Inspired by dear suleka-ite friend sivaram-ji's fitting tribute to the 'Labour' force of India titled 'Bhaiyya tujhe Salaam' at link http://sivaram56.sulekha.com/blog/post/2008/04/bhaiya-tujhe-salaam.htm, as a supplement to his wonderful blog, I too recollected those one-man door-to-door service providers during the 60s and 70s in the Mumbai suburb of Matunga, where I had grown up watching them with wonder.
Those Magnificent One-Man Machines of Matunga
Hats off to the breed of ‘one-man mobile marts' that we see daily on streets of India, but whose efforts we generally tend to overlook, and don’t spare them for their little slips (especially fastidious house-wives!). I look back at my childhood spent at Matunga, which was buzzing with a wide variety of such innovative door-to-door ‘service providers’ throughout the day.
Firstly the ‘Dabbawallah’ whose zero-error network is a subject of great awe and admiration world-wide and an acknowledged Six-Sigma model for managers! How they managed to precisely deliver the right ‘dabba’ to the right person without losing track in the maze of mumbai’s complex geography and its railway connections, is a mystery. The secret perhaps lies in the intriguing colour codes painted on the dabba tops that represented the exact source and destination addresses!
Then we had the ‘family vadhyar’ (priest) who unfailingly will visit the house 2 or 3 days in advance to remind about the annual ritual days and other religious occasions, armed with a cloth-bag and a diary in which he would have noted such dates ranging from ‘ayush-homams’ to ‘punya-thithis’ of umpteen families. On the specified day, he would arrive fresh early in the morning, briskly go about his business of homam, japam etc and move on to another house or another ‘muhurtham’ after a quick coffee break.
Apart from the ubiquitous post-man, occasionally we had the much-dreaded ‘telegram-man’ who would ring the bell at unearthly hours with an alarming shout to accompany, ‘TELEGRAM!!’. But sometimes as you open the door collecting your bundle of nerves wondering which out-station relative’s turn had come to go, he would announce in a pacifying voice ‘Company-se hai’ meaning the much-awaited interview call has come at last! It beats me why on earth companies in Bombay used to send interview calls to candidates within the city by telegrams! The rest of the night would pass sleep-lessly because of the interview-anxiety!
And then we had this innovative ‘Idli’ vendor who would make his round precisely at a fixed time in the evening with a big Aluminum vessel full of fluffy idlis tied at the back of his bicycle and two cylindrical ones on the front for sambar and chutney, and one dabba for ‘molagappodi’(gun-powder?)and a small can of til-oil to boot! He would honk his horn and within no time would have the entire Gujarati neighbourhood making a bee-line towards his bicycle! Just observing him in action, itself used to be a great lesson in time and space management!
We had several such ‘specialized’ vendors like knife-sharpeners, ‘bhaandiwala’ (house-wives' favourite vendor!) who trades stainless steel vessels for old clothes, ‘old- paper-wala’, ‘bhangaarwala’ who does a great service by scavenging the attic in the house ridding off old junk, bottles, rusted metal-ware and assorted ‘kachra’s which you neither wanted to use nor wanted to throw away! The sense of relief one feels after thy clear up a whole lot of space for us, the lazy-bones of the house, cannot be described in words.
Then we had our ‘dhobi’, an aged frail figure visiting our house every Sunday sharp at 4 pm delivering freshly laundered clothes that were collected the previous Sunday and collecting the freshly-soiled ones. Occasionally you may find a stranger’s blue shirt instead of your favorite grey one, but such mix-ups were very rare in terms of the volume of clothes he was handling in the whole locality single-handedly with only his hand-cart to share his burden.
I also remember those shoe-makers, cobblers, the friendly 'mochis' as they were called in the neighbour-hood who with their wonderful skills used to mend those impossibly torn chappals or shoes for a pittance, so that you can postpone spending your valuable 99 Rs or 199 Rs on that new 'Bata' foot-wear! I
Then there were mobile barbers and even ear-wax removers moving around with their kits, who looked straight out of R.K.Narayan’s ‘Malgudi’ village!
Then there were some who would interrupt your siesta at home in the afternoon and co-erce your taste-buds with amazing vocal tactics - 'Kulfi-wallahs', 'home-made ice-cream-walas', 'the fruit vendors, 'murukku-thattai' (crunchy southie delights!) selling ladies and the 'nankhataai'-wala with his trunk full of fresh home-made biscuits that were so tasty that they could give the branded cookies a run for their money!
Not to forget that ‘Kachha Kelawala’ whose specialty was raw bananas. He would come all the way from Mira Road to Matunga by train to target South Indians in the locality to cash on their weakness for raw banana curry and ‘Kela bhajiya’s’. He used to have two huge baskets of raw plantains tied by ropes to a stick and supported like a balance on his shoulder. An innovative salesman, he would sing aloud the latest Bollywood number to attract attention and call out to the house-wives to their balconies, in his half-learnt Tamil, ‘Mami! Nalla Irukka! Vaalakka, Vaalakka!’. A bargaining battle will then ensue between him and the ladies,he will act as if he is giving away his profit margin but finally have his own way and collect a neat amount and go with his empty baskets happily singing aloud. I have observed the same scene for almost a decade with interest. The last time I saw him was when he was singing ‘Kabhi Kabhi mere dil-mein khayaal aata hai---!’
A humble salute to all of them on the occasion of ‘May Day’!
S.V.Nathan.
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Thank you Dr. saab for your wonderful comments! My blog now feels completed! I want to see Sadhana and hear your flute at quiet leisure. So please bear with my delay!
Regards,
Nathan.
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Ha Ha! Great idea, Gregory! Just imagine the hi-tech software guys calling out from the streets, 'PC-WALLEY! PC-WALLEY!'!!
Thanks & Regards,
Nathan.
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How long before you start seeing a door-to-door 'PC wala' who offers to troubleshoot the problems you may be having with your software? Sounds like an entrepreneurial possibility for some enterprising techie who gets tired of working for the corpoartion.
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Dear Shri S. V. Nathan Ji,
Bahut Maza Aaya ye blog padh ke. Aapne phirse mujhe Nostalgic kar diya. Very Good Write-Up. After all I always consider both Dadar and Matunga as my twin favorites. I love both areas equally. And both of these have distinct culture. One is Maharashtrian and other one is predominantly Tamil. Although today, demography has changed a lot but it maintains similar flavor as 30 years ago. Of course, Matunga (East) and also Matunga (West) are less crowded than Dadar even today.
I enjoyed very much the way you covered most of the one man scenarios. You forgot the lonely guy who used to sit in the front corner of a Laundy or a Tailoring shop doing 'Rafoo' of pants and shirts and sarees and many more clothes you just name it. And he used to charge a pittance of Rs 10 for his 'Rafoo' work although his job involved lots of skill to fix a torn pant or a short to make it reusable. Let us salute 'Rafoo Waalah' for his great services to the society.
Yes. All these one-man machines toil whole day while just making a very little money. I always wonder how they make both ends meet. In USA, we have labor law, where minimum wage is about $6 per hour which is strictly enforced. I feel that India also should have some minimum wage law say with a minimum wage rate of Rs. 40 per hour. But even if India makes a law for minimum wage it will be very difficult to enforce it due to over-population problem unlike in USA.
I hope some day Indian society themselves recognizes the plight of these one-man machines and pay them decently so that they can make both ends meet for the great people who work tirelessly to keep society happy all year around 'Rain or Shine'.
Nathan Ji, Aapka Udhar to hamne ab chukta kiya hai aur ab aap par mera ek udhar hai. Yaane ke aap ka comment mere naye Blog Actress Sadhana pe. I am sure you will shortly get to my Sadhana blog which has your favrite melodious Flute Tune "O Sajana Barkha Bahar Aayi" from Film Parakh of 960.
Regards,
Dr. Kamath
Regards,
Dr. Kamath
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Thank You Sivaram,
(I think it's time to cut out the 'ji' part mutually!)
Thanks so much for the generous compliments, but the truth is a 'supplement' cannot be better than the 'main', especially if it is inspired by the 'main'!
I think the 'Dabbawala' secret was not exactly the colour code, but some fancy markings painted by them, which only they could decipher!
You are right about Asthana Vadhyars! At times you have to ask them to know your Grand-father's full name! But like in any profession, there are some fake ones also. My cousin, who didn't remember his 'gothram' when asked by a young temple priest during 'archanai' blurted out 'Saama Gothram'! Apparently the priest was also as 'knowledge-able' as my cousin, because without batting an eye-lid he proceeded with the 'archanai' ----'Saama Gothrasya Balasubramanya Sharmanasya-------'!!
Cheers,
Nathan.
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Nathan-ji
I wrote a detailed comments and then messed up and the screen went off .I am trying to recapture what I wrote
WOW! This was splendid. The supplement looked better than the main article.Do you know why? It had lots of fun and humour . I enjoy your writing style be it a music review,movie review or parody.
I knew about 'Dabbawala" of Bombay.I did not know that the colour code was the secret behind the success of their operation.
I was reminded of our Asthana Vathiyar who remembered everything including the names of our 3 generation of ancestors requiired during annual ceremony. We learnt our family details the hard way after leaving Chennai!
Idli wallah are Matunga phenomenon. Barber as you mentioned used to come home those days and my grandfather use to insist that we do from him only ! His knife used to be so sharp that our head becomes shining after that. Beware of glare!
I really enjoyed this supplement .Thank God you did not post it as comments as otherwise we would not have enjoyed this much.
Wonderful Nathanji . Hats off to you for taking us to the olden times.
Thanks and best regards
Sivaram
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Thank you Sablu-ji, for your thoughtful comments!
Your comment reminded me that I had missed to mention about shoe-makers, cobblers, the friendly 'mochis' as they were called in the neighbour hood who with their wonderful skills used to mend those impossibly torn chappals or shoes for a pittance, so that you can save that valuable 99 Rs or 199 Rs 'Bata' foot-wear! I have to give them their due place in my blog!
Nathan.
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Thank you palahalli for the response!
Yes, they are a vanishing tribe being annihilated by today's multi-plex mall culture. We can only hope their skills are absorbed suitably in more rewarding positions. Good luck to them!
Nathan.
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Thank you Lakshmi-Ji for the comment!
Matunga had also an overpowering aroma about it - a blend of jasmines, agarbathhis, fresh filter coffee-powder (from Mysore Concerns!) and dosas from the no. of Udipi joints and road-side make-shift restaurants!
Those were the days---!
Nathan.
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Thank you, sunkan-ji for the comment!
That 'idli' vendor was fun to watch! He was a great teacher in time and space management!
Nathan.
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