Do you know what Qalai Gar, Katib, Rafugar or even Bhishti mean?
Chances are, you don’t – these are some of the old-world trades that are now dying thanks to modernisation and technology. I went in search of the last few men left in these trades and unearthed their worlds of charm, nostalgia and loss.
Qalai Gar: The Tin and Copper Man
In a busy lane of Matia Mahal, Old Delhi, is this 150-year-old shop, “Sheikh Qalaigar”. Four generations of the Sheikh family have run their qalaigari or ‘tinning’ business. Tinning is the process of melting tin on copper or brass utensils to keep them from oxidising.
57-year-old Md Irfan supervises his sons, Md Faizan, 32, and Md Faisal, 30, who took over their father’s business five years ago.
Earlier, qalaigars would roam the galis and set up their makeshift bhatti (portable mini-furnaces) on the streets. Today, the Sheikhs are purani Dilli’s only qalaigars – they get 100-150 copper utensils each day and turn about Rs 2500-3000 profit.
About three decades back, it would cost Rs 12 for the qalai of 20 utensils (1 Kodi). Now the minimum charge per utensil is Rs 50, but can go up to as much as Rs 2000 for really large deghchis.
How It’s Done
Md Faisal begins the process of Qalai by cleaning the copper utensils with hydrochloric acid.
He then hands over the utensils to Faizan, who heats them over the bhatti, and then coats them first with powdered ammonium chloride, locally called Nausadar – this coating is done in order to make the utensil shiny and help the tin stick to its surface. The tin is then melted on the surface of the vessel and rubbed in with cotton. The finished product? A shiny copper utensil, ready for use.
Eating in copper utensils has health benefits and we at our home also mostly use copper utensils for cooking, it is only when in hurry that my wife uses a cooker.Md. Irfan, Owner Sheikh Qalai Gar
Md. Irfan assures us that copper utensils are not going to become obsolete any time soon. But his sons Faisal and Faizan aren’t married yet and can’t say if their kids would join this line of work.
Typewriter Repair: Restoring The Original Click
Sixty-three-year-old Rajender Kumar Baila sits in K-Block Connaught Place at Adarsh Typewriters which he inherited from his father. The business was started by his grandfather Bijaram, in 1934.
My grandfather always taught us to respect everyone and named the shop Adarsh Typewriters. We used to get government contracts to repair official typewriters apart from lawyers, writers and journalists, who were regulars. Now, only people who are in love with typewriters come to me.Rajender Kumar Baila, Adarsh Typewriters
After school, Rajender would go and sit with his father Kishanchand and become fascinated by the repair work of typewriters. At the age of 14, he learned how to repair typewriters himself.
Though Rajender at his shop services typewriters, other repair works are given on contract basis to Kharadiyas who make the missing parts such as screws or keys and painters who paint the typewriter cover to make it shiny.
Rajender is the third generation of his family to be doing this work. Even though his son learnt how to repair a typewriter, he never joined his father in the dying trade – computers and laptops are fast outstripping the good ol’ typewriter.
The wills and deeds should only be prepared using typewriters, otherwise the ink would fade away. Would you want that? It’s one of the major reasons why the lawyers are still using typewriters.Rajender Kumar Baila
Rajender sits at his shop from noon till 5 in the evening repairing and servicing typewriters. Already reaching retirement age, his love for typewriters makes him keep coming back to his shop in CP to lift up the shutters and work on the machines.
Rafugar: The Mender of ‘Honour’
Sajid can be seen in the busy streets with his head down and his fingers working the needle, mending holes and tears on clothes, helping the wearer keep their honour intact.
In the age when distressed jeans are a fashion statement, Rafugars – darners – are going out of work. Rafugari needed patience and a clean hand to make the mending and stitching look neat. Md Yasin learned rafugari from his father who had a shop in Naisarak, which was looted and burned during Partition. Yasin then bought a small shop in the Chawri bazaar paper market and established Modern Rafugar in 1947. Two decades back, it was taken over by his son, 48-year-old Sajid Suhail.
During the time of my father he used to have 5-6 Rafugars working in this small area –and work was plenty. So much so that we never used to get time to sit back and relax. I too worked with 4 rafugars under me, till 20 days back I still had one more guy working with me – but he left, as work has been sparse.Suhail Sajid, Rafugar
Sajid charges Rs 50 minimum for the mending work he does – he earns hardly Rs 200 from this line of work. To try and supplement his waning income, a year back he got a coffee machine and a fridge installed in his shop and earns a little more now from selling machine coffee and cold drinks.
Most Rafugars take out threads from the same piece of cloth which needs repairing.
It is only in cases where threads cannot be taken out that threads from these colourful spools are used.
Suhail is the third generation of Rafugars in Old Delhi and last in line, his children never wanted to join this work. He might very well be the last rafugar in the old quarters.
Katib: Artist of Words
Mohammed Ghalib is from Saharanpur in Uttar Pradesh. At a young age he was sent to Darul Uloom Deoband to gain Islamic knowledge. But at the madrasa, he was introduced to calligraphy. Each day he used to spend an hour on calligraphy to improve his handwriting. Ghalib fell in love with how the movements of Qalam could make something so beautiful.
The teacher at the madrassa found Ghalib to be a fast learner and told him about how he could make a living out of calligraphy and started giving him work.
In 1982, his friend from the madrassa, Sayyed, who got enrolled in Ghalib Academy for a calligraphy course in Delhi, motivated Mohammed Ghalib to come to the city too as calligraphers were in demand.
When I came to Delhi I became popular and earned a name; though my friend Sayyed was left behind and had to leave this line of work - but this is all a play of luck and fate.Mohammed Ghalib
Ghalib always had his base in Urdu Bazaar in Old Delhi.
He nows sits in Taraqqi Urdu Bookstore, where the owner who is a humorous man doesn’t charge a single penny from Ghalib to use his space.
Ghalib started getting work regularly and got introduced to a professor who needed a book written in Persian – Ek Chaddar Maili si (an 80-page book).
The professor needed the book to be written for it to get printed; so I started the work and re-did some pages to do it beautifully. The 80-page took me 15-20 days. The Professor (Noorani Sahab) liked the work I did. I was paid Rs 8/page after that Noorani Sahab got me regular work.Mohammed Ghalib, Katib
Ghalib makes his own Qalam with bamboo bark. He dries them and then cuts it according to the nib size he wants. He says calligraphy reeds are difficult to find in the market and a good calligrapher always makes his own.
Katib’s tools
Due to modernisation and software available at printing presses, most Katibs are going out of work. Mohammed Ghalib gets works relating to writing the Lal Khaat (The first invite which is sent from bride’s family to the grooms’) or Madrassa letter heads and receipt booklets that he designs.
Aaj kal kabhi 500 kama leta hoon kabhi kaam zyaada nahi aata…toh 2-3 din tak kuch nahi kama pata… Baat aisi hai ki Mera kharcha hamesha isse chalta raha hai, aur abhi bhi upar wala chalaraha hai. Ek baar meine jodna shuru kia tha… aur fir 8 din tak koi kaam nahi aaya… tab mujhe laga ki Upar wala naraaz ho gaye- ki mein tum ko de raha hoon aur tumne jodna shuru ker dia. Fir meine tabse kabhi nahi joda ki kitna kamaya jo aata hai Allah tera shukr hai. Aaj ki date mien apna ghar hai delli mein.Mohammed Ghalib, Katib
Ghalib is one of the few Urdu calligraphers who can still be found in Urdu Bazaar in Old Delhi.
He says, “I tried to teach my kids when they were younger, but they used to tell me that their regular studies were getting affected because of the time consuming process of calligraphy. Then I never forced my kids and even they never took an interest in it.”
Bhishti: The Thirst Quencher
In Islam, giving water to the thirsty helps one earn a reward equivalent to a thousand good deeds. So this work and the workers were well-respected.
Bhishtis originally used to provide water to soldiers in war. Derived from the Persian word ‘Behesht’ meaning paradise, Bhishtis are also known as the ‘Abbasis’ and were the traditional water carriers. They used to supply water in goatskin bags called mashq.
Thirty-four-year-old Mohammed Shahid was born and brought up at the Delhi Gate Kabristan (Cemetery). His father, Md Fazluddin, was hired as a bhishti by the British Government. All the dead bodies that would be hanged at the khooni Darwaza (Lal Darwaza) used to brought for burial at the Delhi gate Kabristan. Fazluddin would quench the thirst of the dead by watering their graves.
Md Fazluddin didn’t want his son to join this line of work and sent him to an English-medium school so he could do something better with his life. But after he passed away when Shahid was just 9 years old, he couldn’t concentrate on his studies and left school to start work as a bhishti in the graveyard when he turned 15.
The kind of respect my father used to get – I don’t even get a percent of that. People have degraded the word Bhishti to Saqqa – paani wala. They call as by shouting ‘Oye!’ or ‘Tsch’… People don’t have manners at all. The tone is very rude and they don’t respect us at all. People think of it as Ganda Kaam. We are seen as a very low caste. But it isn’t that I am working only as a bhisti like my father. I have to do all kinds of work here in the graveyard – from helping in digging the graves to cleaning the graveyard. My father was in this line of work… but I had to join the same line of work. I will work hard so that my children don’t have to work in this line.Md Shahid, Bhishti
Shahid earns Rs 7,000 from the Waqf board. Families who have members buried in the graveyard ask Shahid to water the graves everyday and he charges Rs 20/day and earns an extra Rs 600 from doing this work.
Though they may seem heroic with an air of romance around them, it is never easy for the last men standing.
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