A rather fierce debate has been raging at Kafila, the instigator is Zainab, a “Muslim” married to a “Telugu Brahmin” who discovered how deep is the hold of antediluvian ideas and practices in a city that has for sometime been touted as the hub of 21st century India.

She wrote a simple account of her experiences while searching for a house on rent in Bangalore. The piece also touched upon issues like communal profiling, stereotyping entire communities and such like. Some of those commentating on the piece have made ‘clever’ attempts at obfuscation by raising issues like loan quotas for Muslims and such other totally extraneous arguments. Never having studied economics, banking and/or commerce, never having had the resources to apply for a bank loan and not having my life enriched by the immensely educational experience of house hunting in Bombay and Bangalore, I will not try to take on Ipsita or comment on the secular practice of discrimination against all house hunters if they do not belong to the caste, religion, region, gender or economic status of the landlord. Continue reading The Great House Hunt →