The Thal Sunday Market is indispensable to Neil Khopkar’s family-run eatery in Alibaug. Leaning into local flavours and ingredients, it is here that they buy hirva vanga, samudra methi, and sakla, among a bunch of other produce.
Running parallel to the Konkan coast, the Revas-Alibaug road spans almost the entire length of the Alibaug taluka in the Raigad district. While it is a veritable lifeline, the journey from my home in Navi Mumbai to Alibaug is like journeying to another world. I set off from an urban jungle, riding my bike through dusty highways to first reach Karanja—a fishing village and port about 40 minutes from home.
From Karanja, a 15-minute ferry ride takes me to the quiet port of Revas. Surrounded by low-lying mangroves that lend expansive views, the skies here are open and clear, and the air a mix of muddy and salty. An occasional dragonfly buzzes past.
Heading southwards from Revas to Alibaug, I ride past a nondescript village called Thal. Here, rows of long concrete-paved platforms topped with tin roofs line the roadside. This structure usually appears desolate, but transforms itself once a week into a bustling market—the Thal Sunday Market.
Last year, my father and I decided to start Sarkhel—a small eatery serving local, seasonal fare focusing on lesser-known varieties of fish like sakla (cobia), sasaa (amberjack), and kupa (tuna), and vegetables like samudra methi (fenugreek grown in sand beds) and hirva vanga (a larger, local variety of green brinjal). While we had been running a homestay in Thal for some years, Sarkhel was our attempt to explore local cuisine and ingredients. And the Thal Sunday Market has been the best indicator for what’s in season.
Initially a choice made out of convenience, the market soon won us over with not only the variety and quality of its offerings, but also the warmth of its people. Local vegetables like samudra methi, red amaranth, and hirva vanga are fresher, tastier, and sometimes exclusively available here. Moreover, we would spot vegetable vendors from the Sunday market having a cup of tea or visiting friends in the neighbourhood on other days—a sense of affinity perhaps unheard of in the city.
Local vegetables like samudra methi, red amaranth, and hirva vanga are fresher, tastier, and sometimes exclusively available here.
Started by a local politician around 10 years ago, the Thal Sunday Market has become one of the fastest-growing markets in the region. A primary facet contributing to its growth is a factory—one of the largest employers in the area—which has increased the locals’ purchasing power. Since it is a Sunday market, those with day jobs use their holiday to shop for the week.
For Ashwini Mokal, 40, a regular customer, neighbourhood weekly markets have been a mainstay in the region for as long as she can remember. The Poynad market, 17 kilometres away, is one of the oldest. Other villages nearby—Dhokawade, Nagaon, Murud, Varsoli—also have such markets on certain days of the week.
On Saturday nights, pick-up trucks carrying vegetables like cauliflower, carrots, and onions start rolling into the parking lot across the market. By dawn on Sunday, vendors set up shop at their usual spots. Those who sit within the market area have to pay rupees 50 to the Gram Panchayat for cleaning and maintenance. The early-morning sales are primarily wholesale, when vendors who source locally purchase produce in bulk, in addition to their local offerings. Vendors who go house-to-house across the taluka, selling vegetables on their pick-up trucks, also buy at this time.
As the day progresses, other non-food vendors selling utensils or clothes start setting up shops. Buyers from local restaurants begin their rounds of the market. At mid-day, there is usually a slight lull, owing to the heat. Once evening sets in, the market springs back to life—punctuated by cacophony and chaos—as customers pour in. Families arrive on scooties, dressed up for their weekly shopping. Groups of young people roam around eating popcorn or ice-cream. Children run through the crowd, playing tag, while the older folk grab a comfortable corner on one of the platforms to catch up on the latest local goings-on. The cries of the vendors become louder, eventually carrying over the chatter of the crowd. An odd portable speaker plays music.
Outside the market are pick-up trucks selling garlic and onions in bulk. Instead of shouting out the day’s rates like they once did, the vendors now announce it—on loop—through Bluetooth speakers.
Around dinner time, the crowds thin out and the vendors start wrapping up. Come Monday morning, all that’s left is heaps of garbage which workers employed by the Gram Panchayat slowly sweep away. By dusk, it almost looks like nothing ever happened here.
Outside the market are pick-up trucks selling garlic and onions in bulk. Instead of shouting out the day’s rates like they once did, the vendors now announce it—on loop—through Bluetooth speakers.
The monsoon, I learn, is traditionally considered as a season of abundance and want. As travel is often impeded by the rain, vegetables—especially staples like onions and potatoes—become expensive, but the wilderness bursts forth with foraged wild greens like shevla, takla, phodshi, and chaai. All the other weekly markets are closed during the months of Ashadh to Kartik (June to September). Thanks to the tin roofs, the Thal Sunday Market is the only one open throughout the year.
Upon visiting the market on a rainy, overcast morning in July this year, the vendors were slow to set up their shops, even finding snatches of time for a breakfast of vada pav, or chapati with vegetables. To stay dry, they looked for trees or poles to secure their makeshift tarpaulin sheets. A few shoppers made their way through puddles.
I interviewed a mix of vendors—some I already know and some who were new to me. They were initially unsure whether the conversations would yield anything useful but once they began to chat, interesting details emerged.
Rasika Mhatre lives in Mane-Bhute village, two kilometres away from Thal, and comes to the market every Sunday to sell bottle gourds, bitter gourds, and sponge gourds cultivated on her farm. “Selling vegetables from my farm means that I don’t have to work as a manual labourer. I earn as much as a day’s wages here, and can conveniently buy whatever I need,” says Rasika. She was almost out of stock when I went there at around 11 am, which she seemed rather pleased about.
Pranita Patil’s husband and brother-in-law farm their land in Bhal village while she sells the cultivated produce in the Thal Sunday Market. She also buys some vegetables from other wholesalers in the Thal market early in the morning, eventually selling them along with what she brings from home: various kinds of brinjal, whitish ghevda beans, red and green amaranth, and green chillies. The market is an important source of income for her, as her husband is unable to take on a conventional job.
When asked why she doesn’t sit on the empty platform behind her, Pranita says that it is reserved for the fishmongers, even when they don’t show up during the monsoon. The system to reserve each other’s spots in their absence is a rather organic one.
Originally from Solapur in south-western Maharashtra, Hashim Bagwan moved to Alibaug taluka in the 1970s in search of work. He made ends meet as a mason until the Sunday market opened 10 years ago. His son is a graduate but was unable to find a decent job, and hence decided to invest their savings into a pick-up truck, and now even has his own vegetable stall. For the sake of convenience, Hashim likes to have just tomatoes and an in-season bean (shravan ghevda this time) at his stall. Initially reluctant, Hashim opened up to me amidst chaos, rain, and a barrage of women wanting to buy shravan ghevda.
Rohini and Changdev Kulekar, a couple—originally from Jejuri—moved to Alibaug from Mumbai after Changdev lost his job as a bus driver. They have a small farm in Jejuri, around 200 kilometres away, which supplies about half the produce they sell at the Thal Sunday Market. The other half is bought from neighbouring farmers in Jejuri.
This means the local farmers avoid the trip to the mandi, and even get better rates for their produce. During the week, the Kulekars go from village to village selling onions and potatoes on their pick-up truck. They say the Sunday market is good for business, but is tiring as the family works from 6 am to 10 pm.
The Chavarkar family from Poynad has been trading in pulses and grains for four generations. The son, Harshal, says that his family—belonging to the Agri community—was originally into farming, and then started selling their produce to locals on a bullock cart. The trade slowly overtook farming.
Pointing right and left, he mentions that almost all the grain merchants in that row of the market are Chavarkars. “We have been doing five weekly markets in the region [of Alibaug] for at least the last 70 years. We have regular customers at every market, but since this is the only roofed market, we see good business during the monsoon, with sales only increasing every year. Tourist numbers are growing too; they specially buy vaal (field beans or hyacinth beans), which we source locally. We also sell our own Agri masala—comprising several spices—which is unique to the community,” says Harshal.
The learning that comes with starting one’s own eatery is immense, getting us accustomed to the rhythms of each season. The unpredictability accompanying the ebb and flow of tourists is now familiar to us, as are the comings and goings of intense heat and pouring rain. We’ve worked when the lights went out, cleared traffic jams in our parking lot, worried about the fish getting charred, and even had days without a single customer walking in. But through it all, the Thal Sunday Market has been a constant. From planned market runs to a quick nip down the road to buy an extra coconut or some just-in-case coriander, the market has been indispensable to us.
The market is more than just a resource. I have observed vendors reserve spots for their colleagues; others who guard and, sometimes, sell produce for their friends; customers travel long distances to shop here; couples on dates enjoy ice-cream; young boys earn pocket money by helping shoppers with packing their groceries; and older vendors figure out how UPI works.
The Thal Sunday Market changes with changing seasons but its people remain unchanged. The market might even grow, given the rapid urbanisation—in the form of residential and retail spaces—looming over. But considering the possibility of impending change, what I hear from most people is: “The market will stay.” I think so too.
Neil Khopkar is the Producer Partnerships Associate at The Locavore. Trained in culinary arts and business, his interests range from gastronomy to music. Born and raised in Mumbai, Neil loves to explore its local histories and food culture. He is the co-founder of Sarkhel, an eatery in Alibaug specialising in Malvani and Chandraseniya Kayastha Prabhu cuisines.
Markets carry the pulse of the communities that they serve, and act as a window to diverse cultures. Market Archives aims to document as many markets from around India as possible—small, sprawling, vanishing, noisy, up a hill, tucked away in a corner of the city—every one of them. Join us as we speak to different sellers, see what’s in season across varied geographies, taste the familiar and unfamiliar, and soak in the sounds and scents that define each market.
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