"Can I ask you for the ring you are wearing," Amazing David suddenly says to a woman sitting at a table near him in a restaurant. Flummoxed, she hands over the ring to him, and the he hides it behind a piece of cloth. He removes the cloth - and, of course, the ring is gone. And now there it is, within seconds, dangling with keys from a chain which the magician has pulled out of his pocket.

His act surprises the clients, for David is not a performer at the Calcutta restaurant. He just stands up - in the midst of a conversation with this correspondent - to make a point about how magic acts can entertain diners even in restaurants.

But magic, clearly, does not hold much magic any more.

Harry Potter and his Hogwarts School sell magic across the world through books, films and merchandise, but there are few takers for the art in India. Increasingly, many magicians are looking at other vocations to be able to make a living.

One of the reasons for the decline, they say, is that the government doesn't see magic as an art - unlike, say, dance, music or painting. "There are no funds to encourage the spread and growth of magic. There are schemes and funds galore for theatre and the fine arts. But nothing for us," rues Sumit Kharbanda, president of the Indian Brotherhood of Magicians (IBM) and a full-time magician for the past 10 years.

There was a time when a magic show in a city was a major attraction, quite like the circus. Children wore their Sunday best, and sat mesmerised as a magician sawed a woman in half, or made his assistant, usually a woman in a sequinned costume, disappear inside a box.

But today, the young - and the old - have a huge spectrum of entertaining acts to choose from. There are music gigs, flash mobs, cricket through the year, glitzy kabaddi and hockey matches, car races, rahgiri days when citizens dance and sing in downtown areas, stand-up comedy, a variety of films in multiplexes and what have you.

R.K. Malayath, at 65 one of the senior most magicians in southern India, also attributes the gradual decline of magic shows to the spread of television and mass media.

To top it, the illusionists complain, magic is not esoteric anymore. To know the secrets of an act, all that you have to do is log on to the Internet.

"There's no mystery in magic anymore. People know how it happens. The backbone of any magic performance is secrecy," Malayath, head of the magic troupe Mysteria in Kerala, states.

Not surprisingly, magic shows are on the decline, and magicians feel the pinch. Kharbanda holds that there are 400-500 magicians in and around Delhi, but they all have to look for other kinds of work to run their homes. "With no funds, one has to find sponsors to arrange a magic show or even take part in international competitions. There is no respect in society for magic as an art form," Kharbanda says.

The scenario is not very different in Bengal, though some of the magic stalwarts - such as P.C. Sorcar senior, Goutam Guha and Samiran - helped in its spread across the country.

"A 45-minute show would get me not more than a thousand rupees. People spend 10 times more on even amateur singers," says magician Saptarshi Purakait, who lives in village Dhamua near Baruipur in Bengal.

There is nothing that Purakait, 25, can't do with a pack of cards - and bewilders you equally with a spoon or a fork. But he points out that he is booked for only two or three shows a month. So he runs a cell phone repairing shop as a side business to make both ends meet. "But I can never leave magic and will be a magician in my heart till I die," he says.

Life is not easy for the senior magicians either. Shankar Lal Roy, or Magic Prince S. Lal, received accolades worldwide, and won two International Brotherhood of Magic awards. But when he was diagnosed with cancer, it was fellow magicians who came to his aid.

With few shows, Lal today manufactures magic props for an export company. "The dearth of shows in Bengal has forced many magicians to go into prop manufacturing. Bengal is a hub of magic prop manufacturing and is one of the leaders in exports globally," says Santanu Sen, secretary, Federation of Indian Magic Associates.

The dismal state of magicians in Bengal has been captured in a recent film called Fading Magic: the Story of Kolkata's Magicians by Amit Sahai. "There are many like Lal who are extremely talented but lack a platform to showcase their work. Many are exiting the profession to survive while some are holding on to it hoping for some miracle," Sahai says.

The situation in Bengal, indeed, seems worse than elsewhere. Sen points out that there are 3,000-odd magicians in Bengal who earn much less than their counterparts elsewhere, especially in Maharashtra and south India. "We have given proposals to the state government to alleviate the condition of magicians here. We have got a positive response," says Sen. One of the proposals is to revive Magic Melas, fairs where magicians perform their tricks.

Melas, a few restaurants in holiday resorts and birthday parties are some of the common platforms for magic. Often, magicians are invited by corporate houses to entertain employees. David, 27, is a regular at such events.

Lal, however, rues that many amateur magicians perform without proper knowledge or practice.

"Nowadays we see a lot of young people who just buy props and perform at birthday parties. Most of them don't learn magic properly. One needs a lot of practice. Also, they lack showmanship," Lal, who has been performing for 45 years, adds.

Kharbanda believes that magic has a future if magicians can be affiliated to a formal organisation or if an institute is set up to teach magic. "The IBM has been requesting the ministry of culture since 1982 for land to build a proper magic academy. Though they have shown an interest, it has yielded no result," he says.

The experts stress that for magic to survive, practitioners have to innovate, evolve and develop their skills regularly and come up with new acts. "Practice is the only way to become an expert. And magic can survive only if the performer is perfect," says R. Rajesh Kumar, an established magician of Chennai.

P.C. Sorcar Junior, however, doesn't believe that magic is on the decline, and pooh-poohs the fact that many have other professions.

"Show me anyone who is a full-time author or tabla player. Everyone does something to sustain themselves," he says.

His success - his shows are sell-outs - in the districts of Bengal and the fact that he maintains a troupe of 93 people through the year indicate that magic can thrive.

"Magic is a state of art which should not be performed but attained. People make coins disappear, I make the Taj Mahal and elephants on stage disappear," he says. "The quality is falling, but the demand for magic shows can never go down," he says.