Bollywood fears don who gets everything wrong

mumbai: he is on the most wanted list of the mumbai police. and the interpol has issued a red corner alert for him. starting his career with a small garments shop here in the mid-80s, 38-year-old abdul qayyum ansari alias abu salem now controls a multi-crore extortion racket here from his present hideout in nairobi. a senior ips officer said: ''salem mainly thrives on the fear psychosis he has created in the film industry even though he is known for his sloppy operations.film personalities should not give in to his demands and approach us for protection.'' ''in the last four years, he has targeted over 30 prominent film personalities for extortion,'' a crime branch officer said. they include producers like subhash ghai, pahlaj nihalani, rakesh roshan, j p dutta, rajiv rai and, more recently, aamir khan. on october 13, the mumbai police had shot dead four salem gangsters in an encounter. the four were reportedly planning to gun down aamir khan, director ashutosh gowarikar and financier jhamu sugandh. ''he has targeted producers who have refused to give him rights for overseas distribution of hit films,'' a senior police officer said. the encounter killing of salem gangsters tanvir and sanjay singh on october 13 was a body blow to salem since the two were the main collecting agents for the gang. but the police are still to arrest salem, who is believed to be shifting from nairobi to canada and london every alternate month. salem had come to mumbai from sarai meer area of azamgarh in up in the mid-80s and started a small business in readymade garments. a crime branch officer said: ''he started his second shop in andheri. a resident of jogeshwari, salem came in contact with chhota shakeel, who lured him to work for the dawood gang. to begin with, he worked as a driver for shakeel and was then given the task of supplying weapons to shooters.'' he was then known as abu samaan (samaan refers to firearms). ''he thrived under the tutelage of dawood's brother anees. he formed a small faction of extortionists. after the serial blasts in march 1993, he escaped to dubai,'' the officer said. he was arrested by the dubai police in 1997 for being involved in a bomb explosion in that country in 1995. but the uae government refused to deport him to india. he shot to notoriety in august that year by gunning down gulshan kumar in andheri. but it was the last major operation by his boys. almost every other operation he undertook in mumbai went awry. he dedicated little time to details, handing over guns to rookies who had never touched a weapon in their lives. he paid a paltry sum (about rs 5,000) for a hit-job. several shooters bungled jobs and found themselves behind bars.