These are street vendors outside the Mumba Devi Temple and they sell prasad items, other items for puja, vermillion, beads , rudraksh, conches, ..this road leads from here to the Zaveri Bazar or the goldsmith market , cloth market, the most crowded commercial hub of the city.
Shot from a rickshah at the signal.
Shot from a rickshah at the signal.
polyester dreams
psychedelic photostreams
flickring fountains
seamless inseams
This is the young stud, all ready to roar, he does not beg, his begging days are over,
His work is to look after the younger kids and keep them under control.
He has dreams in his eyes, and has eyes on the little girls that are about his age.
He has slogged from birth to reach this position, he is a Toy Boy..
The Most Wanted
He is the Turner Road Traffic Signal Kid.
He is a Child Laborer.
Yes India Shining.
He begins his work at 10 am on normal weekdays, festival times are stretched hours, no respite, heat sun, dust cold monsoon, and there is one season that prevails poverty. Period.
The older girls, mothers or overseers sit at one end of the signal close to Motivala Jewellers, while the kids wearing shorts, bare torsos, the little ones naked dirt unkempt
attack the motorists as soon as the signal comes to an halt, and they know their way around cars, motorbikes , buses and rickshas.They are not as convincing in their glib like the kids at the Mahim St Michaels Church Signal. Those kids invoke Allah if you are a Muslim, or Jesus Christ if you are a Christian, and their unending spiel can reall unnerve you if you are groping for your girlfriends tits in the back seat of a hot and humid cab, you just pay t get rid of those pesky eyes.
The Turner Road Traffic Signal kids are street smart ,but come from a tribal belt near Amravati, or Jalgaon in Maharashtra, they are direct in their approach, but not rowdy, their main asset is their unguarded smiles.
The little girls have misty eyes and at the age of 10 or 12 turn out to be damsels in a hurry, at about 13 they are already impregnated, the factory of producing kids. Kids is what brings the loot, kids is commodity , kids a week old are put on hire , slung to another kid, drugged and this little tyke to works the hours , no overtime , the clothes of the kids have no pockets , all the money is handed over to the overseer immediately.
Any truant, cheating, than the cheek is burnt with a burning iron rod, or the hand broken. Business ethics that are learnt the hard way. Food is the leftovers from Stomach Restaurant .There is a powerful Beggar Mafia and the Hafta System Syndrome prevails, everyone right up to the top echelons has their hand tainted with this blood money.
Everyone knows it but who cares.
The NGOS are not seen here they are where the big bucks are, big fat donations and the perks where issues are media covered.
I am not liked by the overseers I don’t need to explain.
The most important begging days is the Independence Day Republic Day selling flags and other such badges sops,etc.
Than Dassera, Diwali,Xmas.
The Mount Mary Feast the Turner Road Traffic Signal kids move bag and baggage to the steps that lead out from the Basilica of the Mount , here each beggar makes at an average about Rs 1400 per day. This is for a week, and there are about more than 35 members a rough guess.
The older ladies make a killing weaving flower in a bunch as floral tribute.
The guys the husbans, they play cards, drink and fornicate, here a father in a drunken stupor can impregnate the daughter, the end product is what matters.. a new born child.
Ready for hire 8 hourly basis.
The grown up boys about 14 to 16 are the studs, walkman, music mopped up hair, tight crotchy jeans, and horny as hell, their job to keep the little kids from sneaking the loot..
These Studs openly flirt, impress the prepubescent babes, and the babes well for them these hard on guys are better than Salman Khan the Bollywood Heart Throb.
This is a life at the Turner Road Traffic Signal.
Some of the studs service the begging Hijdas and are fabulously rewarded..
These youngster get into drinks , drugs and into petty crime, just to make a quick buck..
Yes India Shining.
Horsing Around
Most of my pictures betray my passion for seeing the unusual and having a camera
on my person and the agility to shoot it, this is the ephemeral quality of a shot that does not last forever. For me the Turner Road Traffic is bustling with life, today a new born baby started its day at the traffic signal in the arms of another kid, and who is the mother one need not know, the child is on hire, ample dose of Benadryl given to it , so its in slumber in a world beyond the colored lights of the traffic signal.
The little new born child evokes pity, vulnerability, I took a few shots from my rickshaw , all in my camera.
This morning the pagan Sufi Baba came to my shop, he is not well I took his shots too.
Later on my way from work at Ram Mandir Road I banged into the Hijdas whom I had shot at Carter Road near Abhiash Bachchans house..Naivedya.
The head guru was not to impressed and did not allow me to take her pictures but two others kissed my hand, I took a few shots also in the camera.My internet connection at home I have had it disconnected, so no online from home, wife and I were uncomfortable, this the flip side of far too many hours spent on the Net.
I was in town yesterday and shot the exterior of the Mumba Devi temple.
Near Zaveri Bazar, heavy security and police bandobast.
I have been each morning before starting my fast wanting to shoot the Awakeners, these are Muslim mendicants with a torch and a stick who move about Muslim lanes asking the folks to wake up for the fast..
