Mumbai, Oct 21 (IANS): Former mafia don-turned-politician Arun Gulab Gawli, the ‘Daddy’ of Dagdi Chawl, visited his old lair to celebrate the ongoing Navratri festival, during which he was accorded a warm and rousing welcome by the tenants.

Presently undergoing a life-term in prison, Gawli, 67, was released on a 28-day furlough on Thursday from Nagpur Central Jail.

He reached here on Friday evening and was virtually mobbed by his followers, admirers and associates, as he alighted from a swank white car outside the Dagdi Chawl.

Appearing cheerful but fatigued after the Nagpur-Mumbai journey and the weather change, Gawli managed to smile, waved out to his followers, acknowledging them with folded hands, and clad in his trademark white kurta-pyjama-cap, mingled with all freely.

After greeting and meeting his old neighbours, friends, and family at the once-shady neighbourhood, Gawli headed for the impressive marquee housing a large idol of Goddess Durga with folded hands, in one corner of the tenements complex.

There, assisted by a Hindu priest, Gawli performed an ‘aarti’ of ‘Aai Mauli’, bowed before the Goddess and then joined the revellers performing ‘dandiya’, happily shook a leg with them for some time before leaving the venue.

Launched in 1973, this is the golden jubilee of the Dagdi Chawl Navratri Utsav Mandal (DCNUM), and also its final, as post-navratri, the entire chawl complex will go under a redevelopment project, said the Vinayak Narawade, the Chairman of the proposed Dagdi Chawl CHS.

Sources close to the former don said that during his sojourn, Gawli has chosen to live in the secure comforts of his well-appointed fully air-conditioned, top-floor homes in one of the chawl buildings, comprising plush interiors, a home-theatre system and other luxuries befitting a man of his means.

During the four-week-long ‘break’ from jail, Gawli will take part in certain legalities pertaining to the Dagdi Chawl revamp project, attending meetings with the proposed society office-bearers, probably even the builders, signing certain documents and completing other formalities, hinted Karawade.

With politics flowing in the family’s blood, Gawli is likely to take an overview of the political prospects of his daughter Geeta Gawli, a former BMC corporator, who may again contest in the upcoming civic polls and possibly spread her wings higher in the 2024 Maharashtra Assembly elections, too, according to a source.

Gawli, who had launched the Akhil Bharatiya Sena (ABS) has traditionally sympathised with the Shiv Sena founded by the late Balasaheb Thackeray, who had once hailed him as a ‘Hindu don’.

However, now that the party has split into Shiv Sena (UBT) led by former Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray and the Shiv Sena headed by Chief Minister Eknath Shinde, it remains to be seen what will be the ABS’ future political strategy.

Incidentally, Gawli’s nephew, MLC Sachin Ahir, is a deputy leader of Shiv Sena (UBT) and among the trusted aides of Uddhav Thackeray and Aditya Thackeray.

Nevertheless, senior party men chose to remain mum if any back-channel links could be opened up with the ABS in the next four weeks when ‘Daddy’ is relaxing here on his furlough.