Billing for your kirana shop in Chhattisgarh
Rice by the kilo, oil by the litre and the monthly family's udhaar, all on one bill on your phone.
Why a Chhattisgarh kirana never closes the month with the same total twice
The forest-edge family with coins in a knot of cloth and a promise for the next haat
A family from the forest edge brings what coins it has and asks for rice, salt and oil. The rest, they say, will come when the next haat pays. You hand over the goods and the promise stays between you. By the next haat you remember one amount and the family remembers another, and they live too far away to settle it over the road.
The Dhanteras evening queue that reaches the road
On Dhanteras families come in the evening for puja goods, sugar and sweets all at once, and the queue reaches the road. You are looking for change, a customer wants the lamp oil you sold out of at noon, and a child is pulling at a packet. Nothing is written down, and the drawer and the notebook disagree by morning.
The sack that arrives short, with nothing to show the wholesaler
A sack of rice from the wholesaler is sold as a full sack, but when you weigh it at the counter a few kilos are missing, and the dal sack has bits of stone in it. By then the cart has gone. You cannot ring the wholesaler without a record of what you ordered and the day the cart came.
Tools that fit a ration counter in a haat town
Bills on your phone
Rice in kilos, oil in litres and soap in pieces on one bill, so a family's weekly ration is a single sale.
Credit book (khata)
A page only for the families who owe you. A haat-day buyer gets a bill and no page, so the book never fills with strangers.
Low stock warnings
A warning on the dal and rice sacks, set at the number that lasts until the next wholesaler visit, so a short sack is seen before haat day.
Orders to suppliers
The order for the wholesaler, opened again beside the sacks in the lane when his cart is unloaded, to see which line is short.
Daily reports
Haat day laid beside the other days, to see what the villagers take home that your regular families do not.
From the rice sack at opening to the lamp oil at Diwali night
Settling in the evening, once the family has sold its vegetables
A farm family sells its own vegetables in the morning and walks to your shop in the evening with whatever the market gave. Some evenings it pays all and some a part, and the family says how much. The page remembers the rest, so neither of you has to. The figure is not kept in your head, and next evening the family finds the same sum that it left.
The Dhanteras cart, noted sack by sack at the door
The cart comes in the days before Dhanteras with the lamp oil, rice and dal for the festival. Note what came, sack by sack, as it comes off the cart. Whatever is short is known while the driver is still at the door, and there is still time to ring the wholesaler for it before the festival evening.
A short list of festival goods at closing time
In the Diwali weeks lamp oil, sugar and dry fruit fall fastest, and the Dhanteras queue empties them in an evening. Have the cart at the door in the morning, before the queue forms, with those three at the top of what it carries.
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Mandi, mines and small mills: who walks into a kirana in Chhattisgarh
Your customers earn their living in very different ways across the state. Three districts show how far apart they can be.
- Baloda Bazar has many cement plants fed by its limestone, and its Bhatapara mandi is famous for crop buying and selling all year.
- Mahasamund has limestone and granite deposits, and several small industries use the limestone.
- Korba is called Urja Nagari, the power capital of Chhattisgarh, and some estimates put over 60 percent of its GDP in coal mining and related work.
Women's groups that moved their shop from paper to phone
Questions Chhattisgarh kirana owners ask
A sack of dal arrived with stones in it and I want to show the wholesaler. What do I have in my hand?
The order you sent, with its day, and your note of what arrived against it. Show him the line for that sack and the day the cart came, and the talk starts from the paper.
At Diwali I sell lamp oil and puja goods I do not stock in other months. Can I add them for one season?
Yes. Add each as an item with its own rate and unit, and leave it alone when the season ends. Its sales stay in the day's reports for the next Diwali.
A family from the next village leaves some coins today for the bag I keep ready for haat day. Which day does the sale count for?
The day the bag leaves the shop. Note the coins they left on their page the day they gave them, and make the bill when they pick the bag up. The rice and dal then come off the stock on the day they really went out, and the day's total is not padded with a bag still standing on your shelf.
Raipur's festival crowds and a wholesale market on the drawing board
In 2023 the Chhattisgarh government planned the nation's largest wholesale market on 438.47 hectares in Sector 27 of Nava Raipur, meant to serve both small and large traders. A wholesale market is where a kirana owner fills the shop, so one meant for small traders as well as large ones is worth watching.
On Dhanteras 2022, Raipur saw a spike in footfall and sales in all sectors, from showrooms to roadside vendors, with more expected through Diwali and Chhath. Dhanteras is the first day of Diwali, when many families buy something new for the house.