SHEHER MEIN GHAR, GHAR MEIN SHEHER

Vastavikta Bhagat

We at SEA believe that the pandemic has a granularity of meta, non-linear narratives that become useful in making sense of the relational complexities of the pandemic and society. Thus, we set out to collect stories of fears, joys, agilities, fragilities, friendships, networks, collectives, home, work, infrastructures, entrepreneurship, privileges, marginalizations, migrations, desperation, gender, equity, etc. The glossary as a method became useful to reflect on this granularity of experiences and account for slippages during these times. These spatio-temporal stories, when read together or as individual instances produce a new sense of the emergent contemporary. This framework also allows us to speculate on the kind of world we will inhabit once the storm has passed. We draw on multiple readings to bring out the nuances and patterns of social life produced in a pandemic. This we hope would allow us to collectively reflect on the restructured ideas of the self, the collective, society, space, and time. There was a strengthening of boundaries within classes and communities of society during the pandemic. While some slippages occurred from the cracks, the notions of difference became more evident.

Pre-covid, our ghar was mostly a station to sleep, and to store. It had hardly seen us indoors on weekends, or long holidays, and was very unaccustomed to being continuously occupied for long durations.

In the new normal, we have already spent the last nine months stocked up and locked up inside this space – inhabiting it, occupying it and becoming contained in the container of our things. Would we, still part-Muslim family, be able to find a house that lets in some sunshine in the Mumbai of Covid-19 pandemic?

As new immigrants into the city five years ago, hunting a ghar meant using the following filters in order of priority-

Needs to fit within a stipulated budget

Needs to be on the western line, because western line trains are most efficient we were told Needs to be well connected to the local station

Needs to be in close proximity to a market

Needs to be well-ventilation, have good sunlight etc..

When we started looking, it dawned on us that we had not factored in the the largest filter of them all - the fact that the housing society should allow Muslims to rent and that the landlord needs to allow a part-Muslim family to occupy it!

Three weeks of intense house-hunting later, we stumbled upon the right landlord and thus, rented out what we called ghar for the next 5 (and counting) years. We share a love-hate relationship with this Ghar; in some sense it is the typical Bombay kholi - accommodating everyone, always brimming with family and friends and forever surrounded by the market, the rickshaws, even a metro station, on the other we detest the lack of direct sunshine, dampness during monsoon, no balcony space, and the fact that we were forced to dwell here for being part-Muslims.

THE BRIDGE OF MALEGAON

Sneha was telling me that malegaon mein there is a river, ek taraf old city hain and ek taraf new city hain and there is a bridge that connects it. So in the lockdown they blocked the bridge and uss taraf there are informal settlements and basically its a muslim dominated area, and iss taraf there is a new city which is coming up at the other side.

Toh phir yeh bridge pe inhone barricade laga diya, pura bridge block kar diya. Yahaan pe bhi, I was thinking how the crisis then strengthens this idea of boundary bahut he zyada. It is we who are strengthening the boundaries when we are telling the maids to get tested. Matlab we ourselves are scared, the middle class…. I think we should understand that the stories are saying something, they are not just facts, we are strengthening boundaries while we are telling these stories.

Tip

Tip