Chhota Rajan is alive, getting treated: Delhi Police, AIIMS refute reports of gangster's death

Underworld don Chhota Rajan is alive and getting treated at a Delhi hospital for COVID-19 complication, the Delhi Police and Delhi's AIIMS hospital said on Friday after reports surfaced that the dreaded gangster succumbed to coronavirus while undergoing medical treatment.

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NEW DELHI: The Delhi Police and Delhi's AIIMS hospital on Friday denied that underworld gangster Chhota Rajan has died due to the deadly coronavirus COVID-19 infection. Chhota Rajan, 61, was admitted to Delhi's Delhi's All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) on April 26 after he tested positive for COVID-19.

Several reports surfaced today that the Mumbai underworld gangster, who was undergoing treatment at the AIIMS after his condition deteriorated, died due to COVID-19 related complications in the afternoon. However, the police and AIIMS hospital dismissed the report and stated that he is alive and is being treated. 

"News of death of Tihar jail inmate Rajendra Sadashiv Nikalje @ Chhota Rajan s/o Sadashiv Nikalje is wrong. He was found  COVID-19 positive in Tihar Jail on 22.04.2021 and admitted in AIIMS on 24.04.2021," DGP Tihar tweeted today.

News agency ANI too reported that underworld don Chhota Rajan is still alive, citing an AIIMS official.

Underworld don Chhota Rajan is still alive. He is admitted at AIIMS for treatment of #COVID19: AIIMS official

(File photo) pic.twitter.com/gvAgKDuPqC

— ANI (@ANI) May 7, 2021

Rajan, 61, was lodged in solitary confinement in one of the biggest cells at Delhi's high-security Tihar Jail. He was not even allowed to interact with other prisoners due to security concerns. However, officials suspect that he may have contracted the virus from some asymptomatic jail officer.

The dreaded gangster, who was once part of the Mumbai serial blasts case accused Dawood Ibrahim led D-Company, had tested positive for Covid-19 and was then admitted to the AIIMS. He was deported from Bali, Indonesia, in 2015. Notably, all the criminal cases registered against him in Mumbai were transferred to the CBI and a Delhi-based special court was constituted to try him in the cases.

Chhota Rajan was facing around 70 criminal cases pertaining to extortion and murder in Mumbai. He was convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment in 2018 in a murder case of journalist Jyotirmoy Dey.

Last month, a special CBI court in Mumbai had acquitted Rajan and his aide in connection with the murder of Hanif Kadawala who was an accused in the 1993 Mumbai serial bomb blasts case.