New Delhi: RoohAfza, the scarlet, syrupy sherbet steeped in the nostalgia of summer days, traces its roots a century back, to a small shop in the dusty by-lanes of Old Delhi.
The drink, perhaps the most famous innovation of pharma major Hamdard Laboratories, is the product of one family’s inter-generational commitment to Unani medicine — a system that believes in harnessing the healing power of nature to cure remedies.
RoohAfza hit the headlines recently after ThePrint reported a shortage in its supply over the past four to five months. The drink’s absence from the shelves came to notice when the Islamic month of fasting, Ramzan, began Monday as Muslims traditionally break their day’s fast (iftar) with a meal comprising pakoras, fruit chaat, dates and RoohAfza.
While Hamdard’s official statement attributed the shortage to “supply constraints of certain herbal ingredients which were not available due to short supply”, it is believed that a bitter family squabble may be at the heart of the supply-chain hiccup.
The family, however, denies this claim. “There was some uncertainty over who gets to control the organisation, but that was resolved by the Supreme Court order,” a close friend of the family told ThePrint, referring to a 3 April Supreme Court order that identified Hammad Ahmed as the “Chief Mutawalli (equivalent to director)” of Hamdard Laboratories (India).
Ahmed is the brother of the previous Chief Mutawalli Abdul Mueed, and the succession battle had led him to move court against the latter’s son, Abdul Mujeed, who assumed the post after his father’s death.
The manufacturer of popular products such as Safi, Roghan Badam Shirin, Sualin, Joshina and Cinkara, Hamdard Laboratories posted a turnover of over Rs 700 crore in the year ending March 2017.
As of 2015, Hamdard products were available in 450,000 outlets across the country, “with a portfolio of around 600 products of which nearly 580 are medicinal products and the remaining are FMCG [fast-moving consumer goods]”, Business Standard reported at the time.
The Supreme Court order settled a dispute that arose with the the death of Mueed in March 2015.
“Production is back in full swing,” said the family friend. “They’re producing 1.3 lakh bottles a day.”
FCB Ulka, the advertising organisation which got the entire Hamdard portfolio last year, told ThePrint that it was “business as usual” at the company.
“I can officially tell you that we have been given no information about this rift, and it’s business as usual. There’s going to be a big summer push for RoohAfza and we’re working on the campaign as we speak,” said Surjo Dutt, national creative head at FCB Ulka.
Hamdard, too, has dismissed the claim, saying reports of the rift stalling production were “baseless”.
“There has been unprecedented demand due to Ramzan and peak summer season coinciding,” it said, adding that “the situation is getting better everyday with distribution reaching far and wide”.
ThePrint also reached Mansoor Ali, the head of sales at Hamdard, for comment, but he refused.
Old Delhi to all over
Hamdard wasn’t always a multi-crore FMCG company at the centre of a tug-of-war. In 1906, when it was founded, Hakeem Abdul Majeed just wanted to help people feel better with products made using natural ingredients.
‘Hamdard’, translating to ‘sympathiser’ or ‘companion in suffering’, was an obscure and unimposing Unani medicine shop run by him in Delhi’s Lal Kuan Bazaar — and RoohAfza, or “one that enhances the soul”, was just a herbal drink meant to combat dehydration, diarrhoea and heat stroke in the loo season.
But the perfect balance of herbs, vegetables and roots in a sweet-tasting syrup was enough to quickly draw a crowd. Within a few hours of its inception, it is reported that hundreds of consumers lined up to buy the drink — and the entire stock was soon sold out.
Three years later, Delhi artist Mirza Noor Ahmad would design the iconic label for Hakeem in several colours. Delhi, however, wasn’t equipped with a colour printing press and the market had not yet seen the concept of a custom designed bottle for syrups. The labels were thus printed under special arrangement by the Bolton Press in Bombay (Mumbai).
By 1920, crates of RoohAfza Hakeem were being packed manually at his Old Delhi shop — the labels pasted by hand as well.
Two years later, however, Hakeem passed away, leaving the reins of Hamdard in the hands of his son Abdul Hameed, then just 14.
In 1948, the organisation reorganised itself as a waqf (Islamic irrevocable trust), making it liable to donate 85 per cent of its profits to Hamdard National Foundation (HNF), an educational charity.
The foundation runs, among other institutions, the only private medical college in Delhi — Jamia Hamdard. HNF also falls under Section 10 (23C) of the I-T Act, which means that it is only allowed to keep 15 per cent of its income to re-invest back into any business.
The year 1962 saw the family set up of the Institute of History of Medicine and Medical Research in Delhi and, by 1970, Hamdard’s first modern production facility was up and running in Ghaziabad. Eventually, the company expanded to another factory in Manesar, Haryana.
Also read: Pakistani Hamdard offers to help overcome India’s RoohAfza shortage during Ramzan
Partition, Pakistan and beyond
In some ways, the story of Hamdard is the story of the Indian subcontinent.
“This classic summer sherbet, or sharbat, has survived Partition, the licence-permit raj, economic reforms, carbonated drinks, and tetra pack juices,” Delhi photojournalist Mayank Austen Soofi wrote in 2012, calling RoohAfza “Old Delhi’s national drink.”
When India was partitioned in 1947, founder Hakeem Hafiz’s younger son Hakeem Mohammed Said migrated to Karachi, Pakistan, where he established Hamdard Laboratories Waqf Pakistan with two rented rooms and loaned furniture.
The ‘Summer drink of the East’, Pakistan’s RoohAfza, Austen wrote, “tastes exactly the same as its Indian counterpart”.
When East Pakistan was liberated to become Bangladesh in 1971, the Dhaka property was transferred to a set of Bengali owners, resulting in the creation of its final off-shoot – Hamdard Laboratories (WAQF) Bangladesh.
Competing in a modern India
Over the last few decades, RoohAfza’s most difficult trial has been to keep up with the changing times.
“The biggest challenge was to find a pitch that would do justice to the heritage of this brand, but also make it relevant to modern contemporary times,” Dutt of FCB Ulka told ThePrint.
“There’s no bigger iconic Indian brand than RoohAfza. There was no house that didn’t have it, and this is as Indian as any brand has ever been,” he added.
By the 1980s, Rasna, another sherbet, had made an appearance on the market scene, bringing a new kind and flavour of affordable beverages. The 1990s, perhaps the worst for the RoohAfza brand, saw the return of Coca Cola after a brief sabbatical, the entry of Pepsi, the rise of refrigerator sales among the middle class, and the liberalisation of the Indian economy — meaning a lot more potential for a flood of fizzy drinks.
“There was a drop in sales in the late 1990s and early 2000s, and our share of the throat declined,” Tarundeep Singh Rana, general manager, marketing, Hamdard, was quoted as saying by Austen.
“Our brand needed to be reinvented and refreshed. We started new campaigns, got (actor) Juhi Chawla as our brand ambassador and established connections with resident welfare associations in cities across north India,” he added.
In 2010, Rakesh Nayyar, a trained chartered accountant from the UK and old hunting partner of Abdul Mueed, was brought on board, “after Mueed told him he wanted to hang his boots when the company touched Rs 500 crore in revenue”, The Economic Times reported in May 2013.
“Why not Rs 1,000 crore?” Nayyar reportedly asked Mueed, who had until that moment considered it impossible.
Consequently, Hamdard saw an organisation-wide transformation, with a slew of professionals and consultants with FMCG and pharmaceutical experience hired. AC Nielsen (Now Nielsen Corporation) was called in to identify markets of potential growth, accounting firm Grant Thornton pitched extensive changes in management structures, only to eventually be rejected, and finally Ernst and Young “stepped in and made some radical shifts”, ET reported.
Abdul Majeed was also responsible for convincing his father that change was needed. Mueed, despite being a qualified pharmacist with a degree from Chelsea Technical College, UK, had reservations about the sweeping changes being suggested by the consulting houses. His son is reported to have told him then that his legacy would take shape depending on whether he was the man to transform Hamdard or not.
Mueed, arguably, can be credited with directing the course of Hamdard in the 21st century, because, by 2012-2013, RoohAfza sales were back up at 20 million bottles annually.
“A lot of people were sitting in the same positions for a long time, so there needed to be a change, fresh blood and fresh thought needed to come in,” Mansoor Ali, head of sales and marketing at Hamdard, told Quartz in 2017.
When Quartz profiled Hamdard two years ago, the organisation had already launched its first-ever RoohAfza pet bottles (250ml for Rs 50) and the ready-to-drink RoohAfza Fusion (at Rs 20 for 200ml).
What started out as medicine was now again India’s (and Pakistan’s) favourite summer sip.
Also read: Everyone has got it wrong in the Ramadan-Ramzan debate. And no, it’s not about Wahhabism
Childhood memory. Good with water, great with milk.