A One-street Town Switches Lanes

SIX new vehicle finance companies and a recently set-up branded cosmetic shop characterise progress in the small town-ship of Bijnor in western Uttar Pradesh. The latest Bijnori dowry list, claim the town's electrical shopowners, flaunts a washing machine, besides the usual television and refrigerator. Thirty Bobcards and 11 Cancards have been issued to the influential over the past two years, say proud bankers here.

 Consumerism has found cradle-space in Bijnor. Midwifed, perhaps, by the town's seven cable operators who routinely beam urban aspirations into homes run on agrarian incomes.

 The largest grocery store in town has begun stocking Sonamasalas for those with taste. Pearlpet containers, a premium brand, line the shelves of most provision stores. Many an electrical shop has introduced schemes whereby an old black-and-white Jolly TV can be exchanged for a BPL or Onida on monthly instalments. Most sewing machine repair units have branched out into mixie and aircooler repairs. Three new Bijnor beauty parlours advertise their assurance that they use only Lakme products for bridal make-up. And whizzing past the bullock-carts and tractors in the congested Bijnor bylanes, the gaudily done-up Maruti promises to take its owner to the status station.

 "We are as modern as Dilliwallahs. So why should our women continue to take the cycle-rickshaw if we are in a position to buy them a car?" says Jaswant Singh of J.C. Motors and General Finance Company. Having financed the owners of 29 Maruti cars and 42 scooters on a 21 per cent interest rate in the past seven months, Singh plans to get into consumer durables financing soon. An exuberant Singh explains: "Washing machines are the latest craze in marriage gifts—so there's a big market there!"

 A fact that Canara Bank branch manager Devdas Verma has already stumbled upon. The bank's Cancarry scheme for consumer durables, the banker asserts, has Bijnori housewives saving from their kitchen kitties and paying back for goods that make them house-proud. "You see, it's on the insistence of women that the old family divan is being replaced by sofa sets in most houses today. They keep watching these serials throughout the day and want their homes to look like those on TV," he chuckles.

Nodding his consent, owner of Bijnor Videocon, BPL and Panasonic Shop, Laiq Ahmed, observes that households hankering for respectability cannot afford to have cheap black-and-white televisions in the baithak. "Your TV speaks of your social standing...why, I even arranged for imported Sony televisions for two Shadipur (a neighbouring village) families recently," he adds.

 But upmarket adornments are not for the drawing room alone. For those who harbour sartorial passions, the new Atul Garment Store has a range of shirts upward of Rs 450. This, in a town that has an average monthly family income of Rs 5,000. "So? What's the use of saving? Our forefathers lived like villagers and left us some Rs 10,000 in the bank. They thought it was a lot of money. What good is it in these days of inflation?" reasons the store's owner, Atul Singh. "The scene is to live life well." And buy even better.

 Significantly, the youth of this small town seem to echo the same consumeristic cravings. Sporting Liberty Senorita slippers, Payal Bala of RBD College, one of the only two degree colleges in this town, says she shops for her clothes and toiletry only in Lucknow when she visits her mausi (aunt) there. Payal isn't sure that the make-up products in the Bijnor shops are genuine. "One might break out in pimples using some adulterated cold cream. Moreover, we don't have good shoes here. At least, not those advertised on Zee TV," the 21-year-old complains, as she sips Pepsi with her friends in the college premises.

Usha Kishore, principal of RBD College, isn't surprised by these newfound youthful yearnings for branded bonanza in Bijnor. Emphasising that the satellite culture unites all youngsters today, the teacher says its unreasonable to expect the small-town youth to be any less a consumerist than his counterparts in the metros.

 Not that the metro-mania for status through a kingsize lifestyle has spared the elders either. Blissfully ignorant till recently that a posh address enhances social prestige, many Bijnor residents today are willing to pay upward of Rs 2,500 as monthly rent to stay in the 'upmarket' Awas Vikas Colony. "Mind you, rents here aren't above Rs 500 to Rs 700 otherwise. But then, you can't have your relative from Delhi's Vasant Vihar come in and stay with you in Mohalla Khatriyan," points out Bijnor's chief development officer.

 And what house in AwasVikas Colony is complete without a colour television and a washing machine. Maybe a sofa set with Harmony upholstery like they advertise on television. For consumerism to settle down comfortably. And grow. Then step out into Bijnor's bylanes in a bigger way. in Bijnor