Ahmedabad - History and City Life

I’ve spent the past few days in the capital city of Gujarat, Ahmedabad. Gujarat is one of India’s most conservative states; it’s very difficult to buy liquor here, and many of the women go around in veils or burqas. The region has large Hindu and Muslim populations – in 2002, large-scale violence erupted between the two groups.

The people here are much less used to seeing Western visitors than the citizens of Delhi or Shimla; on the streets, we get a lot of stares. Some people even follow us and take photographs of us!

Ahmedabad is also a famous center for textiles. The region has a long history of fabric crafts. It was here that Gandhi launched his movement to make India independent of British cotton cloth by encouraging people to spin and weave their own material.

Yesterday, we visited a village to see a weaving family that makes some of the finest saris in all of India, called patolas. Their work is painstaking – they dye each of the threads to make a particular pattern, and THEN they weave it.

This patola costs $8,000! Saris like this take about six months to make; there is a waiting list of three to four years!


One of the most exciting things I saw in Ahmedabad was an organization called SEWA, or the Self-Employed Women’s Association. SEWA’s purpose is to help women in India become entrepreneurs so that they can become independent and self-reliant. Some of the over 12 million members grow and sell produce in the markets, while others produce beautiful handicrafts. Check out my video to see more of what they do!

In the evening, I had a traditional Gujarati meal called “thali.” Everyone sits on the floor, and you’re served enormous plates with samples of almost a dozen different kinds of curries and relishes. Most of the food is both sweet and spicy; it’s very different from the Indian food I have had in the United States.

Links:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gujarat

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2002_Gujarat_violence

http://www.sewatfc.org/about_us.php

http://www.patanpatola.com/

Questions to Consider:

1. The history of violence between Hindus and Muslims in India during the second half of the twentieth century is an example of “escalation.” In class, we talked about escalation during the Cold War, as both the United States and the Soviet Union built up larger and larger stockpiles of nuclear weapons. Think of some other examples of escalation in history and the world today. (Extra credit – think of some example of escalation in your own life.) How can we stop the problem of escalation without sacrificing our own security?

2. The Hindi word for self-reliance is “swaraj.” Take a look at this explanation of swaraj (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swaraj), and explain why self-reliance is important both for individuals and for communities.