Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel’s Ahmedabad home is fruit godown

Most people believe that the first house in Ahmedabad in which Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel lived on his return from England in 1913, is located in Bhadra. But this is not true. Sardar Patel’s first house in the city was near Khamasa crossroads. It now belongs to a local fruit-seller who uses it as a godown to store various fruits.

When Patel returned from England in 1913 after becoming a barrister, he chose a single-storey building near Khamasa police chowki as his place of residence. He lived there for about a year-and-a-half before shifting to a house in Bhadra owned by the Mavalankars.

Prabhakar Khamar, joint secretary of Sardar Patel Memorial Society, said they had found an envelope on which Sardar Patel’s address was mentioned as: ‘Vallabhbhai Patel, near Khamasa police chowki, Ahmedabad’. The building now serves as the office-cum-godown of Qureshi Fruit Supplier which is owned by one Mohammad Ali Qureshi.

Qureshi bought this house from one Dasharth Patel whose forefathers had bought it from Sardar Patel. “I am proud to own the house that once belonged to Sardar Patel,” Qureshi said. Dashrath Patel used to run a teashop in this house but as business was not good, he rented it out to one Babubhai. “Earlier, part of the building was used by a printing press,” said Qureshi.