Watch: A vestigial accessory

A person halts another unknown passerby and asks ‘What’s time’? We all have been witness to this situation many a times. Alas! This is history now. Watch has lost all its relevance. 

When our forefathers found that time is the only thing that cannot be controlled, they devised ways in which we can measure time. From the earliest recorded history, calculating time has been the concern and passion for man and India was at forefront with monuments like ‘Jantar Mantar’ still standing today. The earliest sundials and weight machines were an endeavour in this respect. 

Let me take you back to watch era phase I when there were only Pocket watches. The watches were worn in a pendant style from the neck but with the introduction of waistcoats, they were worn in pockets. Learned and affluent people used to wear watches and their wives tied their watches to the end of their saree at the waist. This was phase I. 

In the second phase in 1970s, electronic watches came and replaced mechanical watches forever. Watch became a status symbol. This was also the phase when fathers started telling their son to get good marks in board and the prize will be a watch. Also, a trend began with any tom, dick and harry gifting a watch to his son-in-law. There were two main brands available in India in seventies namely HMT, Ricoh. With the launch of Titan from the TATA stable in 1989, watches became as much an instrument of showing time, as a work of art. 

With India going global in Nineties began Phase III, we for the first time realised that there are watches costing more than salary of India’s Prime Minister. There was a flood of brands and watch retail stores came into picture. Now watches are marketed on the perceived value of one’s style, taste, and individuality. 

Nowadays, we see time everywhere – on news channels, on our PCs, mobiles etc. How well we use time is another story and I will go there some other time. Like time, watches have moved from monuments to pockets to hands and now we only see them in print ads of the elite magazines. 

Watches have become akin to a Junk Drawer in our house or like human body full of vestigial organs like muscles in our ear or tailbones etc. Watches just remain souvenirs of our evolutionary past. We don't use them for their original purpose anymore, and this small narration is a stunted memento of that original function.