Sand mafia leader, gang booked under MCOCA

Nagpur: The district’s most notorious sand mafia leader Mohd Lateef Mohd Hafeez Ansari, his younger brother Laiq and two others have been charged under the Maharashtra Control of Organized Crime Act (MCOCA) by city police this week. Thrice booked under MCOCA earlier by rural police, the legal noose tightened around Lateef after city police started cracking down on trucks ferrying illegally quarried sand. Apart from Ansari brothers, offence has been registered against truck driver Sanjay Verma and sand ghat owner Pramod Khojre. While Khojre has been arrested and then released on bail, the rest are still at large.
Lateef, sand mafia leader from Walni in Khaparkheda, had a meteoric rise in the district through political patronage and also clandestine support from a section of police. Having started with illegal arms dealing and other criminal activities, Lateef and his brothers switched to illegal sand mining around a decade ago. His name had also cropped up when an IPS officer’s vehicle was rammed by a truck ferrying illegally mined sand.
As Lateef and his gang’s working is mostly restricted in rural areas, former superintendents of rural police like Manoj Sharma and Arti Singh had tried to reign them in through MCOCA in the past too. Lateef was once acquitted under MCOCA while he had managed to use his connections to quash another attempt by higher officials. In the latest attempt by SP Singh, it’s learnt that the rural police proposal had not been sanctioned a couple of years ago.
Lateef, however, ran out of luck after DCP Abhinash Kumar was shifted to newly created Zone-V following inclusion of Old Kamptee and Kamptee police stations in city police jurisdiction. DCP Abhinash, under the supervision of CP SP Yadav and Joint CP Rajvardhan, started cracking down on illegal sand mining rackets through Koradi police station. Earlier too, DCP Abhinash had started taking action on sand trucks through Kalamna police station while serving in Zone-III.
Senior PI Prakash Londhe of Koradi police station said 13 cases of theft have been registered against truckers ferrying sand illegally while 15 trucks have been seized within a month and the action is continuing.
DCP Abhinash said Lateef has been absconding since he was named in an offence around a month ago. “Action shall continue against anyone violating the law,” he said.