Chhota Shakeel may be with ‘bhai,’ but the succession battle is killing the D-Syndicate

On Wednesday, there were reports that Dawood Ibrahim's most trusted aide Chhota Shakeel had broken away from the D-Syndicate. A day later Shakeel denied the development and said that he is with Dawood.

While a denial from Shakeel was on expected lines, the fact, however, remains that there is a full-fledged succession battle on. The don himself is a depressed man following the decision by his son to turn into a Maulana. He has also been battling several ailments and the intelligence on him suggests that he is not in the pink of health.

There were fissures within the gang for some time now and Shakeel had very often complained about the interference by Dawood's brother Anees. However, Dawood who tried to broker peace always ended up siding with his brother.

The news of the break up was picked up by the IB which listened to the conversations between Shakeel and one operative in Mumbai. Shakeel sounded upset about the recent developments and indicated that he wanted to move on. He also told the operative that he would be shifting to a different area and was getting out of the don's house.

IB officers and also sleuths in the Research and Analysis Wing are taking nothing to chance. They are re-verifying the information. An officer informed that this could also be a ploy to lead us into believing that the gang is falling apart.

This has happened once before in the past and it turned out to be a hoax the officer said. These things are usually done to mislead us and ensure that we are lax, the officer also noted.

However, officials who are in the Dawood files say that there has been a succession battle on for some time within the D-syndicate. While Dawood wants his brother Anees to head operations, many in the gang want Shakeel to take over the reigns. There have been complaints by the gang members about Anees' high handedness. On the other hand, they find Shakeel to be a better person to deal with.

Around 5 years back a similar problem had cropped up. At that time Dawood had indicated that Shakeel would handle the India operations. Anees, on the other hand, was told to handle the international operations. The system was in place for some time, but with Dawood's failing health the row erupted again. Shakeel often complained that despite the territory being marked clearly, Aneed had started interfering in the Indian operations.

An IB official explained that ideally, Dawood would have preferred his son to take over the syndicate. However recent reports and the confession statement of Iqbal Kaskar suggested that his son had turned a Maulana as a result of which Dawood had gone into depression.

OneIndia News