"Not Don's But Daddy's Daughters": Ex-Gangster Arun Gawli's Daughters To NDTV

The two daughters of gangster-turned politician Arun Gawli, Geeta Gawli and Yogita Gawli-Waghmare, who filed their nomination papers for the upcoming Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) elections, told NDTV that people do not look up to them as "don's daughters" but as "daddy's daughters". Arun Gawli is famously called 'daddy' by his followers around the Dagdi Chawl in Mumbai's Byculla.

"People don't see us as the don's daughters, but as daddy's daughters. People look up to 'daddy' with hope and trust. He has resolved many of their issues. Right now, our goal is to win our respective seats. The decision on who to support or not will be made after the elections," the former gangster's daughters said.

Geeta Gawli submitted her nomination from Byculla's ward number 212, from where she was a corporator in 2017. Her sister Yogita Gawli-Waghmare filed her nomination from Byculla's ward number 207 in her poll debut. The two sisters submitted their nomination papers as candidates of the Akhil Bharatiya Sena in the presence of the party founder and their father, Arun Gawli.

The BMC elections will be held on January 15, and the votes will be counted the next day.

Arun Gawli and his brother, Kishor, entered the Mumbai underworld in the 1970s and joined the 'Byculla Company' - a criminal gang led by Rama Naik and Babu Reshim, operating in the central Mumbai areas of Byculla, Parel, and Saat Rasta. Arun took over the gang in 1988 after Rama Naik was killed in a police encounter and began operating it from his residence, 'Dagdi Chawl' - the once infamous den of his criminal activities. Through the late 80s and 90s, Arun's gang was involved in a power struggle with underworld don Dawood Ibrahim's gang.

Arun Gawli got political patronage in the 1980s when the then Shiv Sena chief Balasaheb Thackeray criticised the Mumbai police for taking stringent action against him. However, Arun fell out with Shiv Sena in the mid-1990s and formed his own political party. He served as an MLA from 2004 to 2009 from the Chinchpokli assembly constituency in Mumbai. He was jailed in 2008 for the murder of Mumbai Shiv Sena corporator Kamlakar Jamsandekar and was recently released on bail in September 2025 after serving over 17 years, with the Supreme Court granting him relief due to his age and time served.

(With inputs from Devendra Kolhatkar)