[India] Old Delhi yields to New Age communications

["Irfan Khan" <KhanIA@super.net.pk>]

Old Delhi yields to New Age communications

Binoo K John 
and Shashank Vaid 

New delhi 10 JULY 

IF ONE is looking for sending cheap Internet messages in the capital, 
one will in all probability land up in an overflowing, pestilential 
neighbourhood near the main railway station. 

Backpack tourists, cycle rickshaws, carts pulled by labourers and 
sickly horses, a million cyclists and madly cavorting cars jostle for 
space on its teeming streets. The stench of boiling oil, burning 
diesel from mini power generators and myriad varieties of sweetmeats 
encrusted with flies on the streetside assail the senses. 

Welcome to Paharganj, a place which Delhiites love to hate. Here 
there is a constant cavalcade of life in various stages of evolution -
 from dismembered beggars to millionaire traders in their Opel 
Astras. In Paharganj can be seen a microcosm of subcontinental life. 
What are Internet cafes doing in this seedy underbelly of the 
sprawling capital? 

The cyber cafes are the latest showpiece of this unmanageable 
neighbourhood which is known to tourists from around the world as the 
place for the cheapest lodgings and is listed in the Lonely Planet 
guide, the bible of travellers worldwide. 

Be it hotels, guest houses, travel agencies or even smaller shops, 
everybody and his neighbour is offering Internet services at prices 
that are being slashed by the day. 

"Price is the main factor for the popularity of Paharganj Internet 
shops. We charge Rs 30 per hour for members and membership can be 
taken up by anyone by paying Rs 50, which is also the lowest rate 
available anywhere, thereby tempting tourists to visit us," says 
Ashok Sharma of Cyber-Club at Gold Regency, known to be the city's 
biggest cyber cafe. 

"We know India has a formidable reputation as a centre for computer 
software. So we expected this," says Christian Fetterson, a Danish 
national. "Indians are more open to our ways of living," he adds with 
a smile that resembles the expression on the face of an Indian who 
has discovered a curry house in London. 

It is not just tourists who visit the cyber cafes. Even local 
rickshaw-puller Ram Singh, from Uttar Pradesh, now occasionally 
visits a cyber cafe. 

"I came here for the first time with Anna, a Russian tourist, who 
regularly used to communicate with her friends in Moscow. For me it 
is just like watching a movie in a theatre," says Ram Singh who 
watches a movie or two and a little more once in a while. Most 
foreign tourists in Paharganj use e-mail, though surfing the Net is 
also quite popular. 

"E-mail is a cheaper way of getting across to friends and relatives 
back home rather than making overseas calls that are quite 
expensive," says Amit Kumar Tyagi, an instructor at a travel agency. 
Foreigners also look upon the Internet as a means of finding their 
way around, says Gaurav Saxena, an instructor at Steven's Cafe, 
another Internet outlet in Paharganj. According to him, one of the 
most favourite websites accessed by the tourists is 
www.lonelypost.com. Another popular site, Saxena says, is 
www.netcageguide.com, which has the addresses of cyber cafes all over 
the world. 

As many tourists come to India seeking spiritual solace, sites on 
meditation techniques are also quite popular. "I expected it in a big 
city like Delhi," says Jean, a Canadian national seeking nirvana. 
Whether it is the nirvana-seeker, or the fun-seeker or someone from 
distant lands wanting to trek the Himalayas, they all finally land up 
in Paharganj. 

And now even residents of other neighbourhoods of the capital are 
making their way to the Internet clubs of Paharganj. Even the elderly 
have begun visiting. "It is never too late. I can find the websites 
for two of my hobbies - poetry and painting," says Manmohan Singh, 
80, who has become a regular at Gold Regency. 

Paharganj survives because it keeps reinventing itself. From being a 
decrepit neighbourhood to a place for cheap goods, and then cheap 
lodgings, it kept evolving and adjusting to the needs of commerce and 
tourism. 

When it seemed that other places would overtake it even as a 
destination for tourists, history came to its aid. After the collapse 
of the Soviet Union, plane-loads of traders from the Soviet republics 
came looking for loads of cheap goods, like jeans and shirts. 
They also made their way to this louche locality near the railway 
station. Along with them came sex workers strutting their stuff. 
Paharganj welcomed them all. 

Then when cyberworld opened up, Paharganj again repositioned itself 
as the provider of the cheapest access to the Internet. Now the weary 
European backpacker, the fun-seeker, the Russian trader, they all 
trudge the seedy streets of Paharganj and then cruise along 
cyberstreets. 

Paharganj has begun yet another phase of its life. - IANS 


http://www.economictimes.com/today/11tech02.htm