india

Updated: Feb 01, 2019 09:37 IST

Underworld don Ravi Pujari has been arrested by Senegal police following a tip off by Indian investigative agencies, according to media reports.

Pujari was arrested on January 22 from Dakar and the Indian embassy was informed on Januray 26, media reports said quoting officials in Senegal.

Pujari, who was mentored by gangster Chotta Rajan, is wanted in India for a number of cases including extortion, kidnapping and murder. He started off as a petty criminal and graduated to big crime with the killing of Bala Zalte, a rival and went on to join Chotta Rajan.

Dalit leader from Gujarat Jignesh Mevani had last year filed a police complaint alleging that Ravi Pujari had threatened to kill him.

Earlier, Pujari had allegedly threatened several Bollywood personalities including Mahesh Bhatt and Farah Khan, this was revealed by Mumbai police following the arrest of his alleged henchmen in June last.

The Mumbai police last week arrested Akash Shetty, an aide of Pujari who took over the Mumbai operations, amid high drama in a village in Mangalore in Dakshina Kannada district of Karnataka.

An officer from AEC said Pujari’s extortion cartel, which had suffered a blow after the arrest of top aide Dasrath Shinde in July 2017, had resumed operations in the past seven-eight months. “Pujari had stopped calling Mumbai developers for the past one-and-a-half years,” the officer said.