This story is from November 11, 2016

Old City: Geography and Communities

Old City: Geography and Communities
File photo of the Charminar in Old City
HYDERABAD: The spirit of Hyderabad, its Ganga-Jamuni tehzeeb, continues to lie within the Old City. Home to both Muslims and Hindus who have been living together for centuries, the city has invited and embraced those from different parts of the country.
Once called the walled city, there are several interpretations or definitions of the city, which lies on the south of the Musi.
The first is the geographical location.
An irregular shaped ring of neighbourhoods encircle the Old City. If one starts from the Naya Pul, then it begins at Madina, where the Macca Madina Alladin Wakf once funded residents of Medina, the second holiest site of the Islamic world, after the seventh Nizam Mir Osman Ali Khan in 1944 issued a firman. The High Court, one of the pillars of the Indian Judiciary, also constructed during the Asaf Jahi rule, finds itself looking into the eye of the Osmania General Hospital. This is followed by the Petla Burj, Bahadurpura, Kishan Bagh, Kalapather, Hassan Nagar, Bandlaguda and the Yemeni-Indian bastion of Barkas where an Arab Gourakhshana Samithi, a cow protection committee run by Muslims, was recently formed. The second half of this encircling ring comprises neighbourhoods like Saidabad, Malakpet, Imliban and the predominantly Shiite populated Noor Khan Bazaar.
For many years now, other neighbourhoods which were are gram panchayats are beginning to be considered as a part of the Old City. Case in point: areas in and around Shaheen Nagar and parts of the Maheswaram mandal. In close proximity to Barkas, these areas are populated by those who moved from core Old City which comprises neighbourhoods such as Charminar, Hussaini Alam and Moghalpura, and migrants labourers from other parts of the country. The tragedy is, that despite the fact that it is connected to the Hyderabad International Airport, it continues to remain backward. Development here is unregulated and sporadic and land sharks are aplenty. And in an age when piped water supply is the norm, residents of the area still receive water from gram panchayat sanctioned borewells.
And while the Old City is accused of being communally sensitive, conflagrations big or small, largely, have not significantly dislocated populations in recent times. The neighbourhoods in the older parts of the city comprising the tehsils of Charminar, Saidabad Bandlaguda, Bahadurpura, Golconda, Asif Nagar and Nampally have a substantial number of Hindus, according to the 2011 Census data, approximately 40 percent.

The Gulzar Houz and large parts of Patel Market continue to be one of the most important gold and textile markets the which has a strong presence of the Marwadi community. The Telugu speaking residents are concentrated primarily in Hari Bowli and Lal Darwaza. The Gujaratis of the Old City are scattered neighbourhoods like Chelapura. There is a small Marathi speaking community as well. The Lodhas, who came to the city two centuries ago, have made areas such as Mangalhat and Dhoolpet – on the other side of the Purana Pul where idols of Lord Ganesha and Goddess Durga idols are carefully crafted - their home.
There is an opinion which continually claims that “mixed neighbourhoods” are slowly becoming and thing of the past and that neighbourhoods have become predominantly Muslim or Hindu populated. The same opinion expounds over the years, gradually, some sections of the Hindu community has left the Old City to reside in other parts of town. But many Muslims have moved into newer neighbourhoods such as Toli Chowki, Mehdipatnam and Shaikpet, among others.
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