Mom Opens Sweet Shop Named After Her Daughter in India

When customers first see the sign "Ghosal & Daughter" above a sweet shop in Howrah, India, most assume a father runs the business. But Sutapa Ghosal built this shop entirely herself in 2018, and she's raising her daughter Momoiro to inherit it.

Before selling traditional Indian sweets like kalakand and milk cake, Sutapa worked as a television announcer for Doordarshan, India's national broadcaster. She also earned a PhD in drama from Rabindra Bharati University.

When she decided to enter the food business, Sutapa went back to school for a degree in food processing from Jadavpur University. She started from scratch, with no family recipes to inherit and no network of skilled sweet makers to call on.

"Being a sole entrepreneur in the sweet industry without a family business to inherit, one of the toughest challenges I face is finding skilled sweet makers," she told My Kolkata. She now hires staff from nearby Nadia and Howrah districts.

The shop's name wasn't just clever marketing. It was Momoiro who encouraged her mother to open the business in the first place. "My daughter has been my biggest support throughout my journey," Sutapa said.

Sunny's Take

What makes this story sweet goes beyond the kalakand behind the glass counter. In a country where business names ending in "& Sons" have made male succession feel inevitable, Sutapa chose to name her shop after the daughter who will inherit it.

She faced the quiet resistance many women entrepreneurs know well. "It doesn't matter who claims our society has overcome the traditional norms; women endure the silent gaze of patriarchy even today," she said.

West Bengal leads India with over 23 percent of its small businesses owned by women, according to official surveys. Sutapa's shop adds to that growing number while doing something more deliberate: making the mother-to-daughter succession visible from the street.

Every time a customer glances up at that signboard and questions their assumptions about who built this business, something shifts. The shop proves that dreams and legacies don't need a patriarch's blessing to move forward.

Eight years later, Ghosal & Daughter keeps serving fresh sweets to regulars in one of Kolkata's busiest commercial districts, quietly rewriting the script on who gets to pass down what they've built.