India
Ahmadabad
The Historic City of Ahmadabad is a 15th-century city especially known for its multicultural character.
Islamic elements are mixed with Hindu and Jain heritage. The specific style can be seen in the city's religious buildings and domestic wooden architecture. Further notable are its clusters of gated streets (pol), which belong to families of a particular group, linked by caste, profession, or religion. The city is surrounded by a wall.
Community Perspective: Although Ahmedabad overall has gentrified somewhat, the (limited!) core zone remains noisy, dirty, dusty and dilapidated. Solivagant and Carlo highlight a few structures of interest to explore on your own. Be aware that the Gandhi Ashram and the Hutheesing temple (both mentioned in reviews below) are outside of the core zone.
Site Info
Official Information
- Full Name
- Historic city of Ahmadabad (ID: 1551)
- Country
- India
- Status
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Inscribed 2017
Site history
History of Ahmadabad
- WHS Type
- Cultural
- Criteria
- ii
- v
Links
- UNESCO
- whc.unesco.org
All Links
UNESCO.org
- whc.unesco.org — whc.unesco.org/
Related Resources
- ahmedabadcity.gov.in — Ahmedabad City Heritage
News Article
- Nov. 27, 2024 timesofindia.indiatimes.com — Management Body for Ahmedabad's Unesco Heritage Site Faces 10-Year Stalemate
Community Information
- Community Category
- Urban landscape: Asian
Travel Information
Recent Connections
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Over 100,000 inhabitants
370,000 (an amazing 653 population dens… -
Indo-Islamic architecture
"The comparison emphasizes the signific… -
Named after individual people
Ahmad Shah I of the Gujarat Sultanate t…
Connections of Ahmadabad
- Trivia
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Over 100,000 inhabitants
370,000 (an amazing 653 population density)
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- History
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Mughal Empire
Ahmadabad is also an important city of Mughal architecture from the late 16th and early 17th centuries, with particular contributions of buildings and gardens by Shah Jahan during his residence in Ahmadabad as the Mughal Suba. These were early prototypes for his constructions in Agra when he became emperor. (AB ev) -
Fusion
significant for the fusion of the architectural traditions of two highly distinctive cultures and religions: Islamic architectural traditions brought by the rulers and founders of the city, and the Hindu-Jain tradition of construction and crafts of the local community (AB ev)
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- Architecture
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Urban fabric
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Indo-Islamic architecture
"The comparison emphasizes the significance of Ahmadabad on the grounds of 15th century planning of an Indo-Islamic city in the Indian sub-continent that is still a living city... Sultanate architecture from the fifteenth century is characterised by the fusion of Islamic elements and local Jain and Hindu building traditions, which are manifested in the Bhadra Fort, the city walls and gates, the Jama Masjid, the mausoleums of the royal family, and other mosques and minarets." (AB ev) -
Wooden architecture
Traditional houses (pol houses) are built using composite construction techniques with timber and brick-lime. (AB ev)
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- Damaged
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Destroyed or damaged by Earthquake
Ahmadabad was hit by earthquakes three times in its history (in 1819, 1821 and 2001), all of which caused major damage to the historic monuments of the city. (AB ev)
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- Religion and Belief
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Notable mosques
Jama MasjidSee en.wikipedia.org
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Jainism
Ajitnath Jain Temple and others -
Hindu pilgrimage sites
Swaminarayan Temple. "the first temple to be established by Swaminarayan Sampraday, one of the most popular Hindu leaders of recent centuries. It is also serves as one of the two seats (HQ) of that movement. Among the nine temples personally founded by Swaminarayan, it is arguably the most popular among pilgrims as he spent much time here and there are artifacts connected to his life that are kept at the temple." -
Vishnu cult
Swaminarayana TempleSee en.wikipedia.org
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- Constructions
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Walled cities
The city walls are 10.97 km in length and include 12 original gates (AB ev)
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- WHS on Other Lists
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World Monuments Watch (past)
Ahmedebad Walled City (1998)
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- Timeline
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Built in the 15th century
founded by Sultan Ahmad Shah in 1411 AD
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- WHS Names
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Named after individual people
Ahmad Shah I of the Gujarat Sultanate transferred its capital from Anhilvada to Ashaval in 1411 CE; as was custom, the city was subsequently renamed Ahmedabad after the Sultan (wiki)See en.wikipedia.org
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News
- timesofindia.indiatimes.com 11/27/2024
- Management Body for Ahmedabad's Un…
Recent Visitors
Reserved for members.Community Reviews
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I feel the need to push the opinion about this WHS back to “dirty, dusty and dilapidated”. Oh, and noisy too! Except for a variety of religious buildings (which were included to show the city’s multiculturality on a neighbourhood level, not because they are that scenic or significant otherwise), the OUV is all about the residential quarters (pole) and the domestic wooden architecture within these.
Once you have left the hustle and bustle near Bhadra Fort and the Darwhaza Gate behind, the street scenery does indeed start to change from tacky shops and frantic horning rickshaws into normal living communities. It’s fun to try to navigate through the ‘pole’ to a connecting major street – sometimes you may stumble upon kids practicing cricket in the street, or even half a dozen cows resting.
What’s “authentic” here is the urban plan. However, it’s anyone’s guess which plans the City of Ahmadabad has with the housing. Somehow you’d expect at least a certain upkeep as part of the conservation (they don’t have to be all turned into boutique hotels), but only a few structures have seen some TLC in the past decades and living conditions can’t be good (I noticed a real plague of squirrels for example).
My visit immediately brought back fond memories of the Old City Centers of Lahore and Peshawar which I visited last year. They still house bazaars that ooze history and plenty of wooden havelis. They have great monuments you can enter …
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Immediately after visiting the dusty cities that make up the Golden Triangle (Delhi, Agra, and Jaipur), arriving in Ahmedabad seemed to be a breath of fresh air, literally and figuratively. Yes, the classic mayhem and modern urban problems typical of Indian cities are all present in Ahmedabad. However, its RELATIVELY cleaner air, a well-maintained airport, gentrified riverfront, and less touristy feel made the city a rather nice place to travel to. Such observation is quite contrary to previous reviews, but a lot has happened since—according to a hotel staff I talked to, there has been a rapid development in Ahmedabad in the past several years, and he felt this beginning in 2022. The gentrification was of course limited to certain parts of the city, but somehow it worked. As mentioned by Solivagant, it’s notable that the current prime minister of India hails from the state of Gujarat.
Date of visit: after Christmas, Dec 2023.
We stayed for 3 nights in the excellent House of MG. The hotel is itself a beautiful, storied heritage building that was first built in 1904 and was once the home of the textile magnate Sheth Mangaldas Girdhardas. It was later converted into a hotel in 2014 and now enjoys a high reputation among locals, tourists, and travel websites. Objectively, the hotel deserves a visit for its history and architecture. Its location is also a plus—the hotel is built in Lal Darwaja, an area where the first settlements in the city were established. …
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A few points which arose from our visit in Mar 2019 in addition to those made by earlier reviewers
a. The “Heritage Walk”. Ahmadabad is rather proud of this initiative which goes back to 1997 and is being copied in other Indian cities. It receives many mentions in the Nomination File. Annex 17 is devoted entirely to it and contains a map - but here is the brochure version. These seemed to be as rare as hen’s teeth when we visited, so it might be worth printing it down in advance just in case you can’t get one “on location”! All (most?) of the 20 “pause points” have a large metal sign with a copy of this map, a description and an arrow to show where you are in the maze of alleyways (Photo). The link in Joel's previous review, as well as having its own map, will lead to more detailed descriptions of each of the “pause points” than are included with the above map and would be a useful complement to it (click through to "Heritage Walk packages"). There is fun of course in finding one’s own way along such a route, talking to the locals etc, but there are also advantages in having the significance of what you are seeing (or potentially “missing”) explained by a guide. Much of the “value” (such as it is) of the walk lies in understanding aspects which might otherwise go unnoticed. We met no other tourists (Indian or otherwise) …
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As other reviewers have noted, Ahmedabad is very much not a tourist city. It's hot, dusty and chaotic - even by Indian standards. We spent three days here in February 2019 as a base for visiting the three Gujarat WH sites (here, Rani-ki-Vav and Champaner-Pavagadh), and honestly it's difficult to really appreciate the World Heritage aspects of the city.
To try and fully understand the place, we opted for the Heritage Walk Ahmedabad, a semi-official endeavour supported by the local government and a bargain at only 125rs. The tour went for a couple of hours from the Swaminarayan Mandir, through various pol districts and ended at the Jama Masjid. It was a nice way to see the various aspects of what makes the city: Hindu culture, Muslim culture, along with the unique pol houses, and our young local guide was quite enthusiastic. That said, most of the pol houses are crumbling and poorly maintained - maybe that makes them more authentic? But at quite a few points it was hard to distinguish which were the historic houses and which were far more modern.
Overall neither of us were particularly impressed with the site. We've definitely seen worse, but have definitely seen better. Of the three sites in Gujarat, this was definitely the least impressive.
While in Ahmedabad I'd strongly recommend visiting the Gandhi Ashram across the river from the Old City. Gandhi lived here for about 12 years on and off, and large parts of it …
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Ahmadabad is not exactly a beautiful city, with the historical buildings intertwined with all kind of modern ramshackle buildings and the typical indian street chaos. It's dirty and dusty and very lively. I visited the old core with the heritage walk, which definitely leads you to places you would not have seen by your own, but was also a bit overcrowded (mostly indian students). The WHS description concentrates on the old building clusters (called pols) in the innercity. Other Ahmadabad sites like the stepwells, the sidi-saiyyed mosque and the jain temple are not mentioned. The old havelis have a very dusty charme - there are intricate carvings, beautiful decorations, but everything has a worn-out feeling. On the plus side, it definitely does not feel touristy. The proposal also seems to be the only indian WHS that concentrates not on palaces, ruins and temples, but on normal residential areas - I would therefore welcome its inscription (also as an incentive to preserve the buildings).
Visited: Nov 2015
Importance 3/5 Beauty 3/5 Uniqueness 4/5 Environment 1/5 Experience 3/5
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Visited January 2011 and May 2015
The first impression: Ahmedabad is a very dusty and very dirty city. But if you have a chance to spend there more than 2 days you will discover lots of gems - not only the mosques (Sidi Sayid, and Friday mosque) and museums (Calico Textile and city museum are the must!), but also beautiful old houses, temples, Badra fort (possible to visit now) and at least two step wells in the eastern part of old city.
Hint: as Ahmedabad is not a tourist trap at all you should know that there's only ONE place where you can buy postcards and souvenirs: boutique heritage hotel House of MG, opposite Sisi Sayid Mosque.
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