Extradition of Ravi Pujari from Senegal may face delay due to a fresh complaint of fraud

A recent criminal complaint filed by a Senagalese citizen for a financial fraud may delay the court proceedings of India’s request.

Ravi Pujari

New Delhi: Fugitive Ravi Pujari is trying every trick to impede his extradition from Senegal where he got arrested in January this year after 15 years of run. After pretending to be a Burkina Faso citizen on the basis of a false passport, he found another maneuver to evade facing Indian law. Ahead of a court hearing on India’s extradition request in a Dakar court on May 15th, a complaint was filed against Pujari by a Senegalese citizen complaining a financial fraud worth several million CFA francs in the country. According to sources, this is a criminal complaint and is intended only to benefit Pujari. As per local laws, the court is obliged to dispose the complaint before considering a possible extradition of him to India. Senegalese authorities have informed Indian officials about this complaint. However, Indian authorities handling the matter are hopeful that such delaying tactics will not pass through in the courts. Underworld don Ravi Pujari has an Interpol Red Corner Notice against him since 2002. He kept changing locations across continents to avoid arrest for past one and a half decade. Recently, based on an intelligence tip-off from the Indian agencies, Pujari was picked up by Senegal Police from a barber shop in the capital city of Dakar. He has multiple criminal cases registered against him in Karnataka, Maharashatra, Gujarat and Kerala. India doesn’t have an extradition treaty with the West African nation Senegal. However, to get the custody of this most wanted criminal, Indian government invoked convention under the United Nations Office on Drugs & Crime (UNODC) where the extradition of such fugitive don can be drawn out between the two-member countries. In order to expedite his extradition, the Ministry of External Affairs has sent a comprehensive dossier of all the criminal cases against Pujari to Senegal. For the purpose, details of all the cases registered against him by the Maharashtra, Gujarat and Kerala police were sent to the Ministry of Home Affairs for preparing the dossier and sharing it with the MEA. The 50-year-old don is chargesheeted in several criminal cases under concerned sections of the Indian Penal Code for extortion (384), kidnapping for ransom (364), murder (302) and criminal intimidation (506) among other IPC sections.