Darja Masale

We’ve been here in Parkhatpur Village for a while now. If you come down to Ward No. 9/7 in Akole Taluka, you’ll find us easily. It’s a quiet place in Ahmednagar District, mostly surrounded by farms. My family started Darja Masale because everyone around here needs good spices for their daily cooking. We don’t have a big fancy office or anything like that. It’s just a small setup where we spend most of our mornings cleaning and sorting different seeds. The weather here can get quite hot in the summer, but we keep working through it. Most people in the village know us by name. We don't really do much advertising. People just stop by when they run out of chili powder or turmeric. We like it this way. Sometimes the kids from the neighboring houses come around to see what we're doing. It’s a simple life. We focus on making sure the stuff we pack is what we would use in our own kitchen. There’s always the smell of ground cumin in the air around our gate. Some days are busier than others, especially when it’s harvest time in the fields nearby. We just try to keep up with the orders from the local shops. It’s not a complicated business, just us working hard every day to provide something useful for the community here in Akole. We hope to stay here for a long time and keep doing exactly what we are doing.