Rabindra Flour Mills

If you walk down Shikha Road near the Essar Petrol Pump, you’ll probably hear the machines before you see us. That’s Rabindra Flour Mills. The air is always a bit white with flour dust, no matter how much we sweep. It gets into your clothes and hair by the end of the shift. We spend most of the day pouring grain into the hoppers and watching the bags fill up. It’s loud, so we have to shout a bit to hear each other over the grinding stones. Most of our neighbors just drop off their sacks and come back later when the flour is cool enough to tie up. We try to keep the queue moving, but sometimes the power goes out and everything just stops for a while. That’s when we sit outside and watch the cars go by the petrol pump. It’s a simple setup we’ve got here. Nothing corporate about it, just some heavy machines and a lot of heavy lifting. The floor is old concrete and it’s seen a lot of grain over the years. We open up early because that's when people want to get their chores done. By the time the sun sets, we’re usually pretty tired and covered in white dust, but the work is steady. It’s just what we do here on Shikha Road, day in and day out, helping people get their flour for their daily meals.