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Don’t feel entitled to anything you didn’t sweat and struggle for. A very beautiful statement which depicts a very profound nature of human being of ascertaining everything with their seamless efforts towards their never-ending desires of materialistic possessions during several stages of life. There’s an old aphorism which states “Hard Work Never Goes Unrewarded”. It’s an iteration which everyone follows up and then it all ends up in the death bed. We always want everything to be the best and the best in class products. ROI is what people are looking for in everything; if it fails it’s simply not worth spending.
Is it always necessary to attain the best? Is it important to search for Return on Investment in everything?
To get the answer to these questions let’s start with a very interesting story of a person from New Delhi’s Khan Market.
We have heard many stories of very brave powerful kings, warriors who fought for their nation or Kingdom, for their people. So is the story of today’s warrior, a person, a very brave heart with only wish to see his family living up to the fullest.
Khan Market is one of the most famous marketplaces for its variety of food corners (Kebabs obviously), its stupendous collection of dresses at all prices. Our story starts from a vendor near Starbucks, Khan Market. Mr. Kashiram Sharma, 79-year-old yet standing rock solid to take it all when it’s about his loved ones. Meeting Mr. Kashiram was one of the best experiences of 2020. He travelled to Delhi in the year 1958. The year when living in city like Bombay and Delhi was equivalent to great source of income. The same happened with our protagonist Mr. Kashiram who started working in factories for livelihood of the family. Income was only enough to fill the stomachs of the family, but Mr. Sharma did his best to meet the education of his children (3 daughters, 2 sons). He started switching jobs for better opportunities and then started working as a driver. After having great experience, he managed to crack out a job as a driver in Ministry of Education which brought more respect to himself. As an individual it was a booster for his self-esteem. After this he found out about an opening in Navy for the post of driver and he joined immediately. Several attacks started on the officers of senior posts and Mr. Kashiram had to leave his job due to the danger that the job possessed as he was the sole breadwinner to his family. He now continued working in private firms and borrowed a loan of 1 Lakh which was paid off along with the marriage of his daughters. A point which changed everything, which gave out the reality that Mr. Sharma, is now old and possibly he wouldn’t be able to continue anymore as the breadwinner. He switched jobs and then a time came when he was forced to leave the job with a compensation of Rs. 5000 as any mis-happenings would lead to hefty amount of trouble for the firm. He was again pushed out as he was now old and way beyond the age of retirement from all jobs legally. This forces Mr. Kashiram Sharma to standout of the crowd and start a stall in the Khan Market selling Jute Bags, Handkerchiefs, face towels, kitchen aprons, etc. He had mostly all kind of daily use cleaning towels, handkerchiefs. Everything that was being sold was surprisingly charged a very less amount by Mr. Sharma which left me quite surprised. His daily income is always depending on the mood of people. He can make up to Rs. 1000 to not even a sale totalling to Rs. 100. A man made of ethics and pure love, this helped him to find his way to the end without crying out for help to anyone. “Hard work never goes unrewarded” proves up again.
So, this was the story of Mr. Kashiram Sharma a small vendor in Khan Market. A very subtle and organised person selling daily use clothes used for cleaning purposes mostly. We all mostly use aprons in the kitchen, a handkerchief in our pocket, a face towel in our bathrooms, a moping cloth, etc. We always aim for brand stickers to justify the price of the product. It is known that these products are very useful to us on a daily basis and mostly we need a new one almost after every 2-3 weeks. Yet again we go to our favourite supermarkets and buy shinning new handkerchief from a showroom who are just pressing the electricity charges and the building charges on its customers. The quality is almost same, yet the price margin is relatively high. Let’s just take an initiative of helping these poor, hard working souls. Like all of us, they also have a family to feed. We can just simply prefer purchasing stuff like these from these vendors and it will make a huge difference. 3 handkerchiefs are being sold at a price of Rs. 30 and the same product with fancy packaging is being sold for Rs. 100 or more. The only difference is the AC showroom.
The 2020 Pandemic is a very crucial period for almost all of us, it doesn’t matter if you are from a privileged family or not it’s a pandemic and it’s destroying everything in multiple ways i.e. either due to the Virus or due to unemployment. Let’s help these small vendors, let’s take a pledge to reach out to them for at least products where the brand is just a mere label.
I’m also sharing the contact no. of Mr. Kashiram Sharma as he also promised to reach out to anyone who wants to buy from him at +91-9069588132. Like Baba Ka Dhaba, there are many stories yet to be unraveled, we know we can do it. The power of social media has always been proved to be a very vital one. Hence, let’s use this power and help them to fight this Global Pandemic.
Because why not? Why not should we avoid paying extra money for the same stuff and save a little? Why not should we help these small vendors grow a little? Because every contribution matters. Let’s just ditch the idea of thinking of the ROI while standing in the queue for the payment of a product that can be bought from a local vendor and still won’t make a difference. Sounds like more ROI? Yes, it is a very great deal indeed for you and also for that one poor vendor whom you will be helping to contribute to earnings of their daily bread.
By Saloni Pandey.
