Karachi, the sprawling Pakistani port city, functions in this book as the remote command center of the Mumbai underworld, the place from which Chhota Shakeel orchestrates assassinations, conducts virtual love affairs, and directs the violence that shapes the lives of the women at the heart of these narratives. It is the unseen hand, the distant voice of power that reaches across the Arabian Sea to decide who lives and who dies in the lanes of Mumbai. While the book's primary geography is the teeming, crime-ridden neighborhoods of Mumbai, Karachi emerges as a crucial counterpoint: a sanctuary for the don, a nerve center for his operations, and the source of the orders that lead to some of the most brutal acts described in the book. The city is never described in detail, but its presence is felt in every phone call, every relayed message, and every ambush that originates from its shadows, making it a symbolic and operational heart of the mafia's transnational reach.

The Nerve Center of the Underworld

Karachi is established as the operational base for Chhota Shakeel, the powerful don who leads his own gang. It is from here that he commands his network of spies and assassins, demonstrating a level of control that transcends national borders. The city is not merely a place of refuge but an active command post where plans are hatched and orders are dispatched. This is starkly illustrated in the events leading up to the killing of Hussain Ustara, a sophisticated gunman who had promised to avenge the death of Ashraf Khan. Ustara, known for his recklessness when pursuing beautiful women, had set off alone to visit his girlfriend's house near Nagpada. The moment he arrived, the message was relayed to Shakeel in Karachi, who immediately ordered his men to assemble and ambush him. Within an hour, eight men had taken their positions, and when Ustara exited the building, they showered him with over twenty rounds of bullets, using an AK-47 in a rare occurrence for a gangland shootout. The speed and efficiency of this operation, directed from Karachi, underscores the city's role as a real-time strategic hub, capable of coordinating lethal action across international borders with chilling precision.

A Virtual Bridge of Intimacy and Deception

Karachi also serves as the setting for a different kind of mafia operation: a virtual love affair conducted over phone lines and internet chat rooms. Shameem Mirza Beg, working for Shakeel under the deceptive code-name Mrs Paul, spent hours in intimate conversation with the don from her base in Mumbai. The Crime Branch, tipped off about Mrs Paul in 2001, tapped the phone lines and hacked the email ids, exposing the relationship. For over a year, the police tracked the conversations in which Karachi-based Shakeel wooed Mumbai-based Mrs Paul, sharing filmy-style love notes and photographs over the internet, with Shakeel writing from handsomelovely@hotmail.com and Shameem from shams143@yahoo.com. This digital courtship, spanning the distance between the two cities, reveals Karachi as a space of personal connection and manipulation, where the don's power is exercised not only through violence but also through emotional and psychological control. The city becomes a node in a network of intimacy that is both a genuine connection and a tool of the underworld, blurring the lines between personal affection and criminal enterprise.

The Source of Deadly Orders

The city's most significant function is as the origin point of death sentences that are carried out in Mumbai. The murder of Sapna, a woman who dared to stand up against Dawood, is a prime example of this. The four men who barged into her home in Hujjrah Mohalla, kicking her and stabbing her over twenty-two times, were known to be Dawood and Shakeel's men. The attack was a deliberate act of terror, designed to make an example of her for anyone who dared to challenge the don's authority. While the orders are not explicitly shown being given from Karachi, the narrative strongly implies that the city is the source of such commands, the place where the fate of individuals is decided. Similarly, the killing of Hussain Ustara was directly orchestrated from Karachi, with Shakeel personally giving the order to ambush him. This pattern establishes Karachi as the seat of a necropolitical power, where the authority to decide who lives and who dies is concentrated in the hands of a few men operating from a distant, seemingly untouchable location.

A Contrast to Mumbai's Gritty Reality

Karachi's role is thrown into sharp relief by the book's vivid, sensory descriptions of Mumbai's neighborhoods. The narrative is grounded in the physical reality of places like Dongri, with its bazaar spilling onto the footpaths, and the Sion-Koliwada slum, with its bustling market and Tamil-speaking locals. These are spaces of poverty, crime, and daily life, where the consequences of the underworld's power are felt. In contrast, Karachi remains an abstract, almost mythical location, never described in physical detail. It is a place of power and planning, existing in the narrative as a counterpoint to the gritty, tangible world of Mumbai's streets. This contrast highlights the asymmetry of the mafia's structure: the violence and suffering are localized in Mumbai, while the strategic decisions and the figures of ultimate authority reside in a distant, unseen city. Karachi, therefore, is not just a geographical location but a symbol of the mafia's reach and its ability to operate beyond the reach of the Indian state, a shadowy force that shapes the lives of the women and men in the book from afar.

The Unseen Hand in Women's Lives

The influence of Karachi extends to the lives of the women who are the book's central subjects, often in ways that are indirect but profound. The fear of the don's power, emanating from Karachi, silences entire communities. When Sapna was being brutally murdered, her timid and unarmed neighbors stayed away, knowing that the attackers were Dawood and Shakeel's men. This fear, cultivated by the mafia's reputation for ruthless violence, is a direct consequence of the power that is wielded from Karachi. The city's existence as a safe haven for the don and his lieutenants means that justice for crimes committed in Mumbai is often impossible to achieve, leaving the women and their families without recourse. The book's exploration of women criminals is framed by this reality: their lives are lived in the shadow of a power that is both local and transnational, and Karachi represents the ultimate, unreachable source of that power. It is the place from which the rules of the underworld are dictated, and against which the women's struggles for agency and survival must be understood.