Ahmedabad: 3 aides of sharpshooter Shiva Mahalingam held

The city crime branch on Wednesday arrested three associates of Shiva Mahalingam Pillai aka Aftab with firearms. As per the officers, the accused got a call from Shiva, who is inside Sabarmati jail, to extort money from a builder in Juhapura.

Around a month back, a complaint was lodged with Vejalpur police station against Shiva by a builder after he was threatened by Shiva and was told to pay Rs 3 crore to his associate Ayub Pathan.

With the help of a technical team, the crime branch started keeping a close tab on Shiva's associates. On Tuesday, accused Ayub got a call from Shiva asking him to go the Sohib Gotilal's office located in Royal Amber tower to extort money. Officers of the crime branch arrested three accused identified as Ayub Pathan (57), Sikandar Landha (32) and Mustak Kathiyar (25). Two pistols and seven live cartridges were recovered from them. Interrogation revealed that the trio had arrived at the spot to extort money from the builder.

Shiva was arrested by the crime branch on May 22. He was declared an absconder after he jumped parole in December last year. He is involved in 20 serious crimes including murder, extortion and robbery.