Who is Salim Fruit detained by NIA? All details here

The raids were conducted in a case pertaining to terror activities of the international terrorist network D-Company involving Dawood Ibrahim and his associates.

As many as six persons were detained from different pockets of Mumbai for questioning after raids were carried out by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) on Monday against associates of absconding gangster Dawood Ibrahim and a few hawala operators. One of these detained persons was Salim Quereshi aka Salim Fruit, an aide of gangster Chhota Shakeel. Salim, who is the husband of Shakeel's sister-in-law, was nabbed from his home in Bhendi Bazaar in south Mumbai.

Dawood Ibrahim’s associate Salim Fruit being detained by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) after conducting a raid, in Mumbai on Monday, May 9, 2022. (ANI Photo) (Vijay Gohil)

The raids were conducted in a case pertaining to terror activities of the international terrorist network D-Company involving Dawood and his associates, who are allegedly indulged in narco-terrorism, money laundering, and working in active collaboration with international terrorist organisations Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) and Al Qaeda (AQ).

Who is Salim Fruit?

Salim besides being the brother-in-law of Shakeel is a henchman of Dawood. He is known as Salim Fruit because his family business is of selling fruits in south Mumbai, according to a report. Shakeel is a gangster and a contract killed, who used to operate an extortion racket through his henchmen.

What are the other cases against Salim Fruit?

In early 2000, Salim was accused of running an extortion racket for Shakeel and Dawood and was deported to India by the government of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) in 2006. Soon after, he was apprehended in an extortion case related to Shakeel and charged under the Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act (MCOCA) along with others. Salim was released from prison in this case in 2010.

However, in 2016, Salim was again arrested by the anti-extortion cell (AEC) of Mumbai Police in connection with a case dating back to 2004. Police said that Salim had demanded ₹25 lakh from a Mumbai-based doctor while allegedly residing in Dubai at the time and had called from an international number. Later, the doctor filed a complaint and police nabbed two people after they were caught red-handed accepting the protection money.

During one of the court hearings in 2016, AEC sleuths found that Salim had visited at least 17 to 18 countries, including Bangkok, Sri Lanka and China, in the past three years. He, however, claimed that he went to China for business purposes and to Bangkok as a tourist.

(With ANI inputs)