Dilip Darzi

In a tucked away corner of this ever-growing city, there used to live a modest man with his modest family inside a modest tent house. This house was made by his own nimble hands a few years ago to give abode to his newly migrated family in this small crooked lane, under the green shade of a frizzy tamarind tree, which had gone unnoticed for decades by anyone living in that forgotten locality of this big fuming city. The man was fondly called Dilip’da or Dilip Darzi  by everyone passing by every day. This man, now in his late 50s, out of his sheer hard work, has by now in all these years acquired a good name for his exceptional tailoring skills, especially among the fairer sex in the locality. Even recently, his fame had not remained within the boundaries of this small lane but also had reached far and wide by the grace of his loyal customers’ word of mouth. A few days ago some pretty and young Bharat Natyam dancers from South City with big kohl-lined eyes had come to his shop to sew their blouses from him. To this, modest Dilip’da was quite surprised and asked these young girls as to why they had to travel so far to visit him, as if there were no good tailors to sew their blouses in South City.

As a matter of fact, it was quite rare for Dilip’da to get a fresh order to sew a new blouse or a new dress. Dilip Darzi was actually world famous in their locality for his super human alteration skills. He would only repair and alter all kinds of defective clothes for all kinds of women. He could get into the skin of his customers in such depth and take their precise body measurements in such detail, no lady had ever known that it was really possible before Dilip Darzi existed. And to say the least, every woman who crossed his front counter-table and entered inside his hut, invariably came out with a big, happy and satisfied smile. And in their first visit itself, they would magically become a little extra comfortable with him, freely letting him take their most intimate measurements, never complaining an inch about any unconstitutional behaviour by this respected middle-aged man towards them. There was no iota of doubt about the mastery that Dilip’da had acquired in his skillful craft to satisfy the ever-growing list of his numerous lady clients, big and small, young and old, rich and poor, always leaving them more than satiated in their peculiar alteration needs.

One day a thickly built housewife, a bit shorter than short in height to be fair, had come with a special need to shrink her defective blouse in such a way that it would reveal only an inch of her cleavage through the transparent saree she loved to wear. One day a slim teenage girl had come to him with a special demand to alter her defective skirt in such a way that it should be tight-fitted on her hips so that the taut curve of her behind is pronounced enough, and at the same time the fall should end in a flair, being careful by the inch not to cover her knees in any which way. Another day, a maid servant had come to him with a defective sleepwear in her hand, a modest free size petticoat. Dilip’da was quite surprised to see that even maids wear petticoats under their garments these days. He asked her, “Kya hua Maya ki maa? Kya karwaana hai?” She replied, “Dekhona Dilip'da... ekdum nayi hai, lekin pura defective, thoda bhi fit nahi ho raha hai, humaare size mein banake do na!” Dilip’da said, “Accha accha, ho jaayega.... par tumne kab se petticoat pehnna shuru kiya?” After a small pause, with a shy smile she says, “Nahi nahi, yeh toh memsaab ki hai, woh khud aana nahi chahti thi, iss liye mujhe bheja. Par unka size ekdum mere maafik hai. Lo na... naap lo jaldi se.”

Needless to say, how our down-to-earth Dilip Darzi had reacted to that comment, is not as interesting as the nature of the demand itself. However, this much can be said that Dilip Darzi had managed to satisfy all these customers to the T with their strange and defective demands for more than a few years of his new found life. Meanwhile, Dilip’da’s wife had been pestering him for the last few days to install a sign board for his shop, which had never existed since the time he had started his trade. Everyone just knew this place by his glorious name and the frizzy Tamarind tree. Dilip Darzi, as modest and humble as he was, also never felt the need for any signboard, considering that he was already pretty famous in the locality and all the ladies swore by his name when it came to altering a defective piece of clothing. His wife was a devout Kali bhakt and used to practise Kali Vandana in candle light inside their hut every day after dusk without fail. So her natural first choice for an apt name was “Maa Kali Tailors”. Despite her non-stop insistence, Dilip’da seemed to be quite nonchalant about her proposal and never showed any interest to do anything about it.

A few people in the neighbourhood, like the local newspaper boy, the local iron man, and one or two security guards from the nearby high-rise apartments used to come and visit them for a cup of chai and some harmless gossip every day, just to spend some leisurely time in the afternoon. His wife had already started propagating this indigenous idea of hers to all the others. And needless to say, everyone seemed to be quite excited about this proposal. One by one they started to pour in their ideas about how the colour of the signboard should be; one of them suggested some guy near the bus stand who could do outstanding artwork when it came to hand written sign boards. But Dilip’da himself never gave in to their unending enthusiasm. When they understood that Dilip’da was particularly not so much in favour of the name that his wife had suggested, they started suggesting other names to him as well, like “Karunamayee Tailors” or “Rajmaata Tailors” or “Kamala Tailors” by his daughter’s name, or simply by his own ever-shining name “Dilip Darzi Tailors” along with several others. Like they say, peer pressure is something which becomes increasingly difficult to deal with, especially as a teenager and as an ageing man like himself. Dilip’da slowly started to think deeply about their demands and started processing the real reason as to why they were after him with this queer idea of installing the signboard at any cost.

After a few months of forceful persuasion by everyone surrounding him and after giving a lot of deep thought behind naming his shop, he finally gave in to their demand and agreed to put up the signboard within a week or so. All his well-wishers along with his wife as their undisputed leader were very pleased with his decision, but yet none of them knew what name he had chosen for his shop. They kept asking him about the name whenever they got a chance but never got any answer from him. Finally the night before the sign was about to arrive from the painters, his wife asked him while having dinner, “Kya hua? Abhi bhi bola nahi aapne? Dukaan ka naam kya diya?” As usual his wife still did not get an answer from him, as he quietly kept eating his food without saying a word, looking a bit defeated. His wife said, “Kya ji? Kal humaare dukaan ka board lagne wala hai, aur aap hai ki itna chup baithe hai? Kuch hua hai kya? Kya naam diya hai, boliye na!” Just before getting up, after finishing his dinner plate he uttered, “Kal jab board aayega, tabhi dekh lena. Uske baad bolna humein... Dukaan ka naam saarthak hua hai ki nahi? Jao abhi, bohut raat ho gaya hai, ab so jao.” With a repressed smile on her face, his wife cleaned up and went to sleep, although sleeping tonight for her seemed like a distant dream that would not come to her in this highly excited and curious state of mind. Switching off the lights, she lay down on her bed on the floor, fantasising about the shining new signboard in front of their tent house about to come the very next morning.

At the end of the night, almost into dawn, Dilip Darzi’s wife had just dozed off for a while. And very early in the morning around 6 o’clock the brand new signboard arrived. Dilip’da was the first to wake up to receive his new prized possession. And he quickly started installing it all by himself before anyone else would wake up. The board was almost ready with a few gentle strikes of his hammer on the wooden frame holding the aluminium sheet, the sound of which now woke up his daughter Kamala, and then his wife. Both of them got up hurriedly and quickly ran outside to see the new signboard. There they saw Dilip’da standing with gleaming eyes and a big smile showing almost all of his yellow stained teeth holding the board by his side which read in big red Hindi letters “DEFECTIVE TAILORS”, with a small face of Goddess Kali painted on top. Notwithstanding his evident enthusiasm and not understanding what was written there, his wife’s eyebrows reduced to a confused frown, as she looked perplexed towards her daughter. Kamala had already started smiling with one hand covering her mouth trying to hide her smile from her mother. She totally consorted with her father’s exuberant energy, clearly understanding his direct and to-the-point intention. Looking at her smile, Dilip’da exclaims, “Kya re Kamala? Kaisa laga mera naam?”

How his wife actually reacted after that, and who actually translated the name to her, and how Dilip Darzi would try to console her for days, or weeks, or maybe years to come is only lore. But one thing was for sure, with or without the board, Dilip’da’s flourishing business and fame remained just the same, just as it was before.