Inside Supreme Court, a cafe run by differently abled to open doors

Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud on Friday inaugurated the Mitti Cafe’s newest branch on the Supreme Court premises. Speaking at the inauguration, the CJI said, “If you go down the grand staircase, to the right there is a small café with a place to sit called Mitti Café. Everyone who runs it is disabled. I hope all the lawyers will support…it’s a joint venture between all of us to encourage the disabled.”

Attorney General R Venkataramani too said, “It’s a wonderful act of compassion.”

The café exclusively hires differently-abled people and has more than 30 branches around India. After training the staffers of a new branch in Mumbai, Ghosh is now here at this branch to help prepare it for its launch.

“The training of any staffer goes on for anything between two to three months,” he said. “If, let’s say, someone is blind, then it’s not that they can’t do any work. They can talk to a customer. They can be helped with orientation around the café – if we help them see where tables 1, 2 and 3 are, eventually they will be able to speak to customers and take their orders,” Ghosh added.

Another staffer, Sujith Kumar Mandal from Bihar, used to work at Bangalore’s Chai Gully before moving to Delhi in February to work in the café’s Hansraj College branch.

He said two of his colleagues who are mute and deaf use sign language to communicate in the kitchen, which allows them to prepare dishes like noodles, sandwiches, tea and milkshakes. If someone is in a wheelchair, he adds, they can operate the cash register – everyone has a role to play.

Faiz Anwar, a staffer from Mirzapur, is a newcomer who’s only been with the café for 10 days. He used to work at a dosa dhaba in Bangalore before a friend told him about Mitti Café. He started his training at the Hansraj branch, where he was trained by Mandal. Anwar said the most satisfying part of the job is his ability to help people.

“There are going to be around 10 to 12 people who will work here and the goal is to provide dishes that people will enjoy,” he said.

Mitti Cafe is scheduled to launch on November 19.

(with agency inputs)