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December 24, 2022
Patiala, Punjab
Things we do


IN PATIALA: JARNAIL SINGH’S VARIED LIFE 

A vegetable seller in the weekly markets round Patiala, Jarnail Singh nurtures a
modest collection of coins and enjoys his annual pilgrimages in Punjab
Student reporter: Joyce Nalubanja and Balwinder Singh

Punjabi University, Patiala

 * English

Motorbikes, bicycles and pedestrian  traffic mingle as sellers and customers
arrive and leave the weekly  market here in Patiala, Punjab. Held every
Saturday, there are stalls loaded with  fruits, vegetables and spices, kitchen
utensils, clothes and other household items. By midday, some are being set up
while others are already up and running. 

Sitting on a woven sisal mat with a black tarpaulin sheet for shelter from the
sun, Jarnail Singh carefully measures out garlic bulbs on his weighing scale,
after asking us how much we need. “Teeh rupey [thirty rupees]”, he says as he
hands me our purchase of 250 grams as he looks for the next customer. 

His stall has three varieties of garlic, each lying in its own heap: big cloves
of pahadi garlic, medium-sized bulbs of the regular garlic and small pink cloves
of desi (local) garlic. Two plastic bags of green chillies and a small display
of limes and ginger take up the remaining space on his cart.

“I have been selling vegetables and fruits in this market since 1993,” says
Jarnail, now in his fifties. The market is located in Phase Two Urban Estate on
the outskirts of Patiala city in Punjab. Jarnail Singh is also present on market
days at Gurudwara Dukhniwaran on Tuesdays and at Phase One Urban Estate on
Wednesdays. Both locations lie on the outskirts of Patiala city in Punjab.
Jarnail purchases his produce from Sabzi Mandi – the wholesale market near the
city’s main bus stand. 

Vegetable seller Jarnail is also fond of collecting old coins and brings them
out of an envelope in which he stores below the mats on his cart. “There is no
particular reason,” he said when we asked him about his interest. Old one paisa,
10 paise, 25 paise and 50 paise coins, many of them showing their age dating
back to the mid-20th to early 21st centuries.  Chief among his finds is a 50
paise coin last issued in 2011. He says it’s not the resale value of the coins
but more of the connection they have with the past. 

Left: Jarnail has been selling vegetables and fruits in this market since 1993. 
Right: Showing some of the coins he has collected over the years. Photos by
Balwinder Singh

When he began working in the vegetable trade 29 years ago, Jarnail says, “I used
to earn around 1,000 rupees a day.” Today it takes him three market days to earn
the same amount as the number of sellers in the market has multiplied. When he
first started, there were only about 20 to 30 sellers in the market and there
are over 200 now.  

“I used to lease five acres of land to grow the vegetables that I sold,”
explains Jarnail of his early days. He paid an annual rent of Rs. 2,200 for the
lease of the land. Together with his wife, they would plant wheat and paddy on
one to three acres and vegetables on the rest. They also planted fodder which
they sold to those who kept livestock. In 2006 he stopped leasing the land
because of the heavy physical work that farming requires, and the rising costs
of pesticide. 

Jarnail’s children are grown up; his two daughters were married in 2006, and his
sons in 2016 and 2018. His younger son stopped attending school after Class 10
and took up an apprenticeship with an electrician. He now has his own business
and employs 10 people. Jarnail’s older son has a Masters in Music and teaches
music at Mata Gujri College in Devigarh, 24 kilometres from Patiala, Punjab.  

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Jarnail Singh was born in Sonkra, a village in Nilokheri tehsil of Haryana’s
Karnal district.  He does not remember the year of his birth and because he
never got any formal education there is no document recording it. He says that
according to the government-issued documents, the year of his birth is marked as
1969. 

He lost his mother at the age of two and was left in the care of his father and
five elder brothers. When he was around age 12 or 13, he started working in the
fields with the landlords to help meet the family’s household expenses. When he
was 16, Jarnail Singh along with his family migrated to Sanaur, Punjab on the
advice of his maternal uncle.

When Jarnail first started selling at the market, there were 20 to 30 sellers;
now there are over 200. Photo by Balwinder Singh

Now in his fifties, Jarnail has done a number of different jobs. He used to
change the hooves of black horses and was nicknamed  ‘Kali Ghodi Wala‘ (the one
who keeps or takes care of the black mare). He says the name stuck and at that
time when customers came to him, he would not charge them but rather ask them to
take the money to the place of worship of whichever religion they followed. He
felt that this was important. He later went on to drive a mule carriage and do
construction work. 

In 1978, Jarnail bought 200 square yards of land to build a house for his
family. 

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

On market days Jarnail wakes up at 4 a.m. and leaves his home in Sanaur for the
market which is almost two hours away. His wife Sukhwinder Kaur helps him get
the vegetables ready for the market. She recently slipped in the bathroom and
broke her leg and now finds it difficult to walk. The couple, who were married
25 years ago, live with their sons and their wives who also help out.  

Carrying roughly 100 kilos of garlic and other vegetables, he arrives at the
market at 10 a.m. to prepare his stall. The market starts at 1 p.m. and he likes
to be ready well in time. He brings a packed lunch and carries 10 litres of
drinking water for the day. 
As we are talking, a number of his fellow sellers approach him for a glass of
chilled drinking water. He graciously offers us some as well; later he brings us
cups of chai which he doesn’t allow us to pay for saying: “ਜਿੱਥੇ ਦਾਣੇ ਉੱਥੇ
ਖਾਣੇ”, ਇਹ ਤਾਂ ਚਾਹ ਹੈ ਜੋ ਤੁਹਾਨੂੰ ਇੱਥੇ ਲੈ ਕੇ ਆਈ ਹੈ [It is the tea that called you
here].”



Left: Jarnail carries medicines like paracetamol for anyone in the market who
may need it. Right: He shuts shop at 10 p.m. and packs his goods in a basket to
take them home. Photos by Joyce Nalubanja

Jarnail also carries medicines like paracetamol. “I carry with me some medicines
in case I or anyone in the market needs them,” he says, showing us the tablets
carefully packed in a plastic box.

On the four days of the week he is not selling vegetables, Jarnail visits
religious sites with his best friend Sher Singh. Together, on Sher Singh’s
motorbike, they pay annual visits to the Golden Temple in Amritsar in Punjab,
Patna Sahib in Bihar, Badrinath in Uttarakhand, Paunta Sahib in Himachal
Pradesh, Jagadhri city in Haryana and Anandpur Sahib also in Punjab. Jarnail
says, “ਮੈਂ ਆਪਣੇ ਬੱਚਿਆਂ ਦੀ ਜ਼ਿੰਮੇਵਾਰੀ ਤੋਂ ਫ਼ਾਰਗ ਹੋ ਗਿਆ ਹਾਂ, ਹੁਣ ਮੈਂ ਸਿਰਫ ਆਪਣੇ ਲਈ
ਕਮਾਉਂਦਾ ਹਾਂ, ਮੈਂ ਵਿਹਲਾ ਬੈਠ ਕੇ ਆਪਣੇ ਬੱਚਿਆਂ ਦੀ ਕਮਾਈ ਨਹੀਂ ਖਾਣਾ ਚਾਹੁੰਦਾ ਹਾਂ। ਹੁਣ ਤਾਂ
ਮੈਨੂੰ ਇਸ ਕੰਮ ‘ਚ ਮਜ਼ਾ ਆਉਣ ਲੱਗ ਗਿਆ ਹੈ” [Now I am free from the duty of feeding and
taking care of my children. I earn for myself; I don’t want to depend on my
children’s earnings].”

As the dark of night approaches, Jarnail prepares to connect the three bulbs
that light up his stall. He has paid Rs. 50 for the table that works as his
stall and these lights. Besides this he must also pay Rs. 20 to access the
grounds as a seller. 

By 10 p.m. it is closing time and Jarnail packs up whatever is left of the
garlic, green chillies, limes and ginger. He also packs up his basket in which
he keeps his medicines and other personal effects. His coins are kept in an
envelope that he stows among his things. His eldest son then joins to help push
the bicycle cart laden with the remaining goods as they head home.  

To return to the PARI homepage, click here.

EDITOR'S NOTE

Joyce and Balwinder are pursuing a Masters in Journalism and Mass Communication
at Punjabi University, Patiala. They participated in a PARI workshop at the
Educational Multimedia Research Centre (EMRC) in the university in August 2022. 

Joyce says, “I was drawn to this particular seller in the market because of his
age and the fact that he had already set up at that particular time. Later I
realised that he has this unique coin collection.” 

Licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 by People's Archive of Rural India.