Mumbai dance bar: was dirty but there was a business of ‘two lakh crores’

‘This is a dirty but a business,’ this dialogue of a famous Bollywood film hits perfectly on the dance bar business, which has a huge stake in Mumbai’s economy, which was called as the country’s economic capital, almost half a decade ago. The dance bar business that ran the livelihood of millions of people was not a small business but a legitimate-illegal economy of two lakh crores. If trade experts were to be believed, in August 2005, when the dance bar was closed, its annual turnover was only Rs 40 to 42 thousand crore rupees. According to this, in the last decade and a half, the government has lost revenue of several lakh crore rupees.
Vivek Agrawal, who wrote a book titled ‘Bombay Bar’ by studying Mumbai’s dance bar culture, in a special conversation with ‘Amar Ujala’, told that in the dance bar business there are various types of liquor, dancers, expenditure on various items and prostitution The week to be given to the police is included. The Mumbai Police alone had only about 15 to 20 thousand crores a week

The business of dance bars includes industrialists as well as police and politicians. Sources claim that the top leaders of a leading political party in Mumbai have a stake in five dance bars. It is also said that till half a decade ago, this party’s income was a huge source of income. It is also said that the then Home Minister RR Patil of Maharashtra had played a banned ban on the dance bar to break the economic backbone of its main political rivals