Former Mumbai cop Pradeep Sharma convicted in 2006 fake encounter case | Know all about him
The Bombay High Court on Tuesday upheld the conviction of former cop Pradeep Sharma in a 2006 fake encounter case related to the murder of gangster Chhota Rajan’s close aide Lakhan Bhaiya.
The court also asked Sharma to surrender within three weeks. During the hearing, while the court acquitted six individuals, it also upheld the judgment of the lower court which earlier ordered the conviction of 12 other policemen and other officials in the case. After Tuesday’s judgment, a total of 13 people have now been convicted.
Among the other police officials who were earlier convicted include- police inspector Pradeep Suryavanshi, assistant police inspectors Nitin Sartap and Dilip Palande, police sub-inspectors Ganesh Harpude Anand Patade, among others. Those who have been acquitted include Shailendra Pandey, Akhil Khan, Manoj Raj, Sunil Solanki, Mohammed Shaikh, and Suresh Shetty.
Who is Pradeep Sharma?
A former encounter specialist with Mumbai Police, Pradeep Sharma was reportedly involved in the killing of 112 gangsters in all during his career. He was a police officer from the 1983 batch. Several of his batchmates included Ravindra Angre and Praful Bhosle, who were known for their crackdown against the Mumbai underworld. It was in 1999, that he along with his team eliminated Chhota Rajan’s aide Vinod Matkar. Notably, Rajan had asked Matkar to eliminate Dawood Ibrahim in Pakistan. The same year, Sharma had killed Sadiq Kalia, a member of D-Company, in Mumbai. Four years later in 2003, he and his team eliminated three suspected Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) terrorists in the city. Among the three, two were Pakistani nationals. In 2006, he eliminated Lakhan Bhaiya.
Sharma was dismissed from services in 2008 for his alleged links with the underworld. He was, however, reinstated a year later following the order of the Maharashtra Administrative Tribunal. The Supreme Court in 2023 had also granted him a bail in the case related to recovery of 20 gelatin sticks from a car which was parked outside industrialist Mukesh Ambani’s home in 2021 and the subsequent killing of Mansukh Hiran, who was the owner of the vehicle.
