Religion, poverty and conflict in Ahmedabad, India

What is it about?

Ahmedabad is often called an Indian ‘success story’ in terms of economic urbanization, but it is also highly segregated along religious and caste lines, and a flashpoint in the 2002 Hindu–Muslim riots that left thousands dead. Most of the Muslim communities relocated after the violence work in a vast informal sector around the city’s landfills - peripheries that are ignored by local government and endemic with corruption. While many see this as a recipe for violent conflict, we find that a leveling of social stratification and reduction of segregation amongst Hindu and Muslim communities results in a more friendly relationship than current literatures on the relationship between poverty, religion and violence might predict. However, their unity has come at the expense of jointly ‘othering’ an even more vulnerable group of newcomers – a Bangladeshi migrant community that is persecuted by the state and fellow neighbors. We show that while violence markers are constituted in new ways, challenging assumptions of how inter-group violence is triggered, the fundamental societal weaknesses that facilitate such tensions remain prevalent despite changing conflict actor allegiances.

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Why is it important?

Illustrates how conflict lines in India need not only be between Hindus and Muslims, and in fact the two can unite if another actor provides the right challenge.

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