One of the good things oil companies have done is to permit chemist shops and snack outlets at petrol pumps. The other day I discovered one such outlet at Churchgate. It’s located in the lane behind Mantralaya and cheek-by-jowl with Bank House. The fuel outlet, which provides excellent service, has given a niche to Sankalp restaurants. Sankalp is an Ahmedabad-headquartered south Indian chain with more than 60 branches across the country, including one in Siliguri. The menu includes rasam vada, butter idli, golden crisp masala dosa, military ghee roast dosa, cheese chilly uttappa, cholesterol kulcha, pav bhaji, and brownie with hot chocolate sauce. Most of the items are priced Rs100 and above and there is value for money. However, I don’t understand how cooking on gas stoves is permitted at a petrol pump.
Benefits Of Online Shopping
Online shopping has become a craze with just about everything under the sun available with the tapping of a few keys on the touchscreen of your phone. The concept of going to a shop and choosing your goods is fast vanishing. Blinkit, Zepto, Swiggy, Zomato et al deliver whatever you want most times in 10 minutes. Feel sorry for the thousands of retailers who have spent crores in buying shops, furnishing and stocking them. Footfalls have reduced noticeably. The concept of the local baniya is on the wane. However, it is not that everything about online portals is bad. Even though they levy hefty delivery charges, many find it worth it because online shopping saves the bother of driving, finding parking slot and, more than that, saves valuable time. Thousands of homegrown entrepreneurs are able to market their products in a big way at less overhead cost. Incidentally, even prasad from temples can be ordered these days.
Big Thanks To Poll Workers, Police
Wish our politicians are able to accept their electoral defeat sportingly. All of them are blaming EVMs for their defeat but not one of them is able to provide even a shred of evidence. It must be said to the credit of the election office, led by senior IAS officer S Chockalingam, that it handled the criticism with calm maturity. With statistics it proved how there was nothing unusual in the last-minute surge in voting. The irony is that even opposition candidates who won the recent assembly election are blaming the EVMs. There are hardly any takers for their tirade. At the end of the day one can only say hats off to the thousands of faceless personnel and police for ensuring the smooth conduct of elections.
Tailpiece
What is common between Devendra Fadnavis and Pushpa 2? Well, both have proved to be a superhits.
(Compiled by S Balakrishnan)
