had become so strong that they were more powerful than the cops.
[Ravindra Angre, in Hindi] There were a lot of criminals.
Murders happened openly.
No one was safe.
We could not do anything, we were powerless.
Even if someone committed murder and went to jail,
they would get bail and be out in three months.
I didn't like it, but what could I do?
A police officer shooting someone with a revolver
was out of the question.
[Khan, in English] The underworld was getting out of control.
Police were running around like headless chickens.
So, that's when I decided I'm going to get them.
[horns honking]
When I started studying the activities of the gangs,
my main focus was on Dawood Ibrahim.
He was a major don.
Dawood had a gang called D-Company.
We had very few sources of knowing what Dawood is doing.
So we started cultivating informants.
[phone ringing]
One of my informants rang us up
and said two of Dawood's gangsters were holding a businessman hostage,
and they were armed.
We came and apprehended them, and then we started interrogation.
In interrogation, they gave us a tremendous amount of information
about the activities of Dawood's gang.
This organization was operating on a massive scale.
[horns blaring]
[Shyam Kishore] D-Company is like a huge conglomerate.
I would say, at any given time,
D-Company would add on its payroll more than 25,000 people.
It's a big industry.
It's got its hands in almost every pie, from smuggling gold,
silver, electronics, drugs, bootlegging, gambling.
Dawood was very powerful.
He was like a king, and I wanted to make it big in Bombay.
That was why I joined hands with the company.
Dawood would call himself a businessman.
[indistinct chatter]
But he got to the top mainly because he eliminated all opposition to him.
He would order a killing.
He would want it done with ten, 20 bullets being shot there,
and then people would get scared of him.
That fear factor is what he used to thrive on.
Power flows from the nozzle of a gun, you can say.
[Tejpal] Their big thing was extortion.
Every week, the D-Company would take money from shopkeepers in the area.
Everybody had to pay weekly rental
so that business happens smoothly and nobody comes and busts up your shop.
Anybody who's making money,
whether you're a doctor or a film star or a builder,
you had to pay money to them in order to survive and to stay alive.
They were the unofficial mafia and you had to pay.
[indistinct chatter]
You didn't, next week, boom. You're off, killed.
Dawood and his men were ruthless.
They were extremely dangerous.
So much of drug smuggling in India was the D-Company.
Gold smuggling and prostitution,
organized racket, cricket match corruption, even Bollywood.
In the '90s, it was estimated 500 crores from the underworld
was going into movies being produced.
I mean, this is insane and true.
D-Company not only had their fingers in various pies,
they owned the fucking pie shop.
[horns blaring]
[Sayed, in Hindi] Now there is all this ruckus about Dawood.
I have known him since 1974 when he committed his first robbery.
I used to meet him daily.
I was close friends with his younger brother, Anees.
They weren't born with a silver spoon in their mouth.
They came from struggle.
In the beginning, they didn't have cars, they traveled in taxis.
One day, he gets a tip about a rival at National Bar.
He had come there to drink beer.
They chopped off his fingers and nerves.
Dawood's name in the area was "Terror."
He was known as "Terror."
[horns blaring]
If a person is murdered in Bombay, people look at the body and walk away.
Because if they go closer, they'll be trapped.
[Khan, in English] Dawood's gangsters terrorized people.
People would not come to the police, and it was going on unchecked.
I decided that I have got to get these fellows,
come what may.
At that time, I had about 32 police stations with me.
I picked out officers based on their reputation.
I wanted officers who were physically fit,
who I felt had the guts enough to fight fire with fire.
If you shoot a criminal,
you're laying yourself open to criminal charges.
You are laying yourself open to retaliation by the gang members.
So no one wanted to take the risk.
But I felt that going after Dawood's gangsters
would prove that the police are capable of taking action
and instilled a kind of fear in the underworld.
One of the gangsters that I was looking for was Dilip Buwa.
He was by far the most fearless of Dawood's gang members.
In Mumbai earlier,
Dilip Buwa shot and killed a policeman.
[gun firing]
And he had literally kicked that dead body aside.
[indistinct chatter]
So we started searching.
And one of my informants came forward and he was very secretive.
He'd talk only to me.
There used to be the Sea Rock Hotel at that time.
We parked in the carpark and he quietly came and sat on the backseat.
He informed me that Dilip Buwa had ganged up with Maya Dolas,
a gangster who had escaped from police custody
and they started extortion on a massive scale.
Maya Dolas and Dilip Buwa, who are notorious gangsters,
who, between them, must have committed more than 40 to 45 murders.
My informant said, "I know where these fellows are."
"At present, they are eating and drinking in Lokhandwala,
and they were armed."
"Come quickly, because the moment they finish, they'll leave."
I required 200 policemen to cordon off the area.
We received information
that some of the noted killers from Dawood Ibrahim's gang,
Dilip Buwa and Maya Dolas and several of his henchmen,
they're all armed with AK-47s.
And they were hiding in one Rajwani's flat in this particular building.
[news jingle plays]
[reporter] November 16th, Khan and his men carried out
the biggest operation in the history of the Bombay Police.
Newstrack was there on the spot
and covered the entire operation bullet by bullet.
Here is Minty Tejpal's exclusive first-hand report
of the Saturday afternoon shootout.
Lokhandwala, Bombay. This is Minty Tejpal reporting for Newstrack.
I was working with Newstrack.
My beat was political and terror and threat.
So all my stories were shootout and blood and all that.
At this point, I came to Bombay to do a soft story.
And I was doing a feature on Pooja Bedi.
And just around lunchtime, I noticed a buzz around the crew.
You get that feeling when there's something happening,
and then parallelly I had been hearing too much siren noise
and what the fuck?
[sirens wailing]
And then I hear over the phone,
the unmistakable burst of a AK-47, which I know.
I've heard it in Punjab. I fired it with the army.
[machine gun firing]
Then I took a call right there and then,
telling Pooja, "I'm going to pack up and check out what this story is."
You can't have an AK-47 being fired in Bombay. A pistol, fine.
But AK-47 burst. I heard a burst over the phone. [mimicking rapid gunfire]
Like, "This is something."
A taxi guy agreed to 500 rupees to drive me from Juhu to Lokhandwala.
I'm saying… [in Hindi] "Come on, go!"
[in English] I'm screaming 'cause something's up.
We take a left and we're suddenly at this complex.
I remember when we moved in, cops ran at us and told us,
"Get out. No press. It's dangerous."
[officer speaking in Marathi]
[man speaking in Hindi]
[Khan, in English] An operation in public,
where there are so many people around,
the worst thing that can happen is an innocent civilian is killed.
The gangsters fired AK-47s randomly, without any control.
[in Marathi] Go over this side.
Over this side or your life is in danger.
[Tejpal, in English] The cops wouldn't let us go.
Don't get in on this side.
So I circled around completely like that and got in here, right behind them.
Suddenly, I'm under the building, and I'm rolling.
We're in the middle of the shootout.
[in Hindi] Quick! Get the vehicle!
[in English] Khan's boy said, "You're here, you shouldn't be here."
"Don't move from here, or you might get shot."
As simple as that.
[machine guns firing]
[Khan] Maya Dolas was a cocky fellow, a very arrogant fellow.
In fact, he was taunting the police that, "Come and arrest us."
"Within one hour, we'll get bail and be out."
So I said, "All right. Now, no holds barred. Let's get them."
[guns firing]
But we were firing from two sides.
[gunfire continues]
This is in Lokhandwala, you know, in a residential complex.
Gangsters with AK-47s in a shootout with cops in broad daylight.
It's crazy.
[gunfire continues]
How many people are inside? Two, three, four, five…
Fuck! Nobody knew. Even the cops were guessing.
[gunfire continues]
[young Tejpal] Finally at 5:15 in the evening,
there was a last burst of gunfire.
[gunfire continues]
As we went closer to the building,
we saw one mangled body lying on the ground.
[indistinct chatter]
In a four-hour long operation, with over 500 policemen,
1,400 rounds have been fired.
[Tejpal] There were seven gangsters who were dead,
Maya Dolas, Dilip Buwa and five more.
No human being likes to kill another human being.
It goes against everything that you have been taught from childhood.
Respect for human life. But then
the persons I shot,
they had not only shot innocent people,
but they shot policemen.
[Inspector Qavi] One group was headed by me,
which entered from the door.
I was carrying a gun.
It was already cocked.
I said, "Don't move and surrender yourself."
By the time the warning finishes, Dilip Buwa,
he immediately got up and shot at me.
[Khan] If I come across a criminal and the criminal has got a gun,
if he doesn't put down the gun, I'm going to shoot him.
This is actually a must for a policeman, if he wants to live himself.
[in Hindi] I am here now in Lokhandwala exactly where the shootout took place.
[Khan, in English] We got a tremendous amount of publicity.
Police Chief A. A. Khan.
[speaking Hindi]
[Tejpal, in English] It was the first time something like that had been seen on TV.
POLICE
What that shootout did was show people, the citizens,
that the cops could fight back.
It certainly boosted the cops' profile.
Everybody likes to see gangsters getting killed.
[Khan] This kind of situation became known as an "encounter."
[Angre, in Hindi] After Lokhandwala,
a positive message was sent from us to the public.
That the police had done well. This is how it should be.
You should kill criminals like this.
It felt good.
The police image improved.
I was determined to do something,
to go out and do some good work, to deliver justice to people.
[siren wailing]
We went after all the gangsters vigorously.
The gun must be used,
because it's the moral responsibility of a police officer.
The first time I held a revolver, my palms were sweating.
But I was too excited.
[Sharma] I was transferred to the Crime Branch in '92.
It was in the Crime Branch that my journey really began.
I had an informant in every slum in Mumbai.
They see a shootout, then call me immediately,
"Sir, there's a shootout."
We call this "instant information."
Our intention is to arrest them.
But if someone tries to kill you,
you wouldn't greet them with a bouquet, right?
The government has given us a gun.
It's not just to hang around our waist. It's to use should the need arise.
I have been part of several such operations.
[train horn blaring]
[Zaidi, in English] I was a growing crime journalist in those days.
Me and my other reporter friends like me
supported the cops who had started doing encounters.
I felt that the gangsters had no fear of law.
The only language they understood was bullet for a bullet.
When I went to meet Pradeep Sharma, he was very wary of me.
He was not willing to talk to me.
[in Hindi] I explained to him that I don't have any agenda.
I'm not going to do anything against him.
I'm just looking for my newspaper's page-one.
Then he started to talk to me.
Pradeep Sharma had developed an insensitivity.
For him, there was no wrong.
[Sharma, in English] First time, it was a different experience.
[Zaidi, in Hindi] Pradeep Sharma's first encounter,
where he shot those bullets out of compulsion,
because two people were torturing a woman and forcibly throwing her out of her home.
He was not very sure if what he did was right or not.
[thunder rumbling]
[Sharma] My first encounter,
I went in haste.
I could have had a well-planned operation.
I could have taken more force along.
I opened fire to save myself.
When their family members came, I felt very sad.
I was like, "What have I done?"
But thinking of it as an accident, I was able to accept it.
[in English] I am from a Brahmin family.
[in Hindi] I come from a very moderate family.
We have been taught that only God has the right to a human's life,
and the same with death.
Humans have no control over any of this.
These were my values I grew up with.
No police officer enjoys killing a criminal.
This is the job you selected. Do your duty.
[Changoiwala, in English] I feel very conflicted when I meet gangsters.
Many are remorseless. Many think of killing as a sport.
But there are many others who go drunk when they have to kill
because they cannot bear the stench of blood, the sight of blood.
And, eventually, there is remorse. There is regret.
But the underworld has a very meticulous way
of recruiting foot soldiers.
It's like brainwashing.
They have these scouts who are there on every street corner.
They target boys who come from poor families
but aspire to a good life.
There are school dropouts and college dropouts.
These people are low in self-confidence.
So what the scout will do is he will give a small job to the potential recruit.
And he will praise the recruit so that it builds self-confidence.
He feels appreciated.
In the underworld, they call each other "bhai," meaning "brother."
It creates a sense of camaraderie. It creates a sense of belonging.
Which is also missing from these people's life.
It's done so brilliantly, the recruitment.
There's a reason it's called "organized crime."
-[sirens wailing] -[traffic bustling]
[Sayed, in Hindi] Everyone considered joining D-Company.
Everyone, everyone, everyone.
But the name "gangster"
was something we never understood.
Everyone was just trying to make life work.
When police started killing Dawood's supporters,
the difference between justice and injustice,
it was all mixed up.
After that, people started thinking there'd be a reaction.
He was not the sort of person to just let something be.
But then Dawood left for Dubai.
[Kishore, in English] Doing business was better from Dubai.
His main business was gold.
He used to buy it in tons.
And he had a very good network of smuggling gold from Dubai to India.
There used to be a profit margin of 25%.
From time to time, I would see him.
Meeting him was a big deal.
Like, any Tom, Dick and Harry wouldn't have access to him.
He didn't care about encounter cops initially
because he was safe.
His most trusted lieutenants were safe.
It was only the foot soldiers who were being killed.
He had to pay them money every month.
And if they were killed, probably it saved him his money.
But after the riots of '92 and the police reaction,
then his attitude changed.
[people clamoring]
[reporter] The violence swept India throughout the day.
Stonings, bus burnings, and attacks on police stations all across the country.
[gun fires]
[Tejpal] I covered the riots.
They were scary. They were frightening.
And you saw what humanity is really capable of.
We humans have so much evil and poison in us,
it's unbelievable.
There are certain incidents that poison comes out en masse.
[mob clamoring]
It started in the town of Ayodhya in Uttar Pradesh,
where a Muslim mosque was razed to the ground.
After that, Hindus and Muslims all over the country started fighting.
It was violent. It was very bloody and very violent.
There were neighbors turning against neighbors.
You suspected everybody.
Can the police be trusted?
[indistinct shouting]
[explosion booms]
The '92-'93 riots, it was just chaos.
Bombay was the worst hit.
Around 900 people died.
Many of these deaths were blamed on the police.
They were accused of being heavy-handed,
of usings fire for fire against regular citizens.
[Khan] These kind of activities by the police,
and mind you, there were just a handful of them,
uh, again, uh, widened the gap between the police and the public.
The public started being suspicious of the police.
[man, in Hindi] You just have to be out on the street and they'll shoot at you.
We are leaving Bombay in fear of the police.
The reason for our fear is the police.
[Angre] Police may have been a little strict.
But if action wasn't taken, then the riots would have spread.
We arrested a lot of people,
detained a lot of people.
There was lathi-charge at a lot of places.
People were terrified of the police.
If they saw the police, they would run.
[whistle blows]
[in English] In earlier riots, the underworld had stayed out.
But Dawood was a Muslim.
And people were saying,
"You are such a big bhai staying in Dubai."
People used to call him up and say,
"Your community people, your friends,
they are being bumped off here and you can do nothing about it?"
"You should have some revenge."
"Why don't you strike back?"
I believe D-Company supplied weapons to some rioters.
The result took the entire city by storm.
[Angre, in Hindi] The riots went out of control.
They kept spreading.
The general public have no interest in rioting.
Anti-national elements, those people cause riots.
[female interviewer] Do you think D-Company
and the gangsters had a role in these riots?
100%. Dawood enflamed the riots.
He wanted to create chaos.
[Khan, in English] During the communal riots,
we found a number of Dawood's criminals transporting arms.
But Dawood was multi-headed hydra.
You cut off one head, the others were always there.
We wanted to crack down on a bigger scale.
[horns honking]
[Sharma, in Hindi] In Andheri, there is an international airport.
The illegal activities there were being supervised by Shrikant Desai.
[Kishore, in English] We used to call him Shrikant Mama.
He was one of the top people in the company.
He was not into the actual killing of someone.
Shrikant used to control the smuggling routes from the airport.
Air cargo, basically.
And they made huge money out of that.
[Sharma, in Hindi] Shrikant Mama,
he was very strong and powerful.
He was one of the top ten names in Mumbai in the '90s.
[in English] He was one of them.
[in Hindi] I was with my friend Vijay Salaskar.
We were at the police station.
[phone ringing]
An informant phoned us.
"Shrikant comes to this location."
My team and I headed there to arrest him.
[siren wailing]
As soon as he realized that the police had cornered him,
he opened fire.
[gunfire continues]
We both neutralized him.
As soon as news of his death spread, a pin-drop silence fell.
Nobody imagined that this man could die.
[Kishore, in English] Shrikant, after his death,
D-Company's air cargo section collapsed, literally.
Dawood was affected, and he was full of anger
for this and for the Muslims killed in the riots.
He wanted to send out a message,
but the scale and the magnitude of it
catapulted him to a different league.
[indistinct chatter]
[reporter] A few minutes before trading was to end
at the Bombay Stock Exchange…
[explosion]
-[people clamoring] -[sirens blaring]
[reporter 1] The bombs devastated Bombay's Stock Exchange.
[reporter 2] The explosive device placed in a car
in the basement parking area
claimed at least 70 lives.
[Angre] At that time, I was sitting in Mumbai Crime Branch.
[in Hindi] Shortly after, information came through about other areas.
[explosion booming]
[reporter 3, in English] A car bomb went off at a bus stop
opposite Century Bazaar shopping center.
[reporter 4] Other targets included banks and hotels.
[reporter 5] In total, 12 bombs were detonated around the city.
They were mainly placed in cars.
[reporter 6] The deadliest terror attack India has ever seen.
[sirens wailing]
[in Hindi] The police were now tense.
What on earth is happening?
[reporter 3, in English] The city was shaken by 12 bomb blasts.
[Sharma, in Hindi] The blasts in '93,
it was a heinous crime, a serious crime.
[reporter 7, in English] The main city center hospital is packed.
The scene here, one of utter chaos.
[reporter 8] The number killed is currently put at over 250.
But it's feared that this death toll could rise even higher.
[Tejpal] It was scary.
I mean, for us, I think it was a 9/11 equivalent.
Discovery of these grenades was the first major breakthrough for the police.
[reporter 9] The main suspects, known gangsters,
have fled to Dubai leaving a trail of evidence.
[Tejpal] Dawood Ibrahim was accused of the bomb blasts.
Incidents that started on December 6th in Ayodhya
exploded into this just incredible act of terrorism.
I think the attack was against the very existence and soul of this country.
[reporter 10] The Prime Minister, Mr. Rao,
said the target had been India's economic heart.
[Kishore] Initially, it was disbelief.
But then later, as we saw the evidence coming up, it was horrific.
I had nothing to do with the bomb blasts.
Not many secrets are kept within the D-Company,
but this was one of the best-kept secrets.
[reporter 11] The arrests made
threw the spotlight on Bombay's underworld mafia.
[Angre, in Hindi] Until then, no one ever thought a bombing in Mumbai
could be done by gangs or terrorists.
The concept was entirely new in India.
[man] They would like instability and disorder to prevail
so that they can carry on their nefarious activities.
[sirens wailing]
[Sharma, in Hindi] Dawood's syndicate,
these people are terror.
Love of the nation means nothing to them.
[in English] The Forbes list of the world's most powerful people is out.
Sharing space with the world's most influential leaders is the underworld don
and India's most wanted criminal, Dawood Ibrahim,
described as the boss of the Mumbai organized crime syndicate,
the D-Company.
[Sayed, in Hindi] After '93 happened, he was labeled as a terrorist.
From terror to terrorist.
No one has their future written on their forehead.
He never started with the plan that, "In '93, I'll do a bombing."
He didn't think like that, but the situation kept building.
After the '93 blasts, our enquiries had started.
From the investigations, we found out that the bomb blast was planned in Dubai.
[imperceptible]
Dawood was fully involved in consignments landing.
Material for the bomb blasts were landed. RDX explosives were landed.
The government was furious.
Police were furious.
This was like war against the state.
Our superiors were under pressure to get a handle on this.
[Zaidi] Just think that after the 1993 blast,
a special squad of the Crime Branch was formed.
It included these encounter specialist officers…
[in English] And they were given carte blanche, an unlimited power.
Police Commissioner R.D. Tyagi said, "I want encounters."
[Angre, in Hindi] The police had to create terror
that is with the consent of the superiors.
"Why have we given you a revolver?"
"We want strict action."
We all knew what they meant.
[Zaidi, in English] When certain officers protested
against eliminating people in encounters,
R.D. Tyagi was very angry.
He said, "I know as a commissioner how I can do this."
"You don't teach your father how to fuck."
The Mumbai bomb blast changed everything, you know.
[sirens wailing]
The public outcry was so deafening.
It was open season.
The killing fields are open. Boom. Go for it.
[reporter 1] The Mumbai police have begun an intensive search.
[reporter 2] Police are now out to stop the gang activity
any way they can.
It was fear psychology.
-No, sir! -Stand up!
[in Hindi] If they can scare the public, then we can scare them too.
[reporter 3, in English] The police aren't shy about their tactics.
Shoot first, ask questions later.
[in Hindi] Not a week would pass without an encounter.
[reporter 3, in English] The Bombay police have shot dead
more than 40 alleged gangsters
in the last two months alone.
The encounter squad had a sort of official sanction.
Everybody wanted Dawood's blood,
and they were more motivated than ever to go after his gangsters.
I was like, "Something is finally happening."
[Angre, in Hindi] We would never share information with each other
because there was professional rivalry.
[young Angre, in English] We asked them to surrender.
But instead of surrendering themselves, they started firing on the police.
[Salaskar] When somebody's firing towards you,
you don't have time to consider whether you're firing towards his hand or leg.
We have been taught that the firing should be effective.
[reporter 4] Police gunned down three gangsters here
in Bombay's central business district.
[in Hindi] They could arrest anyone, kill anyone in an encounter.
[men speaking in Hindi]
[reporter 5] Mumbai's encounter specialists,
sharpshooters in police uniform.
[in Hindi] So the media's reaction was good, very positive.
[Salaskar, in English] I have shot down 16 hardcore criminals.
[in Hindi] I carried out four encounters in one day.
[Khan, in English] After '93, squads were created
and they were given unfettered powers.
I had actually objected to the senior officers.
I said that we couldn't shoot a criminal on our own whim and fancy.
The aim of every policeman is initially to arrest the person
and bring him to justice.
And these kind of wanton killings
left a bad taste in the mouth.
I said, "I don't want to continue."
And I decided to take voluntary retirement.
[in Hindi] I still feel like he shouldn't have resigned.
Something must have bothered him
and he resigned.
A great officer.
He had some disagreements with our superiors, so he had to leave.
When I was posted in Thane,
in two and a half years, I did 22-23 encounters.
The press, TV, human rights lot, courts,
politicians, and bureaucrats…
[in English] Nobody objected.
-[indistinct chatter] -[horns honking]
[Perry] I hadn't even been in India for a few months
when I began reading about this.
And that phrase "encounter cops," it took me ages to work that out.
"What is an encounter cop? They're having a lot of meetings?"
I remember the papers kept score of their tallies.
[reporter 1] Ravindra Angre, 52 encounters.
Vijay Salaskar, 48 encounters.
"This guy's got 42. This guy's got 58."
[reporter 2] Eighty-five encounters.
Eighty-three encounters.
[Perry] What was the odd thing about it
was the gangsters would always be armed with an AK-47,
and the cops would always have a pistol.
But somehow, the cops were never hurt.
You know, how does one guy shoot 87 people without getting a scratch?
This sounded quite curious to me.
The other intriguing part was how it was portrayed.
They had laudatory coverage in the papers.
There's something way off here.
[gun firing]
[reporter 3] Encounter specialists,
who have come to be near mythological heroes
with Bollywood films centered around them.
[in Hindi] How many guys have you personally killed till date?
Two, five, ten?
I have bumped off more than 50 already.
[in English] These guys become kind of rock stars.
They were celebrities.
They were stopped in the street and they hung out with celebrities.
[in Hindi] It felt good, obviously,
being in the newspaper, doing TV interviews.
The press called me "Fastest gun in the West."
The talk of us acting like heroes, the media started this.
How is this our fault?
Pradeep Sharma, I would say back in '96-'97, was down to earth.
[in English] Pradeep Sharma, Bombay Police?
Yeah, I am.
[Zaidi] But then there came ego.
[in Hindi] People say you are bigger superstars
than the film stars who play you.
Yes, sometimes people say that.
[in English] They like the fact they want to be the man of the hour.
[in Hindi] As the police, we go to arrest them.
But, obviously, they know they face stringent laws.
If they're arrested, they won't get out for eight to ten years.
That's why, to scare the police or to save themselves,
they fire at us. And then we retaliate.
[Zaidi, in English] Pradeep Sharma was hungry for going after criminals
and killing them in encounters.
[in Hindi] When they did encounters,
I was going on the spot to do stories on them.
[in English] Now, I used to get close to them and speak to them.
If you become a good listener, if you tap that thing in them,
just because you have given them time to talk…
[in Hindi] …you will see how they share stories with you,
they will vent out to you and share hidden secrets with you…
[in English] …which becomes your page-one story.
They were in competition with each other,
trying to score the biggest number of hits.
"I've killed 80." "I've killed 90." "I have killed 100."
It's going to go to their head.
It looked like that was the only accomplishment
that they were really proud of.
At last count, Pradeep, you had 92…
A score of 92, and you 78, isn't it?
-Or something like that. -Yeah.
So it's like a Sachin Tendulkar-Sehwag or Yuvraj-Kaif partnership.
Who chases after whom? You are chasing after him?
-No, we are working together. -Working together?
Merely going around killing criminals
for the sake of building up a record,
or saying, "Yes, I have accounted for so many encounter deaths,"
that is… I would call it reprehensible.
[Changoiwala] During the late '90s, Mumbai looked like a war zone.
But the encounter squad was not pulled up.
Somehow everybody saw it as legitimate.
I think it is justified completely.
[man 1] Extraordinary situations call for extraordinary measures.
[man 2] This is the thing that's happening.
But then gradually, human rights activists started questioning the culture.
I am questioning the police about this quick disposal.
I'd rather see him found guilty in a court of law.
[Changoiwala] By 2003, encounters had killed about 1,200 gangsters.
When you say that the '93 blast was the biggest carnage Mumbai has seen,
1,200 gangsters is five times the casualties we had in the '93 blast.
Of course, these were criminals and I do not justify their actions,
but these were men who had families,
these were men who had wives, who had children, who had mothers,
who had fathers, who probably had a chance at reformation.
Then the term "fake encounter" entered the public discourse.
Their encounters could have been staged.
[Khan] There was a series of anecdotes
that officers picked up criminals from their homes,
and they took them elsewhere, interrogated them and shot them.
[reporter, in Hindi] On Mumbai Police's number one most wanted list,
Sada Mama Pawle, was finally caught by the police.
Police retaliated and shot two dead on the spot.
This is all a media creation.
The public know
who is fake and who is genuine.
[thunder rumbles]
[Angre] I've had 54 encounters.
I don't have any allegations against me for a single encounter.
All of mine were clean encounters.
Why blame the police then? We did the work.
[Kishore, in English] Living in the city became much more dangerous.
Stories were around
that some of my friends got picked up from somewhere,
and then they were shot.
People were saying, "You are targeted."
"You are a name."
"So you'll also be a victim of some encounter, a managed encounter."
[female interviewer] Were you shocked by the number of people being encountered?
Yes…
I was shocked.
But people told me, yes, now it's a more pro-active force.
I did fear Pradeep Sharma.
I had some credible intelligence he was trying to gun for me.
He had a lot of informers from the underworld.
People who probably, to avoid being encountered themselves,
they would say, "Please don't kill us,
I will give you information."
So I made up my mind that I want to step out of this.
It's not worth what I'm risking.
I felt probably it'll be much safer for me to be out of the city.
So, November of 2003,
early morning around five o'clock, I drove to Goa.
I was terrified.
Am I being followed?
Are my phones being tapped?
I do not know. Probably at the next check post,
someone might be waiting for me to bump me off.
[Sayed, in Hindi] Many were killed in encounters.
And do you know what they did?
They left all their illegal activities and surrendered themselves to the police
out of fear of encounters.
[in English] This is a .38 revolver. I always use it against criminals.
[in Hindi] Slowly the fear spread.
[in English] This is an AK-56 rifle.
[in Hindi] What changed for Dawood? The roads started to close for him.
Everyone knew speaking to a terrorist would lead to bad fortune for themselves.
No one would talk to him.
[Kishore, in English] Most of the top rung of D-Company, they fled.
Dawood went into hiding totally.
It was all about securing your own life.
I took a fake name.
I had absolutely no contact with anybody.
My family members, my brother, my father…
Everyone.
I was quite lonely.
I would stay close to ten years incognito.
Trying to evade being made a target of some encounter.
[reporter] A shootout happened near the Deonar Crematorium
in North-East Mumbai early this morning.
Nearly 60 alleged gangsters have been killed in similar encounters
with the Mumbai Police in the last eight months.
[Perry] The effect on organized crime in Bombay was massive.
There have been, you know, two shootings a week on the streets
by the gangsters.
But by the early 2000s, it had fallen to sort of two a month.
So encounter cops had a massive impact.
And I just remember thinking,
"I need to meet one of these guys."
I didn't have a extensive contacts list at that stage.
But I began asking around,
and there was one particular journalist in Bombay
called Hussain Zaidi, who was a crime reporter,
who knew everybody.
You know, he had all these guys on speed dial.
He was very fascinated with these encounter cops.
He says, "We have not seen these kind of cops
except in movies like Dirty Harry."
[in Hindi] He asked me to introduce him to a guy who would open up
or speak to us in an interview.
[in English] So, I said, "Pradeep Sharma."
[Perry] He was India's leading encounter cop.
In fact, he was coming up to make his century.
It's one of those things where you're going into an interview
and you want to try and count your questions
and be quite careful, tread quite carefully,
and let someone almost lead you to a place rather than sort of confront them, um…
and I didn't have to do any of that.
It was extraordinary.
I'm interviewing Pradeep, and in the room next door,
there were a couple of guys chained up, who were being beaten senseless.
You know, they may kill these two guys.
I just kept my mouth shut and just observed this.
No one wrote
"These cops are killing people, executing people on the streets."
No one wrote that.
So, I think I was half expecting to find out that there was some explanation.
But it was definitely only when I got there that I realized,
"Right, they are just whacking these guys… [laughs]
…and making no bones about it."
And telling me that actually.
[in Hindi] Hussain Zaidi brought Alex Perry.
He said, "They want to interview you for a magazine."
I said, "Okay."
I spoke to him the same way I'm talking to you.
I didn't know how important TIME Magazine was.
Naturally, they are filth.
We have to clean them from our society.
We met a few times, and he was open. He was candid.
[speaking indistinctly]
Everybody knows this is going on. Everybody agrees with it.
So who's going to complain?
And I used to look at him sometimes and wonder whether,
"Do you realize that there is a day of reckoning?"
You know, he was obviously enjoying the character that he was.
He thought he was being a service to his community.
And I think these guys all thought that they had impunity.
[Sharma, in Hindi] In 2003, I never knew the value of TIME Magazine.
I had never read it in my entire life.
[in English] "After we shoot some mobster, his victims look at me like God."
"Criminals are filth and I'm the cleaner."
It feels like a kind of Icarus arc, right?
You know, they flew too high.
There was bound to be some kind of blowback.
[reporter 1] Sharma is the first encounter specialist
to have been removed from active duty.
[reporter 2] Sharma, the first senior encounter man,
to be removed.
[reporter 3] He was arrested last night along with five others
for the fake encounter of an alleged gangster in Mumbai's Andheri area.
[in Hindi] I wish I had never given that interview.
[Angre] Suddenly, people started questioning what was going on.
Everyone was happy when the work was getting done.
Why question everything after?
[Sharma] Naturally, I felt bad.
So, the media changed its tune.
I took on the enemies of society.
After doing all that, they are locking me up.
[reporter 1] Mr. Pradeep!
[reporter 2, in English] Sidelined by the same force
that had once rewarded him for his service.
Many policemen see this as the end of an era.
[Changoiwala] When the TIME article came out, things went downhill,
not just for Pradeep Sharma, but for other cops.
Everybody started scrutinizing the actions of the encounter specialists.
[Ribeiro] I think they're criminals in uniform.
-You do think that. -Criminals in uniform.
Because anybody who is being given so much freedom
to kill people, who is safe?
Cases that have piled up against Mumbai's high-profile encounter specialist…
[Changoiwala] There were many allegations of corruption.
[reporter] Builder, Ganesh Wagh, alleged that his life was under threat
from another encounter specialist, Ravindra Angre.
[in Hindi] An extortion case was filed against me.
I was arrested and put in jail for some years.
Everyone in Thane knew that the allegations were false.
Some people were waiting to find anything against me so that they could trap me.
If a junior gets fame, will the superior feel good about it?
So there was a little bit of jealousy everywhere.
[reporter 1, in English] Angre is not the only one to fall from grace.
[reporter 2] Sachin Vaze arrested for the custodial death of Khwaja Yunus.
[reporter 1] Praful Bhosle currently under suspicion.
[in Hindi] Editors used to visit. Our names would be printed in editorials.
We were in the front page of news.
[man, in English] They were once the pride of the Mumbai Police.
They were cops who shot gangsters in encounters
and struck fear in the heart of the underworld.
[interviewer, in Hindi] After all you've done,
all the terrorists and underworld people that you have killed,
which brought peace to Mumbai,
is it painful to find yourself under an investigation like this?
Definitely, I'm hurt. For sure.
[interviewer] How does it feel? I mean, we want to know the feeling.
After killing 112 people, this is the reward I get.
[Rupin, in English] I personally think that killing,
causing death of others is detestable.
As policemen, I think we should desist from doing that.
These are totally avoidable inhuman practices.
So it was just a matter of time that there was resistance
towards police doing this.
By this time, the top leaders from the D-Company
were all sitting outside India.
I had been picked up for deputation to the Ministry of External Affairs.
I was handling investigations abroad and extraditions.
Abu Salem was a big shot member of the Dawood gang.
He was involved in extortion.
Among the Bollywood industry,
there were around 50 odd cases throughout the country against him.
Including his involvement in the murder of Gulshan Kumar.
[man 1] Gulshan Kumar was a multimillionaire.
[man 2] To Indians, Gulshan Kumar was almost a legend.
[man 3] With the fortune he made on film music,
he built this temple near his home…
[man 4] Gulshan Kumar was accosted by gunmen
and shot at from point-blank range while coming out of a temple.
[Rupin] Abu Salem was wanted for the Gulshan Kumar murder case,
and he was wanted for the Bombay bomb blasts.
[reporter 1] Abu Salem is a high-profile convict…
[reporter 2] One of the masterminds of the 1993 Bombay blasts.
[Rupin] That was when I decided,
this is one guy that I will go after and try to get him if possible.
There used to be various news that he is in the US, Canada,
or in the Gulf countries, traveling under fake IDs.
The criminals would change their numbers, their location.
They outwitted the system.
But information technology has broken barriers.
Interpol headquarters forwarded to us emails.
The email said that he will go to Norway and then onwards to Canada.
We tracked the origins of that email.
By the evening, we had come to know
that this email originated from Portugal.
[reporter, in Hindi] In the area of Martim Moniz is this street,
Rua Da Palma, where a lot of Indian people live.
The pink building which you see right now
is Rua Da Palma 284.
On the 18th, Abu Salem was coming down from this building
and right in front near the gate is where the police were waiting for him.
[Rupin, in English] In Portugal, their constitution lays down
that nobody will be extradited
if the death penalty can be imposed.
The next day, I got a call from the legal advisor in CBI.
He said, "What do we do?"
"How can we say that death penalty cannot be imposed?"
"And it is such a serious offense of terrorism or murders and all."
I said, "Sir, we have to decide."
"The bottom line is whether we want him back or not."
"If we have to get him back, there is no option for us
but to give this assurance."
Finally, he did agree.
[reporter 1] Gangster Abu Salem accused in the 1993 bomb blasts
is to be brought to India to face trial.
[reporter 2] He is likely to escape the death penalty
as his extradition from Portugal was on the grounds
that he would not be given capital punishment.
[Rupin] Getting an internationally recognized terrorist extradited,
it was the feeling of elation for all of us.
[indistinct chatter]
[reporter 3] Stay with me, Divyesh.
Abu Salem, one of the main conspirators of the 1993 Bombay blast…
[whistle blowing]
…given life sentence.
Abu Salem has been found guilty under charges of TADA,
conspiracy, murder, arms act, and various other charges.
[Rupin] There is pressure on the police to give punishment,
but punishment is the job of the judiciary.
-[man 1] Abu bhai! -[man 2] Abu bhai!
[Rupin] Abu Salem going to prison, I think it was a message
that societies do evolve.
You don't have to encounter or kill.
There is another way.
[Changoiwala] The death penalty had been handed out
to hundreds of gangsters on the streets of Bombay
by encounter specialists.
But there could have been a better way for the dead and for these cops.
[reporter 1] You wanted to say something?
[man] Who is going to decide if this man is a gangster or not?
You have no right to eliminate him. You are not supposed to kill that person.
Try him, get him prosecuted, get him convicted.
[applause]
[reporter 2] Pradeep Sharma was arrested for the fake encounter
of an alleged gangster in 2006.
Lakhan Bhaiya was killed by the police in an encounter…
[reporter 3] Mumbai Police's controversial encounter specialist,
Pradeep Sharma, is charged with kidnapping and killing in cold blood.
[reporter 4] Sharma was a poster boy of the Mumbai Police.
He was involved in 107 encounters in his 14 years of service.
[Sharma, in Hindi] A jail is a jail.
You won't have the freedom as you did outside.
I'm surrounded by all those that I had arrested.
All the detained gang members live with you.
You are trapped in an enclosed space.
[Changoiwala, in English] Pradeep Sharma was arrested and landed in prison
for his alleged role in the fake encounter of Ramnarayan Gupta,
who was popularly known as Lakhan Bhaiya.
And after that killing,
his brother approached the Bombay High Court
saying that Lakhan Bhaiya was killed in cold blood.
[Sharma, in Hindi] The irony is that for the 110 or 112 I did kill,
no one questioned me.
But for the one I didn't kill, I was framed.
[in English] Another former super cop who faced similar charges
has come out in Pradeep Sharma's defense,
Sachin Vaze, accused of killing Khwaja Yunus
in a fake encounter has sought to justify the act,
calling it "the ideal way to deal with criminals."
Whether or not it's a fake encounter, we have to see the result of it.
[woman] You're saying if a bad guy is eliminated
even if it's a state shootout, it's okay?
Why not?
[busy chatter]
[Zaidi, in Hindi] Naturally, I felt bad about him being behind bars.
I mean, we have known each other for 25 years.
When I met him, we were allowed half an hour together.
We spent a lot of time in silence.
He didn't speak much.
He said, "Hussain, I have not done this encounter."
"I have been framed up."
[interviewer, in English] Did you believe him when he said that?
Why you want to ask such questions?
[Changoiwala] What happened was
a police team picked up Lakhan Bhaiya from Vashi in Navi Mumbai.
But his encounter is said to have taken place
the same day in the heart of the city
off Versova Link Road near the Nana Nani Park several hours later.
[siren wailing]
What the inquiry found was
that Lakhan Bhaiya was killed at point-blank range.
I was not involved in that encounter.
[in Hindi] Everyone involved received an award.
Everyone gave their names. Mine was not on the list.
If I was there, I would have given my name.
I would have led my team.
[Changoiwala, in English] In all, 13 policemen were charged.
Many of them were believed to be working for Sharma
or were answerable to Sharma.
[in Hindi] There were articles, saying this and that.
I can't say much about it.
[male interviewer] How did you feel on a human level about it?
Ultimately, a criminal was killed.
It was not a saint who died.
Naturally, you feel bad, but, well…
[Changoiwala, in English] There was another aspect to this.
The police were said to have picked up Anil Bheda along with Lakhan Bhaiya.
He was the star eyewitness. He was the only eyewitness.
Uh, he went missing in March 2011,
six days before he was supposed to depose before the court.
[man, in Hindi] Anil Bheda disappeared right before he had to testify.
Anil Bheda was the key witness.
It's clear that Anil Bheda would have revealed the truth.
[in English] They found his body in New Bombay in a decomposed state.
So in the end, Pradeep Sharma was set free,
owing to lack of evidence.
[in Hindi] In the case of Lakhan Bhaiya's fake encounter,
Pradeep Sharma has been acquitted.
[reporter 1] Encounter specialist, Pradeep Sharma,
has been acquitted in the Lakhan Bhaiya fake encounter case.
[reporter 2] To hear the verdict, there were many people present in court.
Among them were a few policemen and lawyers.
All seemed to be shocked after the verdict.
He said, "Hussain, I had told you that I had not done this,
and now the court has accepted that I have not done it."
[Sharma] I was punished for three-and-a-half years
for a crime I didn't commit.
But there is one quality of a hardcore police officer.
He never accepts defeat.
No matter how much you push a police officer down,
he'll always bounce back.
[Kishore, in English] Sharma, when he was arrested,
there was a sense of elation in the underworld.
There was, like, joy.
[man on TV] Pradeep Sharma, a known encounter specialist,
was very recently reinstated in the police
after the charges against him were dropped in a fake encounter case.
When we all got to know that Pradeep Sharma was released from jail,
it did scare a lot of people.
I had thought that the tide had turned against the encounter cops.
But then suddenly, now he is back.
Fear factor was there, very much there.
I was very glad.
I was very glad that I was out of the company.
Because nobody knew what would happen.
[Sharma, in Hindi] When I came out, nobody wanted to associate with me
because of the controversies.
After that, I was posted in the district of Thane.
We believed that Iqbal Kaskar was running an extortion ring over there.
Iqbal is Dawood Ibrahim's brother.
Well, yes, for a person like Iqbal, who is the main player of the syndicate.
So, we planned our team.
We needed to adopt different tactics.
Iqbal had seven to eight guards downstairs.
In case any police officer came upstairs,
they would phone him or ring a bell
to alert him and he would escape down an alleyway.
We managed all those guys.
We held them and went upstairs.
A female officer went in front in civilian clothes.
So, it was like, "Some lady is here wearing a headscarf."
As soon as the door opened, we went in.
Iqbal was eating biryani while watching TV.
Then I said, "Iqbal, come on, let's go."
He said, "Sir, can I finish my food first?"
I said, "Yes, eat and then we'll go."
That was the only conversation we had.
[reporter 1, in English] A success story for the police.
Encounter specialist, Pradeep Sharma, arrested a fugitive underworld don,
Dawood Ibrahim's brother, Iqbal Kaskar.
[reporter 2] Dawood Ibrahim's brother, Iqbal Kaskar, has been detained in Mumbai…
That was a stunt. That was a clear stunt.
[reporter 2] The man in charge of the investigation is encounter specialist,
Pradeep Sharma,
recently reinstated in the police force
after being acquitted in a fake encounter case.
[Tejpal] The news crews conveniently landed up, photographs happened,
everything happened.
[in Hindi] We have an encounter specialist, Pradeep Sharma.
Sir, tell us about the operation, such a big operation.
[Zaidi, in English] Iqbal Kaskar, he was not such a big fry.
He was only a sibling of Dawood,
but he was not some kingpin of some big racket.
The Kaskar surname is always good for front pages.
I think the only reason Pradeep Sharma did it
is just to let people know that, "Hey, I've changed."
[in Hindi] I have executed much bigger operations than this.
But to go there and arrest him without any protest
was an achievement in itself.
[Changoiwala, in English] As the man who had around 100 encounters to his name,
Iqbal Kaskar's arrest seemed to be an opportunity
to show a little bit of reformation
as a cop who had evolved over time.
[Sharma, in Hindi] No one likes to be associated
with the term "encounter cop"' or "encounter."
We have solved all sorts of cases and caught several criminals,
thousands of criminals.
[in English] This is a major blow to the Dawood Ibrahim gang.
[Sharma, in Hindi] We have got Dawood living in fear.
Nobody is being troubled anymore.
Before doing any activity, he will think 25 times.
[man, in English] The guns are largely silent now.
Many of Bombay's gangsters are dead, in hiding, or under arrest.
[Khan] I would think that by killing a few persons,
I managed to remove terror.
I managed to allow people to live their normal lives.
Subsequently, what happened with these so-called encounter specialists,
they did it for an ulterior motive.
Now today, unfortunately, if anyone says "encounter,"
the hackles would rise that it's something criminal.
But I very proudly say,
not a single one of my encounters
was conducted in a hush-hush manner or in the middle of the night.
See, killing a human being, in any case, is not easy.
But if you justify yourself
that you're doing something for public good, you can cope.
[Angre, in Hindi] Bringing peace to people, yes, I feel proud.
The identity as Ravindra Angre that I have got
is from all the encounters I have done for the police department.
But politicians and big officers employ a use-and-throw policy.
They will throw you in a ditch.
What can you do?
[interviewer] Do you feel bad about it?
I feel angry.
Only a coward feels bad.
I feel angry.
[Sharma] When crime escalates, police are given freedom.
But when crime gets under control,
encounter cops are no longer needed.
So they are removed from the system.
What I have said, no one else will talk so frankly.
No, what I mean is, no police officer
wants any kind of trouble with their senior officers.