NEW DELHI: India's bandit king died as he lived: in dense forests at the tip of a bullet. For more than two decades, Koose Muniswamy Veerappan eluded hundreds of police officers devoted to nothing but his capture.

Wanted for the murder of 130 people and for butchering 2,000 elephants, Veerappan taunted state governments, striking defiant poses in combat fatigues with his muzzle-loading rifle and his luxuriant handlebar moustache.

While his profile had never been higher, his powers had faded. Life on the run had taken a heavy toll on the 57-year-old. An ageing brigand with asthma and a bad stomach, he had recently lost the sight of his left eye, reducing considerably his ability to pass unnoticed through the south Indian forest.

His condition had made it easy for undercover police to infiltrate Veerappan's gang and convince the criminal mastermind to take a ride to a rural hospital.

Inside the van lounged Veerappan and three of his closest associates. Just before midnight on Monday, on a deserted jungle road, dozens of policemen ambushed and killed the outlaw and his henchmen in a 20-minute shoot-out.

"He had already shaved off his moustache to conceal his identity. But we had lured him into a trap. We ordered him to surrender but he refused. It was a pukka operation," said Jyoti Prakash Mirgi, the chief of Karnataka's special task force, who co-directed operations with his counterpart in neighbouring Tamil Nadu.

Although Veerappan had a $1m bounty on his head, a figure almost unheard of in India, this amount is a fraction of the 1.5 billion rupees (Pounds Sterling 19m) state governments have spent since 1990 hunting for him.

Such is Veerappan's myth that hundreds of locals went to the local hospital to ask police to put his body on display.

The legend of the bandit king began 40 years ago when forest rangers beat up a short, wiry young boy for trying to sneak after ivory poachers. A few years later Veerappan shot his first elephant and joined a notorious hunter's gang. Before long he had taken over the operation, and he committed his first murder in 1969.

Despite this bloody beginning, Veerappan was notable for little more than his facial hair. To many officials he was just another small-time poacher holed up in the woods. It was only when ivory sales were banned in 1986 that Veerappan began to display the ruthlessness, cunning and financial acumen that set him apart from other criminals.

His remarkable escape from behind bars that year by killing four policemen and an unarmed forest official in their sleep alerted state governments to his cold-bloodedness.

By the late 1980s he had made a small fortune illegally cutting and smuggling sandalwood. Veerappan also dabbled in extortion, demanding mon-thly payments from the lime quarry owners in the hills overlooking his jungle lair.

This activity soon alarmed the southern Indian states of Veerappanataka and Tamil Nadu, which straddled Veerappan's domain. The 1.78 million tall charismatic outlaw with an excellent shot became the target of forest rangers from both states.

It was not long before the hunters became the hunted. Having spent his entire adult life in the forest, Veerappan was peerless in the art of jungle craft. He and his henchmen often mimicked the birds and deer in a system of warning signals that helped them dodge the authorities.

Policeman, officials, even rival gangs were eliminated in vicious killing sprees. Veerappan once captured a senior forest official, beheaded him and hacked off his hands. He tied grenades to five policemen and blew them up in revenge for the capture of his gang members. He is also said to have strangled his own daughter.

Most of his guns and equipment, including automatic rifles, were stolen from the police. Veerappan's gang ambushed patrols, made bombs and planted land-mines, blowing up official vehicles.

Aware of his growing cult of personality, Veerappan cultivated the image of a romantic, gun-toting champion of the Tamil people and begun communicating to the outside world via taped messages and brief interviews with favoured journalists.

He described his kidnappings and killings in detail, but depicted them as a righteous effort to avenge outrages committed by the police.

In one particularly gruesome passage he recounted keeping the head of a victim as a "souvenir". Veerappan saw himself as a legendary Robin Hood figure, protecting villagers who depended on illegally hunting elephants and cutting sandalwood for survival.

His wife Muthulakshmi once said: "Many may fear him but they also love him. He is always just, never misuses his power, helps out the villagers in their times of need (and) metes out instant justice to wrongdoers." Veerappan's media strategy also appeared to rest upon making politicians look helpless. Several times state governments accepted terms of his surrender, which included cash for the rehabilitation of his relatives and a minimal prison term for Veerappan himself in a special prison camp. India's most-wanted also demanded that a feature film be made about his life, and at one point insisted he would direct the film himself.

Perhaps his most audacious criminal enterprise was to abduct south India's most famous film star, Rajkumar, in 2000. In what appeared a calculated move, Veerappan sought to inflame ethnic tensions between two of the largest communities in India: Tamils and the people of Karnataka. For the latter, Rajkumar was a cinematic god.

The 100-day hostage crisis convulsed India and provoked rioting in Karnataka. Tamil newspaper offices were pelted with stones, schools closed and bus services were suspended. At least one fan committed suicide.

Veerappan's demands for the release of Rajkumar read like a political manifesto for ethnic Tamils, with calls for the release of Tamil guerrillas and for statutes of Tamil poets to be erected in Karnataka.

Despite this high-minded ransom note, the bandit eventually accepted 4.1 million dollars in cash and released the ageing matinee idol, who had high blood pressure and weak knees.

Veerappan's next high-profile victim, a former minister, was not so lucky. His body was found two years ago on a roadside, riddled with bullets, after three months of being held captive by Veerappan.

Recently more hi-tech methods were being deployed to track Veerappan. Armed with assault rifles and machine guns, police used night vision goggles, a global positioning system and helicopters to scour the jungle region.

"He was not mad, only extremely suspicious and alert," said Ajay Jha, one of the few reporters to have interviewed Veerappan. "The guy could find his way through the forest in darkness and survive for weeks without food. But this man was nearly 60 years old. One has to ask why it took so long to capture him."-Dawn/The Guardian News Service.