Blueprint to break the underworld

Dawood Ibrahim, Chhota Rajan, and Haji Mastan are names that may not strike terror in the hearts of todays youth. But once, in Mumbai, they were enough to silence a room. To whisper them aloud was to invite unease, to feel the invisible chill of a city gripped by fear. They ran an empire built on blood, intimidation, and fear, including the fear of extortion, kidnapping, gunfire and more. It was an era when businessmen quietly shifted their fortunes to safer havens in Gujarat, when a family dinner at an upscale restaurant was a calculated risk, and when even the wealthiest of the wealthy kept their weddings hushed and uncelebrated for too much joy might attract unwanted attention from the underworld. And then came October of 1998. Starting on the 13th, death came hunting. Over the next fortnight, 12 businessmen were gunned down. Panic seeped through the veins of the city. Deepavali that year was no festival of lights it was a black Deepavali. Markets fell silent as businessmen mourned their dead and sent a desperate message to the government: the states forces have lost control. But fear, as it turned out, had finally found its match. From within the ranks of the Mumbai Police, emerged a Tamil man whose strategies helped crumble the empire of fear, piece by piece. The organised crime networks were strategically crushed after the legislation of this mans brainchild Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act (MCOCA) a law that redefined the citys fight against the underworld. And now, more than two decades later, he, D Sivanandhan, returns with a fact-based account of his and the Mumbai Police forces relentless crusade against the underworld captured in his book titled The Brahmastra Unleashed: A first person account of how the Mumbai underworld was annihilated. D Sivanandhan At the books launch in Chennai, on Sunday, he reflected on his decision to write the boo know. Before the others sing the virtues of all the gangsters and criminals, especially with journalists and others writing best sellers after best sellers, somebody has to lead what exactly happened in annihilating the underworld. That is what I have done, he explained. My motto was simply the Tamil saying Namarkkum kudiyallom, namanai anjom , he said while talking about his motivating to lead the fight, referring to the words from Tevaram in Tamil literature, which means, we bow to no one, and we fear no one nor death. Sivanandhan added, The Brahmastra we used was a combination of strategies including the Maharashtra Prevention of Dangerous Activities Act, that helped us detain 1,600 criminals. It was then fashionable to carry guns, from AK47 to Bihars Katta and we incentivised the police and seized illegal guns that were over 2,500 in number. Yashovardhan Azad, a retired IPS officer who formerly was with the Secretary Security and Information Bureau, was among the dignitaries at the event. He pointed out, The most important thing which Siva did and I admire him for which the others and I didnt do was to create and help build a law, that was the MCOCA. No officer in the field does these things. But he religiously went after it and MCOCA was legislated in six months, with the support of the then Chief Minister, the Home Ministry and everyone. He also added that the book will help guide future officers to strategise against other crime syndicates. Retired IPS officer RK Raghavan, and professor Dr Mohan Rajan, vice president of AIOS were also present at the event which was jointly organised by Dr S Natarajan, Chairman of Sundaram Natarajan Blind Free India foundation, in collaboration with the Chennai International Centre. The Brahmastra Unleashed is priced at `499.