Does Siddique murder highlight growing power tussle between D company and Lawrence Bishnoi gang?
Baba Siddique--the NCP leader-- was gunned down by three assailants on Saturday night. Two of the three assailants have been arrested, while the third is still at large.
Amid the probe by the Mumbai police, the infamous Lawrence Bishnoi gang claimed responsibility for the murder on Sunday. Lawrence Bishnoi had also claimed responsibility for the murder of Punjabi singer Sidhu Moosewala.
In a facebook post, Shubuu Lonkar, believed to be Bishnoi gang associate Shubham Rameshwar Lonkar, claiming responsibility wrote: "Siddique has been killed because he was linked to India's most wanted terrorist Dawood Ibrahim and was close to Salman Khan and because of the death of Anuj Thapan, one of the arrested suspects in the shooting outside the actor’s house, in police custody. Thapan was found dead on May 1 inside the Mumbai Crime Branch lock-up."
The police had said he died by suicide but his family had claimed he was tortured in custody.
"We do not have any enmity with anyone but whoever will help Salman Khan and Dawood gang, apna hisab-kitaab kar lena," Lonkar wrote in Hindi in the Facebook post.
While Lonkar is in jail, police said the post was made by his brother Pravin Lonkar, who was arrested on Sunday evening.
However, there's more to the murder of Baba Siddique than meets the eye. Baba reportedly had connections with global terrorist Dawood Ibrahim's D Company. In fact, some media reports have even claimed that the NCP politician was the link between the underworld and the Bollywood to facilitate the conversations and the deals after D Company's dwindling power on the city after the mid 1990s.
Self-proclaimed film critic, Kamaal R. Khan, professionally known as KRK, posted on his X that the D Company threatened Baba Siddiqui in 2013 and asked him to leave one property. He pointed to the case when an alleged associate of underworld don Chhota Shakeel and a businessman were arrested and charged under MCOCA for allegedly threatening Congress MLA Baba Siddiqui in 2013. It was the same year when Bollywood superstars Salman Khan and Shah Rukh Khan reunited, after a five-year stand off, at an Iftar party thrown by Baba.
At the time, Baba had officially filed the police complaint and got police security. The politician allegedly continued to grab properties by illegal means after the case as well.
“D company might have eliminated him for 2 reasons. 1) He was not leaving a few properties. 2) To prove that D company can still eliminate anyone in Mumbai”, claimed KRK in his post on X.
Baba's murder also highlights the growing power struggle between two different groups, the D company and the Lawrence Bishnoi gang with both their head-honchos sitting far away from the city and its coast.
Baba's murder also highlights the growing power struggle between two different groups, the D company and the Lawrence Bishnoi gang with both their head-honchos sitting far away from the city and its coast.
With inputs from IANS
