The Crime Branch on Tuesday arrested Chhota Shakeel’s close aide Mohammed Hasan alias Munna Mohammed Ali Shaikh, 35, on charges of threatening and subsequently attempting to kill a jewellery shop owner for not paying him Rs 20 lakh as “protection money” in September.
Shaikh was remanded in police custody till January 7, 2006, by the metropolitan magistrate on Tuesday. During investigations, it was found that Shaikh had earlier been arrested in connection with the killing of BJP MLAs Ramdas Nayak and Premkumar Sharma in Mumbai in 1990. He had killed Nayak and Sharma at the behest of Chhota Shakeel.
Shaikh was arrested by the Ahmedabad crime branch recently. The Mumbai Crime branch on December 22, 2005, moved court to take possession of Shaikh from the custody of the Ahmedabad crime branch. After getting the “transfer warrant”, a crime branch team headed by DCP Dhananjay Kamalakar brought Shaikh from Sabarmati Central Jail in Ahmedabad to Mumbai on Tuesday.
In September, Ashwin Jain — partner of PL Jain Jewellers on Memonwada Road in Dongri — received a threat call from a person claiming to be a member of the Chhota Shakeel gang and asked him to pay Rs 20 lakh and call Shakeel.
On September 23, an unidentified person hit Jain with a chopper near his shop and fled. A complaint was lodged with the Dongri police and the case later went to the Crime Branch.
