The ravine runaways

UNTIL six months ago dacoits in Uttar Pradesh8217;s infamous Chambal ravines did what they usually do. Mocking and challenging the police. ...

UNTIL six months ago dacoits in Uttar Pradesh8217;s infamous Chambal ravines did what they usually do. Mocking and challenging the police. Nirbhay Gujjar even said he would consider surrendering if the Mulayam Singh Yadav government promised him political asylum. Today, he has little time to consider anything, including surrender.

Instead of considering asylum, the government considered a campaign to end the gun run in Mulayam8217;s native district Etawah on the UP-Madhya Pradesh border where these ravines fall.

This has to be the Uttar Pradesh8217;s fiercest crackdown in Chambal. Its recorded 90 encounters in 2005 and the year8217;s not ended yet. For the first time the dacoits are on the run. Of the five major gangs, three have fallen off the state8217;s crime map this year. While two gangs were eliminated in encounters, another surrendered before the neighbouring Madhya Pradesh government. The other two gangs, including Nirbhay8217;s, have also been considerably weakened: police figures say 20 members of his gang have been killed and another 27 arrested during a total of 31 encounters since last August. The 64 people kidnapped by these gangs have been rescued.

8216;8216;Nirbhay Gujjar is now our target. He may say that he wants to surrender8230;but that is his offer, one that is unacceptable to us. Anyway, do you hear him speak these days? It is because he knows: he is next,8217;8217; says UP8217;s Additional Director General of Police Crime/Law 038; Order Bua Singh.

Says SSP Etawah and a Mulayam favourite, Daljit Singh Chaudhary: 8216;8216;Our Special Operations Group SOG team first killed Chandan Yadav this January. He was wanted in 55 cases. Then, on March 5, we killed the dreaded Rajjan Gujjar and his formidable better-half Lovely Pandey along with two more dacoits of their gang after an encounter lasting 600 rounds of fire. While Rajjan was wanted in over 100 cases with a Rs 1.5 lakh reward on his head, Lovely carried a reward of Rs 30,000 8212; the highest reward on a woman dacoit ever.8217;8217;

Even Mulayam Singh Yadav, on the floor of the state assembly last month said 8216;8216;SSP Etawah is my only SSP producing results in the state. Etawah was the hiding ground of dacoits ruling the ravines in six districts there. It has been busted now.8217;8217;

End game?

8226; Nirbhay Gujjar: The strongest gang in Chambal is now down to just eight members. The last encounter this year in Etawah almost got him
8226; Rajjan Gujjar-Lovely Pandey: Wanted for last 15 years, the fearsome duo met their end last month
8226; Chandan Yadav: Notching up 55 cases in a two-year dacoit run, Yadav was gunned down in January
8226; Arvind Gujjar: Specialised in kidnapping till old age caught up with him. Surrendered in Madhya Pradesh
8226; Salim Pehalwan: Running for cover since a encounter in February when Etawah police killed five of his accomplices

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SO how did the hunters become the hunted? Bua Singh puts it down to a change in strategy. The police planted its informers in these gangs and used inter-gang rivalry to its advantage. 8216;8216;While the Yadav and Gujjar gangs are traditional rivals, there is also a bitter war between various Gujjar gangs for dominance of the Chambal. We used this and first Chandan Yadav got killed, then his arch-rival Rajjan Gujjar,8217;8217; Bua Singh says.

This time round the police also decided to go easy with the people who harbour these dacoits. 8216;8216;We decided not to arrest any of their harbourers. Instead we won their confidence and they brought us to the dacoits,8217;8217; Singh says.

Of course, the dacoits8217; love for talking on their cellphone got them into trouble too.

8216;8216;We deployed electronic surveillance on the mobile-savvy dacoits. We used the same technology against them to know their location and get them. Realising this, many stopped talking on their mobiles; those who didn8217;t are mostly dead now,8217;8217; SSP Etawah Daljit Singh Chaudhary says.

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That8217;s why if you call Nirbhay Gujjar8217;s much-publicised mobile number now, you8217;ll find it no longer exists.