Crowds throng Delhi's small eatery 'Baba Ka Dhaba' as emotional video goes viral

The power of social media! On Wednesday Delhi based food blogger Gaurav Wasan shared a video of an elderly couple struggling to run a small eatery in New Delhi. The video was shared on Wasan's Youtube channel as well as Instagram handle and went viral almost immediately.

The video features a small eatery called ‘Baba Ka Dhaba’ in Malviya Nagar in South Delhi and has the stall's 80-year-old owner Kanta Prasad and his wife showing vessels full of home-cooked food to the camera. Prasad gets teary-eyed near the end of the video as Wasan asks how much has been his earning for the day. Prasad can be seen taking out a few Rs 10 notes and saying that the pandemic has effected his small business.

The couple state they are unable to more than Rs 80 a day, despite starting their day as early as 6.30 am. “Ever since the lockdown, life has been very difficult”, Prasad said. Wasan can be heard promising him help.

The heart wrenching video has caught the Internet's attention and has been viewed over 1 lakh times on Youtube alone. There has been an outpour of help with celebrities as well as political leaders reaching out to extend financial help for the couple. What more, on Thursday the small eatery was sold out in the first half of the day as people lined up to taste home-cooked meals by the couple.

A social media campaign led to the #BabaKaDhaba and #MalviyaNagar trend on Twitter and multiple people posted images and videos of their visits to the eatery after seeing the video.

“There was no sale during the lockdown but now it feels like whole India is with us,” said Prasad on Thursday as he served people.

Cricketer R Ashwin, actors Randeep Hooda, Sonam Kapoor, Swara Bhasker, Raveena Tandon, and a host of other stars have extended support and urged their fans on social media to go visit the eatery.

The local MLA, AAP leader Somnath Bharti also has visited the stall. “Will take care of them n I am starting a drive 2 take care of similarly placed people,” he tweeted and later shared photos of his visit.