Fun time in Bombay's mills

Go-karting is one amusement at a converted textile mill

By Sanjeev Srivastava in Bombay

An ambitious entertainment complex is being developed on a site in central Bombay, which used to be an old textile mill.

Once complete this complex - spread over 250,000 square feet - will offer amusement facilities, adventure sports like rock climbing and bungee jumping, a chain of restaurants, a discotheque and a superstore.

In India, because of artificial supports like government support or restrictions, these industries were kept alive

Textile businessman Vikas Kasliwal

For almost 20 years, the once burgeoning textile mill industry in Bombay has lain dormant.

Huge mills that once employed thousands of people stand empty.

But a handful of mill owners are giving a completely new look to the industry having realised that there is money to be made.

The middle class have time and money to spend

Textile businessman Vikas Kasliwal believes big cities are meant for services - not for manufacturing. He believes it was inevitable that the textile industry would disappear.

"In India, because of artificial supports like government support or restrictions, these industries were kept alive. Now with liberalisation, these props have disappeared so you find these entire old edifice is crumbling," he says.

Cafetarias and bowling alleys are now springing up in some of the old textile mills.

Good opportunity

Sitting on hundreds of acres of prime land in a city where real estate prices are among the highest in the world, textile mill owners saw a good business opportunity as even big Indian cities offer little in terms of leisure activities.

Former textile workers feel left out

"We didn't even have TV for so many years and that's just come in some years," says AD Singh of the Bowling Company.

"It's a question I've heard repeatedly over the years: What do we do? There's nothing to do. I think people like myself are creating a new industry that caters to this pent-up a demand from people to do something with their free time."

Once the centre of the textile industry in the country, mills in Bombay were forced to close in the 1970s and 1980s because of increasing labour trouble and the high cost of utilities like power and water.

Workers left out

But old textile mill labourers like Vithal Kanthi - many of whom have been without a job for nearly two decades - are unhappy they are not part of the new enterprise.

"This change is not going to benefit me or any of the families who have been working in these mills," he says.

Some mills have been closed for two decades

" We will not be getting any money from all this. The only ones that will benefit will be the mill owners and their families. "

But it's not just the mill workers who are unhappy.

Despite an acute housing shortage and the commercial potential of the property, the state government has allowed few of the mills to be developed.

The main reason for this is unresolved labour disputes and political considerations as the government cannot be seen to be siding with the rich.

Mill owners want blanket approval, rather than piecemeal decisions by the government, allowing them to use land in whatever way they deem fit.

However, unless the fruits of this entertainment revolution trickle down to the tens of thousands of unemployed textile workers, the story may have a familiar Indian ending.

It will only benefit the country's privileged.