Dawood’s umpteenth phantom death

The mastermind of the 1993 Mumbai blasts, believed to be hiding in Karachi, was first ‘reported’ dead in 2016 when it was alleged that his legs had been amputated on account of gangrene setting in, and that he had died from resultant complications

Mumbai: Once a hillock that housed a Portuguese fort, Dongri, encompassing Kamathipura, Null Bazar, Chor Bazar, Umerkhedi and parts of Mohammad Ali Road, was Dawood Ibrahim’s notorious backyard in the 1980s. It was from a by-lane called Temkar gully here that the son of a Mumbai police head constable ran his drugs, extortion and terror operations. On Monday however, as social media ran rife with unsubstantiated news of Dawood’ death, Dongri remained blasé, unaffected.

Dawood’s umpteenth phantom death

It’s been 30 years since Dawood Ibrahim was last spotted in Dongri or indeed anywhere in India, and there are now three generations that have grown up with no personal indebtedness to the gangster. In Dongri, Dawood Ibrahim is today a phantom-like figure where the “news” of him dying from poisoning in a Karachi hospital is just the latest of many such death announcements.

The mastermind of the 1993 Mumbai blasts, believed to be hiding in Karachi, was first ‘reported’ dead in 2016 when it was alleged that his legs had been amputated on account of gangrene setting in, and that he had died from resultant complications. It eventually turned out that not Dawood but his youngest brother Humayun had died from kidney-related complications.

The following year, there were reports that he had died of a heart attack in Karachi. Adding to the drama to the accounts of his supposed death was information that the heart attack had followed a brain tumour. These stories gained such currency that Dawood aide Chhota Shakeel himself came on record to deny them.

In June 2020, it was reported, again on social media, that Dawood, who carries a bounty of 25 million USD, had died from Covid-related complications. It was reported that his entire family had been hospitalised in Karachi. It was later confirmed by Indian authorities that Dawood’s nephew Siraj Kaskar, the son of Dawood’s elder brother Sabir Kaskar, had died of COVID-19 in Pakistan.

More recently, a city newspaper claimed falsely that Dawood had been made the additional director general of the Pakistani spy agency, Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI). The paper claimed that the position had been bestowed upon him in recognition of his of his ‘services’ to Pakistan. With most of his family in India now dead, all questions about the gangster’s health or his demise are met with either indifference or are seen as irritating interruptions during ‘dhanda’ hours in Dongri.