Gangster Ravi Pujari, who has nearly 80 cases filed against him in Mumbai, was brought to the city this morning. Last week, a Bengaluru court had given his custody to Mumbai Police after a year-long battle.
"We had been trying to get his custody for a year, and finally got success in the 2016 Ghazali Hotel firing case," Milind Bharambe, joint commissioner (crime branch), Maharashtra, was quoted as saying by news agency ANI on Saturday.
Today, he was presented in court to seek remand. He will remain in the custody of Mumbai Police till March 9.
The 59-year-old gangster - a fugitive for more than two decades till last year - had returned to Bengaluru in the custody of Karnataka Police in February 2020 from Senegal.
A five-member team of cops from Bengaluru had picked up Ravi Pujari, who was once associated with underworld don Chota Rajan, from the west African nation.
He has been accused of over a dozen murders, and making threat and extortion calls to businessmen from real estate and film personalities. Karnataka alone has nearly 100 cases against him.
He had been on the run since 1994 - police say he moved from Mumbai to Nepal, Bangkok, Uganda and Burkina Faso before ending up in Senegal.
Ravi Pujari was renamed Antony Fernandes by Chhota Rajan - and he later changed it to Tony Fernandes and then Rocky Fernandes - the name in his latest fake passport, police said. He reportedly was involved in many crimes in Karnataka before moving to Mumbai.
