This is the story of two cities, both named Hyderabad—one in India, the other in Pakistan. It is also the story of two bakeries, each a local institution.

One is called Karachi Bakery, located in Indian Hyderabad. The other is Bombay Bakery that sits tucked away in Pakistani Hyderabad. And their recent fate seems almost Dickensian: it was the best of times; it was the worst of times.

To anyone familiar with the shared history of the nuclear-armed arch rivals and neighbours, it’s no surprise to find bakeries, restaurants, and spice blends bearing the names of cities now separated by a border of two fractious neighbours. In the long shadow of Partition, nostalgia is often baked into the dough.

After the British departed in 1947, India and Pakistan emerged as independent countries. Under a gash of grief, millions of Hindus and Muslims were killed in ethnic violence while crossing the hastily drawn lines. Many never made it. To deal with displacement, survivors anchored themselves on memories, recipes, and names.

It’s no wonder that people in Pakistan devour biryani made from Bombay Biryani Masala or there is a line outside for barbecued skewers at Meerut Kabab House – both the eateries are named after Indian cities. 

However, this cultural continuity and heritage held together by taste and memory, for Indians and Pakistanis, appears to be under threat. 

In May, the militaries of India and Pakistan exchanged fire—jets, missiles, drones, and artillery—for four tense days. At least sixty people were killed.

The two sides were on the brink of an all-out war when the United States intervened and brokered a ceasefire.

But amid the heightened nationalism, and before the ceasefire, a mob of Hindu right wingers attacked the 73-year-old Karachi Bakery in India’s Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh, deeming it fit to attack anything that alluded to Pakistan. Even though the bakery owners are Hindus. 

The vandals that belonged to the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) were draped in saffron shawls, stomping on Pakistani flags, and shouting anti-Pakistan slogans. The video footage showed them striking the bakery’s sign with sticks. They seemed to be specifically aiming to deface the word ‘Karachi’.

Across the border in the Pakistani city of Hyderabad located in southern Sindh province, things were different.

Cakes after ceasefire

A day after the ceasefire, people were lining up as usual, as they have for generations, to get their hands on the famed cakes of the Bombay Bakery. 

Inside the gated premises, an old Peepul tree—sacred in Hindu tradition—spreads its limbs over the red masonry bungalow. Lignum and neem trees offer shade, and a half-dozen Persian-looking cats dart around the tidy garden. Staff, including women, move through the space. In the kitchen, the staff  bakes cakes with almond, chocolate, fruit, and cream – and guarded recipes. 

“Nothing has changed here,” Aziz Bhai Aziz, 72, the bakery’s longtime manager, tells TRT World. “I started working here in 1961 as a teenager when Kumar sahib asked my previous employer who was owner of a small bakery in the city’s Lajpat road area,” says Aziz, who was once a banjo player.

In front of him, cakes of different flavours are placed in brown colour teak wooden-cum-glass frames.

The bakery sits on a street known among locals simply as Bombay Bakery wali gali, where it shares a wall with the Pakistan Air Force’s (PAF) Information and Selection Centre.

On the day of the ceasefire, even as air force staff fielded calls from aspiring pilots, the bakery next door remained open.

“We never ever faced anything unpleasant regardless of simmering tensions that are often seen between Pakistan and India,” says Aziz. 

This wasn’t the first time the name ‘Karachi’ drew backlash. In 2019, a Karachi Bakery outlet in the southern Indian city of Bengaluru concealed the word on its signboard after a mob protested against it. 

“It’s so sad that the vandals are so blinded by hate that they attacked Karachi Bakery despite it belonging to an Indian,” a customer tells TRT World.

Some customers showed their love and loyalty to the bakery by buying more of its beloved cakes.

“Yes, the bakery shares its name with an Indian city, but that doesn’t mean we’ll turn against it,” says Harish, a devoted customer, speaking to TRT World. “If anything, we’ll show our love by buying more cakes; we enjoy every single flavour.”

Pakistan’s pride: not mere bakery

Founded in 1911 by Pahlajrai Gangaram Thadani, the bakery began in modest quarters in Saddar, Hyderabad, before moving to its present bungalow. It was a building designed by Thadani himself and completed in 1924. He brought his family—three sons, Shamdas, Kishinchand, and Gopichand—and began what would become a family dynasty of cake-makers.

From its earliest days, Bombay Bakery distinguished itself by the quality of its ingredients and the consistency of its recipes. After Thadani’s death in 1948, his sons carried on the business. Kishinchand Thadani, the innovator behind many of the recipes for best-selling cakes and biscuits, still sold today, died in 1960. His brother Gopichand and Kishinchand’s son, Kumar, inherited the legacy.

Kumar Thadani died in June 2010, just before the bakery’s centennial. A philanthropist, he funded a cardiac hospital that now bears his grandfather Pahlajrai’s name. Each month, Kumar also gave alms to the poor.

“All destitute are now asked to wait inside the bungalow's premises and they regularly get financial assistance Kumar sahib used to offer,” says Aziz.

After Kumar’s death, the bakery passed on to his adopted son, Sonoo—now known as Salman Shaikh, following his conversion to Islam and marriage into a Muslim family.

Reclusive by nature, Salman currently lives in Europe, according to one of the bakery employees. TRT World contacted Salman Shaikh on Whatsapp but didn’t receive a response.

According to family lore, Pahlaj Rai originally began baking with his Swiss wife in the 1920s. In a 2005 interview with Radio Pakistan, Kumar had confirmed that the current site of the bakery was purchased in 1922.

“Our grandparents talk about the Bombay bakery that has been here for over a hundred years,” Abbas Ali Wahid, a customer of Bombay Bakery, tells TRT World. 

“The coffee and chocolate cakes aren’t just popular in Hyderabad but throughout Pakistan. When our guests come visiting, they expect to be served confectionery from Bombay Bakery,” he says. 

Today, 114 years after it first opened its doors, Bombay Bakery remains in the hands of the fourth generation of the family. While the religious affiliation of its owners may have changed, the essence of the place and the aroma of almond cakes, the teakwood showcases have not.

One former employee even tried to replicate its success by opening The Hyderabad Bakery nearby, with similar packaging and recipes, but the magic proved difficult to match.

In a time of weaponised nostalgia, Bombay Bakery stands not just as a shop but as a quiet witness. It is the endurance of memory amid the bitterness of history.

“We condemn the attack on the Karachi Bakery in India,” Rafay Khan, a customer at the bakery, tells TRT World. “We won’t let anything like that happen to Pakistan’s pride, the gift of Hyderabad, our Bombay Bakery.”