'Act Before Lawrence Bishnoi Becomes A Dawood Ibrahim'

In this candid Rediff interview (watch the videos) following the shooting at movie star Tiger Shroff, Mr Sivanandhan argues that the old underworld of Dawood Ibrahim, Chhota Rajan, Amar Naik and Arun Gawli has not returned; instead, a "new cookie," Lawrence Bishnoi, is announcing his crimes on social media and targeting Bollywood, which the former Mumbai police Crime Branch chief calls the "soft underbelly" of the city.

'They (the gangsters in the 80s and 90s) were ruthless, and killed hundreds of people.' 'Bishnoi is operating in a different era and time as compared to the earlier gangsters of Mumbai.'

'There are fast guns, fast vehicles and untraceable calls, and cybercrime technology lets the criminal act without ever being at the crime scene.'

 

Contrasting today's threat with 1998, when 101 businessmen were killed and the city came to a standstill, he says the old mafia was crushed with political, judicial and public backing, giving Mumbai nearly 25 years of peace.

Technology, VPNs and cybercrime, he warns, now make organised crime harder to dismantle.

Bishnoi, he says, remains in custody yet appears to wield unlimited access to communication, and urges tapping the phones at Sabarmati jail, mopping up illegal guns and invoking MCOCA, the strategies laid out in his book The Brahmastra Unleashed.

Away from policing, the 1976-batch IPS officer, who was also police commissioner of Thane, Nagpur, director general of police Maharashtra, head of the State Intelligence Department, Joint Director, Central Bureau of Investigation, Assistant Director, Intelligence Bureau and member of the special task force under the National Security Council Secretariat, continues to serve Mumbai through his Roti Bank, a Mumbai-based non-profit he helped launch with the city's dabbawalas, who collect surplus food from restaurants, weddings and events and deliver it by van to people living on the streets, slums and outside the KEM Hospital and Tata Memorial Hospital.

'This return of the mafia under Bishnoi is purely to fund and finance criminal activities'. During your tenure as Mumbai crime branch chief and police commissioner, how were extortion and organised crime rackets run? Do you see any similarities with how they are run now?

During my time the mafia and the organised crime syndicates had reached their peak following a build-up of 4-5 decades crime in Mumbai. It would be difficult to draw similarities during my time and the current scenario because during my time technology was not so evolved as it is today.

Policing and controlling crime was much more difficult during that time as compared to the technological advancements of today.

Now everything runs on virtual private networks, where it cannot be detected. There are fast guns, fast vehicles and untraceable calls, and cybercrime technology lets the criminal act without ever being at the crime scene.

That is the benefit the current lot of criminals have, and a set like Lawrence Bishnoi's operates internationally.

Is Mumbai witnessing the return of gangster culture? In 2024 there was the high-profile killing of politician Baba Siddique, and there have been threats to Salman Khan and Disha Patani.

It is true that in the past two years there have been instances where Bollywood personalities and politicians have been attacked by criminals and gangs claiming to belong to the Lawrence Bishnoi gang or Goldy Brar gang, but to say that it is a return of gangster culture may not be true, because if you see these incidents, other than the killing of Baba Siddique all others have been merely to scare or have been a warning. Hence calling these incidents as return of gangster culture is a bit premature.

Gangster culture or the Mumbai underworld was totally annihilated by the Mumbai police under the leadership of the then Mumbai police commissioner R H (Ronnie Hyacinth) Mendonca (between August 1997 and May 2000) and myself as chief of the Mumbai Crime Branch along with a team of dedicated officers of the Mumbai police.

From what started as a strategic and dedicated attack on organised crime in 1998, we destroyed in entirely in a span of three years.

By 2001, Mumbai was free from the chokehold of the Mumbai underworld.

My book The Brahmastra Unleashed gives the six strategies we adopted, and they were extremely effective.

A new leaf has now been turned in the mafia business. In my opinion, this return of the mafia under Bishnoi is purely to fund and finance criminal activities that may be happening in Punjab, Canada or the USA.

'Our most wanted, most talked-about criminal (Lawrence Bishnoi) is in jail, in custody. It is a very paradoxical, laughable situation'

Is that how the underworld operated too during the 1980s and 1990s by giving a message to Bollywood?

There is no one way in which the underworld operated. I am talking about 60 years, when they were port workers who operated from the sea, then moved on to smuggling, then to putting up Ganpati pandals. They were called Robin Hoods.

What kind of Robin Hood is that? That period cannot be compared with this one. They (the gangsters in the 80s and 90s) were ruthless, and killed hundreds of people.

There were three types of shootouts: Gangsters killing businessmen, police shooting gangsters, and gangsters shooting among themselves.

Now the scene is totally different. Our most wanted, most talked-about criminal (Lawrence Bishnoi) is in jail, in custody. It is a very paradoxical, laughable situation.

You want the main man, and you cannot even bring him to Mumbai, where he has allegedly carried out a high-profile shootout.

Apart from this protected environment, is there a way for the Mumbai police to get legal custody of Lawrence Bishnoi?

Since I am no longer in the police force, it would be difficult for me to answer this because it is up to the Mumbai police to figure out ways to get legal custody of Lawrence Bishnoi. I cannot comment on that.

Is Lawrence Bishnoi the new Dawood Ibrahim or Chotta Rajan? He is creating panic and fear in Bollywood.

You cannot compare oranges and apples. Every criminal has his own way. For example, the way in which Karim Lala and Varadarajan Mudaliar conducted gangsterism was different and it was disrupted by a (the then) new man called Dawood Ibrahim. It is easy to talk about these gangsters in hindsight.

With regards to Lawrence Bishnoi it would be difficult to say how and where he is going to end up. He is operating in a different era and time as compared to the earlier gangsters of Mumbai.