I was given a simple directive. At half-past 6, show up at kalpatru fruit market, near the Hanuman mandir. Joined by a US resident fellow on the trail of digging below the "surface" of India, I asked the rickshaw-wallah to take us there. It is located in the old part of Ahmedabad, beyond the lal-darwaja (that's the gate Maharaja Ahmed used to enter the then tiny city of Karnavati-nagari nearly 600 years ago), through the cacophonous maze of teeny-tiny gullies and jam-packed streets. Here is where the pujari of the temple, for over two decades, has been providing free food to all who come to his door. The concept is simple. You show up, you get food. No questions asked but love and smile offered unconditionally. We reached there to find a few people still getting their evening meal, sitting by the side of the road. The pujari lives in the temple itself, in one small room that has nothing but a 15" TV and a couple of mattresses on the side. The rest is a kitchen and a...
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