‘I had to toughen up to deal with gangsters like Dawood’

Public prosecutor Rohini Salian has dealt with some iconic toughies of Mumbai’s underworld. She was in court the day Ashwini Naik was gunned down and the mafia wars got bloodier. She has seen at close quarters the quiet menace in Subhash Thakur’s eyes. These are names that could send a shiver up any Mumbaikar’s spine but Salian herself is a name feared by criminals. In an interview, she tells DNA that the most important part of her job is to understand the criminal psyche. Excerpts:

Can you recall your first glimpse of Mumbai’s underworld?
In 1984-85, a judge asked me to take up the case of a woman from the Worli slums who had attempted suicide at a police station and needed to be defended. I realised later that she had been facing threats from both the underworld and the builder lobby. Both were eyeing her slum settlement. This was my first exposure to the way the police and the judicial system function in this city. I had never in my life dreamt that I would be taking on dreaded gangsters one day.

Who would you count among the most hardened criminals you met?
Then there was Subhash Singh Thakur who was involved in killing eight accused in the JJ shootout case. Thakur had no vices at all. He was a quiet, cold killer with an expressionless face. He was very well behaved in court. He had only one vice — he liked to kill. I have seen many dreaded criminals but this one made a deep impression on me.

How did you handle the transition to the role of public prosecutor?
The turning point in my career came when I was allotted a TADA case. A Palestinian, Abbas, had hurled a hand grenade and fired at the Alitalia crew at Sahar airport. The TADA law and court were new and so far I had only done defence work. Now, as the public prosecutor, I would have to change my orientation.

You have dealt with some of the city’s most feared gangsters who were at war with each other. How did you deal with them?
At one time members of all the gangs — Chota Shakeel, Chota Rajan, Dawood, Ashwin and Amar Naik, Arun Gawli and Suresh Manchekar — were in jail. All their cases would be heard one after another. Sometimes they were all in court at the same time. There were public spats and even physical fights. I realised that I would need to become tougher at work. From then on, I acquired the reputation of being a dreaded prosecutor! Once an accused told me in court, ‘you are a woman and yet you have no heart. (Laughs) I coldly asked him, ‘who said I am a woman? I am an advocate first in the court. I left my womanhood at home.’ I would talk to criminals in their own language. They soon saw that I was a tough person.

You were in court the day Ashwin Naik and his people were shot dead (in 1994). How did it affect you?
I was in one of the court rooms on the third floor of the Sessions Court. I heard the sound of firing and saw people rushing around. Our judge too ran into his chamber. I began collecting my papers when the police dragged one of the culprits into our court room. I went to the ante-chamber to tell the judge about it. The judge was standing aghast as his secretary had collapsed on the floor. She had been in the corridor when Naik was gunned down. She rushed in to tell the judge and simply fainted. It may sound funny today, but at that time it was a really unnerving situation.