A Hookah , a Roll-up , a Beedi or a Cigarette,
Symbolic of class ; kept safer than a pet,
but alas ! , as the smoke goes up ,
The insignia doth diffuse.
“Agar achhi Job Milti to Dukan Badha deta mai jawani me” (If I had gotten a job in my Prime , I would have quit this shop) says Mr. Satya Prakash Pandey. More commonly referred to , as Pandeyji among hundreds of paan and cigarette patrons in the campus of BITS Pilani ; one of the premier engineering Colleges in our Country.
His day starts when he opens the shutter at 9 A.M everyday without fail. The mornings are usually dull but it gets busy after dusk as he caters to the students’ galore till the clock strikes 11 . It has been the same routine for him for the past 40 years. He was here when after watching a psychedelic Zeenat Aman in Hare Krishna Hare Ram strum to Dum maaro dum; the nation tried a whiff and now here he is criticising the remix of the same.
He says that this and another shop by the Bus-stand are the sole means of putting bread on the table for his extended family of 3 brothers’ . The brothers take shifts and the money is divided equally at the months’ commencement; which according to him amounts to about Rs. 6000 per family ; per se not congruent with their lifestyle but notwithstanding ; I didn’t pry more.
Though the Asia-Pacific belt is frugal in taxing tobacco as compared to the west , even after recent revisions in the union budget ; He is perplexed by the price hike and says that the 20 percentile raise has caused his tobacco-customers to dwindle by around 10-15 percent. According to him Cigarette and Bidi sales contributed mainly to his pocket 2 years back ,but in the wake of the Health Ministry’s crackdown he is forced to keep groceries and toiletries on his shelves to supplement the dip in the former’s sales and a margin of 6-7 percent lingering on the fringes.
What he looks forwards to the most are the College Fests which bring in a large demographic eager for frolic , earnestly buying in bulk ; but the vacations mean a dry spell both literally and figuratively. He is critical of many students who con him by not settling their tabs before passing out but he still continues to keep tabs saying , “Bina is cheez ke dandha nai chalta” ( It is an occupational hazard).
While he has no qualms in selling , he is a teetotaller and abstains from smoking/chewing tobacco and asserts that no one amongst his kin is keen about its use and they are well aware of the fatality rate. The Business was handed down to them by their forefathers and they did little to alter their fate. Nevertheless he is happy about his son who exalted from all that, and is a business graduate.