Hey there travelers, are you ready for a history lesson with a touch of humor? Well, hold on to your hats because we’re about to take a ride to the village of Makarba, just 7 kilometers from Ahmedabad, to visit the absolutely striking Sarkhej Roza!
This mosque and tomb complex boasts early Islamic architectural finesse that will leave you in awe. Spacious corridors, pillared domes, and a mesmerizing water tank surround the tomb, which houses the grave of Ahmad Khattu Ganj Baksh, the former resident of the place. But that’s not all, folks! The mausoleum of Sarkhej Roza is a 572-year-old living legacy that carries within it rich anecdotes of Sufiism.
Some say Sarkhej Roza is the Acropolis of Ahmedabad, and they’re not wrong! The Swiss-French architect Le Corbusier compared it to the Acropolis, and we can totally see why. This dargah had once served as a retreat for many rules of Ahmedabad and was commissioned by the successors of the ruler of Gujarat Sultanate, Ahmed Shah I. Muhammad Shah II commissioned Sheikh Bakhsh’s tomb, which was completed in 1451. The complex was further expanded and beautified with a Sarkhej Lake around the tomb by Sultan Mahmud Begada, Ahmed Shah I’s grandson.
Ahmed Khattu Ganj Baksh was Shah’s spiritual advisor and friend. Shah too, in the last years of his life, retired to Sarkhej Roza and took his last breath here. The place has at its entrance a mausoleum, with exquisite jali work in geometric patterns, of Mahmud Begada and his family at the entrance, and another of Ganj Baksh in its lap.