Don Dawood funding Bengali films: Police

KOLKATA: In a significant breakthrough, the newly-formed special task force (STF) of Kolkata Police has discovered that underworld don Dawood Ibrahim’s is funding Bengali cinema and television serials. Sources said the money was being routed through Bangladesh.

The link was established after STF sleuths recently arrested Dawood’s Bangladeshi confidant Fateh Ali from a posh locality in south Kolkata.

Sources said Ali told STF during interrogation that he was introduced to the world of film and serial financing by a popular Bengali film actress. The sources refused to divulge the name of the actress but said Ali helped her make inroads into the Bangladeshi film world.

“We have come to know that through this actress, Ali got close to a number of influential traders in Kolkata. He was also a regular on the city’s page 3 scene,” an STF officer said.

Besides films, the sources said, Ali was actively involved in real estate financing in the northern suburbs of Kolkata and an erstwhile heavyweight Trinamool Congress leader from south Kolkata was his close associate in the business.

Ali, once a most-wanted criminal in Bangladesh, was also known as the Dawood Ibrahim of that country at one point. He shifted base to Kolkata using fake identity and passport after the recent crackdown on criminals by the Bangladesh government.

r_sumanta@dnaindia.net