Rise and fall of Sharafat Sheikh

From a street hawker to a scrap dealer, then graduating to a drug lord to finally orchestrating robberies and possibly a kidnapping, Sharafat Sheikh has done it all, reports Karan Choudhury.

From a street hawker to a scrap dealer, then graduating to a drug lord to finally orchestrating robberies and possibly a kidnapping, Sharafat Sheikh has done it all.

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The South Delhi Police have arrested Sheikh, already lodged in Tihar Jail, and Kuldeep Singh alias Sonu on charges of impersonation and cheating.

Hindustan Times had earlier reported about the accused being taken into remand for questioning related to the Green Park encounter and involvement with the Satte Gang.

Sheikh-Sonu and AIIMS nexus

As Hindustan Times had first reported on January 21, Sheikh, with the help of Sonu, prepared fake medical certificates in his mother Mehr-u-nisa's name to secure parole. The police zeroed in on Arjun Singh, a lower division clerk at AIIMS who provided them with the fake certificates.

Singh used to visit Sonu’s meat shop in INA Market area. Sonu asked him to help with getting a fake medical certificate. Singh’s relative Omwati was suffering from throat cancer and she was admitted to AIIMS. “They knew that parole would only be given if the cause was as severe as cancer. So they admitted a woman under Sheikh’s mother’s name,” said Deputy Commissioner of Police (South) HGS Dhaliwal.

Kidnapping

After trying his hand at crimes starting from selling stolen goods to drugs and now allegedly bank and house robbery, Sheikh was planning to branch out into kidnapping.

“During his interrogation Sheikh told us that they were planning to kidnap the son of a prominent businessman worth over Rs 100 crore. One of the accused was living in close proximity to the businessman,” said Dhaliwal.

Operating from Tihar

Like a true puppet master Sheikh was operating different modules and orchestrating robberies from behind bars. Sonu met him as many as four times in 2008. “He decided to play safe and operate a gang like Dawood Ibrahim. He always wanted to become a big time gangster,” said a senior police officer. Sonu was his main contact with the outside world.

Meanwhile, Sonu Chikna, one of the accomplices of the Satya Prakash gang who managed to escape after the encounter in the Green Park area, has been finally caught by the South Delhi Police on Tuesday.