Mafia Queens of Mumbai

by Zaidi, Hussain S

  Ganga was surprised because Ramnik had always maintained that he had no relatives in the city; however, she agreed without making too much fuss. Ramnik’s aunt came to collect her from the lodge. The woman, who introduced herself as Sheela, did not make a good impression on Ganga. She was garishly dressed and always seemed to be chewing paan. Ramnik hailed a cab for them and made Ganga sit inside, with the promise of returning in a day.

  When they turned into the lane that housed Sheela maasi’s home, Ganga drew back in shock at the sight of many half-naked women walking around and peering over balconies. Sheela maasi, sensing Ganga’s discomfort, said, ‘Women dress differently in different areas of Mumbai.’

  ‘Which area is this?’ Ganga asked.

  ‘Kamathipura. Have you heard of it?’ Sheela maasi asked.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Good ... this is where I stay. You will be staying here for a while, too,’ she said with a smile.

  ‘No, I am here just for a day...’ Ganga said immediately, trying to assure herself.

  Sheela maasi chose not to reply, instead turning her head towards the window.

  When she got down from the cab, she saw curious eyes on her. Everyone in the area seemed to know Ramnik’s maasi; Ganga tried to stay calm, yet Ramnik’s absence worried her.

  Sheela maasi took her into a small room and asked Ganga to unpack and freshen up.

  ‘I don’t need to unpack. I am going tomorrow,’ Ganga said.

  Sheela maasi looked at her, and then finally said, ‘I can’t hide this from you any longer. I am not Ramnik’s maasi, I run a brothel.’

  There was a stinging moment of silence. Ganga was stunned that Ramnik had lied, but the enormity of the situation hadn’t yet sunk in. ‘Why am I here?’ she asked.

  ‘Ramnik sold you to us for five hundred rupees. He won’t be coming back; he has gone to Kathiawad.’

  ‘You are lying,’ Ganga screamed. She couldn’t believe Ramnik, her companion, the person she had trusted completely, had duped her.

  ‘What will I achieve by lying, Ganga? I know you are from a good family but it is your husband who has sold you to us.’

  ‘Why would Ramnik do something like this to me?’ she asked.

  ‘I don’t know—but now, you will have to listen to us.’

  ‘I won’t,’ Ganga said angrily and made an attempt to leave the room. But Sheela used all her strength and pulled her back inside.

  ‘Don’t take advantage of my goodness! You are in a brothel now and you are here to satisfy my clients. Don’t you dare try and run,’ Sheela said before walking out of the room and bolting it from the outside.

  Days passed; Ganga was beaten and starved because she spent all day crying. Ramnik was still nowhere to be seen and Ganga did not know whether to accept her fate or go home. She had already dishonoured her parents by eloping with Ramnik. Her father, who must have already become a subject of ridicule, would never accept her back. Further, she had other sisters in line for marriage; her family wouldn’t risk their futures for Ganga.

  Sheela also kept reminding her that, once the villagers of Kathiawad learnt that she had stayed at Kamathipura in Mumbai, they would ostracise her family. Mortified by the likely consequences, Ganga finally decided not to return home.

  The only other option left was death, which was almost impossible considering the number of people who kept an eye on her. Two weeks later, Ganga finally gave in. In any case, she thought, her body had already been violated and used by a conman, and there was no way she could erase those scars.

  Ganga called for Sheela and told her that she was ready to do whatever she wanted. An excited Sheela hugged her and assured her that the brothel would always take care of her.

  That very night, Ganga was sent for her own nath utaarna ceremony. Ramnik had not only lied to Ganga but also to Sheela. He had sold Ganga saying that she was still a virgin, and since Ganga was unaware of the rituals of the sex trade, she didn’t reveal this to Sheela.

  Ganga went through the nath utarna ceremony stoically. Deep down she cringed but cooperated fully with the seth, knowing that this was now her profession. To her luck, the seth was more than happy with her. After he had finished with her, he tipped her well and also gifted her a gold ring.

  On his way out, he had turned around and asked, ‘By the way what is your name?’

  For a moment she hesitated, and then replied, ‘Gangu.’ She had decided to do away with everything from her past. From that point on, Ganga became Gangu.

  Chapter 2

  THE PERVERTED PATHAN

  G

  angu quickly became one of the most sought-after paid commercial sex workers in Kamathipura. She shut away Kathiawad, Ramnik and everything associated with her past, refusing to think about that part of her life. Sethi from as far as Hyderabad, Kolkata and New Delhi specifically asked for her when they were in town. This came as no surprise to Sheela because although Gangu wasn’t the most attractive girl in her brothel, men spoke endlessly about her skills in bed.

  Gangu had also learned the knack of getting her clients to open their purse strings without getting emotionally involved with any of them. With the money she earned, Gangu would make gold jewellery for herself. This was her only indulgence, apart from the movies that she watched once in a while at a nearby cinema hall. A career in celluloid was now a distant dream for Gangu, but her craze for the movies hadn’t diminished. Sheela was aware of her indulgences but was tolerant because she was nervous about losing her cash cow.

  When Gangu was twenty-eight, a rowdy Pathan who had heard about the Kathiawadi from other men, barged into Sheela’s brothel one day, asking for Gangu. He was over six feet tall and massive compared to the usual clientele. Sheela was hesitant about letting him in to see Gangu but the man’s intimidating nature stopped her from saying anything. She reluctantly agreed, hoping that Gangu would put her expertise to good use and tactfully handle this uncouth client. However, the outcome was very different. The Pathan was very brutal with Gangu—she had never experienced such cruelty in bed; and then, he walked out of the brothel without paying Sheela as much as a paisa.

  Everyone in the brothel was shocked but no one, including Sheela, complained, fearing that he was connected to a dangerous group of Pathan gangsters in the area. The encounter incapacitated Gangu for over four days, leaving her in no state to entertain her clients. A distressed Sheela apologised to Gangu and told her that she’d ensure that this would never happen to her again.

  A month later, the Pathan returned, and this time he was very drunk. When Sheela saw him, she called for two men. However, they were no match for the Pathan, only serving to enrage him further. He stormed into Gangu’s room. She was with another client at the time, but the Pathan threw the man out naked and latched the door. Sheela grew frantic, helplessly banging on the door; she knew that she couldn’t involve the cops. This time when he left, the Pathan ensured that Gangu’s body was bruised and bitten all over.

  After the ordeal, Gangu had to be hospitalised and was forced to lie in her room like an invalid for weeks. Gangu was not only angry with herself for her helplessness but also with Sheela, when she learned that Sheela hadn’t done anything to solve her problem.

  After having a bitter argument with Sheela, Gangu finally took it upon herself to deal with the Pathan. Gangu realised that if she remained quiet now, it would set a precedent for bigger problems in the future. She began making enquiries about the man. Finally, through one of her clients, she learnt that he was called Shaukat Khan and was associated with the Karim Lala gang.

  Abdul Karim Khan, known as Karim Lala, was still a small-time gangster at the time. He was known for being respectful towards women. In those days, he headed a Pathan organisation called the Pakhtoon Jirgai Hind. Gangu felt that if anything had to be done, it would have to be through Karim Lala. The other girls, including Sheela, tried to dissuade her from meeting him because he was infamous for his activities and aggressiveness in south Mumbai, but she remained o
bstinate.

  One Friday afternoon, when Karim Lala had just finished offering his Jumma namaaz and was walking towards his home at Tahir Manzil in Lamington Road, Gangu accosted him. She had been waiting outside Baida Galli, the lane that led to his home.

  ‘Karim bhai, salaam. I need a small favour from you,’ she said.

  From her appearance, the dour Pathan figured that she was a commercial sex worker from the nearby area.

  ‘What is it about?’ he demanded, taken aback by her boldness and uncomfortable about talking to a sex worker on the road.

  ‘It is about one of your men.’

  Surprised, he said, ‘Come home, we will talk there. It doesn’t seem right to talk here,’ he said and marched down the lane, with Gangu following him.

  Karim Lala was averse to entertaining a sex worker in his house, and so he asked her to head towards his building’s terrace while he changed into his home clothes. Tea and snacks were sent up for her. Ten minutes later, when Karim Lala went up to his terrace, he noticed that Gangu hadn’t touched anything that had been served to her.

  ‘Why haven’t you eaten?’

  ‘If you have a problem with a person of my reputation stepping inside your home, then it would be wrong for me to dirty the crockery that comes from the kitchen of your house.’

  Karim Lala was speechless.

  ‘What is your name?’ he asked finally.

  ‘Gangu .. . I work in Kamathipura.’

  ‘What do you want from me?’

  ‘Bhai, I don’t know if you ever see faults in your own men and have ever punished them, especially if they have done something wrong to a person like me. But if you do, I am ready to serve you as your concubine for life,’ she said.

  Karim Lala’s face grew red; nobody had ever dared to talk to him like this. Yet he tried to stay calm and said, ‘I am a family man, so don’t ever make such an offer to me again. And concerning my men, if they have erred I’m ready to pull them up. But who is the person?’

  ‘Shaukat Khan. I have heard that he is in your gang.’

  ‘My gang .. . I don’t know of any such man.’

  ‘I’ve made enquiries ...’

  ‘Hmm .. . What has he done?’

  ‘He raped me twice in the last few weeks and hasn’t paid me for the services. I might be a prostitute but I am not an object that people can use whenever they feel like. Because of that man, I had to be hospitalised .. . he was very brutal to me ..,’ Gangu said and showed him the scars on her hands and arms.

  The scars were so horrific that Karim Lala actually put his head down. He was aghast at the cruelty that had been inflicted on her, that too by a Pathan who allegedly belonged to his group.

  ‘Gangu, the next time he comes to you, I want a message to be delivered to me. Keep him busy until I come. I will personally deal with him. Now you can go.’

  Gangu smiled and removed a small thread from her purse. ‘Karim bhai, it has been years since I tied a rakhi for anyone because ever since I was brought here, I never felt safe with any man. Today, by offering me protection, you have only reinstilled my faith in brotherhood.’

  The Pathan ganglord was amazed at Gangu’s impudence. A young woman, who just a few minutes ago had said that she was ready to be his mistress, was now telling him she wanted to make him her brother. He smiled and brought his hand forward and allowed her to tie the thread, saying ‘You have my word on this. From now on you are my sister.’

  Then he took a sweet from the snacks on the plate and fed her. ‘I hope you won’t complain now,’ he said. Gangu was elated.

  Karim Lala planted a mole right outside Sheela’s brothel in Kamathipura; this young man kept a check on all the customers who visited Gangu on a daily basis. For days together, there was no sign of Shaukat Khan; Gangu was disappointed—she hoped he would come so Karim Lala could put him in his place.

  It was three weeks before he came to the brothel again. Gangu sent a message through another sex worker to the mole, who in turn rushed to Karim Lala’s house on his cycle. Khan was more aggressive and vicious this time but Gangu decided to fully cooperate until Karim Lala came on the scene. In less than ten minutes, she heard a loud thumping on the door. ‘Open the door!’

  The voice, though unfamiliar, had an ominous tone to it. Angry at another attempt to stall him in the brothel, Khan slapped Gangu and got up. Little did he realise that he would be confronted by none other than Karim Lala himself. Gangu rushed to cover herself with a sheet.

  Shaukat Khan’s jaw dropped when he saw Lala and two other Pathans at the door with hockey sticks in their hands. He hurriedly put on his trousers and was looking for an escape, when Karim Lala dragged him out of the brothel. Then he started beating Khan up mercilessly with the hockey stick. Khan tried to stop him and also spoke to him in desperation in Pashtoon, accusing Karim Lala of going against his own race for a whore. This further angered Karim Lala, who kicked him hard in his stomach and knocked Khan on the head with the stick. ‘Don’t you dare call yourself a Pathan!’ Karim Lala thundered.

  Finally, when Karim Lala was satisfied that he had broken enough bones to render Khan an invalid for weeks, he stopped. ‘Gangu is my rakhi sister. The next time anyone treats her badly, I will kill them,’ he announced loudly, warning everyone in Kamathipura.

  From then on, things changed for Gangu. People in Kamathipura now started treating her differently. Her connection with the most feared gangster in south Mumbai put her on another pedestal altogether. Nobody, not even Sheela, dared to take advantage of her. An entirely new world opened up to Gangu. Under the tutelage of her rakhi brother, she began to develop strong ties with the Nagpada police and the underworld.

  When Sheela suddenly passed away some time later, people coaxed Gangu to stand for the customary local gharwali elections.* She immediately agreed, hoping that this would put paid to her job as a prostitute. It came as no surprise when she won the election and went on to become a brothel madam at a very young age.

  Gangu was now called Gangubai Kathewali, a distorted version of the word kothewali, which also means ‘performing sex workers’. Gangubai chose to call herself Kathewali, a last remaining association with her family name, Kathiawadi.

  *Brothel keepers are usually referred to as gharwalis. Red-light areas have their own hierarchy, and sex workers rise in stature if they win an election. A gharwali usually runs a certain number of pinjras (cages or compact beds) under her command.

  Chapter 3

  THE PROTECTOR

  G

  angubai Kathewali was brought back to the present by the sound of Madhu’s wailing. ‘Will you stop crying? People will think I’m torturing you,’ Gangubai said impatiently.

  ‘Please get me out of here,’ Madhu cried again.

  The old woman placed her hand on Madhu’s cheek and said, ‘Okay, just for a moment assume that I have allowed you to go .. . what will you do after that?’

  ‘I will go back to my village in Ratnagiri,’ Madhu replied immediately.

  ‘To whom?’

  ‘What kind of question is this? Of course, to my parents,’ the girl said. ‘Aye ladki, don’t you dare back-answer ... ’ Gangubai warned.

  The sixteen-year-old immediately apologised. Gangubai ignored her apology and continued. ‘You do realise that you have brought a lot of shame to your parents after eloping with your lover. If the people in your village find out that you were in Kamathipura, you will be an outcast.’ ‘My parents might accept me if I don’t tell them about this place.’ Madhu retorted. ‘What will you tell them then?’ she asked, surprised by the girl’s confidence.

  ‘I don’t know ...’

  There was a long pause, following which Gangubai said, ‘Like you, even I had run away. I was your age when my husband sold me off .. . I never returned because if my family learnt that I had come from Kamathipura, they would have killed me. There was no option but to make this place my home. And even if you do return to your family, what’s to stop them from ostracising you? T
here was a girl here, Vinita, who thought her family was different and went back to them.’ Gangubai was quiet for a few seconds before she said, ‘We heard a few months later from one of the boys in her village that she was the victim of an honour killing.’

  Madhu began weeping again. ‘Does that mean I have to stay here forever?’ she asked.

  ‘I didn’t say that. I just want to know if you will be able to convince your parents.’

  ‘I can at least try,’ Madhu said, adding, ‘I realise I have wronged, and I have already paid the price for this. Just give me one opportunity to ask for forgiveness; if I fail, I will take up a small job in Ratnagiri but I don’t want to live here.’

  Gangubai looked at Madhu’s face, as if trying to read her mind. After a few minutes she got up, opened the door and called out for Madam Rashmi.

  ‘Let her go,’ Gangubai told Madam Rashmi when she entered, ‘she is not meant to stay here.’ Madam Rashmi was shocked. ‘But we have paid a thousand rupees for her. How can we let her go?’

  ‘I am aware of that. You can attribute it to business loss. In future, I don’t want any girl being pushed around against her will. Do you understand?’ Gangubai asked. ‘Just ensure that she is put on the right bus for Ratnagiri. If possible, send Pappu to drop her.’ Saying this Gangubai left the room, leaving no opportunity for Madhu to thank her.

  The news of Gangubai’s gesture spread like wildfire through the narrow lanes of Kamathipura. She was now known as the only brothel madam who did not give priority to business and money but to women. Madhu’s flight also set a precedent for several other women, who now approached Gangubai. If their cases were genuine, Gangubai allowed them to leave; if not, she ensured that their escape was improbable. She had come to control Kamathipura’s brothels with an iron fist and her popularity among the people there soared with time. She protected the sex workers from men like Shaukat Khan who either abused the women or took advantage of them by promising them marriage or did not pay them for sex. These men feared Gangubai for her connections with the underworld and the police; the sex workers, on the other hand, revered her as a mother, calling her Ganguma. Her victory in the bade* gharwali elections only strengthened this position.