Vada Pav (Antara Gupta)

The vada pav is a lip smacking snack which is the most popular and regular snack of Mumbai. You see it so much in Mumbai that you won’t  be able to recall how it became a part of your conscious awareness.  For a Mumbaikar, if someone does not know what is a vada pav, its almost unbelievable. Hence, we can imagine what an integral part of Mumbai’s life the vada pav has become.

Although there seems to be no copyright for the vada pav, and it is hard to pin point who and by whom was it devised, in terms of origin. As per the Hafta Magazine( Deconstructing pav bhaji), the vada  pav was created by  snack vendor Ashok Vaidya outside Dadar station in 1970. What made it so readily accepted in Mumbai is the fact that it is cheap, filling, tasty and easy to carry. The vada pav got easily accepted because it could squeeze in with fast paced life of Mumbai. A person, who mostly misses his breakfast on the run to make it in time, can quickly grab a bite on the go, by buying a vada pav. This is the reason why we see more number of vada pav stalls in and around the station area. Sandip Patil, who runs a vada pav shop outside the Ghatkopar station for the past 28 years says that he makes about 250 vada pavs per day using potato aka. Batata, besan, masala, the  pav is bought from a local bakery. One ladi of pav (comprising of 6 pieces of pav ) costs about Rs. 7. While it seems that anyone can open a vada pav stall and make a living, which is not true in the finance city with a vast population. Sandip says “We use to get ticket for vada pav stalls from the BMC, with time specifications divided into morning evening and afternoon slots, but that has been stopped about 12 years ago, now the BMC extols money from the vendors which is roughly about Rs. 250 per month, but it differs from one shop to the other.”

Jeetendra kumar Gupta who owns a private shop near the railway station since 1948 highlighted the same thing that BMC permissions are required for owning a vada pav stall. He said that most vada pav stalls sell vada pav, bhajjiya pav & samosa pav exclusively. He said that it helps in keeping a check on the number of vada pav wallas, as, if the number of owners keeps increasing, it will be a loss for the vada pav wallas.

Mukul Mondol, an IRCTC stall keeper said that the price of vada pav use to be Rs. 4 about five years back, now it has gone up to Rs. 6 as the prices of pav has increased. The railway stall keepers are just involved in selling the pav and the product is made by a different group of people. Mondol says “ vada pav and samosa pav are equally popular”. So our love for Mc. Donalds does not reduce our liking for the vada pav- also refrred to as the Indian Burger.  While Mc. Donalds caters to the middle class and upper middle class section, attracting large no. of college going youth wishing to “hang-out” with friends, or spend some time with their girl friend/ boyfriend, the vada pav caters to mostly working class of the city, irrespective of class, caste and community. 

If Mc. Donalds is an example of globalization, the vada pav could be an epitome of indigenization. Hence, the Shiv Sena wanted to use the vada pav signify the marathi manoos. One of the Shiv Sena’s most ambitious schemes-to generate employment through vada pav handcarts-got a nod from the BMC’s improvements committee on 10 march, 2009. Shiv Sena executive president Uddhav Thackeray launched Mumbai's favourite streetfood - vada-pav - as the party's branded "Shiv vada-pav" and promised to make it a “global” phenomenon.

Even the vada pav has not been excluded from being branded in the era of globalization. An instance of this is the retail chain of ‘Jumbo King vada pav’. Jumbo King has separate divisions for catering, business development, franchisee relations and marketing. As per the Jumbo king website, they sell 40,000 vada pav per day within Mumbai, and about 450-500 have been sold by the Ghatkopar outlet itself. Sachin, while working in their franchisee, said” ‘butter vada pav’and ‘schezwan vada pav’ are the most popular out of an outlay which has been combined with cholle and cheese”. It is very interesting to note that the owners this fastest growing vada chain is owned by non-Mahrashtrian Dheeraj & Reeta Gupta, who have graduated with MBA degrees from Symbiosis.  An interesting food for thought is that the Vada pav is very indiscriminate about who makes it, who owns and who eats it. The makers and eaters of vada pav are celebrities, labors, house wives, corporate honchos, students, journalists, social workers, doctors, engineers, gangsters, street children, pavement dwellers - rich and the poor, women, men and children. So the baptization of Mumbaikars & non-mumbaikars onto the city is done by the non pretentious, simple yet appetizing sada vada pav.