Dhobi Ghat

Big Laundry Mahalaxi Dhobi Gat

Getting to know

On the train from the south to the north watching to the right at Mahalaxi station in Mumbai city, exact in the center of the city, you can view nothing but slums-ceilings, (lots of them by the rail line), but in that particular spot at Mahalaxi station you see a colorful, strange eyes-opener place.
The very first time I saw this I asked the people next to me what that is. As soon I got the answer I got to know that I wanted to visit “the Big Laundry”.
A gigantic amount of different type of garment and clothes, from simple t-shirt to big white bed hospitals sheets hanging on the clothes-line all over the place.
Get off the train, make a left on the corner and 50 meters walking you start seeing the big laundry, not a place full of industrial machines or a neighborhood full of laundry shops or any type of industrial area, but a non-usual spot full of concrete sinks.

From above you can see this. Is like another slum in which in between the line of houses you notice this line of sinks.

What is it

More than 3000 people living like in a small closed neighborhood, working as a laundryman.
They get out of their houses, (3 or 4 square meter with 4 people or more inside, not too much space in Mumbai is one of the main drawback in the city), and the very first thing they see are buckets, soaps, water, clothing everywhere hanging around; it is their workplace.
It is a kind of a one square meter concrete pen without any roof in which the Dhobi (Laundryman) step inside of it and washes the clothes.

Core work

Procedure seems simple from outside: clothes are soaked into the water and flogged against the concrete; they rub some soap against the piece of cloth and rubbing with strong against the washing table to remove the flecks.

Think about plenty of grandmas inside a big sink washing clothes in the old fashion way one next to the other for hours and hours under the sun, but instead of Grandmas, young men in a really good shape.

No washer-machine, no electricity, no wasting of water, a cheap product and like a lot of thing here with very few technology.

Hospital bed sheet are also soaked into a chemical to eliminate the bacteria, water is being boiled in “the Boiler” (see picture) is not but a tank over two pillars and below of this, fire, wood fire. No electricity in this process makes the service cheaper.

The prices are really competitive: 5 rupees the piece for washing and ironing; one day; and sometimes depending on the living area, also delivery.
They make approximately between 120 and 180 Rupees a day.

They don’t use electricity for the laundry process tough (only to dry in monsoon season) but the place is of course full of services.
Electricity and water is given by the government, 300 Rupees a month is what the pay for this resources.

Since India has become a member of the global market with the benefits that this brings in life comfort, the middle class is getting washer-machines and ironing technology, consequently they are no giving clothes to be washed by the Dhobis. Their business strategy is changing though, now the Big Laundry first service is to the hospitals and hotels.

Although the Washer machine gives more comfort, the waste of water of it is so high that makes the dhobi, in this sense, the best solution for the environment.

Like Dabawala this is another type of job for semi-illiterate people here in the city that with few technologies can get a salary in the middle of the new globalization era.

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