By: Dilip JirukaAMRELI: Amid stringent lockdown Gariyadhar , a town in Bhavnagar district famed for small-scale diamond cutting and polishing industry, set a glittering example of communal brotherhood on Friday when Muslims went all out to help in cremation of a 70-year-old Hindu woman.Ranjan Bhadreshwara, who lived with her two sons Bharat and Rasik in Ghanchiwad area on Palitana Road, died a natural death on Friday morning. As most of their relatives who live in Ahmedabad could not make it for the cremation due to the lockdown, the Muslim neighbours immediately took up the responsibility to help this family do the final rites as per Brahmin rituals.In fact, the Bhadreshwaras have been the only Hindu family in Ghanchiwad area where there are nearly 50 Muslim households, for the past nearly 25 years.On hearing about her death, nearly 10 women from the Muslim families first helped in giving her body the ritualistic bath with water and embalming it with ghee. They then decorated her with bangles, sari and the tika to prepare the body for funeral.Later, 10 Muslim men shouldered the woman's bier up along with her sons and reached the local crematorium after a brief funeral procession. One Muslim man was also seeing carrying the 'doni' (earthen pot filled with water), usually carried by the person leading the funeral.There were emotional scenes when the men lifted the bier and left the house as all women cried inconsolably having lost their neighbour with whom they had lived in times of sorrow and joy. Home guard jawans present there had to request the women to go inside the house and not gather for a long time.In fact, proper social distancing was maintained at the Bhadreshwara's house as well as at the crematorium, said sources.“I have no regrets at all that my relatives could not be beside us in this hour of grief. These Muslim brothers have been our neighbours for years now. In every religion, it is said that the neighbour is your first kin,” Rasik Bhadreshwara told TOI over phone.He said it was improper to call the relatives during the time of lockdown as it have put them in an awkward situation.Rafeeq Solanki, a neighbour said, “We have been living as brothers for years now and always considered them as one among us though Bhadreshwaras are the sole Hindu family in our locality. We even got few shops opened to get the necessary material for the funeral and rituals."