Top criminal Sanjidul Islam Emon yesterday confessed to his involvement in seven murders committed between 1994 and 2002.
On the first day of his eight-day remand, the hardened criminal also told the interrogators that the first murder he committed was of his friend-turned-enemy Pang Babul's, CID sources said.
Babul stabbed him (Emon) during a fight in Hazaribagh as he refused to let Babul have his motorbike, Emon said adding that he killed Babul in 1993 in Dhanmondi, a year after the brawl.
A few days later, Babul's friend Rafiq and his gang shot dead Sumon, the younger brother of Emon, in reprisal, he said.
The CID (Criminal Investigation Department) formed a seven-member team yesterday for interrogating him and Ishaq Ali, another criminal deported from India along with him on Friday.
The others who fell victim to Emon's wrath are Bangladesh Chhatra League leader Ashru in 2002, Titu in 1993 in Khilkhet, Himel of Mohammadpur, Freedom Party leader Mohiuddin, Awlad Hossain at Rayerbazar and Faridpur BNP leader Liakat Hossain at a community centre at Dhanmondi.
Besides, members of his gang shot dead film actor Sohel Chowdhury at a Gulshan bar in 1998, although he was not present there at the time, Emon said.
"He has almost willingly admitted to us of having connections in seven killings in the city," said a CID official wishing not to be named.
The top listed criminal also said that his main income was from extortion in different parts of the city, particularly from Hazaribagh, Dhanmondi and Elephant Road areas. His accomplices used to send him the extorted money to India through hundi, he added.
Emon said that he had carried out the criminal activities, including extortion, in close cooperation with Monir Hussain, younger brother of former BNP lawmaker Nasiruddin Ahmed Pintu.
He earlier admitted that it was Pintu who had introduced him to the underworld of Dhaka.
Meanwhile, Ishaq told the law enforcers that he turned an informant of the Kolkata police to avoid arrest and used to supply them information about Indian criminals hiding in Bangladesh.
Based on his reports, the Indian police arrested infamous criminal Dakat Shahid, also a close associate of Ishaq, from Puri.