Article

2009-05-07 India-Pakistan

Encounter Specialist Pradeep Sharma reinstated by Mumbai Police

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Posted by john frum 2009-05-07 16:11|| || Front Page|| [8 views ] Top

#1 This week on "Encounter Specialist"...
Sharma! Your gun and your badge! You're through!
I'll be back. You can count on it...

Posted by tu3031 2009-05-07 16:28|| 2009-05-07 16:28|| Front Page Top

Posted by john frum 2009-05-07 16:44|| 2009-05-07 16:44|| Front Page Top

#3 with unblinking conviction, Sharma denies any of his 103 hits were in cold-blood.

They fired at me. I fired in self-defence. They had weapons. Obviously they were not going to a temple, he says.

Sharmas reward for being an encounter specialist, a term used for the bunch of quick-draw cops, is a life of constant danger, including for his family. I am like a World Cup for the mafia gangs. Each one of them wants me dead, Sharma says while suddenly turning the wrong up a one-way street on a muggy spring afternoon.

I have to do this enter no-entry zones, one-way streets, jump red lights to dodge them. They could be waiting anywhere. But they can never get me, he says, scanning the streets for that lone gunman who could make his day.

Sharmas exploits are fodder for Bollywood movies along the lines of Clint Eastwoods Dirty Harry.

How quick are you with it? I ask, pointing to the gun tucked under his thigh. In a flash he has pulled out the weapon and is aiming into the street through the windscreen.

This quick! Sharma boasts in true cowboy style. Its a good revolver. It doesnt have a locking mechanism always loaded, always ready for action.

things were changing as Sharma and his fellow encounter specialists Praful Bhosle, Vijay Salaskar, Ravinder Agre and Daya Naik got to work on their assignment to tackle the growing bands of armed criminals.

Each one of them has killed dozens of gangsters, yet the squad has never suffered any casualties.

After a decade of hot pursuit, the gangsters guns are falling silent in Bombay as shootings have dramatically reduced from three to four a month to two to three in a year.

The gangs of Bombay are now on the run, Sharma says with a chuckle.

And for Sharma, Sundays are the most boring days of the week.

At any given time, I have 10 to 12 files of hardened criminals open in my mind. Its an addiction. I feel bored on Sundays because the family keeps me at home, Sharma says.

He always aims to kill.

The top half of the body, he says in reply to a question over where he aims when confronting a suspected gangster.

Posted by john frum 2009-05-07 17:15|| 2009-05-07 17:15|| Front Page Top

#4 Previously, on "Encounter Specialist"...
Yer a dinosaur, Sharma! A rogue cop! An I'm gonna run you outta the department!
You n' what army, chief...

Posted by tu3031 2009-05-07 17:20|| 2009-05-07 17:20|| Front Page Top

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