Antop Hill cemetery
Written by mcgee on April 3rd, 2006
Spurred by the popularity of a new Bollywood thriller, 88 Antop Hill, Indian news site Mid Day has just published an article about an unusual cemetery in the Antop Hill area of Mumbai (Bombay).
The mortal remains of many a Chinese, Bahai, Muslim, Hindu, Armenian and British inhabitants of Mumbai have found their final resting abode over here. Incidentally, the Chinese, Bahai and Muslim cemeteries are adjacent to each other.
The article dedicates brief summaries to each of the sections, offering this about the Bahá’í cemetary:
The Bahai Gulistan has existed here since the past century. The Bahais, unlike other religions that have religious heads, are governed by an administrative order.
One more ritual they follow is that of preparing a vault at the graveyard before a person dies.
The Local Spiritual Assembly (LSA) of the Bahai sect sponsors the vault. These vaults made from concrete and bricks, are used to store the mortal remains.
The Gulistan is managed by Abbas Akhtar Khavari (41), a Bahai, and an undertaker by profession. There is another Bahai cemetery a stone’s throw away, also managed by Khavari.
Concluding the article, the reporter uses the coexistence of these different religions’ graves (as well as a quote from a Bahá’í) to make a point about harmony:
Out of these final resting places, arise instances of communal harmony. A Hindu employee taking care of a Kabrastan. A staunch Muslim managing a Chinese cemetery.
And a Bahai, looking over the Armenian dead. Says Mohammad Rafique, “We have never faced any problems with regard to any religion. These graves have existed before we were there, and will exist after us too.”
For those of us who came into the Baha'i Faith through the ever popular 
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“Chinese is a people whose ashes are so mixed with the land that they constitute perhaps the only nation who don’t feel strange to the materiality of the land.This happens to such an extent that even the mountains ,the rivers and the deserts are not only physical presences but expansions of the human spirit.”
Robert Payne…from “La Repubblica” 07-01-2006
apologies for this sloppy keyboard and typos i do not wish to associate myself with ….the comments are still te same though…and from my time , studying in rural China ,so far…I also agree with Payne’s interpretation.
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wow.
so there IS —- ONE —– Bahai cemetry in the world.
I used to think there wasnt any, after the desecration of the Bahai cemetries in Iran.