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PIX: Bollywood's GLORIOUS bar dancers

The Supreme Court's latest ruling that lifted the eight-year-old ban on dance bars in Mumbai was welcomed by many people.

While some are of the opinion that dance bars represented a cultural side of the city, others contended that the move will rehabilitate the girls who were rendered unemployed after the ban came into effect in 2005.

Bollywood, ever the keen observer of social norms, had assimilated this very integral part of Mumbai into its numerous storylines.

Here's a look at bar dancers onscreen over the years:

Shootout At Wadala

Fashioned after notorious extortionist Shabir Ibrahim Kaskar's girfriend Chitra, Laila is a buxom bar dancer played by Sunny Leone in this Sanjay Gupta crime thriller. 

Laila also features in a popular number in the film.

 

Shootout At Lokhandwala

Actress Aarti Chhabria plays Tanu in Apoorva Lakhia's 2007 thriller, Shootout At Lokhandwala.

A bar dancer shacking up with Maya Dola's sidekick Dilip Bhua (Tusshar Kapoor) in the film, Chhabria has two item numbers to her credit.

Gangster

Kangna Ranaut pulls off the conflicted bar dancer Simran act in her debut film with relative ease.

A timid young girl on her own in Mumbai, Simran meets gangster Daya in the club she works and plans to marry him when a sudden turn of events change her life irreversibly.

Chameli

Cast in the immensely popular song Sajna ve sajna in Kareena Kapoor starrer Chameli, Mahek Chahal serves up some musical respite as a lead dancer in a seedy bar that Chameli enters to conduct her nocturnal business.

While Kareena joins her momentarily on the dance floor, Chahal holds her own for the entirety of the song.

Munnabhai MBBS

As Reena in Rajkumar Hirani's delightful directorial debut Munnabhai MBBS, Mumaith Khan makes a raunchy entry in the hospital to entertain Zaheer (Jimmy Shergill) -- a dying cancer patient. 

Dressed in a racy red outfit and furry accessories, Khan's dance number makes for an interesting watch.

Kaante

Malaika Arora Khan features in the memorable sufi number Mahi ve in Sanjay Gupta's film Kaante, inspired from Quentin Tarantino's Reservoir Dogs.

While not much is given away about her character in the film -- the song served as an item number in the film much before the term came into being -- Malaika's performance stands out in the ensemble cast.

 

Chandni Bar

A standout performance in a standout film, Chandni Bar did wonders to Tabu as well as director Madhur Bhandarkar's career.

Revealing the dark, gritty underbelly of Mumbai's nightlife, the film traces the ordeals of Mumtaz, a village girl who comes to live in Mumbai and earns a living by dancing in a bar.

Vaastav

As a random bar dancer in Mahesh Manjrekar's 1999 gangster film Vaastav, Kashmera Shah is coquettishly singing of her woes of youth to her nocturnal patrons when Sanjay Dutt's Raghu guns down a local goon.

 

Sarfarosh

Upasna Singh's bar girl in John Matthew Matthan's Sarfarosh reveals the clandestine relationship dancers used to have with the police back in the days when Mumbai was still in the clutches of the underworld.

Owing to their close proximity to criminals each night, these girls served as informants to the cops.

Ghatak

Playing love interest to the crusader Kashi (Sunny Deol) in Rajkumar Santoshi's 1996 actioner Ghatak is the pretty Meenakshi Sheshadri as bar dancer Gauri.

In a song titled Badan main chandni, the actress steals the show in a beaded orange outfit and wild curls. 

Inkaar

And here's where it all started.

Hindi film's queen bee of item numbers, Helen was at her sassy best in the Mungda number from 1978 film Inkaar.