24 February,2016 02:46 PM IST | | Saurabh Vaktania
Records of the only case registered with Mumbai Police, in which notorious gangster Kumar Pillai was arrested for assault, helped cops from the city expedite the process
Fingerprints taken 26 years ago helped the Mumbai Police identify and initiate the process of extraditing notorious gangster Kumar Pillai, who has been detained in Singapore. The Mumbai Police have sent the document dating back to 1990 with the dossier to Singapore last week.
Representational pic
Pillai, who was detained by the Singapore Police two months back, has several criminal cases against him in Mumbai. A Crime Branch officer said, "A team of Crime Branch officers was tasked to compile all the documents related to Pillai. Pillai has one murder case, two attempt to murder cases, one extortion case and two MCOCA cases against him. However, except one, he was never arrested in any other case."
The Vikhroli Police had registered a case under Section 324 (voluntarily causing hurt by object or means) of IPC against Pillai on April 21, 1990. He was arrested and released on bail soon after. He later fled the country. "As part of procedure, his fingerprints were taken on three different papers when he was held. The case was about being involved in a brawl. One document was kept at Vikhroli police station, one at the Fingerprints Department in South Mumbai and one was with the Crime Branch. We were a little afraid and hoped that the documents should not have been damaged or lost."
It took over one week for the Mumbai Police to find the documents. A dossier of all the cases along with the fingerprints was sent to Singapore last week. DCP (crime) Dhananjay Kulkarni told mid-day, "The process of gathering information on Pillai took us over one month. We had preserved the fingerprints of Pillai from 1990 and have attached them to the dossier. The dossier was sent to Singapore one week back."
Who is Pillai?
Mumbai's most educated don, Kumar Pillai, an engineer, stepped into the criminal world allegedly to avenge his father's death. Pillai became a gangster to take revenge against the then MLA, Lal Singh Chavan, who had killed his father. And he succeeded in killing Chavan, a suspected D-gang member, in the late 90s.
He was initially recruited by Amar Naik, and eventually became the right-handman of Naik's younger brother Ashwin Naik. Pillai's stronghold was Vikhroli, where he mostly operated in the construction industry. He is also suspected in the murder of an estate agent in the area.
Police sources revealed that Pillai had been constantly shifting his base between UK, Tamil Nadu, Sri Lanka and Singapore.
35-year-old prints had nailed Rajan
After being on the run for 27 years, when underworld don Chhota Rajan was nabbed in Bali, a team of Crime Branch officers, who had gone to Indonesia to extradite the process, had forgotten to take his fingerprints. His fingerprints taken 35 years back in a murder case were severely damaged in the July 26 floods.
Read Story: Fingerprints taken 35 years ago helped cops bring Chhota Rajan back
When the Bali police insisted on matching the fingerprints with Rajan, the cops found the fingerprint document, which helped them deport Rajan to India. mid-day had reported this on November 10 last year, âFingerprints taken 35 years ago helped cops bring Rajan back.'
