BENGALURU: It’s not only Chief Minister HD Kumaraswamy who’s praying that the Assembly session starts on Friday, and runs its course. The dhobi at Legislators’ Home (LH), too, wants the budget session to go off without a hitch.
For Ravi Kumar V, political buzz translates into biz, and the present crisis has seen a sharp spike in the number of visitors at the LH. The three buildings at the LH has rooms for MLAs, MLCs, MPs and former legislators and parliamentarians.
With intense politicking through the past week, most of the rooms have been booked up by netas and their hangers-on from the three parties, whose activity includes staging protests. A senior BJP leader’s aide, who did not wish to reveal his identity, said, “On normal days, our leader wears one set of clothes the whole day. With protests and dharnas, he needs another pair with all the sweat and grime.”
The crisply starched white ensemble, handed down by tradition and said to represent “purity”, has inspired much debate on its relevance in today’s political scenario. But our politicos, who prefer their whites even during dharnas, ensure that Ravi Kumar (60) has laundry loads of work.
Located in cellar of LH building 2, his Lakshmi Laundry Service is working to capacity. On a normal day, they get 75 sets of clothes — which could include shirt, trouser, towel, kurta and even waistcoat — but on special occasions like the ongoing resignation drama, or during the session, volumes increase to 125-150 sets a day.
Regular customers include Raibag MLA Aihole Duryodhan Mahalingappa, Manvi MLA Raja Venkatappa Nayak, Byndoor MLA Sukumar Shetty, MLCs including Basavaraj Horatti, former MLC V S Ugrappa and many more.
“We get cotton, silk and khadi clothes, and most of them cannot be washed in the machine, so we wash them manually,’’ he said. Apart from washing power and soap, they use bleach, starch and soda for the blinding white, crisp effect.
It was his late father, CP Venugopal, who set up a dhobi shop in Nagarthpet, but in the late 1960s, an MLA who was a regular customer, suggested that he move to the then newly constructed LH. “So my father started his business here. He passed away in 1974 and I took over,” said Ravi Kumar.
Ravi Kumar has eight employees, four wash the clothes and four iron them. His overheads include Rs 24,000 as monthly rent, Rs 8,000 towards the power bill, Rs 4,000 for water, apart from salaries.
But while costs are rising, customers are dwindling, says Ravi. “Earlier, MLAs, MLCs and MPs would stay here, so we had more work. Now, many prefer to stay in star hotels or their own properties in Bengaluru. So we look forward to assembly sessions, when there is high footfall. We hope the government doesn’t fall,” he added wistfully.