Friday did not make much of a difference for certain sections of society, particularly fruit sellers and casual labourers.
For them, life was as usual, on the date of counting of votes polled in the Parliamentary elections, even as several others kept watching television channels eagerly awaiting the results.
News breaks on channels on the fate of VVIPs who contested the elections did not matter much for the daily-wage earners.
For them, winning their daily bread seemed to be the sole objective. Braving the hot sun, fruit sellers lined up on NSC Bose Road. Despite it being a Friday, traffic on the important road, around noon, was relatively less. Vendors who would usually occupy the carriageway, affecting vehicular movement, were found abutting the footpath.
And in the midst of selling their ware, they discussed politics. A woman was shouting to another about the BJP’s winning trends she had heard of, and the listener, a flower vendor, nonchalantly asked what difference a change in government would make to their lives.
At Umpherson Street junction in George Town, an autorickshaw driver declared to a pavement hawker that Narendra Modi would certainly become the next Prime Minister, even as he kept dusting his vehicle. The hawker replied with a smile and carried on with his business. Selvam, a casual labourer in Broadway, prioritised the work at hand — delivering the goods he was carrying on his tricycle — before he sat down to hear the poll outcome.
On Prakasam Salai, loaders could be seen carrying on with their work without much apparent interest in the happenings on the electoral front. This was the scene on other streets near NSC Bose Road too.
The radio, which was discarded several years ago thanks to television sets and channels, came in handy for a person in a photocopy shop and an autorickshaw driver.
