Chapter 1: Parvati’s house

“Salam Bombay,” translation – Salute to Bombay, or should I say Salam “Mumbai.” As I sit down to write this blog, on my visit to Bombay, after 4 years, my immediate thoughts were “Salam Bombay.”

For me, Bombay was and will always be “Bombay”, even after the name changed 10 years ago. In 1995, the Shiv Sena changed the name of the city to “Mumbai.” One of the founding principles of the Shiv Sena(translation: Shivaji’s[1] Army) was based on the racial and fanatic concept of Maharashtra as a place exclusive to the Maharashtrian[2]. Hence they conceived of Bombay as a city only for Maharashtrians captured by their famous quote “Amachi Mumbai” (translation: Our Bombay, only for Maharashtrian). .. I will like to pause for a moment here and think…hmm... if this political party had ever been successful with their political agenda to make Bombay to Mumbai in the literal sense i.e. only for Maharashtrain, could I even write this? The answer without even thinking twice is “No.”

If Bombay were singularly Maharashtrian, then with out a doubt it would not be the nation’s capital of commerce, media, and fashion. This is something I strongly believe and nothing could deter my claim. I am 100% Maharashtrian, i.e. both my parents are from Bombay and speak Marathi, and I have no qualms making this statement. Bombay, the colourful and vibrant city that “never sleeps” is because of the people, who are multiracial, multicultural. I take pride in being a Bombayaite, on occasions like Ganesh Charturti[3], where Ganesh a Hindu god’s procession passes through evn Muslim dominated streets. I take pride of being a Mumbaite when I say to my friends in US, that road to most visited church called Mount Mary is constructed by a Parsi[4]. I love my Muslim sounding name, Sabir; I loved my catholic school, Fatima High School and my Hindu parents. It would have been very difficult to quote this if Bombay was in a real sense Mumbai. I still wonder did Shiv sena think through when they came up with the quote “Amachi Mumbai,” did they have the answer for questions like, what if my mother is some other caste and my father is a Maharashtrian or vv., what if a Gujurathi [5] parent educates their kids in a Maharashtrain school.

Chapter 1: Parvati’s house.

On the day of my return, I met Parvati at my parent’s house. The first words I said to her were “whats up Parvati, kiasi hai tu” (translation: What’s up, Parvati how are you). That very moment I said to myself completely ignoring her innocent smile-- “Who other then a wannabe says ‘what’s up’ to a person who doesn’t know even “E” in English.”

Parvati is our maid and comes from Ramabai colony, which is 10 blocks from my house, across the Eastern Express highway also called National Highway 4 (NH4). NH4 is one of the two major highways running through the heart of Bombay; the other freeway is called the Western express highway. As you move away from Bombay downtown, which is commonly referred as the ‘Town,’ towards the suburbs of Bombay, one can find colonies like Ramabai, which are mainly referred as the slum settlement. These colonies are dominated by Dalits[6], Bangladeshi refugees, and families from other rural parts of India. In efforts to reduce the pedestrian accidents, caused due to fast moving traffic on these major highways, the local municipal government made an underground pedestrian crossing in the recent years. I saw a similar underground pedestrian crossing near Ramabai colony.

In just couple of days of my stay in Ghatkopar (suburb of Bombay, where my parents stay) I had noticed a new vegetable market on the narrow “kuccha[7]” road which connected Garodia Nagar (area where my parents stay) to this Express highway. This narrow road can be loosely compared to service roads one can find in the suburbs of Queens, NY. Now that you are imagining such a service road, just add one more attribute to that imaginary service road - it is privately owned. Yes, in Bombay or rather I should say in India, roads can be privately owned, or in more descriptive words a private property, space, land can be made public without the permission of the landlord. The best part of this privately owned public used service road had a big sign saying ‘Private property, trespassers will be prosecuted.’

When this service road was discovered, may be 10 years ago, it was heavily used by locals to get on to the express highway from Garodia Nagar and vice versa, to avoid walking for 4 km around Chembur (the neighboring suburb to Ghatkopar), or paying an extra Rs. 20 (40 cents) by rickshaw. Since this road was a time saver to the local pedestrians, after 2 years, the automobile owners began using it. Now it carried the weight of automobiles, two wheelers, and pedestrian traffic. Like State Troopers, Sheriff Departments and local city police departments in US, in Bombay, the law and order departments are divided mainly in Local city police called Bombay Police department (BPD) and traffic police department, know as Regional Transportation Office (RTO). RTO police wear white and khaki coloured uniforms while the civilian police wear only Khaki uniforms. RTO Department of Ghatkopar passed a new bill to make all the roads connecting to the express highway as one way streets, to avoid accidents due to fast flowing traffic on the highways and the merging traffic from such ramps. Hence this service road was made One Way, and official sign saying “One Way –by Order: Regional Transportation Office,” was clearly visible. Now this 20’ wide, 35’ long privately owned road, with legal signs of both One Way and Private Property next to each other, had a vegetable market, where local hawkers sold green and “fresh” vegetables.

When I saw the market on this service road I wondered why a vegetable market came up on such a cramped up service road, where there is barely any place for people to walk or cross. I continued to ask such questions to myself, “Why a vegetable market, when the noise and air pollution is so high?”

After observing Parvati for couple of days and other maids in the society, the answer was as clear as crystal – “Customer Service.” Since all the maids stay in Ramabai colony, work in Garodia Nagar, and everybody in Mumbai including house maids have cell phones with free incoming call, it is convenient for the house owner, to just call and instruct them to pick up the “fresh” green vegetables on their way to work…Wow.

As soon as I deciphered this mystery of the vegetable market, I literary jumped up and yelled “Eureka.” That day, I felt as if I have the answered to Harvard Business Review’s case study on “India – Economic growth at a speed of light.”

With no doubt in my mind, I can claim that it is ingrained in an Indian DNA to provide better, customer service, through process innovation and technology. In this case it was “cell phone, with free incoming calls.”

Parvati is a maid at my parent’s home since last 10 odd years and also she is the main character of my first chapter of the short stories, based on my experiences to Bombay called “My experience with Bombay – Dec 06.”

I distinctly remember it was Parvati’s second year in Mumbai and in Ramabai colony. She had moved from Andra Pradesh, a state in South India in search for work, and now was well settled and adjusted to harsh life and reality of serving middle class society of Garodia Nagar. I am not sure if 30 Namdeep[8] was her first job as a house maid. But by now she was acclimatized to the job. It was a Tuesday evening when I saw her talking to my mother, who had just returned from a hard day at work, which included 1hour of 2^nd class ladies compartment local train travel with other 300 odd working class ladies cramped in a box on wheels, 20ft long 10ft wide.

For those who have not seen a rush hour Mumbai’s local trains this is a brief snap shot of a 2^nd class ladies compartment: A 2^nd class ladies compartment is 20’x10’ box with other 10 - 20’x10’ boxes on iron wheels, known as Central Railway Train as a whole. During the peak hours over 300 women patrons’ with various colored Saris, board the train from CST [9] along with other 100 teenage girls--the so called “modern” Indian girls, who are in western outfit like jeans and t-shirts. This compartment is so crowded that you can barely see an inch of the floor. The crowded orgy generally lasts for ½ an hour, till Dadar[10] station and the crowd starts to disintegrate, heading toward their respective abodes.

One day, Parvati approached my mom about a loan she needed to buy a house in Ramabai colony for Rs 15,000 approximately $300. “A hut in Ramabai colony!” my mother replied with perplexed look on her face and added “can you buy house in Ramabai colony?” Ramabai Colony was an open land, by the highway where families like Parvati’s family came from distant states, and settled. Residence of Ramabai colony did odd jobs like house cleaning, washing vessels etc. Over a period of time, this settlement increased and multiplied to become, the second largest slum settlement in Mumbai, spread across 10 acres of land. These houses are small huts with walls made of aluminum sheets, which generally are used for roofing purposes. Some houses are made up of bricks, but the families staying in brick houses are the influential families. The house Parvati was planning was just a 300 sq. ft, hut with aluminum sheet walls. After her discussion with my mother, I found out this house cost Rs. 15,000 with one year lease, so when I asked my mother “is it a rented house?” she replied with an Indian nod, meaning “no.” Finally after the long discussion my mom paid her Rs. 10,000 approximately $200, which was equal to her 6 month salary.

To summarize, Parvati who works as a maid, who cleans utensil, sweeps houses, does laundry, cooks and now also buys fresh vegetables, bought a house for her family, which included 3 daughters and a husband who is an unemployed alcoholic. This hut has walls made from aluminum sheets, on land with no landlord, based on a lease of mutual understanding and no legal documents. This payment equivalent to 6 months salary grants Parvati and her family ownership for a 1 year period. Parvati is not the only one with this deal. She is just one of millions families in, one of thousands of Ramabai colonies in Bombay. When I asked my mother the reason for lending the money, she replied – “The feeling of getting to your own house is greater then $200.”

Salam Bombay!

---

[1] Shivaji, also known as Chatrapati Shivaji Raje was the founder of Maratha Empire in western India in 1674. Using guerrilla tactics superbly suited to the rugged mountains and valleys of the region, he annexed a portion of the then dominant Mughal Empire. He is considered a great hero in India particularly in the present-day state of Maharashtra, and stories of his exploits have entered into folklore.

[2] Maharashtrian: Maharashtra is India's third largest state in terms of area and second largest in terms of population after Uttar Pradesh. The natives of Maharashtra are referred as Maharashtrian, whose native language is Marathi.

[3] Ganesh Charturti: Ganesh is one of the most well-known and venerated representations of God. Ganesh Charturi is a festival celebrated in the month of September, in the some states of India. The festivities includes processions, and mass prayers on the streets of Bombay.

[4] Parsi: sometimes spelled Parsee, is a member of the close-knit Zoroastrian community based in the Indian subcontinent. Parsis are descended from Persian Zoroastrians who immigrated to the Indian subcontinent over 1,000 years ago to escape religious persecution after the Islamic conquest (Jhabvalla, 1973).

[5] Gujuratis: Gujarati people, or Gujaratis, is an umbrella term used to describe traditionally Gujarati speaking peoples who can trace their ancestry to the Gujarat region in India. Most of the Gujarati sub-ethnicities are of Indo-Aryan Ethno-linguistic extraction.

[6] Dalit: In the Indian caste system, a Dalit, often called an untouchable. They are also known as outcastes. Included are leather-workers (called chamar), poor farmers and landless laborers, scavengers (called bhangi or chura), street handicrafters, folk artists, clothes washers’ dhobi etc. Traditionally, they were treated as pariahs in South Asian society and isolated in their own communities, to the point that even their shadows were avoided by the upper castes. Discrimination against Dalits still exists in rural areas in the private sphere, in ritual matters such as access to eating places and water sources. It has largely disappeared, however, in urban areas and in the public sphere, in rights of movement and access to schools

[7] Kuccha: Kuccha is Bombay lingo for ‘weak,’ often used to describe the roads. Here is used to describe muddy road.

[8] Namdeep: Name of the apartment complex where my parents stay.

[9] CST: Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus better known by its acronym VT is a historic railway station of the Mumbai suburban railway, as well as for some long-distance trains. It serves as the headquarters of the Central Railways in India and is one of the busiest railway stations in India. On July 2, 2004 the station was nominated a World Heritage Site by the World Heritage Committee of UNESCO.

[10] Dadar: is a place in Mumbai, and has a railway station on the Mumbai Suburban Railway on both the Western Railway line (Dadar) and the Central Railway line (Dadar T.T.). Dadar has the only railway station common to both the Central line and the Western line; this makes it a transit point and the most crowded railway station on the Mumbai Suburban Railway.