Khatau Mills

Khatau Makanji Spinning and Weaving Mills was established in the year 1869 at Byculla spread across 13 acres of land. In 1990s the Mill had workforce of 5,700 workers and was into loss making according to the owners. As a way out, the owner Sunit Khatau proposed for selling the Mill land and moving the operations to Borivali. He submitted a proposal to the BIFR which also meant that he had to take approval of the Mill union RMMS that was headed by Haribahu Naik who refused to agree to this. To counter him Shankarrao Jadhav was enabled to win the RMMS union elections as the President and Sachin Ahir, Arun Gawli's nephew as one of the secretaries. This was made possible by a deal between Sunil Khatau and Arun Gawli which was looked into suspicion by Amar Naik an adversary of Gawli. Unhappy upon knowing that Arun Gawli will get a windfall from Khatau upon the sale of the mill lands his gang members shot him dead at Mahalaxmi Junction on 7th May 1994.