From tricycle to shopping cart

In the day of supermarkets, hypermarkets, credit cards and Sodexo
passes, a few neighbourhood provision stores have been able to hold on
to their loyal customers. While more and more housewives and working
couples stroll the aisles of supermarkets with their shopping carts,
these provision stores and what were called “societies” and “ration
depots” were the main source of the monthly provisions for families in
Bangalore not so long ago.
In the old localities, these were dingy establishments with articles
falling off stone or cement shelves, overflowing gunny bags, leaking
tins and glass jars.
The shopkeeper’s assistant fords his way through the store looking for
footholds on the floor strewn with his ware to fetch your requirement.
The shop is packed with his supplies in every nook and corner and the
air thick with the overpowering odour of tamarind, red chillies,
grains and gingili oil.
The household generally gets its provisions once a month after the
head of family hands over the shopping list to the shop owner. Then,
the delivery boy on his tricycle brings home the goods which he
spreads on the red oxide floor in the hall. The members of the house
then tally the goods on the list with those on the floor and pay the
delivery boy.
Any additional requirement during the month too is procured on credit
by producing a little book in which the shop keeper enters the item
and its price. The carry bags were yet to arrive on the scene and one
had to visit the shop with one’s own cloth bag or wire basket or
stainless steel carrier, depending on what one wanted to buy. There is
invariably a “dispute” over the total in the book at the end of the
month, which is settled after much argument after it is discovered
that the little boy, who had been sent to buy oil earlier in the
month, had also helped himself to a bar of chocolate without the
father’s knowledge.
It is because of this credit facility that households preferred these
provision stores, though the ration depots and societies were cheaper.
Moreover, one had to regularly scan the newspapers to know when the
month’s quota of sugar had arrived at the ration depot before standing
in line to buy it.
Besides the provision store and the ration depot, there was the
ubiquitous “Kaka” store, traditionally manned by a benevolent looking,
pencil line moustached Moplah, to whom the housewife  generally
despatched her little son for emergency supplies like green chillies
or a bunch of coriander leaves, when an unexpected and uninvited guest
needed to be entertained.
Today, the long queues at the ration shops have been replaced by long
lines at the counters of supermarkets as the sales girl gets down to
counting coupons or tries to  coax the card swiper to respond.
vijaysimha@newindianexpress.com