Inspector Madhukar Baburao Zende is a large man with a large voice. The day after he returned to Bombay with his trussed-up prize catch, he was booming out his thanks to a steady stream of visitors who came with bouquets to his ground-floor office in the Agripada police station.
He is two years short of 50 but, apart from the streaks of grey in his hair, looks a vigorous 40. "All those snacks in restaurants in Goa waiting for Sobhraj to turn up have done my figure no good," he says ruefully, pulling out a bill from the O'Coqueiro restaurant which shows that he spent nearly Rs 100 on a gimlet and fish curry and rice. 
