Dreaded and daring

 Well, you wouldn’t associate the latter qualities with brothel owners, bootleggers and police informers. It takes the canny eye of senior journalist S Hussain Zaidi, who has “written about all kinds of criminals over the years”, to compile the extraordinary, never-heard-before and powerful stories of 13 women from the underworld in Mumbai, and to declare with firm conviction that when it comes to gender dynamics, it is easier to be a Dawood Ibrahim than a Sapna Didi, a gutsy and beautiful woman who stood up against Dawood and was given a dastardly death by the don’s acolytes.

Growing up in small towns in India — be it Kathiawar in Gujarat or Dharmapuri in Tamil Nadu — the 13 women whose lives and crimes Zaidi, with Jane Borges, chronicles in Mafia Queens of Mumbai began with very little exposure to crime and cruelty. What they learned was totally on the job. Without seeming to romanticise their exploits or turn them into poster girls of crime, Zaidi and Borges offer perceptive glimpses of the women’s complex minds to show how they pushed the boundaries of dominant moral codes of their times.

Desist from being judgmental by branding the women ‘avenging angels’, ‘mobsters’ molls’ or ‘femme fatales’. Instead, allow the graphic drama to take you on a gripping journey to meet the women who broke through the glass ceiling of brutal masculinity called Mumbai’s Underworld.

Filmmaker Vishal Bhardwaj sets the tone for the rollercoaster ride with his lucid Foreword, making a telling observation that the writing is “so visual that it makes you feel as if you are watching a movie, intercutting between various tracks”. The stories, in sepia as well as in Eastman colour, run through numerous time passages: Bombay during the Second World War to Bombay at the time of the 1993 Hindu-Muslim riots. 

The 13 women, without exception, showed confidence — chutzpah, almost — by refusing to succumb to fear or failure. They were determined not to sell themselves short. They quickly discovered that it only takes guts, hard work and perhaps a little oustide help to get a grip on a situation — however hopeless it may seem. With this, they made their own luck.

 Take, for instance, the shrewd Jenabai Chavalwali/Daaruwali. She did not go looking for opportunity. No doubt, crime was the way she chose to transcend her poverty. But in her case, opportunity came to her and announced “It’s time”. Like the Prohibition in 1939, which helped her amass enormous wealth as a bootlegger and learn the tricks of the trade from none other than Varadharajan Mudaliar, Karim Lala and Haji Mastan. Jenabai had powerful contacts but, in truth, she worked harder and smarter than the next man to leverage those contacts and soon became Apa (elder sister) to Mastan and Maasi (aunt) to Dawood.

Or Ashraf Khan, who transformed herself from happy housewife to cold and calculative Sapna Didi, inflicting deep and damaging cuts in Dawood’s businesses across Mumbai, to avenge lost love. The way she got the notorious gangster Hussain Ustara to teach her everything from loading and firing a gun to kickboxing is a story worth reading and re-reading. Was Ustara plain jealous of her gumption or was he plain arrogant in his confidence that if he could not bring Dawood down, a less seasoned woman would have no chance of success? Go ahead and read Zaidi’s take.

Of course, the risks these women took proved too risky in the end, but it was not for lack of fear or intelligence. All the 13 women clearly enjoyed applying their “eye” in new ways. They discovered abilities they never knew they had. They kept their feet planted firmly on Mumbai’s terra firma as they masterminded sensational crimes across the world. It was Yves Saint Laurent who famously said, “The most beautiful makeup on a woman is passion, but cosmetics are easier to buy.” All 13 women featured in this book truly embody his wise words.

Mafia queens of mumbai
S Hussain Zaidi with Jane Borges
Tranquebar,
2011, pp 290,
Rs 250