Weekly market in Tamil town

The weekly market at Theni takes place every Sunday. Theni is a small town in Tamil Nadu. The concept of a weekly market has existed since a long time in India. In some places, it is held in a village which acts as the focal point for several villages in a region. Sometimes, it is at an important road junction or point where important roads meet, where the weekly market spreads itself on all sides of these roads, with one part being a chilli bazaar, another one a livestock selling yard and another a market selling farm implements with the vegetable market offering a good price on everything from retail to wholesale wares.

The shelters for the weekly market are temporary comprising of plastic sheets for roofing to corrugated metal and bamboo matting. In Theni, unlike in most other places, the shelters are in canvas fabric that has been beautifully stitched at the edges.

Just as vernacular houses in villages and small towns in India are a record of the indigenous building skills, the bazaars within our many small towns also reflect the ingenuity of the artisan who continues to work with his hands and to use natural materials in a cost-effective way. It is important to identify the artisans who make the tents for the weekly market.

Local skills in making these tents can be tapped also for other uses such as tourism camp sites so that there are more opportunities for these artisans to practice their skill and to hone it further for contemporary use.

the "Bakery" in the Indian marketplace

We have in India the "bakery" which sells factory-made bread or the locally made "bun". But, this is only one of the hundred odd items for sale here. It is actually the convenience store.

It is only another version of the kirana shop or the "mom and pop traditional corner stores" as they are being referred to today. Here, you sometimes can buy your dals, cereals, spices and other groceries and sometimes not. The shopfront in this bakery is usually lined with large glass jars that hold home-made nankatais (cookies) and locally made bread.

It sells plastic brushes, plastic bags, plastic tea cups. Today, this bakery is also where you can buy your prepaid cellphone card.

"All those who expect big retailers like Walmart to come in and devour small kirana shops should pause and think. Can Big Retail really do that? Just look at what the average kirana store offers the average Indian household" writes Gaurav Sabnis, in an interesting article linked here : Kirana will still Rule

Bazaars and Indigenous design

Bazaars are a valuable study in indigenous thought that stems from the “education” of the vendor who has learnt intrinsically from his surrounding natural environment and from his “non-education” which understands design to be a collective effort. There is nothing that belongs to a pre-planned aesthetic or to a designer’s style. Space and Place are both seen as an outcome of random forces in nature and man’s individual and collective responses to it.

The YouTube film is by isoguruvinod. Here is a link to their website: www.vinodfilms.com

The vendors who belong to the bazaar adapt to the people who enter and leave the bazaar and to their needs in terms of the spatial configurations and the visual displays they generate as a way of selling better.

In the cities, on the one hand, markets are being built by the Municipal Corporations with better infrastructure but they may lack local flavour and the vigour of the lives of the Indian people. On the other hand, malls are being constructed in small and big cities and retail shopping takes on a new direction.

Hampi - the bazaar

We were at Anegondi. The coracle was waiting. It took us along. It was like being inside a sculpture, a sculpture that flowed by the water. It was of course peaceful, no people, stone and its own ways. As we shored, it seemed like we were entering Hampi from its back door. A winding path through the overpowering stones and we were suddenly onto the street that led to the temple. This had also been the street where the main bazaar had once been. It was today also a bazaar, but a half bazaar. One end was deserted.

It should be possible to experience a historic place in its 'as is, where is' condition. We often crave to know the history before we reach there, or when we are there. Without the stories of the past reaching us, how much of the present of a place is still there for us to experience?



The Hampi of today has people who belong to an India that has changed. It has people who live here with their families and it has people who visit as tourists. The shops that line the bazaar of today sell T-shirts and Pepsi. There are internet booths. There are craft shops. As UNESCO brings in its Conservation experts, there is work also on the contemporarising of this beautiful old bazaar.