India’s wait for proof against Dawood Ibrahim is over. CNN-News18 has managed to speak to one of the world’s most wanted men. Only a handful of people have heard the Don’s voice. This is the first time he has directly spoken to any TV channel.

After CNN-News18’s Investigations Editor Manoj Gupta made contact with Dawood, the voice samples were run past several sources who have been tracking the fugitive Mumbai underworld don for several years. They have all confirmed that this voice indeed belongs to Dawood.

The world exclusive will be aired on CNN-News18 and published on News18.com at 8pm on Thursday.

Sixty-one-year-old Dawood is wanted in India for organising and financing the 1993 Mumbai serial blasts that left 257 dead and 717 injured. The blasts were carried out with the help of his subordinates, Tiger Memon and Yakub Memon. In July 2015, Yakub Memon was hanged to death for this crime, while Dawood and Tiger are still free.

In May 2016, CNN-News18 managed to track down the terror don's bungalow. The address is D 13, Block 4, Clifton, Karachi. The video of the sting operation showed top-angle shots of the house, which is flanked by a cricket stadium on one side and the Clifton Marquee, a popular wedding & banquet hall on the other.

During a five-minute bike ride covering roughly half-a-kilometre radius, the sting operators interviewed locals as well as Dawood's own security guards. Everyone they came across seemed to know where he lived.

Dawood fled to Dubai in the 1980s after the Mumbai Police crackdown on the underworld, and left for Pakistan under the protection of the country’s intelligence agency ISI.