V K Puri

We are located at 4969/5 in Hauz Qazi. It’s very close to the Hauz Qazi Police Station, which makes it pretty easy to find if you know the area. This part of Delhi is incredibly crowded. The streets are narrow and filled with people carrying all sorts of hardware and metal goods. Our shop is just like the others around here—small, packed with stuff, and always busy. We’ve been in this spot for a long time. You can see the history in the wooden counters and the way the floor is worn down. There’s a constant noise of bells, horns, and people shouting to get through the crowd. We deal with a lot of regular customers who have been coming to us for years. It’s a lot of manual work, moving heavy items and making sure everything is counted correctly. We don’t have air conditioning or anything like that; we just open the front and let the air move. Sometimes it’s dusty, sometimes it’s loud, but it’s how things are in Hauz Qazi. We know most of the other shopkeepers around us. We share tea and talk about how the market is doing. It’s a tough environment but there’s a sense of community that you don’t get in a modern shopping mall. We stay open late most days to make sure we finish everything. It is just the way we have always worked.