Politics of Chai....

The tea shop owner, Raghu, 45 years old, lived a few hundred feet away in a small slum with his wife, two daughters and a son.
My job, like most Indians, is from 9:00 hrs to 17:30 hrs. Late evenings are spent with friends at Raghu’s chai shop (tea stall), smoking cigarettes, devouring chai and chatting up.

Raghu’s house-size, a room rather, was such that it would make India’s population-density look negligible, its size was 10’ X 12’ X 8’ (LXWXH).
Raghu had invited us at his house for the satyanarayan pooja, holy ritual done by Hindus to please lord Vishnu, part of holy trinity, and we gladly obliged.
The exterior of his house was rather eccentric, painted in orange. The colour somehow made the house appear smaller than its original 120 square feet of area.
Just looking at that house/room was making me claustrophobic and Raghu shared this space with 4 other humans.
I wondered, ‘would Michael Jordan ever fit this “Space Jam”?’

Compared to the exterior paint, the interiors were very modestly done with a pearl white colour on the walls. Above, a 2 feet mezzanine floor kept their bedding; one corner of the house comprised of kitchen complete with one stove and a couple utensils; an L-shaped table near the kitchen area hosted Television and what probably looked like children’s school books. One mild steel cup board placed near the door must be used for storing the family’s clothes and whatever little jewellery Chandra mausi, Raghu’s wife, we called her mausi, name denoted to maternal aunts, out of respect.

We quickly offered our prayers at the pooja dais and settled outside Raghu’s house on wooden stools that he provided. He offered us tea, only this time, free of cost.
Raghu hailed from a state in North India & poverty & unemployment compelled him to migrate to Maharahstra, in our town. After working at a tea stall for couple of years, he had started his own tea stall and on basis of that venture, got married and had raised a family.
Most of locals and local politicians were making hue and cry that people like Raghu are straining the resources of the Municipal Corporation and State Government and therefore must be evicted from the city/town. Politicians at the centre (New Delhi) were counter arguing that Indians can travel anywhere in India without fear; hiding the facts however; that the State Governments of North India had completely failed in creating employment opportunities, thus compelling people like Raghu to migrate.

Going to Raghu’s house was a humbling experience. Raghu and his household is the epitome of below economy classes of India and the story is same in most of such slums, just like Raghu's.

Raghu meanwhile attempts to legalize his citizenship in this state but in vain. We keep going at Raghu’s chai shop, hoping someday, all Indians will be treated equally, when no body needs to make “first claim” on our already diminished resources.