JOIN USEX-IPS officer says Dawood wanted to surrender
Former IPS officer Neeraj Kumar has triggered a controversy with his comments about Dawood Ibrahim wanting to surrender but he reportedly not being able to take it forward as his superiors in the CBI asked him not to.
After his comments appeared in a newspaper, Kumar on Saturday clarified that he spoke to Ibrahim over phone, but the underworld don was not willing to surrender.
Kumar, who later became Delhi Police Commissioner, was serving in the CBI and investigating the 1993 Mumbai serial blasts case at that time.
He said Ibrahim sounded scared, but did not talk about surrender.
Kumar's clarification came after a report suggested that his superiors asked him not to pursue the matter.
After his purported comments became public on Saturday, CBI ex-director Vijay Rama Rao, then Kumar's superior, said no such offer of surrender came from Ibrahim.
“If it is the case, it was not brought in my knowledge. If such an offer had come, we would have grabbed it. We made lots of efforts to bring him. The government is still trying to bring him. At no stage was the offer brought to my knowledge,” said Rao.
“Throughout my tenure, I have tried a lot to catch him, and I have never stopped a senior officer from taking any action in this regard,” he added.
Kiren Rijiju, Minister of State for Home, said, “We cannot react as we don't have any official information on Dawood Ibrahim.”
Sources also said there was nothing in the files that indicate such an offer.
Kumar, who is writing a book on the 10 top investigations in his career, was quoted as saying that he spoke to Ibrahim thrice in 1994, and was toying with the idea of surrendering.
He was worried about his security and that his rivals would finish him off, the former cop was quoted as saying. Initially his superiors gave the go-ahead, but later they asked him to stop the phone calls, he reportedly added.