Presswala a day to keep wrinkles away
Council for Scientific and Industrial Research to combat climate change — it has now denied issuing any such circular — but some Indians may remember a better solution to electric irons: the presswala. Those who have worn clothes pressed with those old charcoal irons will vouch they are more wrinkle-free than what electric irons can ever achieve.
Climate change can be blamed for many woes of today, but the crux of the issue is our propensity to opt for new technology whenever available. Hence cars, trains and airplanes, fans, air-conditioners and refrigerators, stoves, ovens and bulbs, not to mention the generations of machines that have taken over tasks starting with but not limited to smithing and smelting. So, even presswalas are also no longer entrusted with the task of ridding our clothes of wrinkles.
Yet, the neighbourhood presswala was an institution in the India that I grew up in, alongside the sabziwala, the dhobi, the doodhwala, even the chikwala and sil-batta notcher. Of these only the itinerant fruit and veg vendors still exist, that too only in areas that have not been taken over by condominium complexes and gated colonies. Appliances have replaced many 'walas': blenders, washing machines and irons have come to be regarded as more 'convenient'.
Back in the day, dhobis were just as indispensable as the presswala. He would collect clothes and would wash them by hand in dhobi ghats or other water sources and bleach and starch them. Then the garments would be snared between two intertwined ropes strung
