For more than five decades, Aashirwad Pan Shop has been delighting paan lovers in Nagpur, popularly known as the Orange City, with its delicious and distinctive paan creations. Speaking to Tobacco Plus, proprietor Jayanta Ganpatra Bhoya said that the paan business is a family legacy passed down to him. His father started the shop nearly 50 years ago, at a time when Jayanta himself had not yet been born.
What began as a small paan shop has now grown into a spacious, fully air-conditioned outlet. Its biggest strength, however, remains unchanged—an uncompromising commitment to the quality of its paan.
This commitment to purity and quality is what brings customers from different parts of Nagpur to enjoy its signature paans. Every ingredient used in each paan is carefully selected for its purity and high quality. From chuna and kattha to supari and cardamom, only premium-quality ingredients are used. For Aashirwad Pan Shop, there is simply no compromise when it comes to quality. This uncompromising approach has become the shop’s biggest USP.
The Art of Creating the Perfect Paan
Preparing a paan is an art, and Aashirwad Pan Shop is a strong example of this craftsmanship. The shop specialises in creating a wide variety of meetha paans, each offering a distinctly different taste and experience.
Its range includes dry-fruit paan, chocolate paan and paans featuring a variety of fruit flavours, all of which attract customers with their unique presentation and taste.
The shop also provides paan services for weddings and other special occasions on order. Its popularity can be judged by the fact that customers who taste its paan once often return again and again.
Purity, Hygiene and Branded Ingredients
Known throughout Nagpur for its delicious meetha paan, Aashirwad Pan Shop considers cleanliness, hygiene and purity to be its biggest USPs.
The selection of kattha, chuna and, particularly, paan leaves is carried out with great care. The ingredients and specially prepared homemade masalas used in the paans give them a distinctive taste that sets them apart from those available at other shops.
The shop also places considerable emphasis on cleanliness and the way the paan is prepared and served, making the overall experience pleasant for customers.
Only branded ingredients are used in its paans. Whether it is chutney, gulkand, coconut or cherry, every ingredient is selected with an emphasis on quality.
For chutney, the shop uses Baba’s Meenakshi Navratan and KTC’s Green Gold for flavoured chutney, while Tower Gulkand is sourced directly from Ajmer. The chuna and kattha are also specially prepared in-house using a traditional method.
The price of its regular paans ranges from ₹30 to ₹70. For special occasions, the shop offers its First Night Paan at ₹1,100, although it can also prepare the paan for ₹500 on special request.
Chaman Chutney: The Bestseller
With more than two dozen varieties of paan on offer, Chaman Chutney is the most popular variety at Aashirwad Pan Shop.
It is prepared using a distinctive combination of Chaman Bahar and chutney, creating a unique flavour that has become a favourite among customers.
Other popular varieties include Masala Paan, Chocolate Paan, Pineapple Paan, Khas Paan, Strawberry Paan, Jelly Paan, Fresh Fruit Paan, Dry Fruit Paan and Mixed Fruit Paan, among others.
The Special Kolkata Khar Paan
According to Jayanta Bhoya, the shop uses only Kolkata Khar Paan for its paans, which is sourced directly from Kolkata.
Preparing these leaves requires considerable effort. They have to be washed and cleaned thoroughly, a process that can produce a strong odour. Cleaning around 500 leaves takes nearly two hours.
However, the effort is considered worthwhile. Kolkata Khar Paan is regarded as particularly suitable as a digestive paan and can remain fresh for around 15 days. The leaves are also considerably larger than those used for many other varieties of paan.
Jayanta uses these large leaves to create paans that remain firmly folded and do not open even when thrown, reflecting the care and skill involved in their preparation.
A Customer Flow That Continues Till Late Night
The shop’s commitment to maintaining the quality of every ingredient keeps customers coming throughout the day. From the time the shop opens at 8 a.m. until 11 p.m., there is a steady flow of customers.
Its distinctive paans have built a loyal following, with many customers becoming regular visitors after experiencing the taste for the first time.
Over the years, Aashirwad Pan Shop has also served paans to personalities from different walks of life, including people associated with sports, politics, industry and Bollywood.
According to Jayanta Bhoya, Nitin Gadkari, M.S. Dhoni and Ashish Vidyarthi have also tasted the shop’s paans.
Wedding and other special-event orders are another important part of the business. Whenever such orders are received, Aashirwad Pan Shop ensures that they are fulfilled with the same attention to quality, hygiene and presentation that customers have come to expect.
A Legacy Built on Taste and Trust
From a small shop started by his father nearly five decades ago to a modern, air-conditioned destination for paan lovers, Aashirwad Pan Shop represents a successful combination of tradition, craftsmanship, quality and consistency.
Its philosophy remains simple: never compromise on the quality of ingredients and never compromise on the taste of the paan. That commitment has helped the shop build a strong reputation in Nagpur and turn its paans into a lasting favourite among generations of customers.