A nexus between Bollywood and the Mafia, a one-sided toxic and deadly affair – with just one winner.

Bollywood’s intimate relationship with the mafia is one of the industry’s worst-kept secrets.

For decades, this symbiotic connection fed on itself as stars, directors and producers flaunted their associations with crime bosses.

Gangsters loved its glamour and used the industry to launder and wash their money, financing films, the lucrative business of piracy, counterfeit, overseas rights and extortion.

But it was always a one-sided, toxic and deadly affair – with just one winner.

Extortion has raised its head brazenly once again.

An actor who did not want to be named told Sky News: “It never left the industry; most will pay up and not make it public for fear of retribution.”

On Tuesday, Ranvir Singh, one of Bollywood’s top actors, informed the Mumbai police of an extortion call.

The threat came via a WhatsApp voice note, which demanded millions of dollars. The police have launched an investigation and beefed up his security.

Last week, several rounds were fired into the home of Rohit Shetty, a big-time producer and director.

A social media post by the attackers said this was just a “trailer” and warned Bollywood to stay within limits.

It added: “Those we have contacted should mend their ways while there is still time. Otherwise, there will be nowhere to hide.”

But the most audacious attacks were on superstar Salman Khan in 2024.

A threatening email was followed by men on a bike firing several rounds into his home. Salman’s security has been enhanced with multiple rings of armed personnel protecting him while bulletproof glass shields his home.

The transnational Bishnoi gang claimed responsibility for these attacks. It’s headed by 32-year-old gangster Lawrence Bishnoi, who is said to have several gunmen working for him.

Lawrence has publicly threatened Salman, whom he accuses of hunting a blackbuck in 1998. The antelope is considered sacred to the Bishnoi community to which Lawrence belongs.

Despite being imprisoned since 2014 on charges of organised crime, drug trafficking, extortion, and targeted killings, his operations continue in India and abroad.

The gang has been designated a terror organisation by the Canadian government.

Last year, the group claimed responsibility for killing Baba Siddique, a former minister and senior politician and a close friend of Salman Khan.

The killing sent shockwaves in the industry, and many believe the murder was a message to Salman and others.

But the gang’s biggest hit was the deadly shooting of international Punjabi rap star Sidhu Moose Wala in the summer of 2022.

Canadian-based gangster Goldy Brar, a key member of the gang, took responsibility.

According to the Delhi Police, Lawrence was the mastermind and planned the murder from inside Delhi’s notorious Tihar jail.

Until the law was amended in 2000, Bollywood was unorganised and legitimate forms of financing were unavailable. It meant producers found alternate revenue – and that’s when the mafia stepped in with money and protection.

The shooting of music tycoon Gulshan Kumar in 1997 sent shudders through the industry. A vulnerable big name was targeted, and the rest fell in line.

Leading director Rakesh Roshan narrowly escaped an assassination attempt over his films’ overseas rights in 2001.

It was an open secret that syndicates of Karim Lala, Haji Mastan, Dawood Ibrahim, Abu Salem and Chhota Rajan were entrenched in this crime, but none were ever touched.

Occasionally, low-level foot soldiers would be picked up and perfunctory charges imposed and punished.

Special police units were constituted in Mumbai with the purpose of crushing these syndicates, though with a mix of success.

The most famous case of this nexus is that of actor Sanjay Dutt.

He was convicted of possessing automatic assault rifles and grenades procured from the underworld.

It was part of a consignment of weapons and bombs used in the 1993 Mumbai bombings that killed 257 people.

Sanjay was imprisoned for five years and maintained that the weapons were for his family’s protection and not connected to the terror plot.

According to reports in the last few weeks, a dozen film personalities have received threats, mostly from people who identify themselves with the Bishnoi gang.

There was a lull, or at least publicly for some time, till Lawrence Bishnoi burst on the scene, and now we are witnessing a rerun of the earlier years that plagued Bollywood.

Ever since she can remember, Kathie Lee Gifford has lived a faith-driven life. From childhood to adulthood — and all the moments in between — the seasoned TV host and author has always leaned on her Christian roots, despite labeling herself as “anti-religion.”

In an exclusive interview with Fox News Digital, Gifford — who is gearing up to emcee Childhelp’s Drive The Dream gala in Phoenix, Ariz., on Saturday — opened up about trusting God in moments of discomfort and doubt, the importance of generosity when it comes to charitable efforts, and explained why she believes religion can often put “people in chains.”

“The Bible talks about prayer without ceasing. Our life should be nonstop prayer, nonstop conversation, dialog, and walk with our Lord,” said Gifford, 72. “It’s not a religion. I am very anti-religion. Religion puts people in chains and Jesus takes them away. So I’ve always tried to be, and I am, the exact same person.”

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Kathie Lee Gifford, who is emceeing Childhelp’s Drive The Dream gala in Phoenix, Ariz. on Feb. 14, opened up about her faith-driven life.  (Jason Kempin/Getty Images)

“I don’t separate the secular from the spiritual. I don’t say, ‘Oh, I’m an actress. So that’s my secular life.’ And then I go, and I raise money for Childhelp. No, it’s all one life, lived in accordance with God’s blessing, with His, I don’t like to call them commandments, His teaching, His guidance. We live according to that,” she added. 

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“We have a blessed life, a blessed life. And so I don’t, I know I’m different,” she added. “I’m very different from other people. I’ve never given, I’ve ever stood up in front of a group of people ever in my life with a script. I can’t even imagine, I would feel so phony, because I don’t know what I’m going to say, but I know what I want to say. And the Holy Spirit knows what He wants me to say so between us, we all sort of get it. We get along.” 

Gifford, who has dealt with her fair share of grief and heartbreak, said she has always looked to Scripture as a guiding light. 

Gifford said religion can often put “people in chains.” (Danielle Del Valle/Getty Images for Lionsgate)

“Scripture says don’t, don’t worry about anything. Don’t worry about anything. I am with you. I will lead you. I will guide you every day of your life,” she said. “In Him we live and move and have our very being. That means every nanosecond of our lives is in service to our Lord. So I lose sleep because I’m old. Not because I’m worrying about getting something wrong. I pray before I open my mouth, and then I ask the Lord to guide me.”

“People go, I can’t believe how bold you are for your faith,” she added. “I don’t care what people think. I care what He thinks. And a few hands, like maybe two hands full of precious friends who love me. I care what they think.”

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For much of her 60-year-long career, the mom of two has spent countless hours dedicated to giving back. One cause that is particularly close to her heart is Childhelp — an organization that was created to meet the physical, emotional, educational and spiritual needs of abused, neglected and at-risk children.

“I’ve always been an advocate for children long before I joined Childhelp,” said Gifford, who began her advocacy with the organization in 1996. “That’s just been a lifelong thing for me. God loves all the little children. And we’re all made in the image of God, no matter what color we are, no matter where we come from. It’s, that’s all, I’ve always known that. And Jesus who said, you know, let the little children come unto me, don’t stop them. They are the kingdom of heaven. So all my life, that has been a driving force.”

The mom-of-two has dedicated much of her life to giving back.  (Mike Pont/WireImage)

“I pray every day, Lord, give me a generous heart. You know, the more I give away, the more He gives me,” she added. “It’s always been about that. It’s crazy. It works. It’s scriptural. It’s a scriptural concept. You can never out give God. And if you love children and you care for children, blessing will follow you all the days of your life.”

Despite her efforts in trying to remain stoic and steadfast in faith, Gifford said she’s only human and can crumble in anger over certain things. 

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“I get angry when people hurt children. I get actually furious when people hurt children,” she said. “Child abuse robs a child of their whole life. It’s not just their childhood that they destroy. Children who don’t get what they need when they’re growing up, the love they need, they don’t get the support … they spend the rest of their life trying to find it. And they make really, really bad decisions because of it. And they get deeper and deeper into holes and depression and addictions, and it often ends up with no happy ending for these children.”

“But with Childhelp, there is a possibility. Very often, the ending is, a blessed one, that children have found forgiveness, they’ve found faith, they have found purpose, they have people who care about them. And I want to be a part of people like that.”

EXCLUSIVE: Industry experts warn the United States is “one crisis away” from losing access to the rare earth elements that power everything from fighter jets to electric vehicles — a vulnerability President Donald Trump’s new $12 billion “Project Vault” aims to address.

The initiative, backed by $1.67 billion in private seed money and a $10 billion loan from the Export-Import Bank, would create a federally supported stockpile of rare earth elements and other critical minerals. The U.S. currently imports much of those materials from China.

Executives from Graphite One, one of the country’s largest critical mineral developers, told Fox News Digital the effort could mark a turning point in the battle over China’s dominance of global supply chains.

“The Chinese are willing to weaponize access to … semiconductor materials like gallium and uranium,” Graphite One advisor Dan McGroarty said. “Then they turn off the tap and sort things out, give us a one-year reprieve, you know, it’s a leash, and they can yank that leash anytime they want.”

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CEO Anthony Huston compared the concept to the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, established after the 1970s oil crisis to safeguard U.S. energy security, arguing that critical minerals now play a similarly vital role in powering modern defense systems, advanced electronics and electric vehicles.

“For years, American businesses have risked running out of critical minerals during market disruptions… Project Vault [will] ensure that American businesses and workers are never harmed by any shortage,” Trump said in his announcement last month.

Graphite One recently made news with its “truly generational” Graphite Creek site in Alaska, which is the U.S.’ largest asset of that particular critical mineral, in Huston’s words.

As of 2024, the U.S. was at least 93% import-dependent on rare earth elements and graphite, according to the International Energy Agency, and remains heavily reliant on foreign suppliers for dozens of other critical minerals.

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“The United States really relies on China and Africa for graphite. China, as we understand, is our adversary,” Huston said.

A buried lede in the Project Vault news, he added, is a little-reported counter-terror aspect.

Huston said some African mineral deposits, including in parts of Mozambique, are located in areas where ISIS-linked groups have operated. By onshoring development of critical minerals, the U.S. will not only work to unseat Chinese dominance but also deal a blow to operations in areas run by people who want to kill us, he argued.

McGroarty added that Project Vault reminds him of the idea of “dual-use technologies” during the Cold War, where computers of the time had technology that could not be exported – but could be used for both manufacturing and nuclear weapons design, for instance.

“On another level, we’re going to have to balance it across 20, 30, 40 different metals, minerals, compounds, and composites, not just oil,” he said.

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President Donald Trump, left, and President Xi Jinping, right. (Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/Getty Images)

McGroarty said the U.S. is “one crisis away” from having REEs “cut-off” by adversaries like China.

Huston also spoke of why Project Vault fits the 2020s more than any other time.

In the prior century, there were no cell phones, no EVs and graphite and the like were being used in analog tools like pencils and primitive computers.

The Graphite Creek site supplied materials for World War II-era steel production, a far cry from its potential role in today’s high-tech economy. Huston reiterated that the U.S. needs its own “strategic petroleum reserve” of critical minerals rather than relying on adversarial nations.

“As they say when you’re flying, put the oxygen mask on yourself first before turning to help those around,” he said.

TRUMP SAYS GREENLAND’S DEFENSE IS ‘TWO DOG SLEDS’ AS HE PUSHES FOR US ACQUISITION OF TERRITORY

Asked about any nexus between Project Vault, the Senate’s renewed focus on Arctic national security amid foreign incursions and Trump’s overtures toward Greenland, McGroarty suggested there may be one — but it’s not yet clear.

He quipped that sometimes it’s better to look at the globe from the top rather than the side, which places North America in the center of everything.

“See what nations have a presence in the Arctic, you’ll see the importance of Greenland; you’ll also see that the U.S. is an Arctic nation only because of Alaska,” he said.

Of the 60 critical minerals on the U.S. government’s official list, Alaska has known resources of at least 58, he added.

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“It’s the same sort of thing with Greenland. In the case of Greenland, I think there’s a phrase that I use from time to time: resource denial — That is to say, you might try not to be interested in Greenland’s resource potential in critical minerals. If you wake up one day, and the Chinese and the Russians are engaging in economic relationships in Greenland and directing those metals and minerals into their supply chains, you will have to be concerned about what goes on.”

China-based experts, on the other hand, were dismissive of Project Vault, with rare-earths analyst Wu Chenhui telling the state-owned Global Times that while Trump’s move is novel, it “functions more as a short-term buffer than a fundamental solution,” and other officials in the Communist nation were similarly bearish on the news.

Last Updated:February 13, 2026, 19:30 IST

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