TOUGH Lad of the week: Koose Muniswamy Veerappan

Unlike the other tough lads that have been listed here, Veerappan is someone who I would not actually like to meet in real life. He was an Indian robber bandit who robbed and killed at will for 30 years before he was captured and killed in 2004. He was wanted in connection with 184 murders, smuggling offenses worth over $25 million, and kidnapping dozens of people, including one of India’s biggest actors, who he held hostage for 109 days until his ransom was paid. This was a man who just oozed tough cuntery.

The pot belly and incredible moustache alone qualify him for the list.

Veerappan was seen to have a Robin Hood type image across India, partially because he helped out many villagers with money, and also because he originally went into war against the police because he felt they were responsible for forcing his brother and sister to commit suicide when he was a young man. The villagers hid and protected him on many occasions, though it was also known that he would punish anyone who reported his whereabouts or assisted police. Veerappan was known to almost always operate with a gang, and at some points had hundreds of loyal men following him. 

There was a special task force set up to catch Veerappan, and he managed to evade them for 12 straight years, and also attack and kill some of their number on several occasions. After the task force was set up in 1992, one of Veerappan’s lieutenants was captured and killed; Veerappan answered this by attacking the police station in force, killing 13 police officers and raiding the shit out of their weapons and ammunition. In this same year he lured the head of the task force and 28 other police into a trap using a fake informant, and he and his men threw bombs and hand grenades at them from cover, killing all 29 of them. The next year he killed 17 more police personnel, and also blew up a bus, killing all 43 passengers, including additional police. 

Veerappan was killed in 2004 after he was captured by police. It is not known exactly how he died, because the police released several versions of the story of how they laid a trap and killed him when he fired at them, but Veerappans wife argues all these, claiming that he was captured and killed in police custody. Either way, thousands of people turned up to his funeral, which was not held in his home town because the authorities feared people might have inspired to uprise upon hearing his incredibly tough life story. 

They took his life, but not his glorious, glorious moustache.

My first nomination for TOUGH CUNT of the century (20^th).