NEW DELHI: Indian news channel CNN-NEWS18 on Wednesday claimed that it has tracked down India's most wanted fugitive Dawood Ibrahim at his Pakistan-based location.
“CNN-NEWS18 has secured clinching video evidence of Dawood Ibrahim's presence in Pakistan, a claim denied by Islamabad for 23 long years,” the news channel said in a statement released here.
The channel reportedly has used two Pakhtun men whose “names were withheld for safety reasons” to identify Dawood's Karachi-based residence with address bungalow No. D-13 Block 4 Clifton.
The location matches with one of the five addresses mentioned by India in its dossier to Pakistan.
The channel claimed to have checked all five addresses of Dawood mentioned in India's dossier to Pakistan, “Only one of the addresses in Karachi, D-13, Block 4, Clifton, was in a high security zone,” it said.
“Starting at Clifton Marquee, a banquet hall named after the affluent Karachi locality where Dawood lives, the CNN-News18 team stopped every 100 metres, asking about Dawood Ibrahim's house. All those asked pointed to the same address D-13 Block 4 Clifton,” the channel said in the statement.
“They (two Pakhtun men) made four rounds separately from different directions and spotted the house of Dawood Ibrahim. During the third round of recce, they checked about Dawood Ibrahim from a streetside stall,” the statement added.
The news channel also claimed to have spoken to police officers in Karachi and the security guard at Dawood’s mansion, “all of whom confirmed that Dawood has been living in Clifton”.
The channel asserted that its “evidence is proof of how Pakistan has sheltered India’s most wanted terrorist”.
“CNN-News18 investigation reveals that Dawood’s presence in Karachi is common knowledge, which contradicts the constant denial by a series of governments in Pakistan of Dawood’s base there,” the channel said.