The Bajpai Story (my family)

The Bajpai Family

My family is originally from “PURVA” a village in Unnao (a nearing town of Kanpur), Mr. Kampta Prasad Bajpai was land lord there. But due to some kind of a dispute with the local people the family suffered death threats and my Great great grand father Mr. Hiralal Bajpai came to Kanpur in 1905. First when Mr. Hiralal came he stayed in “Sabzi Mandi” with someone. Then he started trading in cloth on a small level in 1907. After making some money he bought a land from Rastogi’s in “Panchkucha (5 lanes of cloth market)” in ‘General Ganj’, later on which he build a house. “Ajjo Bua” (grand father’s sister) say’s the house is of her age, 80 years old. This is the place where all the later generations established the cloth trade. Each of them had his own style of functioning and the Trade kept changing according to market situations.

It’s difficult to know about the trade of my great grand father Mr. Dwarika Prasad Bajpai but one can say all he dealt with was cotton cloth manufactured by the local mills of Cawnpore. After his demise in 1944 my Grand Father Mr. Bhagwati Prasad Bajpai took charge of the family and shop. He mainly dealt in mill cloth but as it was mainly rough cotton so he also visited Bombay for the fine cotton cloth. In 1949 Rationing scheme was implemented and he was a licensed mill Cloth Seller. This meant only a limited count of cloth could to be sold to an individual; this system was popularly known as “RATIONING OR LICENCING OF CLOTH”. During this period he made a lot of money as there was no requirement of any publicity and consumer was already in need of the product he sold. Bhagwati Prasad Bajpai my grand father was learned man with double MA in English & economics which he did from Christ Church College (the college from which my father, mother and I have graduated), he was a wrestler, read a lot, I have over 500 books on varied topics belonging to him. At that point of time he was so successful that he owned a bungalow with swimming pool in Jajmau & he rode an “ikka” (an open horse cart). His horse was famous for drinking tea at mall road & he spent a lot of money on it, details of which can be found in his bank passbooks.

My father often use to tell me that when my grand father was a kid he had this fascination of throwing silver coins in the well, which still exists in our shop at general Ganj. He liked the ‘sound’ of metal displacing water. Ashutosh Bajpai tells he often use to come to our home with his father & once my Bua demanded a T.V from my grandfather turned to him, and asked “should I bring the TV? I thoughtfully at the age of 5 said yes. Two day’s later when I visited the house it was filled with children allover, who had flocked around the new TV set.”

In the year 1974 when my father “Brajesh Chandra Bajpai” was pursuing his MA (History & Economics) from Christ Church College, my grandfather suffered heart attack and died. This was a shock that pushed my father to take reigns of the Family Business.

At that time our shop was a trader shop (aarath) and we had a percentage of profit in every sale. Everyone was skeptical whether he will be able to care of the business, but he adapted to the situations very well. Reading the new market phenomena, soon after his marriage in 1979, he started collaborating with the private mills. Later he took dealership of Brands like Mayur, Grasim & Bhilwara. Brands like Century, Arvind etc were also sold in our shop.

On the other hand my Grand father’s younger brother Bhagwati Sewak Bajpai (Bade Baba) took his share from the shop and started dealing in cotton waste and supplying to police and government departments etc. He was a successful entrepreneur of the modern times. His elder son, my ‘Chacha’ “Rajesh Chandra Bajpai” put a lot of stakes in the stock exchange, and lost a lot of money. Unwilling to face the failure he committed to suicide. His two daughters are doing well to support the family. Elder daughter “Neha Bajpai (Chipsy didi) has completed her CA and is working with a big CA firm in Delhi.

Baba’s younger son ‘Kapil chachu’ got him involved in a lot of things and suffered, now he is a married man, father of two sons. After the demise of ‘Bade Baba’ in 2001 he is trying to figure out what are the opportunities left for him. On my last visit he said he was willing to shift to Delhi for better business propositions.

The other side of the story is that things were not as smooth within the family as they appear. The very place that was once the pivot for social and financial needs of the family is now in the line of fire. Our shop in General Ganj is a three storey building; ground floor has always been used for the shop and other floors for residential purposes. The mutual division was that my father who is running the shop so he keeps the ground floor and others share the two floors.

Immediately after my father’s death my mother was served a notice for division of the building. Old property disputes are very common in Uttar Pradesh and often they bring out the worst in everyone. Maa suggested that we sell the complete plot and equally distribute the sale. This was agreed to my grand father’s youngest brother “Chote Baba” who still lives in the top floor of the building.

Bade Baba’s family was also not in favor of my mother for unknown reasons. But at that time it seemed like a workable solution as all the three families were in big financial mess. We dint communicate for 5 years till I broke the ice. It might sound a bit mean but I for my film started visiting Bade Baba’s family. Now are relations are quiet good.

As of now the shop remains closed and my mother has opened a PCO there which is run by an operator, she very rarely visits the shop.

*this document is based on conversations with various members of my family.

Maitrey Bajpai