26/11 hero Date moves to Centre

Mumbai’s Crime Branch-CID chief Dr Sadanand Date, who took on Pakistani terrorist Mohammed Ajmal Kasab and Abu Ismail at the Cama & Albless Hospital during the 26/11 terror attacks, has been transferred to the Central Reserve Police Force.

Date, a 1990 batch of the IPS, is currently the Joint Commissioner of Police (Crime) and he would now be an Inspector General of the CRPF. Before heading the elite Crime Branch, he was chief of the Force One, an elite crack commando team formed after 26/11 terror attacks, on the lines of NSG or the Black Cat commandos. Date has handled several crisis in Mumbai – like the hostage crisis when a youth from Bihar, Rahul Raj, entered a BEST bus and took a dozen passengers hostage saying that he wanted to “kill Raj Thackeray.

Besides, during 26/11, he fought Ajmal Kasab and Abu Ismail at the Cama and Albless Hospital. He also survived the June 21, 2012 fire at Mantralaya, the state secretariat here – and undertook a major rescue work.

He had deposed before the special 26/11 court and the then Additional Sessions Judge M L Tahaliyani has praised his alertness and recorded in the judgment: “Prosecution witness no. 118 (Date) was wearing a bullet proof jacket. He, however, instead of directly going to the terrace, thought it proper to access the situation, and therefore, he threw one metal object, which was lying on the 6th floor of the building, towards the terrace door.

Immediately, there was a burst firing from an automatic weapon from the terrace of the building.”