THE coffee is cheap, the art is free. As you exit from Gate No. 1 of the Tollygunge Metro Station in Kolkata, you come face to face with a typical stall, the likes of which vend tea, coffee, biscuits and maybe some more light eats. The difference is that in tea-addicted Kolkata this stall boldly tells patrons not to ask for tea but to settle for coffee.
Kolkata Coffee, which covers no more than 3 ft by 5 ft of pavement space and does not have any kind of hawker’s licence from the municipal corporation, is the brain child and single-handed creation of slim, slightly greying Shyama Prasad Dey who has made it perhaps the most distinctive roadside little eatery in the city. It is plastered with black and white cartoons and illustrations which trumpet all manner of slogans that are always bold and most often funny.