Taming the Steel Bull - The Bike Mechanics at Royal Mechanik Anupuram!!

                                                                                                                -Vidhul Dev(FT13187)

The flow of adrenaline that’s what comes to mind when we drive these great Bikes (motorcycles). The same emotion can turn into an horrendous spit of anger when your dear lil monstor fails to pull you through and goes down due to technical glitches. Now this is the time you look around for a Mechanic and you don’t find him..can you imagine the plethora of emotions that a person under such a situation!

Well.. in this small town of Anupuram, there are only two places or shops if you want to call them who can fulfill your bike servicing needs. Mr Govindan runs this mechanic shop an old timer at servicing and repairing works, have an experience of handling almost all the two wheelers  right from good old LML and Bajaj Chetak.

Sundays are hectic given the fact that most of the customers are free to look into this impending small works. You have a vehicle to give for servicing and fix some glitches then this isn’t the right time to come here. The town has only two bike servicing shops and they are jam-packed with bikes and you see the queue dragged to roads.

On a small discussion while his ‘boys’ where busy at work I found that there is a huge demand for this work, and great business. There is no competition from “The Biggies”- The branded servicing centers in a rural market as they simply shut their eyes to the rural market. “They do not understand that there is quite a lot of disposable income with the small town people to buy the glossy 2-wheeler automobiles and a huge possibility of business as well” says Govindan.

I observed, Patience as the biggest asset to come to mechanic on Sunday. Checked with the owner, the problem he says lies with the small workshop space and unavailability of the skilled labor. The localites form the major chunk of the the customers and they are the ones who promote the place as well. They have the routine of leaving the vehicle and take it back in the evening or next day.

Sometimes the parts aren’t available and the owner has some ‘settings’ to get the stock from Chennai on Thursdays.

Overall the customer sounded satisfied with the service, but the time and the availability of parts they tell are the issues. The mechanics are mainly the young lads living in the nearby villages students of tenth standard,  the owner says their aren’t enough people with the right skills to work here. These kids are very quick in mastering the skills and they fast in delivering the bikes as well.

It’s a huge learning process that this monopolistic establishment of sorts makes the call on its own. The people make not much of hues and cries about the time lag of delivery. The business will improve as the lower middle class junta of our villages start going for bigger bikes. But the question is where are we going to get the skilled labor and how will the customer come out of the restrictions imposed!