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Business News/ Mint-lounge / Features/  Green channel | Banaras, Uttar Pradesh
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Green channel | Banaras, Uttar Pradesh

In this holy city, 'paans' explode with flavour, and markets are filled with moist leaves and fragrant spices

Prahlad Prasad Chourasiya’s ‘paan’ shop. Photographs by Nandini MajumdarPremium
Prahlad Prasad Chourasiya’s ‘paan’ shop. Photographs by Nandini Majumdar

An ancient paan shop: paan for all auspicious occasions; paan of all designs; paan of gold and silver leaf. Prahlad Prasad Chourasiya (a President awardee)—a blue Hindi signboard crowns a small, wooden box-like structure. Long strips of paan masala sachets hang from the sides and top of this structure, forming a colourful, shimmering fringe. The paanwala sits cross-legged within his shop, a low marble-topped table in front of him.

I have grown up in Varanasi—or Banaras as we still call it—and my eyes are accustomed to the thousands of paan shops that pepper it, closing up at night like snails retreating into their shells. I am writing a book on Banaras, and I am on a quest to identify and understand everything that makes the city unique and interesting. I decide to see whether this shop is as special as its signboard claims it to be.

All the ingredients of ‘paan’ laid out.
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All the ingredients of ‘paan’ laid out.

In my growing-up years, I associated paan with the brick-red stains that covered the facades of the city’s built structures—old and beautiful, modern and shiny. Those stains on the walls were also easily associated with unpleasant and distinctly masculine behaviour—the swagger, the distracted look, and the arrogant attitude of ownership, disregard and indifference that accompanied the enjoyment of the paan.

A sadhu meditates on the banks of the Ganga, with the northern-side ghats in view.
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A sadhu meditates on the banks of the Ganga, with the northern-side ghats in view.

I learnt to savour paan—as a treat at odd moments and often to mark even the smallest of special occasions. I came to see that Banarasi paan was inseparable from Banarasipan, which is the ethos that is associated with Banaras, a joie de vivre that we called mauj and masti, or abandon and revelry. For the people of the city, Banarasipan is embodied by a dip in the Ganga, a nap under a tree, an unannounced stop at a friend’s, an open-air music session, a trip to a local saint’s tomb—or, indeed, savouring a paan.

Wordlessly, but with a smile in his eyes, Chourasiya folds a “Special paan" for me. It is a cone bulging with saffron syrup and grated coconut, along with the paan’s regular ingredients—chuna, kattha and supari. He coats the folded paan with a delicate piece of varq, or edible “silver leaf", and fastens the paan with a clove.

I cram the paan into my mouth. I find myself smiling as bursts of flavour explode. “Is it all right?" he asks modestly. I express my enthusiasm by raising my eyebrows and nodding.

Chourasiya is flattered by the fact that I am writing a book on Banaras that might include his shop. He decides to give me a tour of his shop and its environs. Soon, I realize how crucial a part paan plays in the story of Banaras that I am writing, and how perfectly it captures the spirit of the city.

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Another paan shop in one of the many lanes of Chowk

In front of his shop, customers relax on a stone bench—a slab of the cream-coloured, fine-grained sandstone that is quarried from the hills of Chunar, around 45km south of Banaras. This sandstone is a symbol of Banaras—it paves all its lanes and ghats, and most of the city’s older buildings are built of it.

“Bismillah Khan used to relax on that bench every day," he tells me, referring to the late shehnai maestro who lived nearby, in the neighbourhood of Beniabagh. “He was a simple, poor man, a pakka Banarasi. His biggest joys were playing his music and enjoying his paan," he says.

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The shops are bustling with paanwalas buying supplies. Paan leaves are arranged in spirals in baskets lined with damp fabric, and sprinkled with water to keep them fresh.

As we walk, Chourasiya points out the different types of leaves—desi, grown on farms around the city, and sanchi, kapoori paan and Jagannathi, which are grown in West Bengal and Odisha. Leaves from West Bengal and Odisha are packed and transported with a small block of ice in each basket. He also points out the famous Bihari Maghai, considered the best betel leaf for its tenderness. At 600 per basket, it is thrice as expensive as the others.

We pass other shops selling the fragrant ingredients that go into the Banarasi paan: supari, chuna, kattha and gulkand. The shops are furnished in the old Banarasi style, with polished wooden cupboards, a low counter facing the street, and a cushion, or gaddi, that lines the floor.

Shopkeepers sit cross-legged on the gaddi, behind platters and jars of various paan ingredients, and a pair of scales to weigh them. As they wait for customers, they crack suparis with their ornately crafted nutcrackers called sarota.

We are back at Chourasiya’s shop at the Chowk crossing. Elaborating on the centrality of paan in Banaras’ life, Chourasiya points out that the four lanes that diverge from the crossroads at Chowk are thought by Banarasis to represent the four life goals in Hinduism—kama or sensual pleasure, artha or material gain, dharma or correct action, and moksha or release from the worldly cycle of reincarnation.

At the time, little did I think that I would soon have to confront another example of the association that Chourasiya had just explained, this one quite unfortunate.

Last month, four years after my first meeting with Chourasiya, I was on the phone with my mother. I had been in Oxford for a year. My book on Banaras had come out, so I asked her to visit him and give him the good news. It wouldn’t be possible, she said. “He passed away last week."

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Published: 13 Sep 2014, 12:08 AM IST
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