Startup India: Small businesses that shine in summer

A nation of billions has at least a million new enterprising ideas to make hay while the sun shines. Well, literally. As the blistering Indian summer sets in, the country’s street vendors make for a r

Apr 22, 2017, 07:02 IST5 min

<strong>Kulfi</strong><br />&ldquo<em>Photo kya le rahe ho</em> <em>(Why are you just clicking pictures?)</em> &ndash come taste the kulfi, I make it with my own hands,&rdquo says Munendra Gupta. He often gets catering orders from customers during wedding season. At Rs 10 a stick, he sells 150 to 200 sticks a day. <br /><br />

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Kulfi&ldquoPhoto kya le rahe ho (Why are you just clicking pictures?) &ndash come taste the kulfi, I make it with my own hands,&rdquo says Munendra Gupta. He often gets catering orders from customers during wedding season. At Rs 10 a stick, he sells 150 to 200 sticks a day.

Image by Forbes

2/17

MangoesJamal Mohamed leaps at any car that slows down at the sight of his horse-drawn cart, thrusting a slice of totapuri, a variety of mango he sells. Jamal and the others in the four carts along this stretch of a busy intersection in East Delhi are all from Meerut. We are a quarrelsome band of brothers, he says, especially when the sacks of mangoes sent by his big brother from Andhra Pr

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Ice Cream&ldquoVenus Icecream Company has been around since 1955, and myself since 1982,&rdquo says Gyan Chand proudly. He rattles off a couple of other brand names from then that have disappeared long since. &lsquoWhy ask me how much i make&rsquo, he grins, "yeh toh accha timepass hai" (this is a good passtime). He let&rsquos on that it&rsquos around Rs 1500 a day, not as much as "thos

Image by Forbes

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Ice Cream Sunil Kumar was working for Relaxo, the shoe company when he decided to quit out of &lsquoboredom&rsquo. Since six years, he diligently parks his Kwality Walls cart from 4 pm to midnight with an eye out for the swooping municipal authorities. Most days in the summer, he makes Rs 2500, enough to keep him at peace, he says

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Tharbooj (Musk Melon)Thakurji parks his pushcart displaying muskmelons temporarily in the middle of the pedestrian-only road at the bustling Lajpat Nagar market and nobody has an issue with that. Everyone here knows me for long, he says. How long? &lsquoI&rsquom 90 years old! He sticks to selling one kind of fruit at a time. He pauses for thought and then breaks into a tale: &lsquoNow,

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Chuski&lsquoCollege-log&rsquo (College crowds) throng Ramkilavan&rsquos cart for the sprightly green and orange chuski that sell for Rs 30 a piece. The fact that a lot of crushed ice goes into it is not a &lsquosecret&rsquo, he says, but the recipe for his khus flavour is.

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Candy flossVijay walks about on foot around Rajpath once a week, selling candy floss at Rs 10 to tourists for most of the summer. He sells about fifty to sixty sticks. For the rest of the week, he works at a textile shop, selling fabrics with colours like &lsquothese candies&rsquo to middle-class housewives

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JaljeeraRegulars looking for Satpal&rsquos Jaljeera can&rsquot miss his wooden cart, and its garland of mint leaves around a large earthen pot. He takes a bus from his accommodation in Ghazipur to Sarojini Nagar and ladles out glasses of the tangy sap-green drink to thirsty Delhites

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FrockLal Babu&rsquos is a business on the move. He has no idea where these cotton frocks are manufactured, but they are perfect for the season. At Rs 50 a piece, these are a hit with the mothers in the know. He has sizes that fit a month old toddler to an early teen

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Rooh AfzaSalim Mohamed charges Rs 10 for a glass of the sherbet and insists on not just the drink&rsquos cooling properties, but its magical ones. A customer almost splutters on hearing this. Salim makes Rs 3000 to 4000 on a summer day

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