Douhou Pierre's strike on the 21-minute mark proved to be sufficient for the Pune-based outfit. The home side began this crunch encounter making a total of five changes from the side that was humiliated by the defending champions Mohun Bagan only a week ago.
The win helped DSK Shivajians rise to No 8 position from the bottom of the league table with 4 points from five matches. Mumbai FC remain at fourth position with 8 points.
The Ivorian took the ball in his stride and smashed the ball into the net to score Shivajians' first goal of the season. Moments later, Rafi had another telling opportunity, but his luck was out as the ball flew over the crossbar.
There were few more half chances after the breakthrough, but the score at half-time was 1-0 in favour of the Shivajians. In the second period, the Mumbai side kept most of the possession and were convincing with their forward passes.
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The home side were having to give away possession and then play on the counter-attack. Much to their delight, Prakash Thorat had a golden opportunity to seal the game in the 65th minute, but rather than squaring it to an unmarked Douhou Pierre, he went for glory and made a colossal mess out of it.
Another golden opportunity fell to the visitors in the 77th minute. Captain Taisuke Matsugae controlled the ball with easy and fired a thundering shot towards Subrata's goal.
In the final minutes of the game, Shivajians moved to a rather defensive setup, parking the bus on a number of occasions. The centre-back pairing of Haroon Amiri and Don Bosco Fernandes were alert and agile throughout the course of the game and played a key role in their side's performance on the day.
Mumbai FC had a number of chances late on in this one, but the Shivajians keeper was up to the ask whenever called upon and had an exceptional ninety minutes.