Gujarat Unknown- Hindu Muslim Syncretism & Humanistic Forays

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Gujarat is a land of paradoxes. On the one hand it has produced luminaries like Akho, Sayaji Rao Gaekwad and Gandhi who tirelessly worked for the upliftment of the society and to promote peace and amity among people of all faiths; on the other, it has drawn worldwide attention for the repeated communal pogroms between Hindus and Muslims. The riots after the Godhra incident in 2002 were perhaps the most widespread and virulent. This has led many scholars, activists and NGOS to record and trace the scale and nature of violence-to provide a Geography of Violence. An extensive study undertaken in different parts of Gujarat after two years of the pogrom, however, indicated that the aftermath was mainly confined to the central part of the state. In other areas there were only few skirmishes.

There are thousands of dargahs and mazars in the state which are frequented both by Hindus and Muslims. Only some prominent dargahs with high financial turnovers were a bit affected. In fact at one village in Kutch district, a Bajrang Dal activist was found expanding the shrine through public contribution. In this book several syncretic shrines have been documented along with portrayal of many communities with dual or liminal identities.

J.J. ROY BURMAN (b.1955) is primarily an anthropologist having done his postgraduation from North Bengal University in Sociology and Social Anthropology. Immediately after obtaining the degree he worked on the impact of counter-insurgency among the Mizos in Mizoram as a Fellow of Centre for Research in Rural and Industrial Development, Chandigarh. After living there in a village for about one year he joined Help Age India as Project Adviser for East and North- East India. After almost eight years of his direct contact with social work and social engineering, he joined Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai, as a member of the Faculty. Apart from teaching Anthropology, Roy Burman also carries out research mainly on the problems in rural areas. Forests, environment, mass religion have been his main areas of interest. He is the first person in India to have done Ph.D. on Sacred Groves from the sociological perspective. Few anthropologists have had the opportunity to travel in the tribal and forest areas all over the country like him. Right now it has become his passion to portray the inter-ethnic harmonious relations in the country.

Book's Contents and Sample Pages