The Thirstbusters

Nagesh Kumar Bhandari has been selling neera to thirsty people at the University Circle for almost eight years,supporting his family of two with the income that his little stall brings in. Bhandari spends half the year driving an autorickshaw,but during the neera season–from January to June– his stall is his life. He spends over eight hours on his feet,doling out juice and conversation and watching people and vehicles pass by on the busy road. Settled right under a thick,leafy tree,it doesn’t seem so bad when he starts setting up shop at 10 am. But as the day gets hotter,it’s easy to spot the trickle of sweat running down his temples. “It gets very hot during the day and of course it’s a difficult life,but it doesn’t trouble me so much now,after so many years,” he says. For Nagesh,the stall may be a hard taskmaster,but it also greatly improves his life during the nectar season,when he brings home at least Rs 500 everyday. “This is easier than driving a rickshaw. I get all my business in one place without going all over the city,” he says.

For Sagar Bhandari,who mans a stall at Kamla Nehru Park,the neera season is one of his family’s biggest cash cows. Sagar spends most of the year studying in a school in Sangli,living with his family. But when the nectar season begins,he and his brothers move to Pune to make the most of the season. “At the busiest hour,around two,I get 10 to 15 people at a time,” he says. Both Sagar and Nagesh run government supported neera stalls and receive a supply of the nectar outside their stalls every morning.

Life is a little harder for Satish Raju Bhandari,who wakes up with his father and cousins at 5 am and travels over 40 kms every morning to go to the family plantation in Kasar to collect the sap from the palm trees by sunrise. He climbs the trees and brings down the pots that were hung from the trees the night before. He then adds water and sugar to make 16 litres of neera which the family then takes to their stall in Aundh.

Satish finds great irony in the fact that though the summer vacations are on and he is off from school,he actually has to wake up two hours earlier than he does normally,so he can help his family with the business. He hands out a cool,sweating glass of nectar to a customer who comments on the heat. “The heat is good for us. It means more business. And that’s how life is. It’s not all bad,” he says.