Mumbai Police has brought back here the notorious gangster Prasad Vittal Pujari, who was arrested in February 2023 after an Interpol notice. This is the first deportation of a wanted fugitive from China. Officials said this on Saturday.
A team of Mumbai Police officers arrived here by a morning flight along with Pujari (44), a resident of Mumbai’s Vikhroli suburb. He was kept in the police lockup before his formal arrest by the anti-extortion cell of the crime branch.
Pujari was later produced before a special court under the Maharashtra Control of Organized Crime Act (MCOCA), which sent him to 14-day police custody.
Pujari was living in China and Hong Kong for the last 20 years using various aliases like Subhash, Siddharth Shetty, Sid, Johnny etc.
He ran extortion rackets targeting politicians, businessmen, film personalities, producer-directors and other celebs using international SIM cards and telephone numbers from his bases. Police said there were at least eight cases of major crimes registered against him in various police stations in Mumbai.
Pujari, a resident of Tagore Nagar in Vikhroli suburb, started his gangland career with the gang of Kumar Pillai and Chhota Rajan Nikhalje (both exiled) nearly three decades ago.
However, after differences arose with them, Pujari broke away to form his own independent ‘mafia company’. His aim was to extort money from big businessmen in Mumbai, Navi Mumbai and Thane by threatening them.
At one time in 2019, he was involved in the incident of firing on Shiv Sena leader Chandrakant Jadhav. Jadhav survived this incident, but it increased the fear among the rich and powerful people.
Following an Interpol tip-off and acting on a 2012 Red Corner Notice, Pujari was arrested in Hong Kong in February 2023 on charges of possessing a fake passport.
The priest married a Chinese woman and is the father of a child. His arrest occurred while he was planning to fly from Hong Kong to Shenzhen.
As soon as Mumbai Police learned about Pujari’s arrest last year, it initiated deportation/extradition proceedings and finally managed to bring him back from China after a year of efforts.
In 2020, Mumbai Police had arrested Pujari’s mother Indira Vitthal Pujari for her alleged involvement in the kidnapping-cum-extortion case of a Vikhroli builder for Rs 10 lakh ransom and running her racket by proxy.
Following Kumar Pillai’s extradition by Singapore, Pujari took over his business and started running a racket of firing, kidnapping, murder attempts, death threats and extortion targeting prominent personalities in and around Mumbai.
