EX – Mumbai Police Officer Pradeep Sharma Handed a Life Sentence

Pradeep Sharma, a former Mumbai Police officer renowned for his involvement in encounters, was handed a life sentence by the Bombay High Court on Tuesday. This ruling pertains to the killing of Ramnarayan Gupta, also known as Lakhan Bhaiyya, a member of the Chhota Rajan gang, in an alleged staged encounter back in 2006.

The verdict comes after 11 years since Sharma was acquitted by a Mumbai court for the same incident near Nana Nani Park in Versova.

Here are key highlights about Pradeep Sharma’s career within the Mumbai Police force:

1. Sharma hails from the illustrious 1983 batch of police officers, which included notable figures like Vijay Salaskar, Praful Bhosle, Ravindra Angre, and Vinayak Saude. This cohort gained fame for their relentless pursuit of Mumbai’s underworld, dominated by figures such as Dawood Ibrahim Kaskar, Chhota Rajan, Arun Gawli, and Amar Naik.
2. In 1999, Sharma and his team were responsible for the killing of Vinod Matkar, an associate of Chhota Rajan, who had been tasked with eliminating Ibrahim in Pakistan. The same year witnessed the demise of D-Company member Sadiq Kalia in Dadar, Mumbai, at the hands of Sharma.
3. Notable among his operations was the elimination of three suspected Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) terrorists in Mumbai’s Goregaon area in 2003, including two Pakistani nationals, Abu Sultan and Abu Anwar.
4. Sharma’s career was marked by controversies, leading to his dismissal from service in August 2008 over alleged ties to the underworld. However, he was reinstated in May 2009 following orders from the Maharashtra Administrative Tribunal.
5. In 2010, Sharma faced arrest for his alleged involvement in the fake encounter of Ramnarayan Gupta alias Lakhan Bhaiya, a member of the Rajan gang, in November 2006. Despite being acquitted in 2013 after a four-year imprisonment, his legal battles persisted.
6. Reinstated in 2017, Sharma assumed the role of heading the Anti-Extortion Cell of Thane Police. However, he chose to resign from this post in July 2019 to join the undivided Shiv Sena and contested in the assembly elections from Nalasopara constituency in Mumbai, which he lost.
7. Sharma faced another arrest in 2021, this time by the National Investigation Agency (NIA), in connection with the Antilia explosives scare and the Mansukh Hiran murder case, further adding to the complexities of his legal history.

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