Shanthakumar Rice Mill

Shanthakumar Rice Mill is located right on Madivala Road in Bommanahalli. If you walk past 3-456-741/1, you will probably hear the machines running before you actually see the building. It gets quite loud inside when the milling starts, so we mostly talk to each other using hand signals or just shouting over the engines. The air always smells like toasted grain and a bit of machine oil. We spend most of our hours watching the hoppers and making sure nothing gets stuck in the rollers. It is messy work, and by the end of the shift, our clothes are usually covered in a fine layer of white dust. There is a small bench outside under a little tin roof where we sit when the noise gets to be too much. The trucks come in and out all day, taking up most of the space on the road, which sometimes makes the neighbors a bit frustrated. We do our best to move quickly so we don't block the way for too long. Inside the mill, there are rows and rows of sacks waiting to be loaded up. The lighting isn't great, but we know where everything is by heart now. We have a small radio that plays old songs, but you can only hear it when the machines are turned off for maintenance. It is just a regular mill where we put in our hours and get the job done every single day without any fuss.