A S ENTERPRISES
Plot no 19 A, Film City, Sector 16A, Noida, property, Uttar Pradesh 201301, India
https://www.indiamart.com/a-senterprises-delhiindia/
A S ENTERPRISES – Music Gear Heartbeat of Old Delhi
Step off the teeming pavement of Chandni Chowk and duck under the faded saffron awning at Shop No. 1818–1820, Khari Baoli Road; you have just crossed the threshold into A S ENTERPRISES. Three cramped floors above a century-old spice warehouse, this labyrinthine store has been the open secret of Delhi’s working musicians since 1982. Ashok “Ash” Sabharwal—still sporting the same velvet Nehru jacket he wore the day he opened—presides over an inventory that looks chaotic yet is mapped perfectly in his head. One wall teeters with dusty Philips reel-to-reel decks, another glitters with newly-arrived Shure and Sennheiser mics; between them sit battered guitar cases that might hide a refinished 1960s Hofner or last week’s Blackstar combo.
Prices are scrawled in chalk on slate tags rather than barcode stickers, an invitation to elaborate haggling that Ash conducts like performance art. A vocalist looking for a ribbon mic can expect to be steered past rack-mounted compressors still warm from bench-testing and invited to sing a line into a 1960s Beyer M 130 while he twiddles pots. “Voice tells the real story,” he insists, his cigarette ash miraculously missing every pre-amp knob.
What separates A S ENTERPRISES from the neon-lit chain stores downtown is tribal knowledge. Ash’s nephews, Sandeep and Ravi, are underground circuit guitarists who run week-night repair sessions on the roof amid pigeons and smog. They bias vintage Marantz amps with oscilloscopes older than themselves, rewind pickup coils over cups of cutting chai, and have been known to fabricate replacement tremolo arms from salvaged scooter spokes when the original is unobtainable. Bands on tight tour schedules treat the shop as a field hospital: Midnight SOS calls yield replacement tubes yanked from Ash’s personal stash and couriered to whichever stadium or wedding palace needs them.
Listening booths aren’t padded booths at all; they are two battered Marantz Imperial 12 speakers wedged between burlap sacks of cardamom that impregnate every cable with a faint spice scent clientele swear improves high-frequency response. The modest 25-watt practice corner manages to stay booked because any instrument can be plugged in free of charge. A sign, half English, half Devanagari, announces “No Stairway. Try Your Own Raga.”
Credit comes without paperwork: touring DJs leave pawn-shop-style pledges—passports, festival wristbands—against the loan of a spare interface. Months later, they return, alien currency in hand, to collect a memory chip still warm with jungle samples. Regulars dub the place “the friendly sabzi-mandi of decibels,” and Ash beams at the oxymoron. By closing time, shutters come down to the ring of F-sharp major from a repurposed Phillips intercom—an unobtrusive signature tune that assures Delhi’s night-bus musicians their sonic sanctuary is still alive.
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- Published: August 2, 2025
