Man From Matunga

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December 16, 2005

The next door denizen

This one appeared in today's Mumbai Mirror.

Ravi, last week emailed me asking me when Sion would be covered in Writer’s Bloc, saying, “as one of the Onida ads says, ‘Neighbors Envy Owner’s Pride’”. I had anyway included Sion as part of the greater Matunga area, but when Anita on Sunday, muscled in, I realized I would have to move fast to protect my territorial interests (grin).

Sion, like Wadala is nothing but another Matunga, with a few pockets of difference. Most of it is populated by Gujjus…and we actually have a “Jain Society”. In Dr. Kusum Doshi’s words “Housing was also not neglected by the Gujjus of this area. A few of them got together and formed a society and constructed 18 buildings on a co-operative
basis—popularly known as Jain Society. This possibly may be the first co-operative housing society formed in this area. Here every member got one building as his share”.

Even those “townies” who don’t know where Matunga is, know where Sion is. If you want to leave town to go either to Lonavla/Pune or beyond Dahisar, etc. Sion till a few years ago was the only way out and even today is still the best way out. Both the highways converge to this central suburb, the Western Express via Dharavi and the Eastern Express via Everard Nagar. In fact, there was a time when to go from Thane to Juhu, you had no alternative but to come all the way to Sion and then turn around and go to Juhu. Thankfully these days, with the many east-west link roads that have come up, these round-about trips are slowly become a thing of the past.

And yet the traffic snarls don’t stop. The first one is at the Sion Hospital signal. The second is on Sion circle (try taking a turn to CineMax when you have come from Matunga) and the third is on the opposite side when you are coming from Chembur. Last Sunday, we managed Dehu Road to Sion in about 90 minutes and then spent around 30 minutes getting from just beyond Everard Nagar to Sion circle. I am sure the guys who conceived of the Sion circle flyover did all their home-work and are and were extremely wise; but a one-way flyover only from South-North and none in the opposite direction…makes no sense whatsoever. Another traffic snarl is outside CineMax, with a combination of tourist buses, the cars coming in and going out of the theatre’s parking lot and the cars being parked by the Peninsula valets.

As kids, we used to frequent the Gurukripa building to play in their game machines and to pig out on their samosas. Once in college, with most of my friends in SIES, that place became a kind of second home. And, with almost a decade of graduate and post-graduate education in Sion, and my wife being Sionite and my in-laws still living there…I guess my claim is well-established.

Sion has interesting neighbors. To the East is Koliwada with the repair shops and the Punjabi colonies as well as the entire CGHS quarters, now populated by Malayalees. On the West, is Dharavi, and unless you go back via Dadar and Mahim, that is the only way out of Sion to the Western suburbs.

But I still can’t figure out why Sion is called “Shiv” in Marathi and Hindi. Probably because of the fort?

Posted by bhavinj at December 16, 2005 05:40 PM

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