Socio-Culture of Monastery Market

About The People 

There are a certain type of people that forms the crowd in that market. What I mostly noticed is that the customers who come there to shop are generally college goers from Delhi University.

When I started talking to the Shopkeepers and the customers or whosoever who comes to the market, I got somewhat same answers from everyone.

Most of the the shopkeepers in the market had Tibetan descendants. Their ancestors had moved her in the 60s or 70s when this market was built as the refugee for Tibetans. They speak Hindi and Tibetan both so there is no communication gap between them and the customers. When asked about their Education level, most of them didn't even get the chance to complete their secondary education in school. Only 4-5 of them did their +2 and a couple of them graduated from college.

Some of them are north Indians too whereas some of them are Delhi localities.

The thing that I liked the most was that in Tibetan Culture, women rule the roost. The women that we talked to are quite independent and broad minded unlike what we see in Indian culture. They don't like to be dependent on men rather aim to be financially independent.  This is something they pass on to their daughters as well. For example, I talked to Dolma, a 40 year old lady who was sitting in a shop, looking at us out of curiosity. She told us that she thought we were working for some newspaper company. When we started interviewing her, I realized how different she was from the kind of women we see in Indian society. Even though she had studied till class 6th herself but she was determined to make her daughters do masters in whatever field they are. She told us that she didn't want her daughters to be dependent on their husbands either and be financially independent.

There was another lady who works at 2 jobs. One here in the monastery market and the other job as a hotel receptionist. She has studied till class 10th but the way she talks and carries herself makes her look so different than the others. She is confident and easy to talk to.

We saw a few monks too who visit the monastery. There was a fruit vendor too in the market.

We also interviewed some customers who came to visit the market. It turns out that this market isn't really famous or anything because even I hadn't heard about the market till I was told to research on this market. Most of the customers here are men especially students of Delhi University who are on the lookout for fashionable clothes of good quality at inexpensive rates.

(source: www.mapsofindia.com/my-india/travel/tibetan-monastery-market-in-delhi)