NEW DELHI: Mohd Akhtar heard the word
Paytm for the first time about three weeks ago. One of the boys standing in the patient queue before the
ATM
kiosk on the other side of the road walked up to him and said, “Do you take money on Paytm?” When Akhtar said, “No”, he replied with a degree of helpless resignation, “
Cash nahi hai mere paas. Paytm hota to achha hota (I don’t have cash. It would have been nice, if you were using Paytm).”
The scene and dialogue was repeated over the next few days. Several youngsters from the adjacent New Ashok Nagar colony would pose the same query. In regular circumstances, Akhtar wouldn’t have spared much thought to the persistent question. For the past two years, the 35-year-old from Bihar’s Samastipur district has been peddling vegetable biryani from a mobile food stall near the New Ashok Nagar metro station. For Rs 30 a plate, he serves a decent helping of the flavoured rice garnished with slices of soyabean chop, tiny pieces of paneer, tomato chutney, chopped onion and chilli pickle. And business is generally brisk.
But last month his sales plunged after Prime Minister Narendra Modi
banned older Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes triggering a sudden shortfall of currency. Daily-wagers, auto-rickshaw drivers, college students and young executives – the bulk of his customers were not turning up. “I often took back home kilos of unsold biryani. For about a week, I stopped coming here,” says Akhtar, who goes by the name Aman-ji. When he resumed business, the customers returned but not in the same numbers as in pre-notebandi days. Some would still ask about the option of paying through Paytm.
So when an executive from the
mobile wallet
company came by a week ago and offered him the option of taking payments through the mobile wallet, Akhtar reluctantly decided to give it a try. The biryani seller was uncertain because it meant having to part with a small portion of his earnings as the company’s commission. And though, he is “inter pass,” Akhtar wasn’t fully sure how the technology would work.
It is easy to understand Akhtar’s hesitance. Like millions of other migrants, the son of a daily-wager came to Delhi in search of a better life about 15 years ago. The third among seven brothers and sisters, he did a variety of odd jobs in the NCR before finding his true calling: selling biryani. The food cart sustains his family- his wife and three kids.
He wakes up around 5 am, helps his wife prepare the biryani and sets up his roadside cart by 8 am. The hawking is done by 4.30 pm. A brief rest at home and he sets off to the grocers to buy all that he needs the next day. Has he ever considered selling chicken or mutton biryani? The migrant mumbles something about wanting to sell “
shudh khana.”
Akhtar is cagey about divulging details of his daily returns. And he doesn’t want to reveal the number of customers who use the mobile wallet. “About 10-12 customers every day,” he says after a little cajoling. During the two hours TOI spent interviewing him, four customers paid through Paytm. A couple of others were requested to pay in cash if they were carrying currency. The biryani seller explains why. “I would have to stand in a bank queue again to get my money. So I prefer people paying in cash. But when they say, they don’t have any, I let them use Paytm,’’ he says.
One such customer is Sumendra Singh, a 26-year-old who works in the customer services division of a mobile phone company. “I am short of cash. There’s too much work and no time to stand in the queue. I haven’t even brought my wallet,” he says.
This month, as usual, the company transferred Singh’s salary to his bank account. He shifted Rs 1,000 to his mobile wallet. At the food cart, Singh scans the Paytm bar code and transfers Rs 30 to Akhtar’s mobile phone. “
Zara mobile check kar lijiye. Mera payment aur number ka message aa gaya hoga (Check your mobile. You would have got a message about my payment and phone number),” he says. Akhtar asks for the last four numbers of the customer’s mobile number, looks into his own phone and serves him.
Slowly and cautiously, the migrant from Bihar has embraced the world of mobile wallet business.