India, Oct. 20 -- Sunday's attack on film star Tiger Shroff in Mumbai raises the worrying spectre of the return of the underworld in Mumbai following a lull of 22 years from 2002-2024. Why is this happening now? Had the underworld been eliminated or had it merely receded in the background?

When smugglers like Haji Mastan, Karim Lala, Vardharajan Mudaliar ruled the roost they were truly the underworld-operating from the shadows. Then Bollywood began to glorify them. Films like the Amitabh Bachchan-starrer 'Deewar' based on the early life of Haji Mastan or Mani Ratnam's 'Nayakan' based on Vardharajan Mudaliar's life turned them into larger-than-life figures.

Rendered heroes on celluloid these mafiosi figures turned on Bollywood in turn. D...