The clock still ticks...

Rohit Ghosh

The clock tower of Lal Imli Mills once soared high above every other structure in downtown Kanpur and stood like a sentinel. The clock regulated the lives of thousands of people who lived in its shadow. The Lal Imli Mills (more popular as only Lal Imli) were forgotten as the fortunes sagged, but the clock is still ticking and diligently telling time. The credit goes to David Massey, who has been maintaining it for 42 years.

“The clock is running but people don’t throw even a casual glance at it. Even if they do so, they assume that the clock is not working,” says Massey. 

Birth of a mill

Because of its proximity to Lucknow, the East India Company in the eighteenth century developed Kanpur as a cantonment. Commercial activities increased as British soldiers needed things for everyday use. In 1876, four enterprising Britons — W.E. Cooper, George Allen, Dr Condon, Bevan Petman and Gavin S. Jones — decided to set up a mill in Kanpur to manufacture blankets for soldiers.

The mill came up in Civil Lines and was named Woollen Mills, Cawnpore. A tamarind tree that bore reddish tamarind stood in the premises of the mill. A picture of the tree became the logo of the mill and its products were named Lal Imli. Lal in Hindi means red and imli, tamarind. The mill also became popular as Lal Imli.

As years passed, Lal Imli started making woollen products for civilians as well. What Lal Imli produced was considered at par with the best in the world. The reason: Australia produces the best raw material required for making woollen products and the looms in Lal Imli, then and even now, can process only Australian raw material. Raw material from New Zealand follows Australia, but that can’t be finished at Lal Imli. The rich would feel proud in wearing Lal Imli, however, some of its products were so cheap that even the poor could afford it. The mill diversified with time and set up cotton textile mills and a tannery in Kanpur. Indian businessmen also set up cotton textile mills in the city. Kanpur, in the last quarter of 19th century, became the most important and biggest industrial city in the north of undivided India. It was only after the British shifted the capital from Calcutta (now Kolkata) to Delhi in 1912 that Kanpur was relegated to the second position.

Once, I could feel the clock tower swaying and vibrating when all the looms of the mill ran. Today, if you are inside mill, you can hear a dead leaf falling to the ground. — David Massey, timekeeper

A fire & a clock

A fire gutted Lal Imli in 1910. A new structure came up and a clock tower was added to it. The construction of the clock tower, however, took time. Its foundation was laid in 1910 but the clock ticked for the first time in 1921. “Most of the mill workers lived around the mill. Those days clocks and watches were not common. The management wanted to run the mill punctually, hence the clock was put up,” says Massey. The clock has four dials on four sides and being at a height of 130 feet from the ground, it was visible from a distance. The chimes were audible till a couple of kilometres away too.

It was in 1954 that Massey’s father, Babu was appointed as the timekeeper of Lal Imli’s clock. In 1977, Babu asked Massey to assist him for winding the clock. He was 14 then and in class IX. Babu died two years later and David was appointed timekeeper. 

The downfall

Lal Imli’s fortunes had started waning after its British owners left India following India’s independence and was taken over by Indians. The Central government took over the mill in 1981.

Talking about the reasons behind the losses that Lal Imli suffered, a senior official of the mill says, “Regular supply of raw material could not be ensured in the decades following Independence. If the production derailed once, it took years to recover. Fashion changed but Lal Imli stuck to its old designs. Red tape was also responsible. If we had to buy even a bulb, we had to float tenders in newspapers. We lost to private players when they started supplying woollen goods required by Indian defence forces.”

Production in Lal Imli in the past two decades has been in fits and starts. The mill comes to life when it gets some money from the Centre and is able to import some raw material from Australia.

Winter is approaching and the mill should have been running to its capacity right now. However, all that that can be heard is deafening silence.

Massey says, “Once, I could feel the clock tower swaying and vibrating when all the looms of the mill ran. Today, if you are inside mill, you can hear a dead leaf falling to the ground.”

Lal Imli still employees some 600 people but they have not received their salary for the past 26 months. In this year’s budget session, Textile Minister Smriti Irani said revival of Lal Imli was no more possible.

Employees recently gathered at the main gate of the mill and demanded their salaries. But David Massey was in the clock tower, winding the clock. “My job is to keep the clock ticking. I will keep doing so till I retire or until the mill closes, for once and all,” says Massey.