The dream sellers of Calcutta

The feriwalas, on a sweltering afternoon, not only enticed women and children of the household with their goods, but also like magicians would cast a spell on them

Even with the monsoon being officially over, it is still raining at times and my favourite umbrella has a spike jutting out. For the last one week not a single repairwala could be spotted in the vicinity. It was Sunday morning, the best time to catch a repairwala or a feriwala. I sat myself by the window keeping a hawk’s eye and an owl’s ear on the street to grab one. One hour into the ordeal and suddenly realisation dawns: the Sunday soundscape has ceased to be what it was even four or five years ago.
There is no prabhat feri. The sound of Disney cartoons merging with old Hindi film songs and mythological serials only to be broken by an occasional “G-O-A-L” from the nearby football ground and the cacophony of a cricket match is no more. And the street that used to be abuzz with hawkers shouting on top of their voices to sell their products and services has faded making way for an eerie silence of a claustrophobic sophistication.
Yet, I could almost hear the voices:
“Aataa oyiiiiiiiiiiii...” whenever I would hear this scream, I would run to the verandah to catch hold of the custard apple (aata) seller but all I could see would be some old newspaperwala or some random hawker. To me it seemed the most surreal event on this planet. It seemed nobody else but me could hear the custard applewala’s shrill loud cry. But Ma never took this seriously. Older people never take children seriously. Not until one hot summer morning, when Ma caught me running from one window to another trying to spot the fruit vendor once again. “Certainly, this is not the season for custard apples!” But I was not convinced. I made her listen carefully: “Of course you can hear his shout! Aaataaa oyiiiii... it is loud enough!” And then she bursts out laughing: “Of course it is loud enough and it says “Purono khata boi’! It is the chap who buys old newspapers and books.” But, even after so many years I am not absolutely convinced.
Feriwalas or hawkers selling glass bangles, ice-lollies, plastic dolls, balls and cameras, Kashmiri shawls, mangoes, fish, jasmine garlands, mattresses, sweets, brooms and dreams were an integral part of the streets and the soundscape of the city till a few years ago. Every house would have their set of fixed feriwalas who would pay a visit to the household just when you ‘need’ them.
Ma would often tell stories of the Magnolia ice-cream vendors, the bel phoolwalas and the chanachurwala who was so ecstatic to have extracted some compliment from my rather reserved and strict grandfather once, that for the next few months his usual hawking chant boasted an addendum: ‘D-a-k-ta-r b-a-b-u kh-e-ye b-o-l-e-che-n bh-a-l-o h-ye-chhe! (Doctor babu said it’s good).
The cacophony of these different distinctive calls created the background score of the drama of daily life and social essayists, poets, dramatists used these characters and their cries copiously to recreate the city streets in their works. Rabindranath Tagore immortalised the simple but scary-looking, tall, bearded, Afghan dry-fruit sellers who were a common site on the streets of Calcutta in his classic short story Kabuliwala, and in Gora he brings to life a typical old Calcutta residential area replete with the distinctive calls of street vendors. And who can forget the Doiwala (curd seller) whose chants mesmerised little Amal in Dakghar! The monotony of the slow-paced, black and white ‘opera binoculared’ world of Satyajit Ray’s Charulata is often broken by the calls of street vendors. But the most noted works on hawkers and their cries are by Amritlal Basu, Kaliprasanna Sinha, Ishwar Gupta and Sashi Chandra Dutta.
However, the first hand-painted depiction of the hawkers of Calcutta was probably by Balthazar Solvyns. Published as early as 1799 from Calcutta, A collection of 250 coloured etchings descriptive of the manners, customs and dresses of the Hindoos, this book provides a glimpse into the streets of European Calcutta. This was followed by Twenty-four Plates illustrative of Hindoo and European Manners in Bengal, published in 1832 by a certain Mrs S C Belnos. The book, which later received the approval of the Royal Asiatic Society of London, has three plates dedicated to the hawkers. Titled The Pedlar, Cloth Merchant and The Boxwallah, the paintings not only give us an insight into the trade but also stress the importance and prominence of these people in the society. Mrs Belnos writes that these vendors were accompanied by three/four coolies laden with huge boxes stacked with almost all things imaginable-ribbons, gloves, plastic beads, pearls, French satin, Dhakai muslin and what not and thus earned the name ‘boxwallah’.
A vivid account of these boxwallas is found in William Tayler, Thirty Eight years in India, published in 1881, where he writes: “The Bengal Boxwalla is an animal per se; hawker, pedlar, itinerant, no known word of civilised or uncivilised vocabulary will truly and befittingly describe the phenomenon. Isolate him from the angular appendage of tin and padlock, he sinks into a cipher mingling with the mass of brown humanity in which he lives.
After gaining entrance to a house, he peeps into the room or knocks at the door with confidence, sufficient for him is the listless and unequivocal assent of the unoccupied matron or an idle damsel, and in another minute he is in the middle of the room, while at his heel, two, three or four semi-nude followers, with capacious boxes on their heads enter and with silent and stealthy action deposit, in turn their freighted burdens and their own bodies. Their presence for a time is hardly noticed, but the head-man commences his exhibition by removing the choicest specimens of his goods; the quiet perseverance of the boxwallah triumphs in the end. Some attractive objects are produced and forced upon her attention. The love of bargaining or the desire of possession, forces itself on her mind and she condescends to examine one or more of the articles.”
Apart from boxwallahs and vendors, hawkers included street show artistes like jugglers, snake charmers, magicians, monkey players, tight-rope walkers etc boasting various levels of ‘bizarre’ quotient. And then there were the various ‘service providers’ and the most sought after among them were the kuor ghoti tola walas. Most houses in those days had paat kuo (water wells) and every now and then the ‘favourite’ earring of the wife, or the ‘precious’ plastic doll of the daughter, or the ‘ancestral’ brass bucket, or the ‘goodluck charm’ ladle of the servant would fall into the deep dark gorge of the well and these bounty hunters would be called and entrusted with the job to bring the treasures back from their watery graves! Although wells were long replaced by Hindware taps, and kuor ghoti tola walas by plumbers, there are still some ‘service providers’ like sheel kataowala, chhuri kaanchi shaan deoawala, chhata sharaiwala, purono ghori, gramophone sharaiwala, purono khata, shishi botolwala, chaabi katawala, khaat palong toierwala, toshok, balish toierwala, etc remain as indispensible as ever.
But the hawkers were often elusive — when you are in dire need of one, you would hear their cries and keep waiting impatiently on the street only to realise that they have passed by or changed their route.
Often every member of the family along with the neighbours, extended neighbours, visitors, servants, roadside shop keepers — all would join in this ‘feriwala spotting’ exercise. However, it was us, kids, who would usually win the challenge. But of course, we didn’t believe in free service and our parents would have to place formal requests along with the promise to buy us one 25-paise worth orange lozenge each (the deal worked fine with both the parties).
Most of these hawkers were men but when it came to popularity, it was those few non-Bengali ladies, with huge rag bundles on their heads, who stole the show. Usually tagged along by one or two young lads with tubs full of utensils, these ladies would take old clothes and give new utensils in exchange and the dupurer meyeli adda (women indulging in afternoon chats) would often revolve around who got the best deal and what they are planning to exchange next.
However, it was always the kulfiwala and the gas balloonwala who made me go weak in my knees. Then of course there was the ghotigoromwala who always seemed to arrive from nowhere on rain-drenched evenings!
And with that it starts pouring again soaking my train of thoughts. I rush back to my present and immediate concern — how to get my leopard-print umbrella repaired.