Meeting him in camera

(Sometimes you meet the most interesting people in the most unexpected places. This story was published today...)

The story began in 1932…. In a small room on Dr DN Road (as it is now), a man sat at a desk, carefully checking a camera, his fingers delicately manipulating his tools to correct a small defect in a tiny part. He was K Prabhakar and the small shop that he started all those years ago is now a larger establishment, home to another gentleman known as ‘Prabhakar’ to the many customers who inevitably find their way up to the second floor of an old building, along the corridor and into a tiny storefront that hides a well-equipped workshop behind it. The proprietor comes out to find out what the problem is, holding the camera that needs help in hands that know exactly what they are doing, the surety of time and experience plain as he unlocks a lens, peers through the eye-piece, holds the grip in sure fingers.

The gentleman is the original K Prabhakar’s son. His name is Ashok with his father’s name, Kumar, he says with his characteristic somewhat shy smile, but few who come to him for help and advice know that. He prefers to talk with his wife Rekha present, he insists, and she joins in, taking over much of the discussion as he listens, her voice and words definite and detailed. He speaks, but seems to prefer the world of exposures and F-stops, lost perhaps in the world of cameras that he knows so well.

“This business was started by my father,” Ashok says. “He was an expert camera repairer during the war. At that time there were few camera repairers in the Indian market, though there were plenty of cameras – Exacta, Contaflex, Ikoflex.” The real Prabhakar started working with Central Camera, who provided him with a space – the tiny room across the way from the present premises. “He was also doing his own work and continued for many years until he became unwell.” Just 12 years old at the time, Ashok started helping out, leaving school to work with his father full time. “I took the initiative and learned, with my father’s help. Now my son (“His name is Prabhakar,” his mother adds.) is working with me.”

One of three brothers, the other two brought into the same field but not the same firm by Ashok, he became proprietor of the company in 1982, keeping his father’s name. “He loves the name,” Rekha explains, “and he loved his father very much.” And he took his father’s business interests far beyond a small shop. Having acquired service contracts for various globally well-known firms specializing in cameras and photographic equipment – Canon being a long-term contact – he gradually became well known internationally. Along the way, the family set up a factory to manufacture their own brand of cameras too, now a memory, but a very good one. His wife avers, “If you have any queries about photography and cameras, nobody else can answer them like he can. He is so interested in cameras and has read everything there is published on them. In fact, I have had to throw away cupboards full of books on the field since I have no space to store them!”

But with all the time he has spent on cameras, and with all that he knows about photography, don’t his fingers itch to press that button and hear that sweet whirring that signifies a picture well taken? “I have never wanted to be a photographer,” Ashok is clear. “I have done marriage photography, but some time ago, at various Catholic weddings and only for fun and for close friends. I have never wanted to be a photographer.” He speaks of the change in the world of photography – today, cameras, like computers, he feels, are easily available, affordable and become defunct very quickly. When pressed, he thinks long and hard and then hesitantly lists Rolliflex as perhaps the best camera ever made, but leaves that open to debate.

Ashok’s and K Prabhakar’s reputation is jointly huge, not just in Mumbai but in various parts of the world, too, especially in the Far East, where his work with international companies has been most extensive. A number of Indian journalistic photographers come to him – people from the Times of India, Mumbai Samachar, Loksatta, Free Press, Saamna and many others. He explains, “We have a lot of tools to repair cameras. You do not use a screwdriver and a hammer,” he laughs. He has special equipment for film and digital cameras that he brought back from his travels.

Rekha is obviously extremely proud of her husband. “The way he is involved in his work and the way he works, it is a divine gift,” she says. Ashok sits back in his chair and smiles, his mind already wandering back towards the lens he has been working on…