Dawood negotiating with Centre for his return: MNS chief Raj Thackeray

Mumbai: Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) chief Raj Thackeray on Thursday claimed that fugitive gangster Dawood Ibrahim is keen to return to India and is negotiating with the Centre, which wants to take credit for his return.

“I have information that Dawood Ibrahim wants to come back to India, as he is unwell. He has been negotiating with the Centre,” said Mr Thackeray.

“Once he is ready to return to India, the Narendra Modi government will blow its own trumpet over it. It will be a political move of the BJP,” he said.

Mr Thackeray made the claim against the backdrop of the recent arrest of Dawood’s brother Iqbal Kaskar over extortion charges.

After losing all the major polls in the last three years, the MNS chief on Thursday tried to make a comeback by opening a Facebook account to communicate with his followers. In his speech, Mr Thackeray targeted Prime Minister Narendra Modi. “I was the first to support Modi as the Prime Minister of India because I thought that he would do something. But we see only events and nothing else. They talked about Make in India, what happened next? They came up with ‘Swachh Bharat’ and took photos cleaning roads. But what happened with the scheme?" he said.