I left my house at 5.29 am for my walk and I saw this old man cleaning flour using a sieve to remove pebbles or dust particles a painful job and I spoke to him , he was cleaning this flour sack from 3.30 am..and it was needed urgently ,, I knew the rest of the story the Slumdog caterers of Bandra usually buy cheap stuff and palm it off in their highly profitable food orders .. even a few well known restaurants in Bandra source their food chapattis tanduri stuff from them .
And this old man does odd jobs for them..peeling cutting onions garlic , cleaning rice etc.
And the guys who use his services are miserly stingy North Indians all Muslims ,, hardly will you find the Hindu in this line of outdoor catering and everyone of them has prospered here in Bandra , they have bought shops homes one of them has a shop given on rent at Pali Road.
And during the wedding season it is a roaring business , and they are highly competitive as compared to other well to do wedding caterers ..And how did the North Indian caterers make it so big..in such a short while ..The story goes most of these Khansama cooks or chef came to the Bohra caterers to work such as Jeff Caterers , they saw the boom and branched out on their own operating from rental rooms in the Bandra slums..and they bought people from their villages as cheap labor , young boys as old as 8 or 9 made them do the cleaning of the utensils and it was these kids who learnt the art of cooking and later started their own food services too called BC whre they cooked cheap food for the poor working class migrants in the slums , tailors embroiders etc..
The food was cheaper than eating in a restaurant a tiffin for one time lunch was about rs 40 or less .. with meat or fish once a week ,, mostly one vegetable rice and two chapptis and watery gravy,,
The other three peak period besides wedding was Ramzan Iftar stuff and catering for political Iftar party by politicians chamchas for their Muslim slum vote bank.
The Elections where all volunteers get Rs 500 and a packet of biryani and the Muslim women who wear the hijab make the most of it as being unrecognizable they are canvassing for all parties , because of the stricture against kids they lost out on the extra packets of biryani.
Lastly Shia Moharam here the business soars as the Niyaz for large crowds attending Majlis is made by them.. and this side of Bandra I dont think there are any Shia slumdog caterers , the entire catering business is predominantly in Sunni hands .and they have a great network.. they undercut each other to stay in business .
And so leaving him and his job I walked all the way from my house to end of Bandra Reclamation took a turn from Agasty building at 5.45 and headed to MET Gardens .. I entered the garden for my 10 round walk at 5.58 and at 6 am the Mount Carmel Church bells add to the serenity and at 6.09 the Azan from the neighboring Masjid .
At 6.28 I was out of the garden trying to memorize a poem that stealthily entered my vacuous mind , it is a satire and I kept adding words lines etc..
My next blog will be the poem called Congress Mukt Bharat.
