Dolma Tsering prefers her old keypad phone to smartphones because she likes to keep to the basics and a few constants in her life. Just like the momos she sells at Lajpat Nagar’s Central Market — those glistening dumplings bursting with fillings of meat, cottage cheese and aromatic spices — that make for an easy meal on the go and have oozed their goodness into the street food culture across north India.
But constancy isn’t a shield for originality, as Tsering discovered the hard way, registering her trademark years after “poor imitators” in the business ran away with her name. While she got too busy perfecting her momos and won loyalists, converts and fame, others scented prospects in borrowing formula. That’s how a resident of Ghaziabad registered a trademark called “Dolma Aunty Momo’s” in 2018. It took her two years of legal battle at the Delhi High Court to first register her trademark on November 17, 2023 and then win her case as the original creator recently.
Crowd at Dolma Aunty Momos at Lajpat Nagar market in New Delhi. (Express photo by Chitral Khambhati)
“Many people asked me if I had outlets in NCR. Then, my son found multiple Dolma Aunty’s Momos listed on food delivery apps. I also visited some of these places, mostly cloud kitchens or just a counter,” says Tsering, 55, who has now tagged the word “original” in her signages. Most of the newbies hoped to grow as big as her, thinking a Tibetan-sounding name would be enough to convince new customers of their originality.
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Dreams in a momo
Why did selling momos seem like a ticket to a slice of big city life for a labourer, contractor or even a house help? That’s because this Tibetan woman from Bylakuppe in Karnataka, who landed in Delhi in the early 1990s, not only democratised the momo as everyman’s food but also fuelled every migrant’s dream to create their own world of possibilities.
Workers prepare Tibetan dish momo at Dolma Tshering’s ‘Dolma Aunty Momos’ at Lajpat Nagar market in New Delhi. (Express photo by Chitral Khambhati)
Supervising the mixing of the dough and making sure the wispy twirl on the momo doesn’t crust up, Tsering says, “I began with just a 500-gram batch at that hole-in-the-wall I rented here. Nobody knew what a momo looked like. I wondered if the small traders and everyday shoppers around me would take to what was novel for them. But they seemed to like an anytime pop-in-your-mouth snack. The chutney worked best. Today, every alley across the city has more than one momo vendor. I love it that everyone is earning a livelihood. But they shouldn’t be stealing my name or claim their momos are of the kind I make.”
Over the years, she has trained her own kitchen hands and family members to work with a beehive efficiency, the outer wrap not a micron thicker or thinner, sharing her self-taught skills with others.
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Crowd at Dolma Aunty Momos at Lajpat Nagar market in New Delhi. (Express photo by Chitral Khambhati)
Now Tsering doesn’t need to tell her own story. Other migrant vendors, whose entrepreneurial spirit she has nurtured, do that for her. Ask Ramu, 38, a Nepalese migrant in the lanes of Bhogal, how he is trying to make up for a job loss during the Covid years. A cloth vendor by day, he is looking to double his income with his evening momo van, which is swarming with young students from Nizamuddin.
Ramu, a clothes vendor, attends his wife Amrita’s momo stall in a market in Jangpura’s Bhogal in New Delhi. (Express photo by Chitral Khambhati)
“If Dolma aunty could do it, I will too,” says Ramu, who credits his wife Amrita for his unique garlic-heavy sauce. The couple wakes up at 4.30 am to prepare batches of momos, just enough to last till midnight. Ramu cannot afford a refrigerator yet as he pays the shop owner whose frontage he uses to park his mobile van. “These are good to break our roza (fast) with,” says one of the students, not before reassuring him they will do a dua (prayer) for him to open his restaurant some day.
Naseer Ahamed, 65, who came to India all the way from Afghanistan seven years ago, added momos to his menu because that was the done thing by every street food vendor in the backlanes of Jangpura. But Dolma Aunty’s Afghani momos inspired him to revive mantus, the authentic Afghan dumpling stuffed with lamb mixed in onions and spices and dribbled with yoghurt sauce. “These are hot-sellers too,” he says. A couple of metres away, sits Ramesh, 32, from Uttar Pradesh, who has adapted a food that he did not grow up with by adding his own dash of spices. Daily-wage earners make a beeline for his desi spin.
Inspired by Dolma Tsering, Naseer Ahamed, 65, who came to India from Afghanistan seven years ago, decided to revive mantus, the authentic Afghan dumpling stuffed with lamb mixed in onions and spices and dribbled with yoghurt sauce. (Express photo by Chitral Khambhati)
Business advice on the side
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Tsering has kept her hole-in-the-wall steam momo counter as her pride of place, to keep herself grounded and remind others how she began. Now she hand-holds the entire tribe of mobile vendors in Central Market to expand and diversify. She has inspired Farooq, 33, from Siliguri in West Bengal, who sells women’s scarves at Rs 100 a piece just around the corner of Tsering’s shop, which is fronted by a few wires and a pole.
“Aunty helped me put up a few hangers on wires and since her women customers are mostly students or office-goers, suggested that I sell scarves and accessories instead of dresses. Now I make anything between Rs 800 and Rs 1,000 a day. She even feeds me momos, which are priced at an affordable Rs 40-50 for half a plate and Rs 80-100 for a full plate, depending on the stuffing. I can have a full meal here without leaving my spot. The steamed ones are good for hot days,” he says, calling up his supplier in Amritsar for more office-friendly prints for working women.
Afghani momo from Dolma Tshering’s Dolma Aunty Momos at Lajpat Nagar market in New Delhi. (Express photo by Chitral Khambhati)
Tsering hasn’t put any chairs and tables in her forecourt, allowing a free space where mobile vendors weave their way among customers. Vijay from Agra, who used to sell peaco*ck feather fans, is one of them. “Auntyji taught me how to scent out business. Now I sell these green bottle lamps with fairy lights,” says the 22-year-old, who spends his daytime hours collecting wine bottles from scrap dealers in alleys. His customers are usually young couples starting out in life, out for an evening round of momos. “Every vendor here has learnt something from Auntyji. She has guided us on how to boost our sales,” he adds.
Tsering has also encouraged women from vendor families to display their skill set on the stone perch from where she keeps a watch on customers. Her encouragement nudged a young Seema to display her beaded place mats that have quite a few takers milling around her.
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Jaya Roopwani speaks with The Indian Express at Dolma Aunty Momos in Lajpat Nagar market of New Delhi. (Express photo by Chitral Khambhati)
Meanwhile, back at Dolma Aunty’s, the weekend crowd keeps buzzing as generations of loyalists keep coming back. Jaya Roopwani and Sachin Matpal, who have dated as students, got married and now work between Singapore and Dubai, still bond intimately over momos. “For the last 20 years, we haven’t missed eating these momos during our India visit. And they are just as good and comforting,” says Roopwani.
Even a trademark cannot secure a loyalty that has coalesced everybody’s hope together.
