Picture `Anl 27-04' by Javed Raja qued last evening

Picture `Anl 27-04' by Javed Raja qued last evening
SHEFALI NAUTIYAL

AHMEDABAD, NOV 30: With the first rays of dawn, as the aroma of food cooking in Muslim Kifayat Hotel fills the air near the historic Teen Darwaza, scores of dirty, unkempt men, women and children in tattered clothes gather on the footpath. They are hungry, but they sit down quietly and wait.

A man arrives, hands over a Rs 100 note to Abdulbhai -- money for 20 meals -- and the hotel boys start serving the beggars. Each meal comprises two rotis, rice, sabzi and dal. For the non-vegetarian, there is mutton as well. All through the day, people keep coming to Abdulbhai with small donations and he keeps feeding beggars.

It's a unique arrangement, kept alive since 1935 by Abdul Rehman's commitment to an age-old family tradition, and the benevolence of numerous unknown citizens. They donate money while Abdulbhai cooks and feeds the beggars: one meal for every five rupees the donors give him. Every day, he feeds 500-600 beggars. No one is turned away. Rehman's cousins run similar hotels in Shahalam, Jamalpur and Chippawad.

While beggars are the main visitors to Kifayat Hotel, petty hawkers and vagabonds also come for a free meal. So do old men and women with no one to look after them, or those who come to the city for some work and then run out of money.

Many of them have been eating here for years. Like 54-year-old Pramod, who has been begging in the city for 12 years and survives on food from Kifayat Hotel. Or 60-year-old Dinesh Dharamendra Joshi, who talks in impeccable English. Joshi does not tell much about himself, except that he is from Nashik and had studied fine arts in his younger days. ``I have accepted my fate and so I sit here and beg. Whenever I am hungry, the open doors of Rehman's hotel welcome me,'' he says.

Abdul Rehman doesn't know exactly when his ancestors started feeding beggars. But his elders have told him that the practice of feeding the poor started during the reign of Sultan Ahmed Shah, who founded the city 600 years ago. It continued after Ahmed Shah died. Abdulbhai's is the ``fourth or fifth generation'' keeping up the practice, although the hotel was opened only in 1935.

Scores of unnamed people keep the fires burning in Abdul Rehman's kitchen. Many donate money on fulfilment of a wish, others do it out of sheer compassion. Then there are philanthropists who give money regularly -- once a month, once a week, even daily. And in an area that has often seen communal violence in the past, they come from all religions and communities. ``Hamare yahan Hindubhai bhi aaten hain aur Muslimbhai bhi (We get both Hindus and Muslims),'' remarks Abdulbhai.

Subhash Shah says he donates ``whatever I can'' when he visits the area. He has never thought it necessary to wait and see whether the beggars are actually fed. ``I have complete faith in these people. Moreover, there's God watching us all, isn't it?'' he remarks.

Like Shah, Abdul Rehman too has tremendous faith in God. Kifayat Hotel has no doors and shutters. ``What's the need? God takes care of us,'' he says. How does Abdul Rehman manage to serve a meal for just Rs 5? How do he and his family survive? He has just a one-line response: ``Usne hamein bhejaa hai, wohi hamara khayaal rakhta hai (He has sent us, he takes care of us).''

It's the income from other customers, whom Abdulbhai charges at the rate of Rs 15 per meal, that sustains the family. But since beggars are around all the time, very few other people visit the hotel. Abdulbhai, however, isn't bothered.