Attend this bar crawl to discover Mumbai's iconic permit rooms

This weekend, take a nostalgic trip with a bar crawl that takes you through the tales and tipples of the city’s iconic permit rooms

With high-end pubs and funky resto-bars preferred options, it’s easy to miss Mumbai’s permit rooms — cosy, dim spaces where drinking culture flourished decades ago. Old-timers will recall the charm of sipping on drinks in such places that still offer VFM rates. This Sunday, Permit & Co will organise a bar crawl across some of these iconic permit rooms.

A view of Café Universal’s interiors. Pic courtesy/Aditya Vijay Hegde

“During the lockdown, we realised that whenever things go bad, people tend to go back to the basics. That is what reignited my interest in the city’s permit room culture. We sampled almost 10 permit rooms and zeroed down on the ones that have been included for this crawl. With this bar crawl, the idea is to take a group of people to these classic establishments and discover their stories,” Aditya Vijay Hegde, the restaurant’s founder shares.

Shanta, a rum-based cocktail included in the navarasa menu. Pic courtesy/Sundays

Conceptualised as a series, the monthly bar crawls will focus on one area at a time. “From Bandra to Lower Parel and other locales, we will conduct these crawls in almost all parts of the city. I remember my father and cousins frequenting permit rooms. Be it the ambience, the music or classic bar snacks like chakli and chutney, the feeling of camaraderie there is a different experience. We want to take people to these spots in a guided manner to make it easy for them to enjoy the experience,” he explains, adding that each stop will be for half an hour, with drinks and nibbles.

Aditya Vijay Hegde

With the first stop at Colaba-based bar Gokul, the two-hour crawl will cover Sunlight and Café Universal, and will wrap up at Permit & Co. “People can enjoy drinks outside of the ones we have included in the session and there will be food options at each place,” Hegde adds. They are also collaborating with mixologist, V Karthik Kumar who runs Sundays, a restaurant and cocktail bar in Chennai. “He will be presenting navarasa, a curated collection of nine cocktails based on nine emotions. It is incidental that the Mumbai Indians versus Chennai Super Kings T20 match will be played on the same date,” Hegde concludes.

ON March 23; 4 pm onwards
MEETING POINT Bademiya, Tulloch Road, Apollo Bunder, Colaba. 
LOG ON TO @permitandco (to register; limited spots available) 
AGE GROUP 25 years and above
COST Rs 2,500 (inclusive of drinks, snacks and travel)

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