Whether the Pakistani government denies it or not, it is an open secret that Mumbai's underworld kingpin Dawood Ibrahim lives in housing provided by the Defense Housing Authority in Karachi. The government of Pakistan always denied his presence in the country, but he is very much heard and seen by everybody in Karachi. The Karachi Building Control Authority infers his influence from the presence of a queue of majestic high-rise buildings in Shahrah-i-Faisal, a neighborhood in which such high-rises are explicitly banned. Whenever authorities move to demolish these illegal buildings, "instructions" come from certain "quarters" not to do so. Later, it is quietly revealed to the right officials that the buildings belong to "big brothers".
Pakistan lost its fortune in cricket mainly because of gambling. Dawood "Bhai" (brother), as he is fondly remembered, is the biggest patron of gambling in cricket. The Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) tries to be vigilant in obstructing this evil, but it is hard when the "big fishes" - including PCB chairman Lieutenant-General Tauqir Zia - feel free to visit Dawood Ibrahim in his nonexistent housing. Sources say the situation became unmanageable after a security agency detained a few people involved in the Sheraton bomb blast last year in which 11 French engineers were killed. The security agency had clear evidence implicating people surrounding Ibrahim, when sudden instructions came from "concerned quarters" that these boys were not involved in this heinous crime, and the agency should instead focus on the militant group Lashkar-i-Jhangvi. Sources maintain that some persons arrested belong to Dawood Ibrahim's gang.
Two years ago, Karachi was buzzing with the news of possible gang wars as the notorious underworld leader Shoaib Khan (Dawood Ibrahim's reputed associate in Karachi) kidnapped his own partner Ibrahim Bholo and murdered him. They had apparently differed a shipment of smuggled containers to South Africa in which some consignments filled with drugs were caught by immigration authorities. Shoaib Khan initially disappeared, only to re-emerge after some time had passed. He was briefly arrested by police, but later was let go. The Military Intelligence (MI) unit reported to Musharraf that Shoaib Khan had been seen in the Askari apartment building in Karachi, where army officers are housed, along with the provincial chief of Inter-Services Intelligence (Sindh), who is a serving brigadier along with other police officials. There they reportedly enjoy "live shows" and gamble. |