Beautiful Thing Inside the Secret World of Bombay's Dance Bars

Meet Leela: nineteen, charismatic and fearlessly outspoken. With her sharp wit and stubborn optimism, she is the best paid bar dancer on Bombay’s notorious Mira Road. Leela has a ‘husband’ (who is already married), a few lovers whose names she can’t remember, an insufferable mother camping out in her flat and an adored best friend, Priya – the most beautiful woman she has ever seen.

But when the dance bars are banned, Leela’s proud independence faces its greatest test. In a city where everyone is certain that someone, somewhere, is worse off than them, Leela fights to survive – and win.

Sonia Faleiro was a reporter in search of a story when she met Leela, a beautiful and charismatic bar dancer with a story to tell. Leela introduced Sonia to the underworld of Bombay’s dance bars: a world of glamorous women, of fierce love, sex and violence, of customers and gangsters, of police, prostitutes and pimps.

When an ambitious political politician cashed in on a tide of false morality and had Bombay’s dance bars wiped out, Leela’s proud independence faced its greatest test. In a city where almost everyone is certain that someone, somewhere, is worse off than them, she fights to survive, and to win.

Beautiful Thing is a vivid and intimate portrait of one reporter’s journey into the dark, pulsating and ultimately damaged soul of Bombay.