Dawoodi Bohra Forum

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Email address: vijaymehta1952@rediffmail.com
Subject: Locating very good old family friend from dawoodi bohra community
Message: Dear Sir,
Let me introduce myself as Vijay Mehta from Chembur, Mumbai having native place at Bhavnagar, Gujarat. Since quite sometime, I am keenly trying to locate our old family friend from dawoodi bohra community with whom, we have lost contact from 1985 ( around 30 years ). I am giving details of them and seek your advice regarding, how to locate them. During the course of trying for this, I came across this reference page hence writing this mail to you. Our attempt for this may look absurd to someone but WE believe that you will understand our profound feelings for them and desire to meet our old family friend with whom we have lived many memorable moments which we want to relive again, if opportune enough in locating them.

The details of our old family friend is as follows
Name of family head : Shri.Hamzabhai Lakdawala ( present age may be more than 80 years )
His wife's name : Sugaraben
Daughters' names : Suraiyaben & Shehnazben
Son's name : Do not remember as he was mostly living with Asha Parekh family at that time
Cross references : Hamzabhai Lakdawala was living in Vile parle west, Mumbai till 1985 in "Vivek Vinay Vatika" society situated opposite "Golden Tobacco" company in Vileparle west.
Famous hindi film actress Asha Parekh's mother was sister of Hamzabhai
Lakdawala as far as I remember
Landline telephone number at that time : 571210

Sir, this is the only information available with us of our old family friend till he was living in Vileparle west but after which they have shifted to Lallubhai park area in Andheri west, which we came to know from their old neighbour living in their old society, however, no more information/address/contact numbers eetc is available with him. Inview of above and our keen desire to locate and meet our old family friend, we request you to help us in this matter or advise us about how to locate them.

With regards,
Aditya Shantilal Mehta & Vijay Shantilal Mehta
M = 098980 21077 M- 9920795159

Hamzabhai Lakdawala expired last year, he was suffering from cancer. His wife now lives with her daughter at Indianapolis, USA.

[DELETED] DELETED]
please note that my father who was a primary school teacher has given loan of "Vidya" ( Education ) to Suraiyaji & Shehnazji along with their cousin sister ( mama's daughter) Shabnamji & cousin brother Jawahar in mid sixties when all these four cousins were living at their mausi ( Zaitunben Kapasi ) home in Bhavnagar during their schooling period and this "Loan" was not meant for recovery but to spread among needy people. The time and value of relations were such at that time that , there was family bond between both family and they were used to visit our home often and particularly during Diwali/new year day for paying respect to my parents, though they are from Dawoodi bohra community and we being Hindus.
After that period they were moved to Mumbai where as Shabnamji & Jawahar moved to some other place, with their respective parents but family relations continued whenever happened to meet. This was again strengthened when my elder brother Aditya came to Mumbai for study Chemical Engineering at Indian Institute of Technology, Powai in Mumbai during 1968-73 for five years and he was in their contact till say 1985 . However, Since he was settled at Bhavnagar and did not visit Mumbai few years, we have lost contact with Hamzabhai Lakdawalaji.
For any sensible and emotional person it is really difficult time after age of 60 years when he/she wishes to meet people with whom he/she has lived some part of his life with lots of memories but could not relocate them for reliving those nostalgic period again !
That is it and nothing else. DELETED]

Thanks very much Ghulam Muhameed saab for your vital feedback. According to you Shri.Hamzabhai Lakdawalaji has passed away to heavenly abode one year back and Sugraben is living with her daughter at USA. As far as I remember, Suraiyaben is married to Mumbai based family hence, she must be Shehnazji with whom Sugraben is living with now. Her son must be also there somewhere in India.

If you know any contact information of Suraiyaben or her brother or Sugraben in USA, PLEASE HELP US .,

With regards,

Vijay Mehta wrote:Thanks very much Ghulam Muhameed saab for your vital feedback. According to you Shri.Hamzabhai Lakdawalaji has passed away to heavenly abode one year back and Sugraben is living with her daughter at USA. As far as I remember, Suraiyaben is married to Mumbai based family hence, she must be Shehnazji with whom Sugraben is living with now. Her son must be also there somewhere in India.

If you know any contact information of Suraiyaben or her brother or Sugraben in USA, PLEASE HELP US .,

With regards,

Its always a pleasure to help someone whom we can. Please see your PM.

Actually, I appalled at this generalization. We object when people generalize "All Muslims are terrorists". And here we have Mr. Al-Noor making such a generalization [which was DELETED by Admin] about the large Gujarat community and making demeaning and insensitive remarks about Mr. Mehta.

I bow my head in shame at such a horrible statement without you knowing even an iota about Mr. Mehta. So much for not speaking badly during the month of Ramadan.

This appears to be a heart-warming story of inter-community friendship; we need more of it and not less. In this, our holy month of Ramazan, I wish you luck, Vijayji, in re-connecting with them. It is part of the rich mosaic that is India, where we all have friends from other religious groups.
[DELETED - Irrelevant]

Thanks very mush for your wishes for my success in re-connecting with my old family friend.

Yes, you are right sir and agree with your views . Even, I remember my childhood days during 1957-62 when one very noble muslim family ( Bagza family ) was living in our neighboring bungalow in Bhavnagar and I was used to go to their house regularly for playing, rather many times, they were calling me. During primary schooling also, we had muslim friend Salim with whon we used to play kabbadi regularly during recess time. Even during professional life in Mumbai, I have very good muslim friend Mr.Khurshid since last 30 years with whom we have family friendship is there. There are many such examples.
You are very correct in describing such inter community friendship as rich mosaic of Indian culture and pray to Al- Mighty to keep always that glowing, otherwise, extreme minded people in both community are determined to extinguish the same and present day politicians are not bothered to bring people close by heart.

Let us pray to Allah / God to bring sanity in everyone during these holy months of Ramazan & Hindu's Purushottam mas and keep brotherhood feelings forever.

Vijay Mehta