Shabir Ibrahim Kaskar

Shabir Ibrahim Kaskar, the son of a police head constable Ibrahim Kaskar, hailed from Mumka village in Ratnagiri district, Konkan region in the Indian state of Maharashtra in 1955. He belongs to the Konkani Muslim community.

His father Ibrahim Kaskar was a police constable in the CID department at Azad Maidan police station. The family had eight children and was perennially impoverished. Shabir and his younger brother, Dawood were school dropouts and often spent their days wandering in the streets of Dongri- Bhendi Bazar. In those days, people lived in fear and awe of Karim Lala, the leader of the Pathan gang and Haji Mastan, the smuggler who enjoyed a cult following among the impoverished Muslim youths in south Mumbai including Shabir and Dawood. Soon Shabir and Dawood joined in the petty street crime of selling smuggled electronics goods and watches. They often cheated gullible travelers and got involved in street brawls.Shabir, Dawood, and their friends called their group, "Young Company." They would hang out near Crawford Market in search of gullible travelers and offer them smuggled Rolex watches for a measly price compared to the actual cost. After the buyer paid them in cash, they would pretend to wrap the watch in a small paper or cloth and tell the buyer not to open it to avoid police suspicion. It would be a stone instead of the watch. They called this activity "Alta-palti." If the buyer found out that he had been cheated and accosted them, they would intimidate him with the help of burly Pathan hoodlums from the neighborhood.

Their father requested Haji Mastan to give his wastrel sons decent employment. On Mastan's instructions, they worked in an electronic shop at Manish Market for some time, but very soon they were back to their petty crime and mob fights. Soon they found their way into the Pathan gang where they did odd jobs often transporting contraband and illegal goods from one place to another.

The Pathan gang was run by Samad Khan, the eccentric nephew of Karim Lala. He was supported by his Pathan cronies like Amirzada, Alamzeb, Jangrez, Saeed Batla, and Ayub Lala. Shabir and Dawood were often sidelined and confined to menial jobs like transporting smuggled consignments from one place to the other. The Ibrahim brothers would also work for Haji Mastan and other gangsters. Being the sons of a police constable and their ability to speak Marathi helped them to seek the sympathy and support of many law enforcement officers and Maharashtrian gangsters.

It is said that some policemen decided to use the Ibrahim brothers to combat the supremacy of the Pathan gang by turning a deaf ear to complaints against them. In return, the Ibrahim brothers would sometimes tip-off the police on the illegal transactions of the Pathan gang.Their journalist friend, Iqbal Naatiq also encouraged them to oppose the intimidating tactics of the Pathan gang. This created a rift between the Ibrahim brothers and Samad Khan.Samad Khan believed that Iqbal Naatiq had tipped-off the police about his illegal gambling and liquor dens which were raided by the police. He got Naatiq killed.

Naatiq's murder inspired Shabir and Dawood to revolt against the Pathan gang. They seized control of some of the Pathan gang activities and began operating an independent gang called the Young Company that encroached the areas of the Pathan gang. Although Haji Mastan had warned both groups not to clash with each other, tensions reached to such an extent that in 1981, Samad Khan decided to eliminate Shabir and Dawood to regain control of the underworld in South Mumbai.

Shabir was already married and expecting his first child. He also had a girlfriend called Chitra, a prostitute at Congress House in Kamathipura.

On 12 February 1981, Shabir and Chitra drove out from Kamathipura in a Fiat car heading towards Bandra. They were unaware that the Pathan gang members were following them.

The chase began at Haji Ali, and the Pathans closed in on their target when the Fiat halted at a petrol pump opposite the Siddhi Vinayak temple in Prabhadevi. It was past midnight, and Shabir was aghast to see Samad Khan, Amirzada, Alamzeb and Jangrez Khan standing outside his car. Amirzada asked Chitra to step out of the car and leave the scene. The four men then pumped five bullets into Shabir, leaving him lifeless in the car.

An hour later the Pathans were at Pakmodia Street. The plan was to take Dawood by surprise even before the news of his brother’s death could reach him. But Dawood’s key associate Khaled Pehalwan who was guarding Pakmodia Street recognized the vehicle used by the Pathans. The colossal steel door to Dawood’s house was shut seconds before the rival gang resorted to indiscriminate firing. Gunshots rent the neighborhood as both gangs engaged in gunfire and abuse. Dawood escaped and planned to take revenge. He offered a big supari (contract for killing) to kill Samad, Amirzada and Alamzeb. The first one to be eliminated was Amirzada who was shot dead in the Mumbai sessions court in September 1983 by David Pardeshi, a member from the Bada Rajan gang. Alamzeb was gunned down in Vadodara by the Gujarat police in an encounter, rumored to have been engineered by Dawood Ibrahim. After Alamzeb's death, Dawood evaded police arrest and escaped to Dubai. Finally, in October 1984, Samad Khan was shot dead in south Mumbai by members of the Rama Naik gang.

Manoj Bajpai's character Zubair Imtiaz Haksar in the film, Shootout at Wadala was based on Shabir Ibrahim Kaskar. Shootout at Wadala initially premier the name as Shabir Ibrahim Kaskar on their promos. which later on changed to Zubair Imtiaz Haksar.