Our earlier posts (The Concept of the Trail, What is Freedom?) have presented that we will embark on a 'Freedom Trail' on The Great Driving Challenge. The drive is taking place in August and culminates a day after Independence Day. The natural thing to do was to base our travel plan theme around Indian Independence. However, we wanted the theme to be broad and inclusive. Hence, we decided to focus on ‘Freedom’ – in it’s various forms as we experience it, and aspire for.
Selecting the cities / towns we would visit was the next big thing. The organizers have set a parameter with respect of minimum distance and maximum distance per day, and start and end point to be Mumbai. So, the outer limits were defined. We had a choice of going down South along the Konkan and visiting hometown Bangalore and our present home, Hyderabad before heading back to Mumbai, via Nagpur. Having evaluated quite a few options, we converged on one thing – we should follow the route of the Salt Dandi March from Sabarmati to Dandi, the beginning of the Civil Disobedience Movement lead by Gandhiji which took the Indian Freedom Struggle to a climax. In fact, we wanted to end this drive tracing the path of Dandi which has made freedom of many kinds possible. We started working backwards - Ahmedabad, Indore, Nagpur, Hyderabad, Sholapur, Pune, Mumbai.
Each of these places on The Cedia Freedom Trail represents a different facet of freedom we would like to focus on. Baramati – providing a ray of hope to sugarcane farmers; Basavakalyana – a place named after the revolutionary social reformer Basavanna who propogated social equality in the 12th century; Hyderabad – a city that was known for its laidback attitude till very recently but today represents the progressive India that we all are part of; Basara – a temple town dedicated to the Hindu goddess of learning Saraswati the only in the South; Nanded – the city that became the permanent abode of Guru Gobind Singh; Tadoba – part of Project Tiger Reserve and is a relatively less popular tiger reserve; Nagpur – the central city of the country housing the Zero mile marker; Betul – experience the richness of central India’s tribal culture; Mhow – synonymous with the Indian Army and housing some of the Army’s finest training establishments; Godhra – look at the healing process in this infamous town; Ahmedabad – Sabarmati and everything else to do with Gandhiji; Daman and Diu – the only union territory on our itinerary; Nashik – the vineyards capital of the country.
Each of the cities that we are passing though has something unique to offer. It also represents a different facet of the concept of Freedom that may not be mainstream, but significant none the less. We present to you The Cedia Freedom Trail at The Great Driving Challenge on a canvas that is wide, vibrant and fresh.
Enjoy the ride with us! We look forward to your company as we seek to understand ‘Freedom’!
PS: We are yet to agree whether this post should have been so philosophical in nature or not. Sowmya feels that we should let you guys know of all the fun elements right away while Guru feels that it should be saved for the drive! Like with any couple, the argument continues :)
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