Karachi, April 26 :    Karachi, April 26:  Right opposite the Karachi Municipal Corporation building is an archway that leads to the local Swami Narayan temple in the centre of the city's Gujaratipara. There are about 300-odd Hindus who live in Gujaratipara. They speak Gujarati and teach their children to read and write Gujarati as the local schools have stopped teaching the language. The gateway to the cluster of Gujarati Hindu households is guarded by a single plainclothes policeman during the day. At night, the residents say, there are two policemen on duty. The population of Gujaratipara is aware of the communal rioting in Gujarat and is, understandably, opposed to it. The priest of the Swami Narayan temple, Bhauji Maharaj, says: 'Whatever is happening in Gujarat is not right. But what can we do from here? I can only say to the people of Gujarat that they should put a stop to the killings. What they are doing is not sanctioned by any religion.' Harish Kumar, the supervisor of the Hindu Dharamshala next to the temple, says that he no longer calls himself a Gujarati: 'We used to declare with pride that we are Gujaratis. But how can we say that now? We feel ashamed of what is happening in Gujarat. This is not insaaniyat.' Sunil Kashiram, the manager of the Dharamshala, is also upset. He says of his co-religionists in Gujarat: 'They are taking religion in the wrong direction. There are some people who want to make political capital out of it. If the violence in Gujarat increases, it will also affect us here. Our government supports us at present. We have a huge temple here. Hindus come here from all over Pakistan. Thankfully, there is nothing to fear as of now. But if the government decides not to protect us by posting policemen here day and night, things can definitely go wrong.' The total number of Gujarati-speaking Hindus in Karachi, its surrounding suburban villages extending up to Hyderabad in Sindh, is estimated to be anywhere from 20,000 to 60,000. However, no exact figures are available. There are 11 communities of Gujaratis living in Pakistan. Not all of them are Hindu. They also include Parsis, Memons, Ismailies, Bohras and Ganchis (from Godhra). There are people from Kutch, Bhuj and Marwar. They used to run more than a hundred Gujarati-medium schools in Karachi. However, in 1971, after the bloody formation of Bangladesh based on a separate linguistic and cultural identity, the Pakistan government asked the Gujarati schools to adopt either Urdu or English as the medium of education. Now Gujarati is taught to children only at home. However, even today, there are half-a-dozen Gujarati newspapers in Karachi - Millat, Watan, Daily Gujarati, Memon Bulletin, Memon Samachar and Al Zulfikar. The Gujaratis here still lament the closing down of Dawn Gujarati and Pak Samachar. Farooq Memon, who was born in Pakistan but calls himself a Gujarati because his family came from the Kathiawar region, says: 'A murderer is a murderer. He neither belongs to Ram nor to Rahim. It does not matter whether you are a Hindu Gujarati or a Muslim Gujarati. Today all of us feel ashamed of the events in Gujarat. Only one word used to unite us - 'Gujarati'. But today, I cannot understand what is going on in Gujarat. Even the partition riots did not last this long.' There was a time, Memon recalls, 'when we went to Ahmedabad and the train crossed the Sabarmati, we knew that we were among our people. I don't know whether I would feel the same if I went now. I have fond memories of offering namaaz twice at the Ameena Masjid in Ahmedabad. But now, I have written to my relatives to somehow come here. We Gujaratis are shopkeepers and businessmen. A shopkeeper can open a shop anywhere. But if his wife and children are killed, how can he get them back?' Memon, a secretary in a newspaper office and very active in the Gujarati community here, says India should realise that the Gujarati Muslims have made a definite choice - to be Indians. 'It has been 52-years since the partition. If the Gujarati Muslims did not see themselves as Indians, they would have come to Pakistan by now. Why have they stayed on? Because they are Indians, just as the Gujarati Hindus you meet here are Pakistanis.' Sonbai, who lives in the Gujaratipara and has been listening to us discussing Gujarat says: 'Baba, galat hua hai (Whatever has happened is not right). We have a song - Bhagwan, mein tujhe khat likhta hoon par tera pataa nahin maloom (God, I want to write to you but I don't know your address). To my Gujarati brothers in India, I say, I know the address of God. He lives within you. He cannot sanction the killing of another human being.'