Say races and you think horses. Not many of us are aware that a perfect horseshoe goes a long way in the making of a winning horse. Dattoba and Sons, situated at East Street, is where all the horses are led to. The shoes made by this century-old outfit are famous for their sturdiness and huge bankability. The horseshoes made here are supplied to the Race Course and to stud farms in Pune, Mumbai, Hyderabad and Bangalore.``We are the only ones that makes horseshoes in the whole of the State and we are proud of it,'' claims Sanjay Sumbe. The family business started by his great-grandfather Dattoba Laxmanrao Sumbe in the Raj times will complete a hundred years this year. Dattoba, who shod horses for the British decide to set up his own enterprise.The four brothers - Vijay, Sanjay, Rajendra and Ramesh along with their uncle Sukhdeo are at the helm of affairs. Their regular clients include the Poonawallas, the Amateur Riders' Club of Bombay, where they send 125 sets of horseshoes every month. The outfit has also had the prestige of supplying their horseshoes to royalty like Jivajirao Scindia of Gwalior, and Shahu Maharaj of Kolhapur. Their uniqueness is that all the horseshoes are handmade.``Even though we have modern machinery, we believe that our handmade shoes are much in demand than the machine-made ones,'' says Vijay. When the strenuous work can be consigned to the machines, he said,``We have only a fixed amount of horseshoes to be made. The fineness is lost when the `comfort instruments' (machines) make them.'' They believe in superstition that horseshoes bring luck. ``People come to buy them on the new moon and no moon days,'' says Rajendra.
