In the heart of Karwan Bazaar - an area renowned for its bustling marketplace with the towering corporate offices at the periphery - lays a particular enterprise which tends to go largely unnoticed on many accounts.

In such a lucrative location, the owners of this venture do not even have to worry about land rents making it profitable and to an extent, reasonable for its customers. Built primarily on the foundation of good will, Hotel Saladia as it is known for its roof made from a coarse cloth material called salas, caters to the very basic, fundamental needs of people, all at the expense of less than Tk 10.

The hotel opens for business in the morning, closing roughly at around evening time during the course of which, dozens of rickshaw and van pullers and daily workers serve as its customers.

Easily traceable to all for its distinct features, the owners, Amena and Jamal await the customers with a large bowl containing the different varieties of meals on offer, placed in front of them. The customers are greeted with a warm smile and are served with hand-fans for their convenience along with two waiters, Mahabuba and Shafiq, to call on. Several brick bars make for the seats of the customers and if that gets too uncomfortable, then they feel free to use their own shoes to sit on.

The customers can choose from fish heads, chicken legs and skin, smashed eggs and vegetables along with beef and mutton, all contained in one bowl. All this amounts to Tk 10, except if one chooses to feed on vegetables which would cost him around six takas, with rice included and a fiery Bombay chilli, a gift from the chef, to add to their pleasures.

The motive behind this venture as simple as it is commendable – no one should go hungry. ‘I know what the plight of hunger is and do not wish to see that on anyone,’ says Amena, residing in Dhaka for the best part of 26 years. ‘When I first arrived in Dhaka, proper meals at an affordable price for me and many others were extremely hard to avail and keeping in mind such circumstances faced by many in the lower income population, I decided 25 years ago to start a hotel like Saladia,’ she adds.

Meanwhile, two children arrive at the shop asking for a meal worth two taka. Jamal immediately points them to their seats before serving them with a plate full of vegetables which the children consume in an instant.

‘We do not refuse the customers as our motto is sales and if anyone asks for a meal worth taka two to five, we feel obliged to provide them with that’, says Amena.

‘I take meals every day at the hotel as the prices are so reasonable and I never get the facilities provided here at any other hotel’, says Monir a worker who loads and unloads vegetables in Karwan bazaar. ‘Amena Khala cares for us just like a mother would and not just as a shop owner,’ he adds.

Every day, the hotel’s seats are filled by customers and while many others queue up to take meals like Monir, all of whom are daily workers, rickshaw pullers and tokais of Dhaka city.

And in spite of the philanthropy, Amena does have a take home income. ‘We sell around Tk 1500 worth everyday, of which around 300 takas I earn as profit,’ she says.

But one does wonders, how Hotel Salaida can provide meals at such a low price. ‘I collect the chicken legs from the waste of the dressing shops, the fish heads from fish cutters,’ she says. The eggs are collected from wholesalers who give away the ones that have cracked during loading and unloading. The vegetables are collected from a morning bazaar which sells vegetables that have fallen off trucks while the rice is collected from the shop warehouses when some of it spills from the sacks.

Text and photo by Khamin.