Ahmedabad or as the locals say ‘Amdavad’ is the principal city of Gujarat. Sultan Ahmed Shah I founded the city in 1411, on the banks of the Sabarmati River. Ahmedabad means `established by Ahmed’. It is the second largest city in western India after Mumbai. Modern Ahmedabad straddles the river and spreads out on both sides with a population of close to 3.5 million. Though crowded, Ahmedabad provides an interesting introduction to Gujarat and is also a convenient base to explore the interesting places in the state.
The city has been a thriving textile and commercial centre for the better part of the century and was renowned as the ‘Manchester of the East’. Mahatma Gandhi set up his Ashram on the western bank of the River Sabarmati in 1915. The Sabarmati Ashram became the nodal centre for India’s independence movement and the place from where Gandhi launched his famous Salt March (1930) to the small seaside village of Dandi in protest against the salt tax imposed by the British government