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"Sadly we will fight for the religion and be willing to die for the religion... anything but live for it and live exercising prudence and wisdom,” wrote Bombay Parsi Punchayet (BPP) trustee Noshir Dadrawala in response to pictures of the disused dakma in Ilav that were doing the rounds on WhatsApp in the third week of August 2018. "Hundred-and-twenty-year-old dakhma at Ilav village, now abandoned and neglected since many years, resulting in the growth of a huge tree inside, and vast land surrounding it... will slowly be encroached by neighboring landlords,” said the anonymous message, accompanied by three pictures. Ilav stands 48 km from Bharuch and 41 km from Surat.
Dadrawala said he was "sad” about the dakhma, adding that there are "many such villages where Parsi properties are in a state of neglect.” The trustee asked rhetorically, "What’s the solution?” and queried if Parsis would go back to Ilav and such places even if incentives are provided? "No,” he answered. "Will guardians of the religion and defenders of Parsi property go there and protect it?” he further asked, before answering in the negative.
"But, any talk of developing or leasing such properties partly and transparently and in an accountable manner (and at the same time leave the structure as sacred monument) will lead to protests and stay orders and court cases right up to the Supreme Court,” rued Dadrawala. 

 

 

 

 

 

"The last consignment in the Ilav dakhma took place in 1972,” trustee of (unregistered) Ilav Zoroastrian Inhabitant Dharam Fund Pervin Jehangir told Parsiana on August 22, adding that her co-trustees are Peshwan Jehangir, her son, and Parvez Havewalla. The dakhma property is not mentioned in the Fund’s deed, she explained. A separate trust looks after the 1869-built defunct Jamshedji Burjorji Mistry Daremeher in Ilav.  "We will appreciate any legal assistance (to regularize matters regarding the property) that anyone can give, including the Federation of the Parsi Zoroastrian Anjumans of India (FPZAI),” Pervin said.
 In the FPZAI’s annual meeting held in April 2017 at Bombay, Sam Chothia, chief executive officer of the Defunct Anjumans Committee (DAC) and FPZAI vice president, West Zone B had given a detailed visual account of the encroached/dilapidated community properties (see "Dealing with the defunct,” Parsiana, May 21, 2017). Deesa, Khambhat, Nadiad, Damka and Suvali in Gujarat, besides Bhopal, Bijapur, Bina, Dharvar and Neemuch in other states, have disused community property that the DAC had highlighted. Since the FPZAI has not had an  annual meeting, since April 2017, further efforts of the DAC have not been presented to the community.
Only a special FPZAI meeting of executive committee members was held on July 30, 2017 to specifically decide on intervening in an existing court case of an Originating Summons filed by Calcutta resident Prochy Mehta and her daughter Sanaya Mehta Vyas regarding who has the right to enter the local fire temple (see "Insistence on intervention,” Parsiana, August 7, 2017). The body was in favor of intervention.