Tarannum Khan

Tarannum Khan was the crown of Mumbai's nightlife, the pin-up girl of suburban Mumbai's Deepa Bar and Restaurant, whose arrest in 2005 for her links to an international cricket betting racket shattered her glittering career and exposed a shadowy world where bar dancers, bookies, and celebrated sportsmen collided. At the age of twenty-four, Tarannum was no less popular than any Bollywood starlet, allegedly making over Rs 1.5 to Rs 3 lakh every day and attracting a clientele that comprised the affluent and the famous. Her story, as told in Mafia Queens of Mumbai, traces a dramatic arc from a teenager with dreams of becoming an air-hostess to a high-profile dancer, and finally to a jailed figure whose downfall became a national media spectacle, her name forever linked to the murky intersection of entertainment, crime, and gambling.

Rise of a Bar Dancer

Tarannum's tale had its beginnings in the struggles and hardships she underwent as a teenager. Although she had a diploma in computer education, her ambitions lay elsewhere—she wanted to become an air-hostess. Instead, she flourished as a bar dancer, captivating and wooing rich businessmen and film stars alike. Her performances were legendary; draped in a glittering translucent pink sari with a cleavage-revealing blouse, she would cavort onto the dance floor to the popular Bollywood track Kajra Re, drawing the attention of every single person in the room. Like the Pied Piper, she managed to captivate everyone with her tune, her admirers showering her with 500 and 1,000-rupee notes that flew like a deck of cards in her direction. There was nothing extraordinary about her—she had long black hair, pale wheatish skin, and was only as pretty as the other girls—yet no one could take their eyes off her, and the other bar girls swayed on the sidelines, envious of her for grabbing all the attention.

The 2005 Downfall and the Cricket Betting Scandal

Tarannum saw no reason to look for greener pastures until 2005, the same year that marked the deathknell for all dance bars in Mumbai. The then home minister of Maharashtra R.R. Patil called for a ban on dance bars across the state, citing it as detrimental to society, and set an early deadline of August 15 for dance bar owners to shut shop. While most dancers began looking for alternative sources of livelihood in the neighbouring states of Goa, Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka, or turned to prostitution, Tarannum, who had been entertaining clients for over seven years and was used to making big money, saw the potential in cricket betting. Her clientele had included some avid cricket bookies, and with their help, she started taking serious bets on the game and her earnings tripled in no time.

On 29 August 2005, Income Tax officials raided her bungalow—Tanishq—in suburban Mumbai when they learnt that she had failed to file her I-T returns for over four years. The raid unearthed pieces of a puzzle that could not only land her in trouble, but also jeopardise the careers of some of the world's most celebrated sportsmen. I-T officials seized over Rs 22 lakh in cash, and gold jewellery worth Rs 8 lakh from her bungalow that was now worth Rs 1.25 crore. In her defence, Tarannum claimed that she had not filed her I-T returns because her chartered accountant had misguided her. Further investigations shockingly revealed the phone numbers of some notorious cricket bookies and an international Sri Lankan cricketer on her cell phone. The case was immediately handed over to the Mumbai police to probe if Tarannum was in any way associated with a betting racket. Several names emerged during the investigations, including bookie-turned producer Jagdish Sodha, bookies Shobhan mehta, Pradip Kumar and Milind Dhiraj Nandu, alias DJ. The police had also found enough evidence to show that she had placed bets for an Australia-England match on 20 August 2005, for which she was to receive anywhere between Rs 20 to 30 lakh.

Arrest, Imprisonment, and the Bond with Preeti Jain

Finally, on 15 September 2005, the police, under intense pressure from the state government and the media, arrested Tarannum, along with two other bookies, under the charges of criminal conspiracy and gambling. For the first time, the police invoked provisions of the Information Technology (IT) Act in a gambling case and slapped charges of misuse of IT against the trio. Tarannum had to spend the next two months at the Byculla Women's Jail before she was granted bail by a sessions court in November 2005.

While behind bars, Tarannum bonded well with actress Preeti Jain, who was her cellmate. Preeti, who had stirred a hornet's nest after she had alleged that Bollywood director Madhur Bhandarkar had raped her, was also serving time in the same jail. She had been charged for allegedly hiring gangster Arun Gawli's hitman to kill the director. The actress spent around thirteen days with the bar girl in the same cell, before she was bailed out. Reminiscing about her days with the bar girl, Preeti told that Tarannum had spent most of her time in the jail crying. According to Preeti, Tarannum was initially traumatised and frightened at the thought of being locked behind bars and would break down often. As Preeti said, 'As a human being, I could relate to her pain. I became a shoulder for her to cry on.' Later, the duo bonded really well and became comfortable in each other's company, playing board games, eating food and watching television together. The starlet maintained that Tarannum was no run-of-the-mill bar dancer, claiming that she was extremely beautiful and not only well-groomed but well-spoken. 'People have this preconceived notion about bar girls being crass. Tarannum was anything but that. The best part is that she did not regret being a bar dancer or care about the stigma that the job brought with it.' Months after her release, Preeti signed a lead role in the low-budget film titled Deepa ki Tarannum, a movie on a bar dancer, which in Preeti's words was inspired by 'her friend in jail'.

Aftermath and Public Scrutiny

After receiving bail, a disturbed Tarannum complained about how she was being treated. 'Now, people point at my home and say, "Look, this is the house where the bar girl stays". Now all of India knows about me. I want an answer from the government: what will happen if all the allegations levelled against me are false? Who will be responsible for it?' she had said in an interview. Her miseries had begun to unfold like a nightmare as she made the headlines almost every day, her story becoming a cautionary tale about the perils of fame and the fragility of a life built on the fickle foundations of nightlife and illicit gambling.