Abu Salem

Mumbai, July 24: Abu Salem was today attacked by fellow gangster Mustafa Dossa with a sharp spoon during a brawl in Arthur Road Jail.

Prison officials said the inmates, who were part of Dawood Ibrahim’s gang, had an old rivalry.

Jail sources said a quarrel broke out this morning minutes after Salem was moved from cell 1 to cell 10 that houses Dossa and others.

Salem was shifted to Dossa’s cell because renovation work was on in his cell, a jail official said.

Dossa and Salem first had a heated argument. Then Dossa reportedly grabbed a spoon lying in the cell and slashed Salem with its sharper edge.

With a bleeding cheek, Salem was taken out of the barracks by panicking prison officials and put in another cell.

A doctor treated the 43-year-old in the prison for the cut. “He suffered a gash in his right cheek. We requested the court to allow Salem to be treated in JJ Hospital and the court has granted permission. Jail authorities haven’t communicated yet when he would be moved,” said Salem’s nephew, lawyer Rashid Ansari.

Additional commissioner (crime) Deven Bharti said: “They (Salem and Dossa) share an old rivalry and the fight is a result of that.”

But a police source said the argument and subsequent fight started because Salem told jail authorities that Dossa was getting better facilities than him.

The jail also houses Pakistani gunman and 26/11 attacker Ajmal Kasab but he has been kept in an isolated bomb-proof cell, guarded round the clock by the Indo-Tibetan Border Police. Kasab’s government-appointed counsel K.P. Pawar said Kasab was “safe and secure”.

Salem and Dossa are both accused in the 1993 Bombay serial blasts case. Dossa’s brother Mohammed Dossa is a prime accused in the case.

Salem, who supplied an AK-56 rifle to actor Sanjay Dutt, was a courier for Dawood in 1993. He was later named in the murders of T-Series owner Gulshan Kumar, builder Pradeep Jain and Manisha Koirala’s secretary Ajit Dewani.

Salem was extradited from Protugal in 2005 with his girlfriend Monica Bedi.

Dossa was deported from Dubai in 2003 for his role in the smuggling and transportation of RDX and weapons.

Though they have been languishing at the Arthur Road jail for years, Salem and Dossa continue to await trial in the 1993 serial blasts case.