Know Your City: From tangas and soda bottles to SUVs and social media: How Pune’s underworld has changed with the times

Gang rivalries, then and now

The first-known major rivalry between organised gangs in Pune dates back to the 1960s and 70s. These feuds were between outfits led by Narayan Jagtap, a vegetable trader from Mandai, who was also running illegal liquor and matka (gambling) dens, and Govind Taru, who dominated the Kasba Peth area, according to police officials who have studied Pune’s underbelly.

There were other gangs too, like the ones led by Jan Mohammad Pathan, Akbar Khan, Rampuri Brothers in Cantonment area and Bhavani Peth and gangs led by Soma Landge, Anil Alhat, Balkrushna alias Balu Andekar, Changa Thorat and others in the Somwar Peth and Guruwar Peth areas.

These gangs used weapons like bicycle chains, swords, Rampuri knives and soda bottles to spread terror. Officials say gangsters then even used horse carriages, a public transport used in Pune till the late 1970s, for carrying out attacks and fleeing from the spot.

Balu Andekar gained supremacy after a series of attacks on the Appa Taru gang but his gang split after trusted aide Pramod Malvadkar parted ways in 1982. The Malvadkar gang, in fact, killed Andekar in broad daylight in Shivajinagar court on July 17, 1984, according to police records.

In the coming years, the city witnessed some of its fiercest gang wars with six gangsters being killed.

To control the rising gang war incidents, a team comprising police sub-inspectors Balkrushna Kutwal and Ram Jadhav (both retired from the force as assistant commissioners of police) was formed. The squad went to arrest Malvadkar and he was killed in an encounter on November 19, 1997.

The 2000s brought no respite as Pune continued to witness brutal gang rivalry murders. One of the most talked-about murders was that of gangster Sandip Mohol. Then an office bearer of the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), Sandip was shot dead in broad daylight by a rival gang led by Ganesh Marne on Paud Road on October 4, 2006.

After Ganesh’s arrest, his aide Kishor Marne began running the gang. In January 2010, Kishor was killed by rival gangster Sharad Mohol and others. Sharad was convicted and jailed along with six others in this murder case.

In June 2012, Sharad and his aide Alok Bhalerao were accused of killing an Indian Mujahideen terror operative inside the high-security Yerawada Central Prison. However, the duo were acquitted. Sharad also got bail in the Kishor Marne murder case. Police sources say Sharad’s link to the IM operative’s murder brought him fame and support. Sitting in jail, he even won an election to become the deputy sarpanch of a village in Mulshi taluka.

Another sensational gang war murder in Pune was that of Sachin Kudle, an aide of notorious gangster Gajanan alias Gaja Marne. In the early hours of May 9, 2010, Gajanan’s henchman-turned-rival Nilesh Ghaiwal and his aides gunned down Kudle in the Dattawadi police station area after a 2 km chase. Later, Gajanan and his gang members were charged with gunning down Ghaiwal aides Amol Hari Badhe and Santosh Hiraman Gawade in November 2014.

Gaja Marne was arrested and later released. In February 2021, to ‘celebrate’ his release from Taloja Central Prison after his acquittal from both these murders, a never-before-seen massive roadshow comprising hundreds of high-end SUVs and luxury cars was held on the Pune-Mumbai Expressway by his supporters.

Following the roadshow, Gajanan was placed under preventive detention for a year under the stringent Maharashtra Prevention of Dangerous Activities of Slumlords, Bootleggers, Drugoffenders, Dangerous Persons and Video Pirates Act. Recently, the Pune city police arrested Gajanan again and booked his gang under the Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act (MCOCA) and kidnapping in a ransom case.

Over the last couple of years, Pune Police Commissioner Amitabh Gupta has intensified action against organised gangs and booked most of them under the MCOCA. So far, over 105 gangs have been booked under MCOCA, senior Pune police officials said.

A link to the Mumbai underworld

Initially, the Mumbai underworld looked towards Pune as a safe hiding place. But later, some of the Mumbai gangsters started networking with local youngsters in Pune to spread their base.

Around the 1990s, the names of Pune youths linked to Mumbai dons Arun Gawli, Chhota Rajan alias Rajendra Nikalje, Ashwin Naik and Ravi Pujari began to crop up in various incidents of murders, kidnappings and extortions in the city. At one point, even Dawood Ibrahim was reported to have spread his base in the city.

Pradeep Sonawane, an alleged Gawli aide, eliminated a hotelier in July 1990. Sonawane was later killed in an encounter in August 1995. The Gawli gang is suspected to have strengthened its roots in Pune when he was lodged in Yerawada jail under the Terrorist And Disruptive Activities (Prevention) Act (TADA).

While Pune gangster Pilu Khan, who was allegedly linked to Dawood, was arrested from Kalyani Nagar area of Pune in October 1992, alleged Chhota Rajan aides Balu Dhokare and Dharmesh Nitin alias Nanhu Shah were arrested from a beauty parlour owned by former corporator and murder convict Datta Khade in the Deccan area in August 1998.

Rajan’s name also cropped in the murder of corporator Satish Misal, who was shot in his car on the busy Puram Chowk on Tilak Road on February 28, 2003. The police named 12 people in this case, including Rajan gang member Ravi Vora alias D K Rao, and they were acquitted by a court in 2009.

Rajan was also named as an accused by the state Criminal Investigation Department (CID) in a case related to Shiv Sena leader Ajay Bhosale being fired upon during the Assembly election campaign in Pune in October 2009. Bhosale is now with the Eknath Shinde Shiv Sena faction.

Recently, the Pune Police were shocked as names of Pune gangsters Santosh Jadhav and Siddhesh Kamble alias Saurav alias Mahakal cropped up in the investigation into the murder of singer Sidhu Moosewala, who was shot dead in Punjab on May 29 this year. The duo allegedly worked closely with jailed gangster Lawrence Bishnoi, who is alleged to have masterminded the Moosewala murder.

Use of firearms: From 1990s to the Moosewala murder

With the entry of Mumbai gangsters, the use of firearms became common in gang attacks in Pune in the 1990s. An alleged Gawli aide, Ajit Lavand, was shot dead by rivals in Nigdi in January 1993, the first major gang rivalry incident where firearms were used in Pune, according to the police. The Gawli gang allegedly took revenge by murdering a Pimpri-Chinchwad Municipal Corporation corporator with alleged links to a rival group.

The quality of firearms used by local gangsters has improved over the years, police officials said. The police have recovered fine-quality country-made pistols, and even foreign-made guns and carbine rifles, from city gangsters. The easy supply of firearms through illegal weapon dealers in Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh is a worrying trend, officials added.

Recently, the Pune Rural Police had recovered 13 country-made pistols from associates of gangster Santosh Jadhav, who was arrested in connection to the Moosewala murder case. A probe revealed that Jadhav’s gang went to Sendhwa in Madhya Pradesh to procure the firearms using contacts of jailed gangster Lawrence Bishnoi.

Along with weapons, the vehicles used by gangsters have also improved. High-end SUVs have not just become a preferred means of transport but also a symbol of status, nuisance value and area dominance, police officials said.

Land, politics and movies

The police have also observed a clear shift in the economics of Pune gangs. Earlier, it was all about supremacy in areas to run small illegal businesses related to gambling, liquor etc. But as the city has grown in the last 30 years, the IT boom and the subsequent growth of real estate and industrial belts have led to an influx of money into Pune.

With this, the gangsters too have upgraded their sources of income. Not satisfied with small-time businesses and extortion, gangsters today are engaged in land-grabbing, land deals, extortion from builders and businessmen etc, the police said. Besides real estate, gangsters also have stakes in mathadi workers’ (manual labourers) contracts, cable TV operating businesses, scrap deals, labour contracts, transport contracts, and even, security contracts in the industrial belts.

The murder of former mathadi worker and notorious gangster Parshuram alias Parsha alias Aba Pandurang Jadhav (39) at Gujar Nimbalkarwadi in the Katraj area on June 19, 2014, exposed the growing involvement of Pune gangsters in workers’ unions in newly booming industrial areas.

As per police records, top gangsters were found to be involved in land dealings, with affiliations to different political parties. For example, Sandip Mohol was an NCP office bearer when he was shot dead. A history-sheeter, Datta Khade alias DK, later went on to become a BJP corporator. While he is out on bail, his wife was also a BJP corporator from Shivajinagar. Notorious criminal Vitthal Shelar had joined BJP in the presence of BJP leader Girish Bapat in 2017 but was expelled after media outrage. Gangster Gajanan Marne’s wife Jayshree won a seat in the 2012 civic elections on a Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) ticket. In 2017 too, many criminals linked to organised crime contested civic elections, cutting across parties.

The growing link between the underworld mafia and politics has also attracted filmmakers. Marathi film Mulshi Pattern, which was released in 2018, was one such film that dealt with organised crime in Pune and received a huge response.

Social media, the latest battleground

Over the last few years, gangsters and their followers have taken to social media to spread the word – from claiming dominance in an area to influencing youngsters to ‘follow’ them, say police. Members of Gaja Marne and Nilesh Ghaiwal gangs are known to have an active social media presence. After Gajanan’s release from Taloja prison, one of the offences registered against his gang members was over social media posts glorifying the gangster and his release.

Social media reels brandishing dangerous weapons, status messages issuing threats to rivals, gangs claiming dominance in an area via online posts are some of the activities that are now on the radar of the police. In the last five months, 39 people have been arrested by the Pimpri Chinchwad police for posting images of weapons on social media posts.

The hostilities in social media statuses and reels between two rival gangs – known as Sarkar Group and Baba Group – in Pune’s Talegaon Dabhade town recently led to the murder of a 19-year-old and the attempted murder of a 15-year-old.