Gang rivalries in the 1980s–90s turned Mumbai’s streets into crime zones, with extortion, encounters, and the 1993 blasts embedding fear into everyday life.
Outlook’s 1995 “Bombay Gang Wars” issue traced mafia lineages and exposed the dangerous nexus between business, aviation, and organized crime.
By 2025, street violence has receded.
In the Mumbai of the 1980s and 1990s, fear had a sound. It was the crack of gunfire outside a cinema hall, the screech of tyres after a hit, the evening news whispering names everyone knew but never said too loudly. The city’s underbelly was no longer hidden, it bled into everyday life.
Gang rivalries turned footpaths into crime scenes and made the idea of “wrong place, wrong time” terrifyingly real. From builders to Bollywood producers, no one was untouched. Extortion calls arrived like clockwork, and encounters became a grim shorthand for justice. After the 1993 bomb blasts, Mumbai learned that its gang wars weren’t just about territory, they had the power to shake the city’s soul.
Outlook Magazine in its November 29, 1995 edition titled ‘Bombay Gang Wars’ explored the dynamics behind the rise of the gang wars in India’s financial capital. In the article titled The Mafia: A Brief History, it scanned the history of mafia leaders like Haji Mastan, Dawood, Karim Lala and Varadarajan Mudaliar.
Veteran journalist Ajith Pillai looked at how the thriving nexus between Mumbai’s business community and the underworld receives a jolt as patrons of the mafia increasingly become the targets of intense inter-gang rivalry. In the article titled The Seven-minute Ambush, the magazine looked at the life and death of Thakiyuddin Wahid, founder and managing director of the now-defunct East-West Airlines, the first scheduled private airline in the country and how he was murdered in Mumbai’ gang war scene.
Fast forward to 2025, and the streets feel calmer, almost deceptively so. The dons who once ruled by fear are either dead, jailed, or exiled, their empires dismantled by relentless policing and global scrutiny.
