``To begin with, Ulhasnagar was not just mounds of garbage on which people indiscriminately built illegal structures and dabbled in crime to settle differences over money,'' says the first president of the Ulhasnagar Municipal Council (1954-55), Prahlad Advani.

At the time of Partition, around 50,000 Sindhis had fled from areas like Lahore, Sialkot, Multan and other areas in what is now Pakistan. They were routed to various settlements by the then Union government. The Britishers had built barracks to station over 6,000 troops just outside Kalyan, considering its nodal location, during World War II. The barracks fell into disuse after the war. ``From January 1948, a steady trickle of refugees continued coming here,''informs Advani.

When the government realised such a huge number of people could not be moved elsewhere, it decided to settle them here by forming a proper township. The then Governor-General C Rajgopalachari laid the foundation stone for the town on August 8, 1949.

Earlier, Ulhasnagar did not even have a railway station, and locals had to get off at James Siding (called Vithalwadi station now). But the never-say-die Sindhi spirit of enterprise stayed alive. ``So many of our brothers made a living by selling biscuits and sweets made at home on the local trains,'' remembers Advani, who however admits that even two generations later, the insecurity that everything will be snatched away has not left the mindset of the locals.

By the end of the 60s, many enterprising residents had made fortunes making duplicate electronic items. With money came crime and gang rivalry. To add to it, the rioting for grabbing vacant barracks saw the Central rehabilitation secretary K P Mathrani rush to Ulhasnagar on May 11,1965. He announced that all structures built before 1965 would be regularised, and scenting opportunity, owners of various structures tried every trick in the book to convert their structures into legitimate constructions.

However, illegal constructions meant more money, and the township began to see regular killings between rival groups. As illegal constructions increased, so did crime and corruption in the municipal body. Pappu Kalani then rose first as Congress councillor and then as as MLA and municipal council president too. The extent of his popularity as a Robin hood figure endures even seven years after he was arrested. He has continued to remain MLA from this Assembly constituency. ``People still feel that only he can work miracles and do something for the town,'' says his wife and president of the Ulhasnagar People's Party, Jyoti Kalani.

After Ulhasnagar was given corporation status in 1996, Gopal Rajwani, who had worked with the bete noires of Kalani, the Behrani brothers (Thakur and Mohan)fell out with the two Congress strongmen and joined the Sena, where he emerged as a strongman. His release from prison last month (he had been lodged in jail under MPDA), observers say, will lead to intensification of his conflict with the Behrani brothers.

A basket case to the core, Ulhasnagar may have gone beyond the brink with a failing administration (the Bombay High Court is virtually running the show here) and corrupt politicians, feel residents. ``One only hopes that Ulhasnagar does not prove to be the maverick municipal commissioner T Chandrashekhar's Waterloo,'' says a senior Congress corporator, who is sure that ``only a miracle can change this pig-sty into a township.''