The man who launched a thousand Darshinis

Coffee or kokum sherbet? Rava or ragi dosa? Even as newbies wonder what to order at Upahara Darshini (UD) in Jayanagar, Manasa Harish buys tokens for her staple ­ masala dosa, picks up her plate and settles with it and a glass of water at the small stainless steel table. She sniffs at the ragi dosa eater who is picking at her food and quickly finishes her crisp dosa filled with a mildly spiced potato masala. “Every time I come to the maternity hospital nearby for consultation, I eat masala dosa here,“ smiles Harish.

Eating at a Darshini is an exercise in minimalism. There is no time or lengthy menu to plot the next culinary adventure. Once you give the order, you should be prepared to hop from one counter to the other in quick succession, and eat your food standing while sharing the table with office-goers, offduty security guards and moms with cranky school children in tow.

So it is better to stick to tried and tested food as the kitchen at UD churns out dosas and thatte idlis in full view of its diners.

This is how Prabhakar R envisioned the ideal Indian fast food restaurant when he started the first Darshini in 1983 where now UD stands. “Darshini means to see and select food (from a menu) as in a KFC or McDonald's,“ says Prabhakar. In this case, one gets to order south Indian staples at pocketfriendly prices just like he saw during a trip abroad. “Simple and fast. That's what we needed to beat MNC restaurants and high food prices,“ says Prabhakar, sitting at his Banashankari residence.

Today, three decades later, Baba Ramdev wants to start a chain of Indian QSRs or quick service restaurants to gain nationalist mileage and profits while beating 'foreign competition'. Prabhakar, who calls himself a consumer activist and a consult ant, says the more the merrier.

“Maybe, Ramdev will be able to do it na tionally,“ he says.

Prabhakar is underplaying the impact his Darshinis have had on the eating-out culture. The city has hundreds of Darshinis, most of them mentored for free by the 64-year-old. The model is so popular that the city cor poration has been issuing trade licenses for “Darshini type hotel“ since the mid-2000s.

At the heart of a successful Darshini eatery is pricing. And that is achieved by scaling up operations while keeping things sim ple. “Earlier, people used to put money on fancy interiors and charge food at three times its price.There was no quality and affordable food for students and working population,“ recalls Prabhakar.

At the age of 27, he was already a businessman running a grocery store in Basavanagudi. Prabhakar, whose father G Ranganath ran Udupi hotels in Mumbai and Solapur after leaving

Kundapur

, had insights into the food industry after helping manage the familyowned Nithyanand Coffee Bar in Basavanagudi. Adulteration and high prices bothered him. A trip to Singapore, Malaysia and Europe helped him come up with a solution. “I saw KFC and McDonald's and realized that we needed south Indian fast food restaurants,“ says Prabhakar.

Back home, Prabhakar adapted the self-service restaurant model at his brother-in-law's Café Darshini, which required minimal investment in real estate and labour. “No body took it seriously as they thought fast food won't work. Then they saw the rush and high turnover,“ smiles Prabhakar.

A number of Darshinis came up and Prabha kar became the go-to mentor for food entre preneurs.

G Srini vasa Rao, chairman and MD of Mayura Group, still recalls Prabhakar's suggestion to serve 120 ml soup for Rs 5 in 1996. “I was new to Bengaluru and he was called Darshini Brahma by then. I followed what he suggested and it was a big hit,“ says Rao. That suggestion built the iconic Cool Joint in Jayanagar. “He knows three things: how to ensure quality of food, what kind of food locals will like and at what price.Cool Joint's sandwich and soup menu was revolutionary,“ he says.

Entrepreneurs like R Vasudevan of Hot Chips sought out Prabhakar when the time came for expansion. “He advised us to keep the price low with no compromise on quality,“ says Vasudevan. But how to sell coffee for Rs 3 in 1995 and make a margin? “He asked us to focus on volume; that is to sell 2,0003,000 coffees a day,“ says Vasudevan. Prabhakar also told which Coorg coffee to buy and sent experts to train the team in coffeemaking. The experiment worked, says Vasudevan whose 30 self-service restaurants now have a turnover of Rs 100 crore.

“This is the model he created even before KFCs and others came to India. By the time the international chains came in, we realized how good his foresight was. He had prepared us even before the competition came in,“ says Vasudevan.

Innovations didn't stop there. There was food by weight concept, food trucks, dosa camps, the rural-themed Halli Mane, much ad mired by writers like UR Ananthamurthy, and jazzy new outlets like

Taaza Thindi

and South Kitchen. “The interiors and hygiene have to be good to appeal to young sters. There are many north Indians in Bengaluru who are homesick. So food has to appeal to them too,“ says Prabhakar.

Despite a nerve problem leading to vision loss, Prabhakar remains active. “His latest project is South Kitchen. Finally , the family owns something that he has created, after he sold off the original Cafe Darshini all those years ago,“ says Santhosh Prabhakar, his son, who runs cafeterias for corporates.

At one point, Prabhakar was so focused on helping others that he stopped running his retail business. Then there were threats from people whom he exposed through media campaigns as adulterators.“My family wanted me to stop my consulting and campaigning. But I didn't stop,“ smiles Prabhakar.

His children Seema and Santhosh say that they understand their father's passion for social justice. Santhosh says his father was shaped by the ups and downs any businessman goes through.Though his lack of interest in profit-making occasionally puzzles him, he is happy that Prabhakar tried to make the food industry more process-oriented.

There is no quiet retired life for Prabhakar. He continues to consult and remains vocal about 18% GST being ruinous to small eateries. As for the ambitious plan of Karnataka government to start affordable canteens, he is blunt. “It is going to be a 100% failure as there is no planning,“ says Prabhakar. Unlike in Chennai, which pioneered the popular Amma canteens, real estate is costly in Bengaluru. But where to cook food hygienically? It might work if they have a centralized kitchen and food trucks to sell the items,“ he says.

As they say, it is all about the process with Prabhakar.