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Big business in Little India: Commerce flourishes in vibrant ethnic neighborhood

littleindia7.jpg Sangeeta Piparia inside Myyraa, her fashion jewelry store in Iselin.

"People love me,” says a beaming Jayesh Saraiya, perched behind the counter of his neon-lit music store.

No wonder; Sangeet, his shop on Oak Tree Road in Iselin, is jammed with 5,000 movies and 75,000 CDs, the latter including everything from “Punjab Sad Songs” and “Trance of India” to “Dance Radio Asia” and “Shake it Party Hits.”

As Saraiya spoke, a flute solo from a CD provided soothing, hypnotic mood music.

“This is the music,” says Kapil Shah, eyes alight. “Saturday night, with a couple of beers.”

It’s difficult not to be swept up in the sounds, smells and sights of Oak Tree Road in Woodbridge and Edison. Two blocks and adjacent streets in Iselin alone — the epicenter of this Little India — are filled with nearly 100 stores of dizzying variety. Music shops. Jewelry stores. Restaurants. Sweets and snacks shops. Clothing stores. Hair salons. Antique shops, a pharmacy, shipping firms, dancing schools, plus offices belonging to doctors, lawyers, accountants, real estate agents and other professionals.

Farther west, on the other side of the Parkway in Edison, are two Indian-owned banks, Indus American Bank and Habib American Bank. Also in Edison is Big Cinemas, which shows Indian movies only.

littleindia1.jpg The two blocks of Oak Tree Road in Iselin are known as India Square.

The two commerce-crazy blocks of Oak Tree Road in Iselin are now officially known as India Square.

“Like Times Square,” points out Manher Shah, like Kapil Shah an officer in the Indian Business Association.

India Square may not boast the bright lights and 24/7 drama of Times Square, but there’s plenty of feverish activity in those two blocks, where skirts give way to saris and free copies of Desi Talk and News India Times are available in newspaper boxes.

There’s a line at Chowpatty Chavana & Sweet Mart, where display cases are packed with halwa, a pudding-like dessert filled with different combinations of fruits, vegetables, nuts and grains; milk cakes; chocolate nut rolls and papdi chips, fried chips made from chick peas. Good luck resisting the chorafali, a spicy crispy chip sprinkled with red pepper.

Need to speak to the boss? Owner Chandrakant Patel sits at a desk in the middle of the action, just past the last display case.

It didn’t take long for Oak Tree Road to be transformed into one of the state’s most vibrant ethnic neighborhoods. In the late 1980s, Oak Tree Road in Iselin amounted to a collection of bars, pizzerias, a barber shop, hardware store and other businesses. In 1987, Chetan Nayar opened Sona Jewelers in 1987; a friend opened a restaurant nearby. They were two of the first four Indian-owned businesses here. The neighborhood, by all accounts, needed an infusion.

“There were three or four bars on the block,” recalls Mahesh Shah, owner of Quality Auto, a repair shop across the street from Chowpatty. “Most of the stores were closed down, boarded up.”

littleindia3.jpg Jayesh Saraiya inside his music store, Sangeet.

Indians who had been living in Jersey City started looking for affordable homes in the suburbs with good schools and access to major highways and mass transportation. The logical choice was Edison, where an estimated 35,000 people of Indian origin now live, compared with about 15,000 in Woodbridge.

There was some opposition when the first Indian businesses appeared on Oak Tree Road — Mahesh Shah remembers egg throwing and window breaking — but it soon waned. The Indian Business Association formed in 1991; the statewide association now has 275 members, about 100 in Edison and Woodbridge combined.

In 1991, the state’s first Navratri festival — the word is Hindu for “nine nights’’ — was held here, according to Mahesh Shah and others. Oak Tree Road’s transformation to Little India was complete.

“We put the seeds down; now everyone shares the fruit,” Kapil Shah says of the Indian Business Association.

Celebrating Diwali

This week, India Square was busier than ever, as Indians celebrated Diwali, the five-day Festival of Lights, celebrating the triumph of good over evil and marking the Indian New Year. The biggest event on the social calendar here, though, is the annual India Independence Day Parade in August, which features food, music, dancing and an appearance by a major Bollywood star.

littleindia4.jpg A Hindu priest leads prayers in preparation for Diwali inside Sahil, a boutique on Oak Tree Road.

The two-block stretch may boast the highest concentration of beauty salons and jewelry stores in the state, but there seems to be enough business for everyone. While the fashionable Sona Jewelers concentrates on high-end pieces, Myyraa sells fashion jewelry and accessories — pendants, necklaces, bangles, anklets, belts, handbags and other items for “small occasions, medium occasions and grand occasions,” according to owner Sangeeta Piparia.

“I opened in October 2008. A month later, they declared a recession,” Piparia says with a wry smile. “Somehow, I survived.”

Maybe the string of seven chilies and one lemon hanging above the entrance — a traditional Indian charm to ward off evil spirits — helped.

Piparia makes three three-week trips to India every year, visiting manufacturers in as many as 10 cities, ordering custom-made pieces, such as shiny cell phone cases.

“Every six months. the fashion changes. I have to keep up,” Piparia explains. “The teenage crowd is very difficult.”

She calls herself the “Queen of Fashion Jewelry,” while labeling Chaman Nayar, son of Chetan Nayar, the “King of Fine Jewelry.”

littleindia6.jpg The interior of Sona Jewelers, Oak Tree Road.

“My dad started with one (jewelry) counter,” Chaman Nayar explains inside Sona Jewelers. “Every year, there would be another counter. Back then gold was so cheap people were buying it like groceries. It was $250 an ounce; now it’s $1,700-plus.”

Mahesh Shah calls the 40-year-old Nayar a key part of Little India’s future.

“You have to attract the younger generation,” Shah explains. “We want to make this street a brand.”

Inside Patel Brothers market are neat rows of fresh cucumbers, tomatoes, pumpkins — along with suran (yams), chutneys, almond oil and other traditional foodstuffs.


littleindia5.jpg

Jimmy Patel talks on his cell phone as he stocks produce inside Patel Brothers.


A sign outside Dimple’s Bombay Talk advertises Badshah Falooda milk shakes, generally made with milk, rose syrup and vermicelli and topped with ice cream.

Lovely Sweets advertises “100% pure vegetarian, sweets and snacks.”

One restaurant promotes “all kinds of masala & pan,” while another offers a 12-piece seekh kabab for $15.

Temptation is everywhere. Outside is the intoxicating aroma of grilled meats and fruity sweets and fried chips — and the seeming sweet smell of success.

Kapil Shah takes in the view and smiles. “One-stop everything,” he says.

Peter Genovese: (973) 392-1765, pgenovese@starledger.com, Twitter: @NJ_Munchmobile and @petegenovese