Muscat – A talk titled ‘Ramesh Bhavan and the Architecture of Belonging’ at Bait al Kharusi in Riyam, Muttrah on Thursday explored the connections between architecture, memory and identity. It was presented by Muneer Toprani, the 13th generation of a family from a Gujarati Banyan trading community with continuous trading connections and residence in Oman. 

The talk was organised by Mukhtabr Research Lab, a think tank for architectural preservation in Oman, which described it as an effort to help understand how buildings become more than physical spaces, “transforming into repositories of memory and meaning that shape people’s sense of home and community”. An organiser said, “This talk offe-rs an opportunity to understand Muttrah’s architectural heritage through the lens of lived experien-ce, revealing how the stories with- in our buildings are as significant as the walls that contain them.” 

The Toprani family’s connection with Oman began in 1797, when an ancestor sailed from Kutch Mandvi to Zanzibar transporting a Shiv ling for the first Hindu temple there. The family acquired land in Sur as a stopover on its trading route between India and East Africa. In 1806, it took Umersi 16 days to walk from Sur to Muscat. Sometime later, he acquired three acres of land in Muscat. In 1905, Umersi’s descendant and Muneer’s paternal grandfather Naraindas Pragji, then 18, decided to remain in Sur rather than return to Kutch. 

In 1930, Naraindas advanced Rupees Five of the total price of Rupees 500 for a 110sqm prime Muttrah seafront plot and started construction of a family home in April 1939. He used local mountain stone cut and shaped like bricks instead of red bricks imported from India. It was named Ramesh Bhavan after Naraindas’s eldest son with his second wife, Shanta Devi. Ramesh passed away when he was just a child of seven or eight but the house named after him withstood the test of time and is a landmark on Muttrah Corniche more than 80 years later.  

The photographs and slides put on display at the talk are the work of Manubhai, Naraindas’s son who survived. His life’s work and stories are being preserved for posterity by his son, Muneer. Among other collectibles, Muneer has in his possession a letter from October 1960 issued to Naraindas by the Wali of Muttrah with which the family didn’t need any other document to stay in the sultanate. That changed in 1973/1974 following implementation of residence regulations. 

“Much is unknown to the present Omani generation of the glorious history and brotherhood of Oman and India relations. In some way, I feel it is my moral and social responsibility to pass on the historic, cultural and traditional past of my roots to the next generation,” Muneer said of the objective behind the talk. 

In attendance was HE G V Srinivas, Ambassador of India to Oman, who said, “When Muneerbhai speaks, it appears as if he’s a historian. But he’s a man of business getting into the business of putting into perspective historical documents.”

More than his impressions, what the ambassador described as more remarkable was seeing the involvement of the architecture students who organised the talk to explore these historic connections and collections.