Mumbai: Mushtaq ‘Tiger’ Memon, one of India’s most wanted criminals and the alleged mastermind of the 26/11 terror attacks in Mumbai, called up his family just an hour ahead of his younger brother Yakub’s execution at the Nagpur Central Jail on July 30.
According to a report published on Friday in a leading daily, The Economic Times, Tiger Memon, the man solely responsible for the Mumbai carnage, talked to his family members in Mumbai and pledged to avenge his younger brother Yakub’s execution by the Government of India.
A wing of the Mumbai Police, which has been keeping an eye on the Memon family for long,intercepted the call and recorded the conversation between the fugitive and his mother in the early hours on July 30.
As per the report, the phone in the Memon household at the Al Husseini building in Mahim rang at about 5.35 am. Tiger Memon talked to his ailing mother Hanifa and another family member ,and also talked about taking revenge ‘very soon’.
Tiger’s mother Hanifa, who initially appeared reluctant, spoke to his fugitive son and asked him to end violence. However, her appeal fell on deaf ears of Tiger Memon, who said that he will avenge Yakub’s death. “Main unko chukwaonga (I will make them pay),” Tiger reportedly said.
The newspaper, which claimed to have accessed the copy of the transcript of the purported conversation between Tiger Memon and his family members, said that the warning from the fugitive has send the police and security agencies in a tizzy.
Mumbai Police officials, who listened to the conversation, have identified Tiger’s voice and are concerned about the prospect of retaliatory terror attacks in the aftermath of Yakub Memon’s execution.
The fact that Tiger Memon did make a call on July 30, which was intercepted by Mumbai Police, was also confirmed by officials in Delhi.
However, the report cited Additional Chief Secretary (Home) KP Bakshi as saying that he was not aware of any phone conversation between Tiger and his family. “Neither the Maharashtra DGP (director general of police) nor the central agencies have given us any such report,” he was quoted as saying.
Amid unprecedented security, the Government of India, on July 10, executed Yakub Memon, a former accountant, who was convicted of involvement in a series of co-ordinated terrorist attacks that killed hundreds of people in Mumbai in 1993.