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Mumbra expanded with great velocity in the aftermath of the Babri Masjid in Ayodhya. The Bombay riots of December 1992, which overwhelmingly killed Bombay Muslims, and the retaliatory bomb blasts in January 1993 by the Muslim underworld, reconfigured the social geography of the city. Bombay Muslims from riot-hit areas sought safety in numbers and found it in Mumbra, where Muslims from the Konkani coast had a long-standing presence. Through a combination of the desire for safety among Muslims, the relatively cheaper price of apartments, and continued rural-urban migration, Mumbra’s population grew 20 times from about 45,000 before the 1992 riots to more than 9,00,000 in the 2011 Census — possibly one of the fastest expansions of an urban area in India.
- BASHARAT PEER
SHAKY GROUND: “Mumbra builders have built illegal and substandard apartment blocks which are much cheaper than those in Mumbai.” Picture shows apartments in Mumbra.
Uprooted from Mumbai after the 1992-93 riots, thousands of Muslim families found safety in Mumbra on the city’s outskirts. Visiting it over a few days, Basharat Peer discovered islands of progress amid large seas of neglect in the township that nine lakh people call home
On a recent afternoon, after a two-hour drive out of Mumbai, I followed a highway hugging the low hills of Mumbra, north-east of the city, near the Thane creek. As the road forked downhill, hundreds of grimy, teetering buildings stacked like tattered books in a neglected public library were the first glimpse intimation of Mumbra, India’s largest Muslim ghetto. Despite the heat, young boys played cricket in a clearing by a graveyard. A chaotic medley of vehicles choked the main street leading into the Kausa area of the ghetto.
Mumbra expanded with great velocity in the aftermath of the Babri Masjid in Ayodhya. The Bombay riots of December 1992, which overwhelmingly killed Bombay Muslims, and the retaliatory bomb blasts in January 1993 by the Muslim underworld, reconfigured the social geography of the city. Bombay Muslims from riot-hit areas sought safety in numbers and found it in Mumbra, where Muslims from the Konkani coast had a long-standing presence. Through a combination of the desire for safety among Muslims, the relatively cheaper price of apartments, and continued rural-urban migration, Mumbra’s population grew 20 times from about 45,000 before the 1992 riots to more than 9,00,000 in the 2011 Census — possibly one of the fastest expansions of an urban area in India.
"Not Bombay, a village"
Assadullah Khan, an electrical engineer in his late 40s, was among the first groups of people who moved to Mumbra from Mumbai after the 1992-1993 violence. Mr. Khan was living in Kannua Nagar in the suburb of Vikhroli, a mixed neighbourhood, where Hindus and a smaller number of Muslims lived together without incident. Mr. Khan, who also gave part-time tuitions to students, was the only Muslim in his building. After the riots, most of his Muslim neighbours began to migrate to areas with a heavier concentration of their co-religionists. Mr. Khan was weighing his options.
A female neighbour warned him. “You should leave now,” she said. “Things are going to get worse.” He moved his wife and children to his in-laws’ house overnight. “A little later, I sold my apartment for much less than it would fetch on the market,” Mr. Khan told me. The market for distress sales was booming.
Mr. Khan found shelter in his brother-in-law’s apartment in Mumbra. “We then bought an apartment of our own and have lived here since,” he said. Thousands followed him, from Bhandup, Vikhroli, Ghatkopar, Behram Baug, and Walkeshwar. Uprooted from the charred geography of the city, they converted a semi-rural backwater into a promised land.
The Maharashtra and central governments, which had watched impassively through the riots, left the migrants to their own devices, but Mumbra grew. Power and water supply was feeble. There was little public infrastructure. The crisis provided a business opportunity for Mumbra builders; they set out to build illegal and substandard apartment blocks, which were (and still are) a lot cheaper by Mumbai standards. In the early 90s, an illegally built two-bedroom apartment in Mumbra would sell for around Rs. 2 lakh. “Most of the buildings are illegal,” a builder told me. “Today, an illegally built three bedroom costs Rs. 8-10 lakh. If I built that legally, it would cost Rs. 25-30 lakh.” Mumbra is a mixture of middle, lower-middle, and working class Muslims, but the majority are from the lower-middle and working classes. “Most people here couldn’t afford the legal market prices,” he said.
The poor building quality exacted a terrible cost in 2013 when a building collapse killed more than 70 people. It did not deter new arrivals. Rafiuddin Khan, a retired teacher in his 70s, lived most of his life in a tenement near Mohammad Ali Road — one of the oldest Muslim majority areas in Mumbai. “Our area was safe but I was tired of living with a growing family in two rooms,” he said. He sold his chawl; it fetched enough money to buy an apartment in a Mumbra apartment block. “It is a lot more space than we had in Bombay,” he said. He paused for a while, as if reimagining the vistas of his earlier life in the middle of the bustling metropolis. The ease of travel and the proximity to major public hospitals, schools, and colleges was missing in Mumbra. A journey to the city in a sardined local train took about an hour and half. “It is not Bombay, it is a village.”
Desire for upward mobility
The signs of aspiration are seen in the names of apartment blocks: Shimla Park, M.M. Valley, and Wafa Park. The impatience with the status quo and the desire for upward mobility screams from roadside billboards advertising the achievements of Mumbra boys and girls in coaching classes and private schools. A higher secondary level school, Al Hidayah School, has advertised with a collage of smiling student photographs and the percentages of their Senior Secondary School marks. There was pride in that data: Out of 24 students, 9 have secured above 75 per cent and 14 between 60 per cent and 70 per cent. Meanwhile, Shoeb Junior College simply said: 89.16 per cent success.
“When we moved here, we clearly felt the absence of things we were used to in the city,” said Mr. Khan, the engineer. The ghetto had a few government schools, which were abysmally overcrowded and lacked infrastructure. Mr. Khan gave up engineering and set up a tuition centre, Unique Classes. When an old Sikh family, which had run a private high school in Mumbra decided to sell the school, Mr. Khan bought it, renaming it Assadullah Khan English High School and Junior College. It already has 1,400 students. “We are trying to fill the gaps ourselves,” he said. Despite having around a million residents, the Maharashtra government has not set up a single public college in Mumbra.
Beyond the doors of the ghetto, a Mumbra address often carries a degree of prejudice and suspicion. A lawyer spoke of trying to buy an Idea Internet dongle at a Thane shop and being turned away; an Urdu publisher spoke of waiting months to get a landline and broadband connection from BSNL. A few weeks ago, a private school in Panvel, a suburb 24 kilometres from Mumbra, decided to ban admissions of students from the ghetto, claiming that they behave badly. Waris Pathan, the Byculla area legislator from Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen, led a protest against the school administration, which eventually revoked its decision.
Neglect and discrimination
One evening, I met Nazim Qazi, a sanitation officer with Thane Municipality. Before moving to Mumbra, when his wife, a schoolteacher, got a job in the area, he lived in Andheri and Thane, working as a freelance Hindi journalist, writing about cinema and the underworld — the two great Bombay themes. He gave it up for a more stable income at Thane Municipality.
Mr. Qazi lived in a relatively spacious, meticulously neat two-bedroom apartment with his wife, son, and two daughters. He saw certain benefits in living in Mumbra. “Women can walk around anytime and nobody will bother them. We have been here since 1999 and we sleep in peace, without any fear of riots or disturbances.” He loved hearing the azaan, the call for prayer, five times a day. “It has been easy to raise my children with Muslim values here,” he said.
As we spoke, Shehzad Faisal Qazi, his 20-year-old son, who has a mechanical engineering degree from Anjuman-I-Islam College, a minority institution in Panvel, joined us. A fashionable young man with rimless glasses, Mr. Faisal had recently returned from Coimbatore, where he and his college mates had won several top positions in a Go-Kart design competition. They were trying to patent an anti-skid mechanism for cars. He was about to leave for New Delhi to take classes for the Indian Administrative Services examination.
Along with the strivings, a sense of neglect and discrimination pervades Mumbra, which does not have a single public hospital. The nearest public hospitals are in Kalua and Thane. Several clinics and rudimentary private hospitals have come up. Mumbra goes without electricity for at least six hours everyday. “We are No. 1 in load-shedding,” Mr. Qazi laughed. “But things are a lot better compared to even five years ago.”
The evidence of incremental progress was visible in Mumbra. Some streets had been paved with tar. State Bank of India, HDFC, and Bank of Maharashtra had opened branches or ATMs. A Domino’s Pizza outlet opened last year. The absence of banking facilities or companies denying home delivery of products has, for years, been the standard attitude towards India’s Muslim ghettoes. Barely an hour from the Indian Parliament, the Okhla Muslim ghetto in New Delhi did not have a single bank despite a population of several lakh. Two years ago, Jammu and Kashmir Bank opened a branch in Zakir Nagar. Juhapura, the Ahmedabad ghetto, whose population doubled after the 2002 riots, still does not get piped water or gas, and remains excluded from Ahmedabad’s vaunted public transport network.
Run-ins with police
Mumbra also lives with a hostile relationship with the police. It was home to Ishrat Jahan, who was killed along with three other men by the Gujarat police. The Central Bureau of Investigation later described the killings as a “fake encounter”. Taunts of being a safe house for terrorists are often thrown at Mumbra. Last March, several hundered policemen raided Mumbra one and a half hours after midnight. A video recorded by a local journalist shows scores of men being paraded through dark streets by the police, bundled into police vans, and held for hours in Mumbra police station. Around 80 people, including young students, poets and old men were arrested. The police claimed to be looking for two petty thieves wanted for chain-snatching.
One afternoon, I met Ishrat Jahan’s family in Mumbra. They continue to litigate and fight the everyday battles of existence on the periphery. Ishrat’s sister Musarat Jahan recently completed her B.A. in Psychology through a correspondence course, but her mother, Shamima Kausar, is too scarred to let her step out and seek work. “I can’t trust the world anymore,” said Ms. Kausar. Yet, there are bills to pay. Ishrat’s brother Anwar Iqbal used to do odd jobs to support the family. Initially, he was denied employment because he was Ishrat’s brother, but he persisted and found work at a BPO in Thane. “It is an American company,” said Ms. Jahan. “He doesn’t make calls, he does data entry.”
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Readers
mohajir
BJP, allies & its government parrots imaginary grievances & it is practiced for so long that it took atleast last three generations to dwell in a cave of prejudices. When they step out & experience sunlight in form of reality via above article, course correction gives way to held prejudices & they recoil from the light and return to the darkness, and stay there forever. Muslim generations though bear hardships, yet can be said to be living in reality. What may facilitate a political endeavors is infact the biggest disservice to the generations of non muslims as they are indoctrinated to a non existing, imaginary ghost / stuff . India is a nation & not a religion. Government is not a religious diety for government delivery mechanism to be allocated / distributed to the adherents of a religious diety but be for the ease of Indians who are the nationals of India the nation. Vision of government be 20/20 & not squint towards Mumbra or Jammu or any religious adherents but at India & Indian.about 8 hours ago · (24) · (11) · replyPoints7340(0) ·
- Gentleman
Mumbra shelters anti-social elements in higher numbers compared to its neighbourhood. A Mumbra based guy who was running mobile repair shop in my neighbourhood run away with several mobiles including mine by closing his shop overnight. People in locality suggested me not to chase them as it's not a safe place for gentleman. It confirms that prejudice do not arise automatically, it needs some causal factors.about 9 hours ago · (7) · (13) · reply(0) ·
- vashikar
Totally biased article unlike Gujarat so called secular parties like Congress and NCP were in power in Maharashtra from 1999- 2014. Area is represented by NCP MLA Mr Avhad. Why did not they raise these issues with their representatives like corporators , MLA and MP's who belong to NCP and Congress and were partly voted to power due to Muslim votes? As far as load shedding is concerned Mumbra is notorious for power theft and hence load shedding is enforced to curtail losses . Please ask him to check why load shedding is nil in Navi Mumbai because there is virtually no power theft.about 9 hours ago · (19) · (20) · reply(0) ·
- Suresh Hattangadi
Author has has done a quick fix job of the subject.Even after Babri Masjid demolition and riots and Bomb blasts thereafter,much of Muslim population still lives in Mumbai in their homes. Some might have migrated to Mumbra but middle class and better off Muslims continue to live in Mumbai.There is reference in Wikipedia that many Muslims from Northern states also settled there in Mumbra. The article required some research ( painstaking ) to do justice to the subject. I am not very convinced by the authors description that most Muslims living in Mumbra are from Mumbai.This will be far off the mark.about 9 hours ago · (7) · (8) · reply (Points8900) ·
- Vishal
"Uprooted from Mumbai after the 1992-93 riots". This is plainly incorrect. Most of the people staying in Mumbra are immigrants from other parts of the country or Bangladesh. It is a blatant lie to say they are victims. I have spent months working there with an NGO. Yes, the conditions there are horrible, but your analysis is plain mischievous.about 9 hours ago · (17) · (13) · reply(0) ·
- Jeetendra Choudhary
To those claiming that this paper has not published articles about kashmiri pandits please go and search Rahul pandita the hindu you well get chilling and horrendous expulsion of the case as it was.coming to the article,i think that there are always more than religious trends in a violence as seen from the distressed selling of apartments which would have benefitted the real estate.about 9 hours ago · (20) · (2) · replyPoints200(0) ·
Reyaz Khan
Well elaborated the issues today India is facing more. Polarization among communities has become much wider today after RSS backed Government came in power. There may be thousands of ways to improve situations and everyone has to works towards that. One of the ways could be strategically ensuring diversity in housing, educational institutions, and other bodies. More and more interaction among people and living together can improve the situations.about 9 hours ago · (13) · (4) · reply(1) ·
- narasimhan
As if muslim demanded separate country for muslims only after Modi government was formed. Even RSs was formed only after many muslim organisations had sprung up in the Indian Continent. Read History properlyabout 5 hours ago · (0) · (0) · reply (0) ·
- Digvijey V
I am surprised to read the report ... what is motive off writing and timing ? Is Mr. Author really worried about ghettos are muslim ghettos only ? There is no any kind of possible or alternative solutions, how to get it rid of from such ghettos. Ie religion a problem or solution for such ghettos ?about 9 hours ago · (8) · (12) · reply(0) ·
- sirajjugnu
Thank you Mr.Basharat for bringing to light the plight of muslims and I also request you to bring to light from the places eversince the demolition of Babri mosque.about 9 hours ago · (0) · (0) · reply (Points2400) ·
- Amaan
Appreciate author for writing...n who r saying india is nt for muslim are biggest terrorist of humankind. .so first we have to threw dem from india...n so disgusting ppl are here, if he is reporting abt muslim so dey want hindu pandit news also..u want hindu pandit news so go n be a reporter...becoz hindu pandit r disasterabout 9 hours ago · (16) · (6) · reply(1) ·
sabarish Down Voted- narasimhan
Sir, Would you say the same thing if some one writes about all the wrongs being committed by intolerent muslims all over indiaabout 5 hours ago · (0) · (0) · reply (0) ·
- Rajan Mahadevan
Given the superficial Hindu tolerance to cover the deep distance from caste muslims, it would only seem comforting for the alienated ones to flock together in ghettos anywhere else than in close integration. And given the headgear-conscious PM Modi's infamous rejection of sporting a muslim skullcap even for a symbolic photo-op and plans for a forthcoming business-trip to Israel, situation of of the social divide will hardly get better.about 9 hours ago · (12) · (6) · replyPoints12210(1) ·
- Thrinethran T
In all fairness, most Muslims would excuse themselves from wearing the faintest Hindu religious symbol as well. Hindu tolerance and Muslim integration are two sides of a coin we must have one nation.about 6 hours ago · (0) · (0) · reply (0) ·
- mohajir
Uprooted from Mumbai post 1992-93 riots, thousands of Muslim families found safety in Mumbra on city’s outskirts while perpetrators of riots fond safety in the corridors of power. Government doesn’t have political will to implement Sri Krishna committee report findings on riots as the displaced riots victims are not a vote block. They are not Kashmiri pandits who enjoys budgetary allocation in central government budget too. Kashmiri pandits are most appeased as their talk facilitates political endeavors of BJP & allies. No Matter many of those who stayed in Kashmir during turbulent time got disrobed at hands of uniform personnel while carrying out cardon & search operations (as cited in article politics of rape which appeared in TH few months Back) & 100 plus children fell to the bullets of those who enjoy immunity under AFSPA , so shouldn't Mumbra residents be thankful to Mumbra police for confining the operations to as cited in instant brief ?about 10 hours ago · (19) · (5) · replyPoints7340(1) ·
- narasimhan
Sir, How many times have you condemened the actions of the muslims in kashmir. Keep your hand in the heart and in the name of Allah say to yourself whether even once you have felt bad or raised your voice against these muslimsabout 5 hours ago · (0) · (0) · reply (0) ·
Ramachandran Venkataraman
It is surprising that even people like who read papers daily do not know such a situation occurs in Moder Bharat. I am ashamed as an Indian. The Government and corporate should help these people.about 10 hours ago · (13) · (6) · replyPoints130(0) ·
- Sishtla
It is not the question of religion. It is the question of rich and poor. irrespective of religion. The reasons for the ghettos is economic disparity, Nowadays it has become fashionable for every journalist to write on religious lines in a biased way. Poor irrespective of religion should be educated about small family norms and the benefits instead of crying foul for every thing.about 10 hours ago · (0) · (0) · reply (Points11500) ·
- Sreeparna
There are a number of factual errors in this article. The suburb mentioned a couple of times is spelt incorrectly - it is Vikhroli not Vitroli and it is Kalva not Kalua. Notwithstanding these errors, Mr. Peer has captured the essence of Mumbra really well. I grew up in Thane and am familiar with the problems of the area. Mumbra has a serious problem because of the lack of any public services as well as the nexus of corrupt politicians and builders which allows them to construct extremely poor quality buildings that collapse during the torrential monsoons of the area.about 10 hours ago · (0) · (0) · reply (0) ·
- INDIAN
It's not about being biased towards Muslims . But it has been written to portray the aftermath of communal riots . The condition of Indian minority has only get worse. Why doesn't government work on the welfare for minorities . Every govt. has used minority as their vote bank no such work has been done by anyone since independence.about 10 hours ago · (2) · (6) · reply (1) ·
Milind Up VotedAbhi Down Voted- narasimhan
Sir, If Government has not helped minorities or they are not well off in this country the population of minorites should have come down. The communities which are rich in this land belong to minority community such as Parsis, Sikhs, Jains, Christians etc. These are facts. They are not vote banks yet they are not only surviving well in this country but also contributing to a great extent. This is also appreciated by the majority community. The problem for muslms lie within thier own prejudices and ranks.about 5 hours ago · (0) · (0) · reply (0) ·
- Nick G.
Muslims being the second largest group after Hindus have also suffered so the chaddi-walas should stop crying over Kashmiri Pandits as Kashmiri Muslims were also tortured!about 10 hours ago · (11) · (6) · replyPoints345(1) ·
- Milind
Muslims suffered due to their intolerance, inability to embrace modernity. They get easily provoked by some outrage outside the country (Israel-Palestine) or some sacrilegous cartoons, prodded by fiery Friday sermons from the neighbouring mosque. This condition is pretty much everywhere right from India, Western countries, China etc. The Kashmiri Pandits were genuine natives there, did not indulge in conflict with anybody. They were threatened to leave through sermons from the local mosques (leave your property & women behind).. Of course you won't understand the pain and will continue to blame chaddi-wallahs.. Assuming you're a Christian, you're faring quite well under these chaddiwallahs, compared to the neighbouring or other Muslim countries. So stuff your crap.about 8 hours ago · (0) · (0) · reply (0) ·
- Vedprakash
I am saddened to know that Media thinks it proper to highlight religious segragations, though, it is not an ideal situation. People from all religious communities should live randomly. No segragation is desirable. But it is the irony that we have no problems living in USA in minorities, but we are scared of each other in India. Social workers, NGO's and leaders of different faiths must act possitively in order to change this state of mindset. Highlighting such issues may be used as some kind of awareness campaigne.about 10 hours ago · (6) · (0) · reply (Points3150) ·
Hemant Bisht
The Muslim community needs to be a doer and not the victim-player. Such hardship as mentioned by the author are faced by Muslims as well as Hindus alike. The author fails to mention the hardships faced by the Kashmiri Pandits.about 10 hours ago · (9) · (21) · reply(2) ·
Salah Mohammed
An inspiring and touching independence story! Despite hostility, the society here seems to enjoy the freedom, aspirational, dreams and a zeal packed determination to accomplish. I see no hurdles to their spiritual rise even though the world may loot them for worldly greed and selfish satisfaction of their sadistic pleasure packed into the political mind of Maharashtra.about 10 hours ago · (17) · (11) · reply(1) ·
- narasimhan
Sir, Whether one likes it or not I appreciate Maharatrians very much for their tolerance towards others very much. Even Shiv Sena and other Maharastra political parties should be appreiciated. In other states the regional parties would have created hell if even in their capital city they are in minority in every sense. Would any regional party in other states such as Kerala, Tamilnadu,karnataka, West Bengal etc allowed hindi movies to be screened freely but not their language films.about 4 hours ago · (0) · (0) · reply (0) ·
Hindu Hindus
Another pro Muslim writing in THE HINDU which doesn't have space for Hindu pandiths and Hindus plight. THE HINDU keep it up and keep publishing only for Muslims cause for THE HINDU other people leaving in India are not human especials Hindus are not human to you. THE HINDU You sucksabout 11 hours ago · (16) · (30) · replyPoints290(1) ·
- Abhishek Chakrabarty
Doesn't really bother us where the Muslims are living and how they are living. India is not their country anyway. The main concern is how come their population increased by such a huge proportion. The author did not write about that. Anyone who is concerned about poor condition of Muslims may pack them together and go to ISIS. Within the next 10 years, the Muslim population in India has to be reduced by half - either by conversion or by mass genocide.about 11 hours ago · (7) · (38) · replyPoints280(3) ·
Surya · Kumar · Yashwanth · Abhi · Jhindupur · Lele · Avinas h · AThinker · Kumar · krishna raj · Down Voted - Ilango
How "The Hindu"editorial board permitted this particular comment and also gave it 280 points?I wonder what purpose your editorial board serves?I have been observing that this board takes inordinate time to screen sane comments and do not publish comments containing references to other newspapers and yet allowed this sort of provocative comment.Is it a ploy to get more comments in response to this provocative comment?You owe an explanation to your long time readers.about 5 hours ago · (0) · (0) · reply (0) ·
- abhishek rawat
its shameful how the govt, through its passive complicity, forces any community (primarily muslims) into seeking security in numbers, and then ironically dubs their places of residence as dens of terrorism....little that one can do if law and order is auctioned to the highest bidder...about 11 hours ago · (17) · (2) · replyPoints420(0) ·
- KS DILIP
Lot of space wasted. The author seems to be recirculating old crop of Muslim marginalisation....when it is clear that they never took a stand against their co religionists taking to terrorism. They are happy to be called victims and try to take political milage rather than getting out of the mess they have created. Many enclaves of Muslims in Kerala, Karnataka and Tamilnadu are used even now as terror hubs with full cooperation of Muslim populace. Time for them to wake up..about 11 hours ago · (12) · (18) · reply(0) ·
- Lovely
Condition of muslims will not change even after 100 yrs. Our politicians should stop using them for votes.Muslims should first come out of ghetto mindset, limit the size of their families. Every religion is against family planning but almost all religions have limited their family size. Obviously I should cut my cloth according to my size only.Sachar Committe was silent about this point.about 11 hours ago · (0) · (0) · reply (Points106150) ·
- Subramanyam
The author should go to any slum area occupied by the Hindus anywhere and compare their plight to those of the Mumbra Muslim residents. If the population of Mumbra is a million now as he says, does he imply that a million Muslims moved away from Mumbai to Mumbra? If not, the original denizens of Mumbra have had the same lack of infrastructure, facilities, attention etc, haven't they? These drawbacks, shameful as they are in our country, are not peculiar to Muslim-dominated places alone. Many times, they exist in the middle of a metropolis. Many of our towns and villages have the same sorry plight. To attribute these, therefore, to apathy towards Muslims is bigotry. Police rounding up residents to catch suspected thieves is a common occurrence in India, right or wrong. Why does the author link it up with Muslims? Did the police do it falsely or deliberately to harass Muslims? It is such articles that develop ghettoisation and a frenzy. Muslims have to willingly be a part of mainstream.about 11 hours ago · (15) · (17) · replyPoints31520(0) ·
- ramanan
@Author, Somebody asked me in the IT Company where I work as a senior consultant why I do not allow muslims in the Project time and space for their prayers on the floor of the Project while I celebrate festivals like Holi or Christmas in the Project. My reply was other religions are inclusive and do not try to 'act' superior. The same asnwer to your article. We do not want to hear 5 times azan not want to covet your women wearing black tents head to foot.about 12 hours ago · (7) · (12) · replyPoints235(1) ·
- Abhishek Saini
Fantastic read. I wanted to read about the Muslim perspective of things. I being born a Hindu, can't even imagine the feeling of being a minority. I hope we will get the things better.about 12 hours ago · (13) · (9) · reply(0) ·
- Suren Singh
Segregation on the basis of religion in India not much different from Colour in S Africa when the whole world United to break down the barriers. The founding fathers dreams lay shattered and the world is benign to the new realities in India.about 12 hours ago · (19) · (2) · replyPoints365(2) ·
- Martin
Dharavi Asia largest ghetto. No wonder he the reporter sees the speck and not the log. Speaks volumes about his reporting and how secular his views is.about 12 hours ago · (11) · (14) · replyPoints1675(1) ·
There's a difference between a ghetto and a slum. While Dharavi may be Asia's largest slum, it is certainly not a ghetto, it has 60% Hindus and the others are Christians, Buddhists and Muslims. A ghetto on the other hand is characterized by a predominant population (>80%) of a single religion/caste. Also, a ghetto need not be a slum, it can have pukka buildings as well.about 10 hours ago · (0) · (0) · reply (1) ·
- Kumar
Formation of enclaves does not bode well for the fabric of society. Certianly there are enclaves where only NRIs live, or only judges live... Sometimes it is privilege and prestige and sometimes it is a feeling of insecurity among some groups. If a feeling of insecurity is driving this trend then the State has failed as a provider of law and order, safety and security.about 12 hours ago · (13) · (1) · reply(0) ·
Bharati Down Voted - rs
Congress and NCP, both secular parties, ruled Maharastra for last 15 years. If it was BJP government all these secular press would have made it every day affair to cover it. They did it in Gujarat. Double standards are fully exposed. Unless the MSM /TV channels cover such incidents in a fair way things will not improve. Obsession to paint only BJP with anti Muslim image should change.about 13 hours ago · (9) · (21) · replyPoints4740(0) ·
- krishna
When the subject of the article is Mumbra and the muslim population, what CBI said about the nature of the encounter in Gujarat is irrelevant. What is relevant is, is Ms. Ishrat Jahan innocent or is part of a terrorist gang. The author has carefully avoided mentioning about the innocence of the individual as the whole world including the author knows the truth about that girl.about 13 hours ago · (5) · (13) · replyPoints325(0) ·
- Raj
And the point of this article is what? The fact that Muslims chose to live together in a ghetto and cut themselves off from broader India? The issues described here are no different than in any other lower income area anywhere in India. Except for the people. They have chosen to isolate themselves on the basis of their religion.about 16 hours ago · (8) · (6) · reply (Points3600) ·
Abhi Down Voted
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