Under The Model Town

Muslim ghettos in Ahmedabad are dilapidated and neglected

- Sharmita Kar

THE vast stretches of the main road of Sarkhej, Ahmedabad, become narrower, the buildings smaller and more congested as you take a detour and enter into what is known as India’s largest urban Muslim ghetto. Surrounded by settlements of the riot-hit minority community, the lanes lead up to a towering brick wall with fencing on top, built with the sole purpose of separating the Muslim population from its neighbouring Hindu colony, Vejalpur. This is Juhapura, an area located just a few kilometres away from the heart of Gujarat’s largest city, Ahmedabad. While it was founded as a rehabilitation project for the flood-hit victims in 1973, the area took a whole new meaning with a series of communal tensions over the next few decades.

The contrast here is stark: tall buildings lining up the Hindu colony, and waterlogged lanes, crumbling small houses and the poor economic conditions in the Muslim settlement. The streets of Juhapura are brimming with autorickshaws and cycles, lined on either side by meat shops, barber shops, mechanics and offices of travel and estate agents. It is usually at its busiest when the sun is up and shining. The bylanes open into multi-storeyed concrete structures stacked up like Lego blocks. Inside, the rooms are small and functional, housing a family of four or more and bearing the weight of an urban life amidst neglect and decay.

Shagufta Anjum, 38, lives on one of these lanes of Juhapura area. Early in the morning, as she prepares to get ready for the day, she calls out to her brother looking up to the corridor outside a cramped nine-by-nine room, “Switch off the pump. There has been no water since yesterday.”

“Today is jumma,” she turns to us and says. “But look, we don’t even have water to bathe. See how much the government is doing for us.”