Underworld hold over Bollywood a front for ISI?

By Mahesh Vijapurkar

MUMBAI, DEC. 21. Underworld, especially that segment being controlled out of Karachi where Dawood Ibrahim is now ensconced, may be actually fronting for the Pakistani ISI in taking control of the world of motion pictures, sources suggest. Gangland invest money and the ISI controls the gangland chiefs like Ibrahim. It may not be too keen on mere profits.

Given the manner in which the gullible minds can be influenced, if not controlled by a mix of fiction, fantasy and propaganda through films in a cinema-crazy country, the ISI would be finding the film industry an useful arena to operate in, they said. There is a lot of scope for propaganda, even of the subtle kind.

Dawood Ibrahim, according to the authorities dealing with the March 12, 1993 blasts, has been the kingpin of the entire planning and operation of the frightful sequence of explosions and now resides in Pakistan under the ISI protection.

``You can easily put these together and see what the scene would be like,'' a source said.

Chota Shakeel, next in line to Dawood in the underworld hierarchy, has been linked in the episode concerning the film Chori Chori Chupke Chupke and ``that explains a lot''. Interestingly, none has officially come forward to claim the seized negatives of this film.

Hitherto, the entire Bollywood had been firmly denying that any of the underworld money had come into film making but the recent arrest of Nasim Hassan Rizvi has torn aside the curtain on its involvement in this sector.

Now even elders like Mr. B. R. Chopra have spoken of such connections having existed in the past.

Therefore, police have been authorised to work without political fears, and as Mr. Chagan Bhujbal, Deputy Chief Minister said, ``The Police are rightly keen on ensuring that the film Chori Chori Chupke Chupke is not screened''. Senior police officials have said that now with this ``breakthrough, every other worm should be coming out soon.''

Police, which has involved the Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act (MCOCA) which allows even in-camera trial, liberal tapping of telephones and which is admissible as evidence, has actually chosen to keep a lot of information under wraps so much so that even the chargesheet was withheld from the accused's counsel the day Rizvi was produced.

Obviously, a lot of the information is sensitive, and Mumbai Police is careful not to tip anyone's hand given that the underworld has moles even in uniform at one level or the other.

Today, when Abdul Rahim Allahbaksh, a co-producer of Rizvi and described as a ``conduit'' between the underworld and the film world was produced for remand, the contents of the application were kept under wraps.

All this care and circumspection, the source said, ``is because we are dealing with unseen powers who have shadowy operatives and tremendous reach''. Apparently the reference is to the ISI of the neighboring country but are not willing to make a breast of it yet.

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