Top Luknow gangster Sohrab vanishes post-parole, STF begins search
The Delhi Police has sought help from Uttar Pradesh’s Special Task Force (STF) after Sohrab was not found at his house in Lucknow’s Sadar Bazar area under the Cantonment police station. He is suspected to have travelled to Nainital to meet his wife, Sanno.
Mohammad Sohrab, one of the three brothers considered among the most dangerous gangsters operating out of Lucknow, has gone missing after the end of his parole from Delhi’s Tihar Jail. Sohrab, convicted in the 2011 ₹1 crore jewellery showroom loot and murder case, failed to return on Thursday after completing his parole, prompting jail authorities to alert Delhi Police.
The Delhi Police has sought help from Uttar Pradesh’s Special Task Force (STF) after Sohrab was not found at his house in Lucknow’s Sadar Bazar area under the Cantonment police station. He is suspected to have travelled to Nainital to meet his wife, Sanno.
A senior STF official confirmed that three teams have been deployed to trace Sohrab. “We are monitoring his family and trying to determine his current location. His last known mobile communication was with his wife on Friday,” the official said.
Sohrab and his brothers Salim, 47, and Rustam, 42, have been in Tihar Jail for over a decade, serving life sentences for their involvement in the February 2011 Karol Bagh jewellery heist in which a jeweller was murdered. The three were arrested in May that year and have remained behind bars since.
A senior Lucknow police official said the brothers have long instilled fear among locals, expanding their extortion racket even from jail. “Despite incarceration, their network remains active, and victims often avoid reporting due to fear,” the officer said.
Officials noted a pattern of misuse of parole by the trio. In August 2016, Rustam allegedly opened fire on a police team during an attempt to arrest him. He had been out on parole and was reportedly collecting ₹10 lakh extortion from a property dealer near Phoenix Mall in Sarojini Nagar.
“He escaped after opening indiscriminate fire on the police team,” an STF officer recalled.
Lucknow Police had earlier requested Delhi courts to deny parole to the three brothers, citing repeated misuse for criminal activity.
The trio gained notoriety after allegedly killing three individuals in different parts of Lucknow, Purana Qila, Khadra, and Madiaon, within 45 minutes on the eve of Eid in 2005. The killings were reportedly carried out as an open challenge to the then SSP, Ashutosh Pandey.
Timeline of key criminal cases involving Sohrab and his brothers
June 5, 2016: Salim and his brothers were involved in the killing of former MP’s grandson and property dealer, Mohd Zaid Shakeel, 26, in Lucknow. The murder took place during Zaid’s visit to Kanpur court while he was out of Delhi jail custody.
January 12, 2016: The trio orchestrated an attack on trader Mohd Islam in Lucknow’s Wazirganj after he refused to vacate a shop. Their aides dragged him out of his house in Sadar and assaulted him with rods and sticks.
September 29, 2013: The brothers were named in the murder of BSP leader Shyam Narain Pandey, a three-time member of the Lucknow Cantonment Board. The killing was allegedly over his opposition to the candidacy of Salim’s wife in the board elections. Despite the controversy, she was later elected unopposed as vice president in January 2015.
