When gold
means money

For many months now, a calm, moustachioed middle-aged man in a checked jacket holding a cell phone or talking into it has been staring out from gold-and-yellow ads on BMTC buses. Bengaluru’s commuters couldn’t have missed the thick gold bracelet, the thick gold ring, and the chain on him. A popular Telugu actress appears at the other end of the ads running across the length of the buses with gold jewels and 500-rupee notes strewn in between. In contrast, its chief competitor has gone for bright, blue-and-yellow-schemed ads with a popular Kannada TV anchor and a couple of RCB players as brand ambassadors. Hundreds of BMTC buses ply the city with these ads, all day long.After months of indifference to these ads, I became curious about the entire business. The two companies’ brash video ads, along with gushing podcasts and TV interviews with their owners, were all over the internet.Both owners echoed similar messages. Starting from humble beginnings, tough circumstances made them see the value in the used-gold business and achieve success through sincerity and dedication. Between the cumbersome gold-loan schemes offered by banks and the crafty pawnbrokers, they claimed, there was a real need for assessing the value of used gold swiftly and objectively, and selling it in return for instant cash. Both use a German X-ray machine, which checks the quality of gold in no time without scraping it.Both companies promise cash payments within thirty minutes. Their source of profit: one took a 2% cut, the other 5%, from the price customers received for their gold. Both owners see a higher purpose for their business. Since their companies helped harness domestic gold to meet domestic consumption, one of the owners said he was really doing a service to the country.Both seek to secularise people’s attitudes towards gold, long regarded in Indian society as auspicious and a source of family honour. One asks that gold be seen as an investment, rather than as a sentiment. One of their ads tries to make this point with unbeatable logic: ‘Buy gold when you have money, sell it when you don’t.’ BMTC to launch Vajra Vistara on Bengaluru-Kunigal routeBut this is easier said than done. A friend in a gold finance company told me that a large number of gold loan borrowers repay their loans on the eve of festivals, use the redeemed jewellery for festival worship, and take out a loan on it again after the festival ends. And festival periods are lean periods for the used-gold buyers.For those unable to redeem their pledged gold due to accumulated interest, the new used-gold-buying companies appear to be a blessing. They take over their loans and buy the pledged gold, giving borrowers something for it when they would otherwise get nothing if it were auctioned off. Mostly from the lower and middle classes, the borrowers are also spared the embarrassment of bank officials knocking on their doors with threats of an auction.Besides, the need to pay education fees, meet medical emergencies, or make a down payment on apartments and other high-cost EMI purchases is among other occasions when people turn in their gold for money. In recent years, the surge in gold prices driven by wars, a weakened dollar, and other factors has also led those fearing a price crash to sell gold in large volumes. In all of this, buying gold has become out of reach for perhaps the largest number of Indians ever.Set up over a decade ago, the two companies I have touched on above each have more than 150 outlets in Bengaluru and elsewhere in the country. How two rank outsiders managed to pull this off amid so many rich and established gold and jewellery traders in the city would itself make quite a story. But the stories of desperation and inner turmoil within families that run through the entire process should matter more.The writer is the Vidyashilp Professor looks for new ways of looking. (Disclaimer: The views expressed above are the author’s own. They do not necessarily reflect the views of DH.)Write to us at: theprism@deccanherald.co.in

Source: Deccan Herald