[Reader-list] third posting

[Jeebesh Bagchi]

In this list archive there will be fifty postings by the name "third  
posting" or "second posting".....that is not very intelligent way of  
getting people to read.....

comrades..please post with an nice subject header....

On 28-Mar-06, at 3:54 PM, Farhana Ibrahim wrote:

> Apologies for this delay – I hope to become more regular at these  
> postings once I stop traveling around in Kachchh and return to some  
> archival research in Delhi and Mumbai.
>
> I still am on my search for some clues about the lives of the  
> Kachchhi merchants who were once based in Kachchh and have now  
> moved out in all kinds of directions. After Jakhau (I discussed it  
> in my last posting), I moved to Bhadresar, another old port of  
> Kachchh, close to the contemporary port of Mundra. Mundra is  
> becoming highly mechanized – it has been taken over by the Adanis –  
> and is increasingly the new face of industrialized Gujarat. On the  
> other hand, Bhadresar is now little more than an old fishing  
> village. Once a shallow-water port known as Bhadravati Nagari and  
> then Bhadresar, it was home to large shipping magnates of the  
> region. In the old part of town, and old temple and dargah sit side  
> by side, frequented by the fishermen and what is left of the once- 
> thriving port town. It is almost as though the post-earthquake  
> reconstruction drive in Kachchh has passed by this area. Old houses  
> stand disheveled and dilapidated, but not as a result of the 2001  
> earthquake. These structures fell apart over time and have not been  
> rescued from decay by the state government. Recently a Japanese  
> heritage conservation project has identified a cluster of old  
> buildings to restore and maintain. There has been much controversy  
> among local level leaders over the proposed plan to restore an old  
> Ismaili Muslim Jama’at Khana. The Jain temple should be restored  
> first said the panchayat, then the Jama’at khana. These divisions  
> are relatively recent in Kachchh. As far as the villagers are  
> concerned, they seem to be relatively unconcerned about these  
> fractious debates. As I walked into the village with my research  
> assistant, the call to prayer was sounding from a nearby mosque. He  
> went in to pray, while I sat outside for him, admiring the frescoes  
> and sculptures on the imposing house just across the mosque on the  
> narrow street. Soon I was engaged in conversation with an elderly  
> man smoking a bidi next to me. The Khimji family house that we were  
> admiring so ardently was once a towering structure of three  
> storeys. The family lived here while they traded in Muscat and  
> Zanzibar, dealing in spices and silks. As they prospered, they  
> decided to add storeys onto their single floor. Painters were  
> invited from all over Kachchh to decorate the facades and sculptors  
> who were employed by the royal families of the area were secretly  
> spirited away to embellish the house. They were warned not to go  
> higher than the dome of the mosque, and once they did, they began  
> to lose their business. Then the old man fell and broke his leg.  
> The upper storeys have never been inhabited again, I was told. All  
> the villagers know this tale, and believe it carries a powerful  
> portent for the future; they bow their heads in respect as they  
> pass the mosque, regardless of their religious or sectarian  
> allegiances.
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