Salem's journey from bhai to neta

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Mumbai: Underworld don Abu Salem may be cooling his heels in Mumbai's Arthur Road jail but his ambitions show no signs of cooling off. In fact now Salem has chalked up plans, which may soon see him walking the corridors of power.

A small-time cloth merchant better described as a pheriwalla, that is what Abu Salem started his life as but twists in the tale saw him moving on to the underworld of Mumbai.

Salem finally took premature retirement when the CBI managed to poach him from a Lisbon jail but he is still not at a dead end even while behind bars he is readying his cards for the next game — a spell in Uttar Pradesh politics.

"We have spoken to Salem about this and he has expressed his desire to contest the elections. Some political parties have also started to approach us for UP elections,” Salem's lawyer, Rashid said.

As far as the constituency goes Salem is keeping his options open although indications are he is eyeing a seat close to his hometown of Saraimir.

“He may contest from Mobarakpur in Azamgarh. The other areas could be Nizampur or Saraimir, which is his hometown,” Rashid said.

With UP Assembly polls in Uttar Pradesh just around the corner, regional parties like the Bharatiya Samaj Party from Eastern Uttar Pradesh consider Salem to be a prize catch.

Close associates of Salem say that he is a thinking man and after being in news for all the wrong reasons he is now aspiring to don a new mantle, a complete transformation from a bhai to a neta.