The Mumbai police on Sunday arrested a Bangladeshi man for allegedly stabbing actor Saif Ali Khan at his Bandra residence three days back during a prima facie burglary bid and interrogating him to unravel “international conspiracy”, if any.
IMAGE: Bangladeshi national Shariful Islam Shehzad Mohammad Rohilla Amin Fakir arrested in Saif Ali Khan attack case from Maharashtra’s Thane on Sunday. Photograph: ANI on X
The preliminary investigation suggests that the man was unaware that he had entered a Bollywood star’s house and his intention was theft, a senior police official told reporters.
A court remanded the accused, Shariful Islam Shehzad Mohammad Rohilla Amin Fakir (30), in five-day police custody after observing that the police’s contention of an international conspiracy cannot be ruled out.
The breakthrough came in the early morning hours when the police traced Shehzad to a labour camp in a forested area in Thane based on the information provided by a labour contractor.
Multiple teams of the police and the crime branch worked on several inputs and analysed footage from several CCTV cameras in the last three days to track down Khan’s attacker.
The probe saw police picking up two lookalikes of a suspect captured in a CCTV grab of Khan’s building in the last two days for questioning.
The accused, later identified as Shehzad, was seen outside Dadar railway station three times from where he went to Worli Koliwada, the police officer said citing the investigation.
“The police examined hundreds of CCTV footage and found out that the attacker had visited a labour contractor in the area,” he said.
He said the labour contractor gave the police details about the attacker, and based on his direction, the police traced him to a labour camp in a forested area in Thane around 2:30-3 AM.
Shehzad was nabbed at Hiranandani Estate on Ghodbandar Road.
The police officer said Shehzad had changed his name to Vijay Das after entering India illegally from Bangladesh.
The police told the court that the accused was a Bangladeshi national and they needed to find the real motive behind attacking the actor.
The police also told the court they needed to find out if there was an international conspiracy linked to the case.
Accepting the police’s contention after perusing documents on record, the court said the prosecution’s submission of international conspiracy “cannot be said to be impossible”.
However, defence lawyer Sandeep D Sherkhane contended his client was residing in the country for several years and has vital documents (for staying in the country) and that his family is also living in India.
The case has been hyped because of the presence of actor Saif Ali Khan, the defence lawyer further submitted.
As per the preliminary probe, Shehzad sneaked into the Bollywood star’s apartment, in the Satguru Sharan building in Bandra, in the early hours of January 16 with the intention of theft, the police had said.
Khan (54) was stabbed multiple times in the attack, after which he underwent a five-hour surgery at nearby Lilavati Hospital.
Preliminary investigation suggests that Shehzad climbed the stairs to the seventh-eighth floor of the building where Khan and his actor wife Kareena Kapoor live with their children and domestic staff.
“He entered the duct area, climbed to the 12th floor using a pipe and entered the actor’s flat through a bathroom window. He then came out from the bathroom, where the actor’s staff spotted him, leading to the chain of events that culminated into the knife attack,” the official said.
He said the accused started arguing with a nanny in Khan’s house and demanded Rs 1 crore. Hearing the ruckus, Khan arrived at the spot and held the attacker from the front.
“The accused was startled and stabbed Khan in his back. Khan later locked the flat believing the accused was pinned inside. However, he managed to flee from the same area from where he had entered,” the official said.
He said police recovered a hammer, screwdriver, nylon rope and other materials from his bag, which suggests he may have criminal antecedents.
The accused realised that he had attacked a Bollywood star only after seeing television news and social media posts, the official said.
After fleeing Khan’s flat, Shehzad slept at a bus stop in Bandra till 7 am before boarding a train.
“He slept at a bus stop near Patwardhan Garden in Bandra (West) till 7 am on January 16 after the incident. Later he boarded a train and reached Worli (in central Mumbai),” the official said.
Meanwhile, another official claimed Shehzad got time to flee as a detection personnel from Bandra police station took the CCTV digital video recorder (DVR) of Khan’s building, and these were not shared with the Mumbai Crime Branch.
The police said Shehzad hails from Jhalokathi district, also called Jhalakathi, in southern Bangladesh. He has been staying in Mumbai and adjoining areas for the past five months doing petty jobs, including at a housekeeping agency.
Shehzad has been charged under Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita sections 311 (robbery or dacoity with the intent to cause grievous hurt or death), 331(4) (house-breaking) and other offences as well as provisions of the Passport Act, the official said.
A detailed probe has begun into how he managed to enter the country illegally, the kind of documents he possesses and how he obtained them, the official said.
Meanwhile, actor Soha Ali Khan said on Sunday that her brother Saif Ali Khan is “recovering well” from the injuries.
“We are very very happy that he is recovering well. We are thankful, we feel blessed and grateful that it wasn’t any worse. Thank you for all your wishes,” Soha told reporters on the sidelines of an event in Mumbai.
