Sectors. Chandigarh, read room by room Open in the atlas

Sectors 8 to 11 · spot

The Gedi Route

The city’s coming-of-age cruising strip past the colleges of 8 to 11, and the road a women’s-safety campaign later fought to reclaim.

Where it sits in the city
Gedi, for me, is just going out for a drive. The aimless one. My getaway on a bad day, or just to get out of the house. The word is so much ours that even my mother says it now. My route is 16, to the Sector 10 chownk, to Sukhna, and after the first rain of the season every colour gets amplified to 50. The greens go plush, the bark goes dark, the sky is dead clear. Best drive there is.Anirudh · the owner’s memory

Then & now

Then
A cruising spot since the 1970s, surging in the 1980s as cars spread; renamed on the map after 2017.

The OG move

“Geri” means rounds. The classic stretch is the Sector 10-11 road between the women’s colleges, and it’s as much a snack circuit as a drive, lined with dessert spots and kulhad chai. The avenues you cruise are colour-coded by season, a different flowering tree per road.

A fact that reframes it

After the 2017 Varnika Kundu stalking case and the “Bekhauf Azaadi” (fearless freedom) march, a citizens’ campaign got Google Maps to rename the street from Geri Route to Azaadi Route. A place-name changed by an anti-harassment movement.

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Sources (3)
  1. 'Geri' = rounds; route runs Sectors 8-11 past the colleges; classic stretch the Sector 10-11 road; since the 1970s
    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geri_route
  2. Renamed Azaadi Route after the Aug 2017 Varnika Kundu case and the Bekhauf Azaadi march
    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geri_route; holidify.com
  3. A different flowering species per avenue, staggered by season
    worldarchitecture.org (tree plantation along city roads)