India's most wanted bandit is expected to demand an amnesty for his crimes, which are thought to include over 150 murders, in return for the release of a south Indian film star he kidnapped at the weekend.
Officials in the southern city of Bangalore yesterday said the bandit Veerappan, who is over 60 and suffers from asthma, abducted 72-year old actor Rajnikant from his forest home on Sunday night.
State Chief minister Mr S.M. Krishna said Mr Nakkeeran Gopal, the editor of a local Tamil daily who had earlier brokered peace with Veerappan, and who helped in the release of kidnapped forest officials, had been dispatched as the government's emissary.
Police officials said Mr Gopal entered the thick jungles in the adjoining Karnataka and Tamil Nadu states early yesterday evening on his way to Veerappan's hideout.
Mr Krishna said the hunt for Veerappan, involving hundreds of policemen, had been suspended to prevent the bandit from panicking.
In an audio cassette sent to Mr Krishna, Veerappan said he wanted to hold talks with a government nominee. Unlike his earlier kidnappings, he made no ransom demand. Rajkumar, who has appeared in more than 200 films in the local Kannada language, is revered in the state.
Besides "total amnesty" for himself and his associates, Veerappan, in earlier negotiations, had also wanted a film to be made about him similar to Bandit Queen, which portrays the life of Phoolan Devi, a female bandit who surrendered in the mid-1980s after brokering a deal with the government.
He also wanted to keep his weapons and be given a mansion and a large sum of money.
The bandit, who now has a $30,000 bounty on his head, began as an ivory and sandalwood poacher nearly two decades ago. Since then he and his gang have killed almost 150 people, including 51 policemen and 10 forest officials.
His most notorious attack was in the early 1990s, when he blew up 21 policemen in a land-mine attack.
Forest officials said Veerappan had killed more than 2,000 elephants for ivory - worth $350,000 - and cut thousands of precious sandalwood trees in Karnataka and Tamil Nadu worth some $3 million.
He was arrested in 1986 but escaped after killing five policemen and a forest guard.
Meanwhile, rioters protesting against Rajkumar's abduction yesterday paralysed Bangalore, the country's hi-tech capital. One man was knifed to death by protesters in central Bangalore as thousands of Rajkumar's fans took to the streets, destroying shops and offices. Officials said more than 5,000 policemen had been deployed and road and rail traffic were at a standstill.
Bangalore, with a population of over five million people, is among the top five information technology centres in the world.
Information technology executives estimate the city has lost $200 million in revenue since rioting began on Monday and that it has plunged the "software development chain", especially in the US, into chaos.