This story is from October 5, 2014

One more city's eating joint Indira Bhavan downs its shutters permanently

One more city’s eatery which served the people with various specialties is downing its shutters on Monday after a long service of more than seventy years.
One more city's eating joint Indira Bhavan downs its shutters permanently
MYSORE: One more city’s eatery which served the people with various specialties is downing its shutters on Monday after a long service of more than seventy years. Mysoreans cannot forget to visit Indira Bhavan hotel on busy Sayyaji Rao Road whose food items like Idlis, Upma and dosas were relished by the people most. One would be surprised to hear that Upma served by the hotel used to sell like a hot cake within minutes of its preparation in the evening.

Today it was the last day for the hotel owners to serve the city people. “ With a heavy heart we are ending our services , however the sweet stall will be shifted to a new place” the owner of the restaurant Mohankumar told, adding that they were overwhelmed by the peoples support to them when they came to city from North India before independence.
It would be a surprise to know that this was the first restaurant in the city to introduce Pista badami laced basundi a sweet prepared from milk. Even the hotel’s external look never appeared like a commercial establishment and it looked like a old house with rooms of the house acting as the serving halls for the customers. All the rooms of this hotel series of pictures of the depicting the events associated with this historic city.
Though Indira Bhavan hotel was a commercial venture , its founder Badri Prasad who came and settled here from Uttar Pradesh was closely associated with freedom movement. Still many elders in the city recollect how Badri Prasad gave rooms freely to the freedom fighters who arrived in city to participate in various activities associated with the movement.
“Our ancestors were from Uttar Pradesh and my grand father Badri Prasad who arrived here first named the hotel as Bombay Indira Bhavan as Bombay then was like a New York city to traders” claimed Mohan Kumar , adding that even his grand father was himself a freedom fighter. Many people from the city are afresh with the memories of how hotels served as Dharma shala ( free community halls of yester years) for the freedom fighters like Tagadur Ramachandra Rao and Pandeshwar.

Even many politicians including former prime minister H D Devegowda, S M Krishna and present chief minister Siddaramaiah used to relish the dosas of this hotel , claimed a litterateur, adding that the hotel acted as an evening meeting point for many retired academicians, politicians and officials.
Journalish Samachar Satya recollecting how he was a offered a party at this hotel by his boss when he married in fifties said as the civilization is growing one by one such old structures and establishments are vanishing from the scene, turning nostalgic over the closure.
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