Circuit Safari: Exploring Mumbai’s Lamington Road for Repairs & Spares

Poster prepared to spread the word

A short walk was planned to explore Mumbai’s electronic repair hub starting at Grant Road Suburban Station to Lamington road...

How did this business come to flourish in these parts of the city? A 50-year-old says that in the nineties this was a hub for TVs, DVDs, VCRs along with the first versions of Personal Computers. A 35-year-old says that this was the place to get Thirty paise cyclostyle machines, when the rest of the city used to go at Fifty paise. Notes of the toppers in the college classes were photocopied here and bound into books for the benefit of others who relied on such help for examinations.Someone says that the market has been here forever and they have continued to sell electronic products that are relevant for the times. But these are pricey—real estate—and Mumbai is possibly the priciest. It is a business fraught with risks.

Footpath vendors selling laptop and mobile covers on Lamington road

A laptop shop-owner who set up in 2015, repairs the laptops right there on the street! He says for more sensitive components he takes out the parts and sends it to his colleagues elsewhere in the building. His shop is but a niche in the wall about one foot deep, the width is seven to eight feet by seven feet in height. Laptops, parts, tools etc. are stored inside this street shelf and the work happens on a wooden shelf at the bottom.

"Why don’t you stick to matters of repair," he says.

The repairer with the ‘shelf in the street’ responds to my questions honestly. When I ask him about the rent he pays for the ‘shelf in the street’, he says, why don’t I stick to matters related to repair? I am told his rent will be in the range of Fifteen thousand INR to Twenty five thousand INR. There is a lot of pressure on these shops to have a good turnover in order to continue to pay heavy rents.As a result, the shops on the ground floor are selling parts and accessories for Laptops, Mobiles, Sound systems, TVs and the like. The first and second floors are accessed through staircases directly from the sidewalk and open out to a narrow verandah on the upper floors. The repair shops function here. The repair shops are jointly rented by four or five kiosks.

The staircase leads up to this upper-floor verandah which allows access to repair shops 

Staircase going up from the sidewalk 

Incidentally, the Lamington Road is a straight road from the south to the Mumbai Central railway station. So one can approach it either from Grant Road suburban station and enter directly the heart of the market or enter from the end at the Mumbai Central railway station. In the days of yore, the location so close to the main station of the city would have afforded a primacy to the market like no other. The business continues to thrive here.

The sound system repair market in a bye-lane off Lamington road

Putting the Market to Test

What good is a walk in a repair market unless some repairs are in fact taken up? We had just the right thing to test the depth of the repair market. Something that normally people would never want to repair, as a new one costs less than the repairs. We had a pair of JBL earphones which was not giving clear unbroken sound. We were looking for the sound system repair shops to try our repair.As the walk carried on, we veered off from the main Lamington Road to a side lane that curves back through a beautiful neighbourhood with Art Deco buildings and a church dating back to 1921. On one side, we were told were the chawls of Girgaon, where the famous Bollywood movie Satya was shot. The ground floor of the buildings were lined with shops selling refurbished and new parts. Soon we chanced upon the shops that dealt with sound systems.

Church compound is entered from this beautiful cast-iron gate

Church has a small guest house and a tree-filled backyard

“There is only one man who can fix it for you, right now,” said a shop owner.

A few enquiries with shop owners directed us to one particular shop very near to the entrance of the Grant Road Suburban Station. The other shops could take our set of headphones, repair and return it the coming day, but this person could do it right now! We headed in that direction. The man had gone for a cup of tea and we waited, looking at other shops in the area. There were some shops that were not more than kiosks, albeit kiosks for accessories and parts of electronic sound equipment.

Some shops are nothing more than a kiosk but they do all the repairs

When the man returned he said he could do it. The headphone had a problem of loose connections. But such headphones are designed in a manner that it disincentivizes repairers from opening and fixing easily. The whole wire and stereo jack would have to be replaced. It would cost more than Four hundred INR.We thought the price was too steep. The repairer offered, that he would fit it for Two hundred INR, if we could get a wire. We headed to one of the kiosks nearby, luckily he had a half length of wire for Sixty INR.

“Sir, this wire will not match this headphone,” is what he said when I took it back to him.

I asked our guide to possibly reconsider and get another piece of wire. But he insisted that it is possible to repair with this wire. this headphone was designed so that there was only one wire to one of the earphones and the other earphone was connected through the body of the earphone. As a result, the headphone was designed with 3 terminals and the wire that we got was designed for 4 terminals (two each to each of the earphones).An intense discussion ensued during which our guide was able to convince that these 4-terminal wires could be adapted to the 3-terminal headphone.

“If it doesn’t work you still pay me for my labour,” is what the repairer insisted, and our guide agreed to this, and the repair began.

The headphone needed very experienced hands and concentration on the part of the repairer, who delivered a perfectly working piece of equipment.

Truths and Myths of Lamington Road

There is a lot of fear among customers who try to avoid coming to Lamington Road. Many said that they will scam you there. It is not a place for youngsters to look for a deal.But the fact cannot be further from such perception. It is a hard-as-nails market, like many others in different cities of India. But there are possibilities here that would not be entertained in other parts of the city. Those who visit here regularly build relationships with retailers, who in turn provide the best prices in a very competitive environment.

Trust brings peace of mind

Our guide summarized: Only when something goes wrong you get to meet the dealers. The warranties are controlled by the dealers and you have to take the faulty part to them. They will inspect your equipment; if indeed it is not functioning, you are handed a replacement or a fix as the clause may deem.

After the heated repair negotiation, we aimed for chai at the Irani café—but it was shut. A nearby tea stall saved the day, offering the perfect pause. What followed? Endless discussions on planned obsolescence, buying habits, and everything in between. The tea cooled us down, but the conversations stayed hot!