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AbstractIn this essay, I discuss issues of identity within the context of social and economic circumstances of the Sidi1 community in Mumbai. I argue that the Sidis who work as caretakers of shrines in Mumbai are accorded dignity and status from the community of devotees who are often from the Muslim, Hindu and Parsi Zoroastrian communities. Those Sidis who are dispersed in different parts of the city and who work as domestics in the homes of middle class Muslim or Hindu families, on the other hand, merge into the nameless toiling masses of the city of Mumbai. Most of these Sidis work in low-income jobs and live in one or two room shanty dwellings. Part of my enquiry also raises the question of home and belonging for the Sidi community. Where do Sidis locate home and how do they construct belonging in India? Finally, I conclude my essay by examining a very different Sidi presence in Mumbai, that of the descendants of the royal family of the Sidis of Janjira (an island off the coast of Mumbai) who live in the upper middle class area of Mumbai. I discuss how the descendants of the Sidis of Janjira construct identity in terms of class and privilege.

Intimate portraits of Dubai, where to handle heat and remain ready to work, men sleep wherever a good spot is to be found.

MUMBAI INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL 2005 MAMI, the acronym for the body that organises the International Film Festival of Mumbai (IFFM), stands for Mumbai Academy of the Moving Image. That's a curiously old-fashioned name for a body that was set up only about eight years ago. Run by film-makers and technicians, as against the central government funded and organised International 7th Film Festival of India (IFFI), IFFM had its seventh staging last January 6-13 in Mumbai. IFFM had some good films, a centrally located venue and the ever-enthusiastic captive film-buff audience of India's film capital. It also had some glitches, little glamour, and very few foreign delegates. Lack of funds is the bane of every festival, and IFFM has always felt the pinch. Money comes from some sponsors, a state (local) government grant, co-organisers in the shape of the central government's National Film Development Corporation (NFDC) and the P. L.