Background
Manekji was born at the village of Mora Sumali near Surat, in Gujarat, India in Anno Domini 1813. And as he himself tells, earned his own bread from the age of fifteen, traveling widely as a commercial agent in India.
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Maneckji Limji Hataria
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Career
By the time of his appointment, he was already experienced, self-reliant and resourceful, and his choice by the Society proved a wholly admirable one. Hataria may also have been instrumental in obtaining a remission of the jizya poll tax for his co-religionists in 1882. Manekji preached the advantages of collective social work and communal unity.
Reports of early activities, sent by Manekji to Bombay, show that amongst other matters, the Kerman society attended to the restoration of the fire temple there.
Similarly, hearing of the efforts of Manekji, the Bombay Parsis (led by Sir Dinshaw Petit, whose wife Sakarbai was from her mother"s side of Iranian ancestry) collected funds for the repair of the Yazd Atash Behram (not the same as the present one, which dates to 1932). A bust of Manekji stands in the entrance gallery of the present-day Atash Behram at Yazd.
Between 1876 and 1882 Mírzá Abu"l-Fadl, a well-known Bahá"í scholar, was Hataria"s personal secretary, and acted as his intermediary with Bahá"u"lláh.
