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Down Memory Lane
The lure of paper toys
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Paper toys and flowers, almost a thing of the past, are witnessing good days again, says R.V. SMITH
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Mahmud used to make paper flowers for a living. That was in the pre-Partition years. He belonged to a village in eastern Uttar Pradesh and had come to the city of the Taj for better earnings. The whole day he roamed the streets, selling the flowers w
hich were a novelty at that time, and at night, slept in Buddhi Master’s tailor shop. The few belongings he had were stacked on top of a cupboard in which the tailor used to hang the clothes he had stitched, along with the crepe paper from which the flowers were made.
That was in the night, when Mahmud would sit in a shop corner before a hurricane lantern cutting out beautiful flowers of all shapes. When business was slack, he would go to the nearby convents, where the nuns found his work worth buying and displaying for the benefit of nursery children. But there were days when he was sick – and this was almost every second week – and had not enough money even for food. Mahmud hardly took any medicines but Buddhi Master’s wife saw to it that he didn’t go hungry.
One doesn’t see such artistes now, for times have changed and not many are interested in buying paper flowers. Poppy Day (in remembrance of World War victims) on the second Sunday of November brought good earnings for Mahmud as not only the schools, but also military establishments and hospitals would buy them in large numbers. Those days are over but paper toy makers are still around to remind one of the song in which the film hero, Sanjeev Kumar, waxed eloquent on the charms of the Phirkiwali.
Paper toys
The phirkiwallahs who keep children in good humour during the Dussehra-Diwali days are an integral part of Ram Leela. They have their abodes on the riverside or on the outskirts of colonies or roadsides. One such habitation is opposite the Beriwala Bagh in Subhash Nagar, New Delhi. In a cluster of hutments dwell some families which ply the trade in paper toys.
In keeping with the spirit of the season they make bows and arrows, the mace of Hanuman and Bhima, swords, daggers, shields and masks, besides the phirki which rotates with the breeze. The sellers are both men and women. But the men do most of the rounds for sales while the women prefer to make the toys before and after their chores.
Phirkiwallahs are a common sight these days with a crowd of children around them, all eager to buy weapons brought back into prominence by the renewed interest in the Ramayana and Mahabharata. Ramdas and his wife Sita Devi are a phirkiwallah couple with three little children. They have never read the great epics because they are illiterate. Yes, they have heard parts recited by the panditji who sits down after his evening meal with a lantern and a copy of the Ramayana. He never keeps the Mahabharata for they say it brings bad luck. But now television has broken that hoodoo and Ramdas and Sita Devi have benefited from it. But the Ramayana is their favourite. Others too have dreams of greatness, and not just Mungeri Lal. But dreams come true in strange ways. In the case of the couple it is the revival of a trade amid a profusion of TV sets. Thanks to them the footpaths of Beriwala Bagh bustle with weapons for the epic battles that are fought day after day under the garb of livelihood.
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