Phool Mandi once again.....

The flower market at CP is a place that has been visited and revisited by every photographer, but every new excursion brings forth new surprises and images. The phool mandi is also about seeing conflicting worlds, of beauty, fragrance along with deprivation and decay. Buyers and sellers form a conglomerate, of diverse colours, shapes and sizes. The phool mandi (hindi for Flower Market) is a study of services, offering you everything from start to finish of the flower arrangement industry. In the sidelines are some totally unrelated but essential services being offered, including, the ubiquitous 'chai wala', a guy selling hot idlis and vadas, people offering to clean ears, people offering packing services, my car parking attendant who come all the way from Azadpur to assist people in parking their cars, for a sum of Rs. 10, and several other such people. In addition, we are joined by the regular inhabitants of this parking area where the market (temporary - only from 0430 hrs to 0900 hrs) is organise, and these are the drug addicts. If is not uncommon to see them in the fringes, heating pieces of metallic foil. This mix of the sublime flowers and the mundane is what characterises India.