At 15, Saniya Ansari had her whole life ahead of her. But, in August last year, she chose to end her journey on earth.
Reports surfaced of months of harassment by neighbours that drove her to suicide.
They allegedly used a 39-year-old Gujarat law to claim her family had no right to buy property in their area.
Her death has put a spotlight on the Disturbed Areas Act. Critics believe the legislation mutated from a post-riot protection measure into a tool of religious segregation. They are of the view that it’s now active across 18 of Gujarat’s 33 districts and increasingly replicated by other BJP-ruled states.
The Law
The Gujarat Disturbed Areas Act was first enacted in 1986, after communal riots in Ahmedabad, as a temporary measure to prevent distress sales of property during unrest. It was made permanent in 1991.
Today, any property transaction in a designated “disturbed area” requires prior approval from the district collector, who must verify that the sale was made by free consent and at a fair market value.
Has this process been weaponised?
A news report alludes to a 2022 study by Dr Sheba Tejani of King’s College London that found Ahmedabad’s disturbed areas expanded by 51% between 2013 and 2019.
By 2014, at least 40% of the city already carried the designation. A 2017 academic study described Ahmedabad as the most segregated city in India for Muslims.
Tejani found that the Act was being used to limit the outward expansion of Muslim localities and prevent desegregation — the opposite of its stated intent. She noted the law was never meant to be used to prevent any perceived outbreak of communal violence.
She cited the case of Geeta Goradia, a Gandhian businesswoman in Vadodara who sold a flat to a Muslim buyer despite neighbour opposition, pointing to it as an example of how the Act could be used to block desegregation and prevent the formation of truly mixed neighbourhoods.
Crucially, the Act allows even unrelated third parties — not just neighbours — to legally object to property transfers, a provision that critics say is routinely exploited by vigilante groups.
In January 2025, the Gujarat revenue department declared 312 locations in Vadodara as disturbed for the next five years, illustrating how the Act continues to expand.
What Happened to Saniya
Saniya’s parents had lived for decades in Choksi ni Chali. It’s a mixed-religion settlement in Ahmedabad’s Gomtipur area. In 2024, they purchased a house directly across their lane from neighbour Sumanben Sonawane for Rs 15.5 lakh, paying in full by December 2024.
Sonawane’s son Dinesh then reportedly moved back into the house with his wife Sarla and adult son Manav, and refused to vacate. The family allowed the Ansaris access only to the ground floor.
When the Ansaris visited to clean or repair the property, they faced abuse. Jahan said the Sonawanes would throw dirty water at them, shout, and follow them down the lane. Manav allegedly followed Saniya to the main road on her way to school.
The Sonawanes began claiming the sale was illegal, repeatedly telling the family that Muslims could not buy property in a disturbed area and demanding they leave. The family approached Gomtipur police station multiple times. No complaint was registered.
On 7 August 2025, the dispute reportedly turned violent. Dinesh, Sarla, and Manav, along with others, assaulted Saniya’s 20-year-old brother Musaif. Saniya tried to intervene and was beaten. Musaif was struck on the head until he bled. The family attempted to file an FIR, including charges under POCSO since Saniya was a minor. Police refused.
Two days later, on Raksha Bandhan, Saniya was found hanging in the house her family had bought. She left a suicide note naming six people.
An FIR was registered only five days after her death, after the family approached the city’s Commissioner of Police. Dinesh and Manav Sonawane had by then fled. They remain absconding. The Gujarat High Court granted them interim protection from arrest. No chargesheet has been filed.
The family’s lawyer, Nitish Mohan, said the interim protection had been appealed and the matter was still being heard. The reporter sought comment from Inspector D V Rana at Gomtipur police station by phone and WhatsApp in November 2025 and January 2026. He did not respond.
Saniya’s sister Rifat Jahan, 28, said the family had lost a sibling, a daughter, and a home.
The Wider Pattern
The Ansaris’ experience is not exceptional. Property developer Nabiullah Pathan reportedly paid Rs 1.11 crore for an industrial shed at a bank-organised auction in Ahmedabad in 2023.
Forty-four neighbouring shed owners opposed his purchase, claiming a Muslim occupant would disturb the area. His application was rejected. The case is still in court. Pathan said the process itself had become the punishment.
As a report notes, Vadodara businessman Onali Dholkawala bought a commercial property in 2016. A deputy collector rejected the transaction in 2017. He won in the Gujarat High Court in 2020, faced continued threats, won again in 2023, and finally in June 2025 — nine years after the original purchase — a court directed the state to ensure he could safely use his own shop.
Developer Ruknuddin Sheikh, with nearly three decades in the business, said the collector was legally required only to verify free consent and fair value, but instead routinely entertained complaints from vigilante groups.
He said the law had become one used to target a single community.
Sheikh’s experience extends to a high-profile case in Ahmedabad’s upscale Paldi neighbourhood. In 2018, right-wing groups including the Vishwa Hindu Parishad spread rumours of a so-called “land jihad” after Muslim buyers purchased a bulk of newly redeveloped flats in the Varsha Flats housing complex.
Two men, Apoorv Shastri and Jigar Upadhyay, claiming to represent a group called Nagrik Sewa Samiti, alleged that around 125 flats were being taken over by Muslims in a disturbed area.
According to the report, Sheikh and his colleagues had already received legal permission from the revenue department for the redevelopment.
The opposition from right-wing groups stalled the project regardless, and a court case has been pending for years.
Political Dimensions
The Act has expanded steadily under BJP governance. A 2020 amendment sought to empower collectors to reject transactions on grounds of likelihood of polarisation or demographic imbalance.
The Gujarat High Court stayed those provisions in 2021 after a legal challenge. In 2023, the state’s only Muslim MLA introduced a bill to repeal the Act. It was defeated by voice vote.
The Act has also been used as political capital. Two BJP MLAs in Surat — Sangitaben Patil and Purnesh Modi — made enforcement of the law an election promise in the 2017 assembly elections. More recently, the Act was expanded in Vadodara at the behest of BJP MLA Manishaben Vakil.
Other BJP-ruled states are following Gujarat’s lead. Assam announced in August 2025 that inter-religious property transactions would require state verification.
Rajasthan approved a similar bill in January 2026.
A BJP state treasurer reportedly defended the law. He said it was necessary to regulate areas where Hindus had been displaced by Muslim buyers. He cited differing dietary preferences between communities as justification.
He declined to address questions about discrimination or constitutionality.
One Ahmedabad MLA, when asked, pointed to the relocation of a Jain temple without addressing the questions put to him.
A Congress leader told the media outlet that the law thrived on fear among officials, who knew that any decision favouring Muslims would draw BJP-affiliated groups to their homes.
He warned that if the pattern continued, Muslims in Gujarat would end up like displaced Kashmiri Pandits living in camps.
In Gomtipur, Jahan sits in her aunt’s two-room home. It’s across the lane from the house her family cannot occupy. She said the area had always been mixed, with multiple Muslim families having purchased homes there before. Now, she told the media house, they were scared.
The accused are free. The chargesheet has not been filed. The house remains out of reach.
Also Read: Bharuch Residents Display ‘For Sale’ Banners Outside Properties In Protest Of Disturbed Areas Act https://www.vibesofindia.com/bharuch-residents-display-for-sale-banners-outside-properties-in-protest-of-disturbed-areas-act/
