Manya Surve

Manohar Arjun Surve (8 August 1944  – 11 January 1982), popularly known as Manya Surve, was one of the dons who made an impact in the Mumbai underworld. Being a Hindu, he was denied just two years, his gang rose to such prominence that Pathans, who ruled the underworld for over two decades, sought his help to eliminate the leader of their arch rival gang, the Konkani speaking Kaskar group. It was headed by Dawood Ibrahim's elder brother, Sabir. Manya was known for his dare devilry and strategic planning. For Manya, it was a clear shot to success. The top gang of the city had come asking him for help and in doing so he would eliminate the other. The first educated Hindu gangster, who hailed from an area called Agar Bazaar in the suburbs of Dadar. Manohar Surve, a young man, fresh out of Kirti College got implicated in a murder that he did not commit and was sentenced to life in Yerwada Jail.

Each and every one involved in Sabir's gruesome murder met with a worse fate. All except Manya Surve. He vanished in the city like a needle in a haystack. Dawood and his boys were unable to trace him. Around the same time, the Bombay Police had decided that enough was enough. They would no longer stand on the side as onlookers. The best in the force were assembled to send out one strong message to the underworld: No more nonsense. And thus was launched Operation Manya Surve. Inspectors Isaque Bagwan and Raja Tambhat were put in charge. Manya Surve's death in 1982 during an encounter with the Maharashtra police became known as the city's third recorded encounter killing. However, the spate of encounter killings only increased in the late 1980s and further rose after the 1993 Mumbai bombings; a total of 622 alleged criminals were killed in police encounters from 1982 to 2004.

Born in 1944 in the Ranpar Village, in a Bhandari caste, Pawas Tal&Dist- Ratnagiri Kokan region of the erstwhile MaharashtraState, Surve moved to Mumbai with his mother and stepfather in 1952. For years he lived in different Chawls in Elphinstone Road and Lower Parel. He was a BA graduate from Kirti College and got 78% at that time and formed a gang of students during his years there was his best friend Sumesh Desai, through influence of his stepbrother Bhargav Dada. Bhargav was a feared thug from Agar Bazar in Dadar. In 1969, Surve was involved in the murder of a man named Dandekar, along with his step brother and an associate, Manya Podhkar. The trio were soon arrested by Police Inspector E.S. Dabholkar and were subsequently sentenced to life imprisonment.

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