How to put Indian textiles centrestage

The past few months I have been pre-occupied working with weavers from Chanderi in Madhya Pradesh and a few wooden block printers from Ayodhya and Faizabad in Uttar Pradesh. Incidentally, the wooden block printer had come asking me to help him find a factory job and the thought was so heart-breaking that I decided to design some sarees to help him tide over a temporary bad patch. I called my weaver from Chanderi to send me some sarees that had space to print on them in the sense that weaving didn’t cover the entire saree. Now this weaver is a graduate who not only sent me images on WhatsApp and after I selected the pieces, he couriered the stuff and within 10 days, my first batch of sarees was ready! The social media helped me to reach out to fellow saree wearers and many younger people who were happy to acquire the sarees. I decided to put the profit money in a small fund to help other weavers whenever I came across such situations.

The idea behind recounting this story is to not pin a halo around my head, but to share that however small the drop in a vast ocean, it always helps to lend a helping hand. Now with the change of guard in the ministry of textiles at the apex level there is some hope that handlooms will get the much-needed fillip.

It has to be a multi-pronged strategy to stem the rot and put Indian textiles centrestage again. From preserving the old designs — many of which are nearly defunct, getting weavers and other related artisans to upgrade their skills to enable them to earn better wages, skill development of the children of artisans to enable them to carry forward the tradition and make it blossom further, training the next generations to use their educational skills to catapult themselves on to bigger stages.

Most importantly, since weaving takes place in easily identifiable craft pockets, designing syllabus to enable children to study and carry on with their vocation of weaving as well. As a former consultant to the ministry of human resource development, I have tried several times to push for designing school syllabus in these crafts pockets with the children of crafts people in mind but to no avail.

The reason for my syllabus agenda is very simple: India is divided into clear craft and weaving centres where for want of better alternatives, all children go to the same schools.

However, the needs of children from artisan families are not addressed as the education being provided in not relevant to them and there are many dropouts or misfits who don’t wish to take the family tradition forward.

The story of my block printer Naseeb is no different. His father was one of the finest block printers I know and he tried to send his two sons to school and simultaneously taught them the skill of printing. They didn’t do well academically and became dropouts but learnt block printing very well, but at the same time have been unable to take it to the next level to expand their work laterally.

On the other hand, I must share the story of my Chanderi weaver Mohammed. Mohammed studied to become a college graduate but instead of looking for a job, expanded the family tradition of weaving to another level by taking a bank loan, putting looms in his sister’s and various cousins’ homes, mentored other members of the family to further develop their weaving skills and used the social media to hawk his wares.

He used his educated mind to improvise some of the looms, revive exquisite defunct designs and has helped his entire family to prosper alongside by functioning like a mini co-operative. He has got the women of the family to weave within the privacy of their homes and eliminated the exploitation of the middleman and empowered his family.

Traditional poetry in India likens life itself to cloth on a loom. It is no surprise then that textiles have had such an intrinsic and perhaps intimate relationship within the Indian cultural, spiritual and economic context.

The fact that Indian textiles have captured the imagination of art historians and connoisseurs alike and generate tremendous interest is amply borne out by the fact that a large number of publications on the subject have and continue to emanate from all over the world. Unfortunately, while some styles and weaving techniques have disappeared over the years, others have seen resurgence and renewed vigour over the last few years where tradition has taken the step forward to explore newer vistas.

India, with its breathtaking and varied textile traditions, is in the enviable position of having practically all the styles of weaving, printing and embroidery still intact.

While photographs and other published material has been seen, the actual textiles have been seen in fragments.

It is my dream to curate an exhibition that will attempt to give a pan-Indian overview of the amazing dexterity and mind-boggling range of textiles that form part of the sub-continent’s great cultural heritage.

The idea is to showcase and put on board some of the stunning examples of these works as part of commitment towards the great heritage of Indian textiles and crafts, which employ nearly 50 million people in India.

Indian textiles find mention in some of the ancient bandishs and texts.

In fact a whole stream of music developed in parts of India to help the young weavers to learn by shruti – listening – and smriti – remembering complicated patterns by heart to ensure that no graphs or written patterns were needed and hence could never be stolen or copied.

Dr Alka Raghuvanshi is an art writer, curator and artist and can be contacted on alkaraghuvanshi@yahoo.com