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He is often seen with his bicycle parked on one Walled City lane or another, selling ‘udne wale gubbare’. These are helium-filled balloons that float into the air if let loose. In fact, a few balloons are always tied to his cycle’s handle-bar with cords so invisibly thin that they seem to be tied to the cycle only out of sentimental attachment. A gigantic “gas cylinder” is also fitted to this cycle.
Chhote Lal has been into this street hawking business since 1978. Naturally, he is recognised in Old Delhi as a balloon seller. Not many people are aware of his other mode of living. That aspect of his career was revealed to his long-time patrons on a recent evening when he was sighted, after a prolonged absence, with his arm bandaged from wrist to shoulder. “I fell from my horse,” he says, here in Mohalla Qabristan.
In his early 60s, Mr Lal reveals that he is also a ghoda walla, a horse owner. “That is my main profession,” the gentleman asserts in his unusually gentle voice — though this voice grows as stern as a merciless maths teacher while dealing with naughty customers. Mr Lal explains that he rents out his horse to weddings and other similar functions, and that he keeps only one horse at a time. Some days ago, after the passing of his longtime horse, he purchased a new one for ₹14,000 from a horse trader in Loni. “On 28th January, I was trying the new ghoda near kela godam by riding on his back when he stumbled upon a large stone lying on the middle of the road.” The horse fell. Mr Lal fell. He fractured his right arm. The injured horse died a few days later.
“I’d named him Badal,” says Mr Lal. It will take some months for him, he says, to save sufficient money to acquire another horse. “Meanwhile I must earn from these balloons.” Two sizes of balloons are on sale, at 10 and 15 rupees each.
Now a young girl in ponytail stops by, asking for a peela gubbara. Handing out the favoured ballon to her, Mr Lal makes another revelation: “Not many people know my real name — it is SP Singh, Surinder Pal Singh.”
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