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IA S BABA

Baba’s Gurukul
The Guru-shishya Parampara Continues….

BABA’S GURUKUL FOUNDATION - 2023

(For Freshers)

HISTORY NCERT MODULE (PART 2)

VALUE ADD NOTES (VAN)
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Notes
Contents
CRAFT .......................................................................................................................................... 1
CLAY ............................................................................................................................................ 9
POTTERY ................................................................................................................................... 10
STONE ....................................................................................................................................... 15
PAINTINGS ................................................................................................................................ 68
THEATRE CRAFTS ...................................................................................................................... 79
CRAFTS IN THE PAST ................................................................................................................. 89
COLONIAL RULE AND CRAFTS ................................................................................................... 96
MAHATMA GANDHI AND SELF-SUFFICIENCY ......................................................................... 107
POTTERY ................................................................................................................................. 107
HANDLOOM AND HANDICRAFTS REVIVAL ............................................................................. 111
CRAFT IN THE AGE OF TOURISM............................................................................................. 138
DESIGN AND DEVELOPMENT .................................................................................................. 143

Living Craft Traditions of India

Sources-11th NCERT
o Chapters 1 to 10

Note:
UPSC has asked a few questions from aspects covered in this book but you
never know when UPSC is known to throw surprises. Secondly, you can
effectively utilize content from here in Mains too since a lot of fodder material
is there.

There are a lot of aspects of Art and Culture that can be asked from this section.
We will be covering such aspects in advance module taking inference from
UPSC’s PYQ’s. So here, we will stick only to NCERT’s content.

CRAFT

India is a combination of many worlds, living in many centuries and cultures.

CRAFT
The world of India’s craftspeople spans millennia and spreads across the length
and breadth of our land, which is seen in cities and towns, by-lanes and villages.

A small crafted object made in an unknown village of India has the capacity of
becoming an object displayed in the finest museums of the world, but the
people who made it never thinks of it as a great art.

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It is often a lack of knowledge of the variety of cultures, techniques, meanings, Notes

uses and relevance of such handcrafted objects that allows us to neglect their
beauty and take our cultural heritage for granted.

The Definition of Crafts:

Indian words for handicrafts are commonly hastkala, hastshilp, dastkari,

karigari. The aesthetic content is an intrinsic part of handicrafts.

Note- aesthetic means something that is concerned with beauty. E.g., Nike
shoes feature many aesthetic traits that make them unique.

However, handicrafts have practical use too, they are not just decorative. Crafts
are closely related to the cultural heritage of the people of a region. The crafts
are influenced by the history, tradition, values, habits etc. and therefore they
vary and are unique from region to region.

Image: Wall and floor decoration in a house, Jharkhand

Crafts through the Ages:

India has been greatly blessed by having a many-layered, culturally diverse, rich
heritage of craft skills influenced by historical events combining with local
practices and religious beliefs. These influences have come from multiple
sources,

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• The skill of weaving carpets and superior forms of shawls was brought Notes

to Kashmir by the pre-Moghul king, Zain-ul-Abedin. Persian artisans

enriched carpet-weaving and shawl-making according to the needs of
Indian courts.

Image: Carpets of Kashmir

Note- Ghiyas-ud-Din Zain-ul-Abidin (r. 1420 – 1470 CE) was Kashmir's eighth
sultan. His subjects referred to him as Bod Shah (Great King).

Do you know: Zain-ul-Abedin was called 'Akbar of Kashmir'.

• Historically, the static nature of the Hindu caste system has kept many
craft forms alive merely because the artisan had no opportunity to
move away to other professions as social boundaries were rigid and
hierarchical.

• The courts of various maharajas encouraged excellence in many courtly

crafts connected with the making of armoury or jewellery.

• Temples kept alive the finest metal work, stone carving, mural painting
and even textile weaving right across India, and particularly in South
India. Kammalars who claimed descent from the five divine artisan sons
of Lord Visvakarma, followed the Shilpa Shastras.

Note-

• The Kammalar is a Tamil caste group found in Tamil Nadu. The

Kammalars are involved in crafting.

• Shilpa Shastras literally means the Science of Shilpa. It is an ancient

term for numerous Hindu texts that describe arts, crafts, and their
design rules, principles and standards.

• Murals are a large picture painted on a wall.

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Notes

Image: Mural painting in Ajanta caves.

Tribal Crafts:

Tribal communities comprise about eight per cent of the population of India.
Spread out in different parts of the country, they have continued with ancient
cultural practices related to their specific ways of life.

• In Jammu and Kashmir, the Gujjars and Bakarwals are mountain tribes
who spend their lives crossing over from one side of the mountains to
the other in search of grass for their sheep and goats. Their jewellery,
blankets, embroidered caps and tunics, saddle bags and sundry animal
accessories are similar to the artifacts of the people of Afghanistan,
Iran, Iraq and the smaller countries of Central Asia.

• Mirror work in embroidery of Saurashtra and the desert regions of

Kutch in Gujarat, and Rajasthan stems from the use of mica from the
desert sands in the garments of those who liked heavy and shining
ornamentation. Each group developed its own style of embroidery and
it is this that can still be clearly seen in the many communities that
inhabit the western region of India. Both, the identity of the tribe and
the marital status of a woman, are embedded in the style of the
embroidery and the colour and cut of the upper bodice worn by its
women.

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Notes

Image: Mirror work embroidery

• The various tribes inhabiting the north-east of India live among the rich
bamboo forests where the finest quality of skill in the weaving of
bamboo, cane and other wild grasses can be seen. This group links itself
culturally to the people of Myanmar, Thailand, Indonesia, Vietnam and
even Japan and China, where mat-weaving and basketry are of the
highest quality.

Image: Bamboo craft of north-east

• Handloom weaving too is a common skill of north-east region. Apart

from weaving ceremonial shawls and lungis, headscarves and waist
belts, small scarves for ceremonial greetings are woven in almost every
household. These cloths are revered for many reasons: they establish
the identity of the tribe or the status of the wearer, they serve as
welcome scarves to greet a visitor, they honour the achievements of a
chieftain, and they pass on skills from generation to generation through
their womenfolk.

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• The textiles of the tribals of central India have their own distinct Notes

identity. The tribes of central India spin and weave thick cream coloured
yarn with madder red borders and end pieces reflecting images from
their lives. Birds, flowers, trees, deer or even an airplane decorate these
cloths.

Image: Central India tribal textile

• In Orissa, ceremonial cloths to be worn by the priest or priestess are

required to be of a certain colour. Each colour has an auspicious
meaning and unity of communities is expressed through the similarity
of dress and adornment.

People's Art:

Tribal and indigenous arts related to specific cultural traditions of various

communities could be termed as people’s art as opposed to the more stylised
classical arts that evolved within the Hindu social system.

• In each region they have different cultural practices and urbanisation

has affected the extent to which they continue to make or use
handcrafted objects.

• In most cases, however, their deep connection with the forest in which
they live and their spiritual association with all forms of nature has
enabled them to retain a distinct style of making bamboo items such as
bows and arrows, musical instruments and baskets.

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• The metal work incorporates the world of trees, animals and human Notes

beings as if they were all forged from the same shapes and impulses of
nature.

• Earthen vessels and toys are painted with bold black and white stripes.
Winnows for grain take on wondrous hues with strips of bamboo dyed
in brilliant yellows and magenta pinks.

• Palm leaf brooms are playfully embellished with decorative handles,

and baskets carrying the trousseau of the bride to her new home are
capped with plumed birds made of bright coloured strips of bamboo.

Formation of Social Groups:

Those who worked with their hands in artisanal skills were denied easy access
to the tasks assigned to the upper castes.

Even though socially and psychologically problematic, the caste system locked
artisanal skills in place and ensured the transmission of this knowledge from
generation to generation in the absence of any alternative, thereby preserving
techniques and processes that may otherwise have been lost.

Even today, the prajapati or kumhar (potter), the vankar or bunkar (weaver),
the ashari (carpenter) and all the other identified and categorised artisans are
divided and recognised by the caste groupings whether they continue to
practise their skill or not.

Empowerment of Women Artisans:

In Bhadohi District of Uttar Pradesh hundreds of women took up carpet

weaving since young boys went to school after the anti-child-labour campaign
came into effect. Sometimes four or five women weave a carpet together
under uncomfortable conditions, earning a meagre Rs 1500 per carpet
collectively.

During a visit to some carpet producing villages, it was found that these
women, as a part of tradition and custom, weave baskets with local moonj
grass to serve as containers for sweets, saris, jewellery, fruit and other items
on ceremonial family occasions. The brightly dyed grass of moonj is woven into
small and large baskets with intricate designs depending on the creativity and
mood of the maker.

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Notes

Image: Moonj grass baskets

With some minor suggestions regarding colour, size and costing, the women
were encouraged to bring a collection of these baskets from every home and
sell them at Dilli Haat in New Delhi. What began as a shy and hesitant venture
ended in delight as the women sold out their stock earning Rs 17,000 in the
process.

Note-Dilli Haat is a paid-entrance open-air market, food plaza, and craft bazaar
located in Delhi. The area is run by Delhi Tourism and Transportation
Development Corporation.

They described their experience as one of independence, for they had control
of the raw material (free grass from the fields), control over production (home-
and leisure-based work), control over creativity (they design each basket as
they wish), and control over sales (they had sold the items at the stall
themselves). The earnings were free of the male control prevalent in the carpet
industry and were entirely based on their own efforts.

After some design workshops were held in the villages and the produce
exhibited at different places, they were able to sell more than six lakh rupees
worth of baskets in one year. Perhaps this is the closest example of what
empowerment actually means when translated from abstract jargon into
reality.

But there is still a lot of work to be done such as organizing the women into
self-help groups, encouraging savings and delivering micro credit to them so
that they have money for raw material, transportation and other needs.

Note- Self-help groups are informal groups of people who come together to
address their common problems. One important characteristic of self-help
groups is the idea of mutual support – people helping each other.

Note- Micro credit is the lending of small amounts of money at low interest to
new businesses.

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Notes
CLAY

The art of pottery is probably as old as human history. No other art traces the
story of human beings on this earth as clearly as pottery does. The tides of time
CLAY
have washed away many civilizations but evidence of their existence remains
in fragments of pottery.

There are two reasons why this is true:

• the first is that clay is found in abundance in practically all parts of the
world;
• the second is that clay objects are the least perishable of all materials.
The history of pottery tells of the daily life of human beings, their death and
burial, of human migration, trade and conquest, cultural practices and
influences.

As to the discovery of how clay could be manipulated to make pottery, it is easy

to imagine how, as prehistoric communities walked through rain-soaked mud,
they noticed their footprints and how these impressions became hardened by
the wind and sun. Exactly when human beings intentionally used these
discoveries for making pottery is unknown but it may have been invented
independently in many parts of the world.

However, the process of making a pot has evolved over many generations of
trial and experiment.

What is Clay?

Clay is universally found as it forms part of the earth’s crust that developed due
to weathering over thousands of years.

In India different types of clay are found along riverbeds and banks, lakes and
ponds, and agricultural lands. Clay is essentially silica but the varying mineral
content in clay adds to its colour and determines how suited it is for different
processes.

When clay is mixed with water it becomes malleable, elastic. Thinner clay
solutions can be created to use as paint for walls and on sculptures. By
controlling the amount of water that is mixed with clay it can be used in
different ways.

• It can be made into a creamy compound that can be poured into

moulds and allowed to set.
• It can be mixed to a leathery consistency and cut like a sponge.

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Notes
• When dry the surface can be scraped off as fine powder.
• Straw and grass can be added to create a strong, rough texture ideal for
the creation of very large images.
• So, each artist treats clay differently to suit the type of object that is to
be created.

Note-Malleable= that can be hit or pressed into shape easily without breaking
or cracking.

POTTERY

Artists, through the ages, have loved clay as it is the most sensitive material on
earth for it captures the slightest touch or the gentlest imprint. As soon as the
POTTERY
clay object is dried or fired, a chemical change occurs and the object becomes
rigid and is no longer sensitive to touch.

Clay of some kind or the other can be found almost anywhere in the world.
India, too, has an unbroken continuous history. Artists have used clay to
produce objects for the home to cooking pots, roof tiles, clay bricks and
sculptures.

Clay objects are prepared using various techniques:

1. The Coiling Technique: The earliest method of making pots for storage may
have used the coiling technique. The artist rolls out strips of clay and then
places one coil upon another, joining them together with his fingers to form a
hollow pot.

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Notes

2. Wheel-turned pottery: The most important change came with the invention
of the pottery wheel. There are many kinds of wheels used in India today,

The first is a simple flat stone or wooden disc that is turned with the hand or
a stick. By placing a soft lump of clay on the centre of the disc and turning them
wheel the potter can change the shape of the clay. By varying the pressure of
her/his fingers and palms she/he can create a pot of different sizes and shapes.

Image: Flat stone disc

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Notes

Image: Stick turned wheel

Another type of wheel is mounted on a vertical shaft. By extending the shaft

and adding another disc at the bottom it is possible to turn the wheel with the
feet, leaving both hands free to make the pot. Today even motorised wheels
are used.

3. Hand Modelling: In this technique artist begins with a well-mixed lump of

clay and starts working with his fingers to give it shape and form. Clay can be
rolled, coiled, pinched and attached to the main form. Here, there is no use of
the wheel.

This technique has several advantages that the artist can use to create a
sculpture. He can add legs and arms to the figure by wetting a smaller piece of
clay, rolling it and attaching it to the main body. The process gives the artist
freedom to change, modify and repair areas at will.

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What Is Terracotta? Notes

Terracotta: Firing a clay object in a kiln transforms the clay into terracotta. The
intensity of heat and the type of firing gives the terracotta its colour and hue
that range from dark brown to lively reds.

Once fired, the terracotta becomes insoluble, un-plastic and durable. On firing,
the clay loses its chemically combined water, and becomes hard and almost
imperishable. That is why 5000-year-old seals from the Harappan Civilisation
still exist.

Image: Terracota figures of Harappan Civilisation

Giant Clay Figures of India:

Votive terracotta figures are made in Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh. In

Bastar, on amavasya (the no moon night) of Bhadrapad (August to September),
tribals offer terracotta bulls, tigers, elephants and horses, sometimes with one
or two riders, to the goddess whom they worship for wealth, health and
protection from evil spirits. These clay animal gifts or votive offerings have
replaced the practice of animal sacrifices of earlier times.

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Note- Votive figures are objects offered to a god or goddess at a sacred place, Notes

such as a temple.

In Tamil Nadu the dramatic larger-than-life size image of Aiyanar, the local
deity, is surrounded by a sea of attendants, horses and bulls. They serve as
gram devatas who stand at the entrance of the village and protect it.

During Durga Puja in West Bengal enormous figures of the goddess are
created. The artists use different techniques and mixtures of natural materials
to make these excellent stately statues. They follow the traditional practice to
create the inner core with local grasses bound together to form the legs, arms
and head. The grasses are often swathed with thin cotton cloth. Then layer
upon layer of clay is carefully applied to the body of the goddess to gradually
build it up. Over a period of several days, each layer is allowed to dry
completely so that no cracks appear and there is no warping. Once dry, the
entire figure of the goddess is painted with natural mineral colours. After this
the figure is dressed in a sari and adorned with jewellery made of paper or
artificial jewels, and garlands of flowers, before it is ready for worship.

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Notes

STONE

Even today the stone carvers of Tamil Nadu begin with a prayer that first begs
forgiveness from Mother Earth for cutting the stone. The prayer ends with
offerings of sweets and milk to the earth and a solemn promise never to misuse
or waste stone.

The stone cutter starts by locating a good stone quarry. Then begins the
process of cutting what he needs from the mother rock. Metal pegs are
hammered in a straight line into the rock at intervals. Water is poured on to
the rock to wet it. The change in night and day temperatures causes contraction
and expansion and the rock gradually slits along the straight peg lines into
perfect slabs.

Types of Stone:

There are myriad varieties of stone to be found in India. Soft soap stone
contrasts with the hard granite, an igneous rock of the Deccan. Sedimentary
rocks of the northern plains of India produce a variety of coloured sandstones;
and metamorphic rocks, hardened over centuries under the soil form marble
and limestone.

Note- Igneous rocks start as molten lava that cools and solidifies. Sedimentary
rocks are made up of grains that break off of other rocks through a process
called weathering. Metamorphic rocks form under the action of pressure, and
temperature changes.

Each type of rock, be it granite or sandstone, has intrinsic qualities that the
sculptor explores when he creates a work of art. The nature of the stone will
determine how the sculpture is made and also its possibilities. Soft soap stone

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allows for delicate, intricate carving whereas sandstone, a fragile sedimentary Notes

rock with layers of fine compressed sands and grains, has to be handled with
extreme care as it breaks easily.

Within each category of stone there is enormous variety. Sandstone ranges

from the golden yellow of Jaisalmer to the soft pitted and speckled stone of
Mathura and Fatehpur Sikri. The sculptors of India have been using these
stones for the past five thousand years.

The difference in treatment of one stone from another in the hands of an artist
can be seen in the granite sculptures of Mahabalipuram and the sandstone
figures of Khajuraho.

Note- Mamallapuram, also called Mahabalipuram or Seven Pagodas, is a

town that lies along the Coromandel Coast of the Bay of Bengal, south of
Chennai.

It is an important town of the erstwhile Pallava dynasty that ruled in parts of

South India.

It is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The group of Monuments at

Mahabalipuram, including the Shore Temple built in the 8th century under the
reign of Narasimhavarman II, stand at the shore of the Bay of Bengal.

The creation of this complex was initialized during the reign of King Narasimha
Varma I who was called by the name Mahamalla, after whom the city was
named as Mahamallaouram and gradually Mahabalipuram.

Image: Sculptures of Mahabalipuram

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Note- The Khajuraho Group of Monuments are a group of Hindu and Jain Notes

temples in Chhatarpur district, Madhya Pradesh. They are a UNESCO World

Heritage Site.

Image: Sculptures of Khajuraho.

Hard granite stone was used in South India to make temples and household
items like grinding stones. The quality of stone available in each region of India
distinguishes the style and form that can be created.

Carving:

Carving is a process in which forms are cut away or subtracted from the original
solid material. It is a difficult process, requiring skill, concentration and extreme
caution. '

Stone Works are classified into categories that explain their technical
dimensions:

• Relief-sculptured panels: A relief has carvings only on one side. The

carving can be shallow or deep while the other side is flat and is usually
embedded into the masonry work of the building.
Note- A relief, is a work in which the figures project from a supporting
background, usually a plane surface.

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Notes

Image: Mahakapi Jataka, Bharhut, Madhya Pradesh

Three-dimensional figures: can be viewed from all sides.

Image: A three-dimensional statue at Hampi.

Stone Sculpture through the Ages:

At Bhimbetka in Madhya Pradesh, there are a number of rock shelters of the

Stone Age period. Early inhabitants lived in natural caves and created fine tools
and flints of agate and other natural stones in the area. These tiny flints and
well-carved stone implements are the first examples in the long story of Indian
sculpture.

Note- The Bhimbetka rock shelters are an archaeological site in central India
that spans the prehistoric Paleolithic and Mesolithic periods, as well as the
historic period. It exhibits the earliest traces of human life in India and evidence
of Stone Age.

Note - Agate is a common rock formation, consisting of chalcedony and quartz

as its primary components, with a wide variety of colors.

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Notes

Image: Bhimbetka rock shelter

At Ellora, in Maharashtra, there are Hindu, Buddhist and Jain rock-cut shrines.
The Kailash temple at Ellora of the ninth century is an entire temple that was
carved out of the natural hillside. The temple is really a massive sculpture cut
out of a single piece of the hill. The artists started work from the top and carved
downwards, beginning with the towering roof, the windows, the doors through
which one enters into halls with enormous sculptured panels.

Do you know: King Krishna I of Rashtrakuta dynasty built the Kailasha temple
at Ellora.

Sandstone panels with geometric and floral design were made to decorate
palaces and tombs during the medieval period. The Mughals in the sixteenth
and seventeenth centuries built some of the most beautiful buildings in the
world like the Taj Mahal in Agra. The sculptural decorations are of many
varieties of marble jalis are made out of a single slab of stone that is cut to
create a lattice window that allows for light and ventilation.

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To make inlay marble or sandstone panels the artist has to carve out the design Notes

in the form of compartments on the flat stone slab. Then precious and semi-
precious stones are cut into exact pieces of the pattern and laid into the
compartments. The inlay work in the Taj Mahal is so extraordinary that over
twenty pieces of different coloured stones were used to create a single flower.

Note-A jali or jaali, is a perforated stone screen, usually with an ornamental

pattern constructed through the use of calligraphy and geometry. This form of
architectural decoration is common in Hindu temple architecture, Indo-Islamic
Architecture and more generally in Islamic Architecture.

Image: Jali work

Image: Marble carving, Taj Mahal

Rajasthan is famous for delicate jali work, for domestic architecture in yellow
and pink limestone and white marble. Jaipur also produces stone figurines.

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Notes

Image: Rajasthani Jali work

METAL

AtMETAL
the time of Dussehra, Kullu valley comes alive with the arrival of many
mohras (metal plaques of Durga) from different parts of Himachal Pradesh.
These gold and silver masks were commissioned by the kings in ancient times.
Each village brings its mohra from its local temple to Kullu in a decorated palki
(palanquin). The mohras are then moved into a huge wooden rath that is
pulled by hundreds of devotees. At the time of Dussehra you can see
processions of these raths as they weave down the mountain. Musicians
accompany each of the processions and the whole Kullu valley fills with the
sound of their long metallic pipes.

There are a variety of pipes, long telescopic ones known as shanal or karnal
and the S-shaped curved trumpet known as narasingha. These are made by
local metal-smiths who are often attached to the temple.

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Notes

Image: Karnal

Image: Narsingha

The Role of the Blacksmith:

Metal craft is one of the most vital traditions of Himachal Pradesh. Here
blacksmiths, carpenters and stone workers consider themselves a single group.
While they maintain their occupational distinctions, they frequently
intermarry. Carpenters and metalsmiths call themselves Dhimans and trace
their origins back to Vishwakarma.

Do you know: Vishwakarma or Vishwakarman is regarded as the God of

‘creation’ in Hindu mythology. It is believed that he is the ultimate creator, the
divine architect of the universe.

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Blacksmiths are the largest craft group in Himachal villages. They are also Notes

traders who sell their products. In Himachal the blacksmiths usually work from
their workshops located on the ground floor of their homes.

In any village in the world, the blacksmith is importance springs from the fact
that he is indispensable. The lohar (blacksmith) makes and mends the
agricultural implements that are made of iron and also fashions utensils with
material provided by the customers. In addition, he also makes tools for other
artisans, creates icons and ornaments, and repairs damaged metal objects. His
payment usually comes in the traditional way ó he receives a share of the
produce.

Patrons of Metal Craft:

The patronage of the temple and royal court gave rise to highly accomplished
crafts persons, one generation following another practising the same skill for
centuries. As time went by, temple and rural art traditions came closer
together. Innumerable bronze figurines cast by rural metalsmiths can be seen
in village shrines and in home altars even today. These images appear to be
timeless.

For our traditional rulers, the nobility and wealthy landowners, objects made
of precious metal were symbolic manifestations of power. Much of their
income from taxes was converted into treasure (khazana) in the form of objects
made from precious metals and jewellery. It was in workshops (karkhanas) that
goldsmiths and silversmiths, whether private or public servants, practised their
skills under the patronage and close supervision of their masters. Some of these
objects were made to be presented as gifts on special occasions such as the
public assemblies (durbars) that formed part of court ritual, while others were
only brought out for specific religious rituals. Still others were designed for
everyday use.

Do you know?

For 11,000 years human beings have been fashioning metal for their use.

• Ore metals are the source of most metals. First the ores are mined or
quarried from beneath the earth, or dredged from lakes and rivers, then
they are crushed and separated, and finally they are refined and
smelted to produce metal.
• By 5000 BCE copper was used to make beads and pins. By 3000 BCE tin
was added to copper to produce bronze, a harder metal. Iron, even
harder than bronze, was widely produced by 500 BCE.

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• The technology of how to master metals (copper, bronze, iron) Notes

developed independently in various parts of the world.

• By 3000 BCE, most of the gold extracting techniques used today were
already known in Egypt.
• The concept of carats indicates the amount of gold in gold! Nowadays
copper and silver are often added to gold to make it harder. The gold
content in this is known as carats.
• More than half of the gold mined with so much labour, returns to the
earth or buried in bank vaults!

Crafting Metals:

Human cultures around the world have a long history of experimentation and
expression using alloys like brass and bronze, and precious metals like gold and
silver, and in more recent human history using iron and steel. We have created
countless objects from different metals, from tiny coins to buildings, pots and
pans to timeless images of gods and goddesses.

Materials and Processes:

Other than silver, the metals used in our country for craftwork are brass,
copper and bell-metal.

Do you know: Brass is an alloy of copper and zinc, bell-metal is a mixture of

copper and tin.

The shaping of an object is done either by beating the sheet metal to the
approximate shape with a hammer while it is hot, or by pouring the molten
metal in a mould that is made of clay for ordinary objects and of wax for more
delicate objects.

The beating process is preferred particularly for bell-metal and copperware as

it is supposed to make the object more durable. Further, tempering is done by
heating the article till it is red-hot, and then dipping it in cold water.

Lost wax technique for Metal Works:

The lost-wax technique or process is used for making objects of metals. This
process is mostly used in Himachal Pradesh, Odisha, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh,
and West Bengal. The technique differs slightly in each region.

The low wax process involves different steps,

• First, a well-detailed solid wax model of the figure is created.

• Then, a clay mould is made around the wax model. This is heated, thus
melting or ‘losing’ the wax.

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• Molten bronze (or any other metal) is then poured into the empty clay Notes

mould. Upon cooling, the clay is broken to reveal a solid bronze statue.
• The sculpture is then filed and buffed to remove scratches and give it a
shine.

Do you know: The Lost Wax Technique is also known as the ‘Cire-Perdu’
process.

Making of a Bronze Image:

The oldest bronze images in our country date back to Mohenjodaro (2500 BCE).
From the Rig Vedic times there have been references to two casting processes,
solid and hollow, termed eghanai and esushirai.

While the images are countless, each is very individualistic, and the craftsman
has to learn not only the physical measurements of the right proportions to
make the images but also familiarize himself with the verses describing each
deity, its characteristics, symbolism and above all the aesthetics. This is known
as edhyanaí, which means meditation. This is to convey the need for intense
concentration on these instructions.

Note: Dancing Girl from Mohenjodaro, belonging to the Harappan civilization

and dating back to c. 2500 BCE, is perhaps the first known bronze statue.

Tamil Nadu is one of the famous bronze casting regions. Stylistically, the
images belong to different periods like Pallava, Chola, Pandyan and Nayaka and
the images that are now produced belong to one or the other of these styles.
The icon- makers are known as stapatis.

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Notes

Image: The famous Nataraja bronze statue of Tamil Nadu

Silver:

According to Hindu tradition, if objects made of gold and silver become ritually
polluted, they can be restored to purity by the simple act of washing them in
water or scouring them with ash or sand. It was believed, for example, that
water is automatically purified when placed in a gold or silver container. In the
case of silver, this theory has been scientifically validated and we now know
that the ionic reaction of silver with water does have the effect of killing its
bacterial content.

Even though silver occurs rarely in its pure and natural state in India, it has
always been widely available. Then where did it come from? The answer is
through 2000 years of trade. While we exported spices, dyes, textiles,
diamonds and other luxury goods in both raw and finished forms to the
Mediterranean, East Africa, the Arabian seaboard, the Red-Sea and the Persian
Gulf, the islands of the Indonesian archipelago and even China and Japan, our
main import has always been precious metals.

Contemporary studies show that through centuries of accumulation followed

by recent import (through both legal and illegal channels!) the people and
temples of India possess more than four billion (4,000,000,000) ounces of
refined silver! This staggering figure is only a rough estimate.

Metal Craft Across India:

In the Kinnaur District of Himachal Pradesh, the metal objects used for
religious purposes are a unique synthesis of Hindu and Buddhist designs. The
thunderbolt or vajra motif is commonly seen on kettles and jars.

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Fruit bowls with a silver or brass stand designed like a lotus, prayer wheels Notes

inscribed with the eom mani padme humi mantra, conch trumpets, miniature
shrines and flasks are also made. Many of these forms come from ritual objects
used in Tibetan Buddhist temples which are located next to Hindu temples all
over Kinnaur.

Teamwork is essential in the craft of metal-work. In Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh

for example, the production of an enamelled hookah base would involve
several different specialised skills, each practised by a different craftsman. A
sunar makes the object; a chitrakar or nakashiwalla marks out the surface
design; a chatera chisels away the depression in the design needed to hold the
enamel; a minakar carries out the actual enamelling; a jilasaz polishes the
object; a mulamasaz might gild it, while a kundanaz sets the stones required in
the design.

Koftgari is the term for a type of silver and gold damascene work produced in
Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala, Jaipur, Rajasthan, Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh
and Punjab.

Note-Damascening is the art of decorating steel objects with designs in gold

and silver, resulting in beautiful embellishments of the object.

In ordinary damascene (tari-nishan), a technique used frequently to adorn the

blades of swords, a chiseled groove is first made into which precious metal wire
is hammered. The koftgari process is simpler and less time consuming, and
allows for much freer decoration. The entire surface of the object is first
chiseled in at least two different directions so as to roughen it and then the
wire (either silver or gold or both) is hammered onto it in intricate patterns.

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Notes

Image: Damascene swords

Bidri, a technique named after its place of origin, Bidar, Karnataka, is the
application of inlay (mainly silver) to objects cast in a relatively soft alloy of zinc,
copper and lead. After the inlay work is completed, the ground is stained black
using chemicals, thus creating a splendid contrast to the silver decoration.

Image: Bidriware

In Kerala to make the uruli (wide-mouthed cooking vessel, with flat or curved
rims) the lost wax process is used. A giant cauldron called varpu, which is
magnificent in form, is used in temples for making prasad to feed thousands of
devotees. Kerala also has a great tradition in making metal tumblers for
drinking, which range in size and are very elegantly shaped.

Note- A cauldron is a large, deep, metal pot that is used for cooking.

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Notes

Image: Uruli

Among the numerous ritualistic articles made of metal in Gujarat are large
temple-bells. The famous temple-bell on the Girnar Hill weighs 240 kg.

Note- Girnar temple is located near Junagadh in Junagadh district, Gujarat. It

is said to be the place where Lord Dattatreya performed penance at the top of
the hill.

Nachiarkoil in Thanjavar District of Tamil Nadu is an important bell-metal

centre. This is due to the presence of light brown sand called vandal on the
banks of the Cauvery, ideally suited for making moulds. Some of the articles
made by casting are vases in different shapes, tumblers, water-containers,
plain and decorated ornamental spittoons which are a specialty of this place,
food cases, bells, candle-stands, kerosene lamps, picnic carriers, and a large
variety of oil lamps.

JEWELLERY

All of us enjoy decorating our bodies. In ancient times it was believed that
besides enhancing its beauty, decorating the body gave it additional strength
and power. Even today many tribal societies use flowers, wild berries, leaves
and feathers for this purpose. Flowers and fruits celebrate nature and growth
while feathers are valued for their colour and for the power of flight. Seeds,
even wings of insects such as colourful beetle wings are used as embellishment
and decoration.

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One of the oldest forms used in jewellery was that of a sphere, representing Notes

the seed, the bija. Later a range of beads were made from clay, glass, metals
and precious stones. This symbolised fertility, growth and the origin of life.
Many jewellery forms made in metal reproduce forms of flowers and fruits.
Champakali is a necklace made of jasmine bud motifs and is worn throughout
India. Karanphul jhumka is a combination of the form of an open lotus at the
ear lobe and a suspended half open bud. Mangai mala is a rich necklace from
Tamil Nadu, with stylised mango forms studded with rubies. Precious metals
such as gold and silver were for the rich while the less affluent used even brass
and white metal. Gold was associated with the sun, and silver, chandi, with
chandrama or the moon.

Meaning and Significance of Jewellery:

In some tribal societies, each ornament was a symbol of the rank and status of
the wearer, and it was also believed to have certain magical powers. Thus, the
purpose of ornamentation was not only to satisfy an instinctive desire to
decorate the body, it was also invested with symbolic significance. This aspect
is clearly expressed in the form of amulets which carry inscribed prayers to
protect the wearer from evil influences. All communities and faiths use this
form of jewellery as protection against harm or to activate certain positive
qualities.

It was with the establishment of a settled agrarian society that jewellery

became a form of saving and a symbol of status. A variety of designs in folk
jewellery evolved over the years, and the important position of the jeweller in
village society also points to the fact that jewellery was considered as the only
form of investment which could be encashed during an emergency. It was
mandatory for married women to wear jewellery. Necklace, earrings, head
ornaments and bangles were essential for every married woman. It was only
widows who were deprived of jewellery.

Note- Streedhan: From Vedic times onwards, jewellery was counted as a

woman’s wealth and comprised a part of her inheritance from her father, as
well as a gift from her husband.

Jewellery for Every Part of the Body:

Each region in India has a particular style of jewellery that is quite distinct.
Differences occur even as one goes from one village to another. Despite the
variety in jewellery patterns in different parts of the country, the designs in
each region are also at times strikingly similar.

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Head and Forehead: Women wear the bore resting upon the parting of the hair Notes

in Rajasthan and parts of Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh, whereas the tikka, a
rounded pendant at the end of a long chain which falls on the forehead, is used
throughout India. The shringar patti which frames the face and often connects
with the tikka on the top and the earrings are also used widely. In earlier times
men wore the kalgi, a plumed jewel, on top of the turban.

Nose: The ornament worn all over India has variations from the simple lavang,
clove, to phuli, the elaborately worked stud, or nath, the nose-ring worn in the
right nostril, and the bulli, the nose ring worn in the centre just over the lips.

Neck: One of the ornaments is the guluband, which is made up of either beads
or rectangular pieces of metal, strung together with the help of threads. A
ribbon is attached at the back to protect the neck of the wearer. Then there is
the longer kanthi or the bajaithi. Below this is worn either a silver chain or a
necklace of beads. The men would wear a charm or a tawiz at the neck and a
kantha, a long necklace.

Fingers: For the hands there are a number of rings. On festive occasions women
wear the hathphool or ratthan-chowk to decorate the back of the hand.

Wrists: For the wrists there is the kada, the paunchi, the gajra and the chuda,
which quite often extends six inches above the wrist.

Arms: The bazoo, the joshan, and the bank are worn above the elbow. Men
wore a heavy kada or bangle.

Hips: A series of silver chains formed into a belt are worn at the hips and are
generally known as kandora or kardhani, while the men would wear a silver or
gold belt.

Ankles: Solid, heavy metal anklets combine with the delicately worked paizebs
ending in tinkling, silver, hollow bells, while men would wear a heavy silver
anklet. Only royalty wore gold on their feet.

Toes: The bichhua, scorpion ring, for the toe is put on by women at the time of
their marriage.

Jewellery through the Ages:

3000 BCE to 1500 BCE: Harappan Period-India has an unbroken tradition of

over five thousand years of jewellery making. The excavations at the Harappan
site have uncovered beads and shell bangles. The shell bangles are exactly
similar to the ones worn by married women in Ladakh even today . Gold sheets
shaped into head bands were also found.

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Notes

Do you know: Harappans wore various jewellery such as bangles, chokers, long
pendant necklaces, rings, earrings, conical hair ornaments, and broaches.

300 BCE to 300 AD:

The richest collection of jewellery was discovered in Taxila, an important

Buddhist centre of learning. It was on the trade route, as well as the road for
migration of people entering India. Here the jewellery exhibits Greek influence
and the introduction of new technology such as filigree and granulation.

Note- The meaning of FILIGREE is ornamental work especially of fine wire of

gold, silver, or copper.

Note- Granulation, in jewelry, is a type of decoration in which minute grains or

tiny balls of gold are applied to a surface in geometric or linear patterns or
massed to fill in parts of a decoration.

Do you know: Taxila or Takshila was located on the eastern bank of the Indus
River in Punjab, in the city of Takshila (modern-day Pakistan). Takshila
university was a Buddhist study center in the early days. It is thought to date
back to at least the 5th century BC, based on existing evidence.

It is interesting to observe, however, that there are marked similarities

between our present-day jewellery designs and the jewellery of the Sumerians
and the early Greeks.

A necklace excavated at Ur, which is made up of finely designed pendants of

lion-heads with granulated work, and supposed to have belonged to Queen
Bathsheba, has a remarkable likeness to the garuda necklace prepared in
Kerala.

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Note- Ur was an important Sumerian city-state in ancient Mesopotamia, Notes

located at modern day south Iraq's Dhi Qar Governorate.

Note - The Queen of Sheba is a figure first mentioned in the Hebrew Bible. In
the original story, she brings a caravan of valuable gifts for the Israelite King
Solomon.

Early Greek jewellery has a close similarity with some of the traditional
jewellery of Kutch and Saurashtra. The patterns of some Egyptian jewellery,
especially armlets with snakeheads, are found in India, as well.

400 AD:

There is a close similarity in the jewellery design of today with those of early
times. This we know from descriptions in literature, and in the depiction of
jewellery in sculpture and painting.

• The kanthi, a necklace worn close to the neck and the phalakhara, a
long necklace comprising a number of tablets strung with a series of
beads, is seen in the early Gupta period and is found in use even today
in most parts of North India.
• The chudamani, shaped like a full-blown lotus with many petals, was
worn at the parting of the hair and is similar to the present day bore of
Rajasthan.
• In the Ramayana, there is mention of Sita wearing a nishka necklace.
Nishka, a gold coin, is also referred to in the Jataka stories. The tradition
of wearing of coin necklaces continues.

900 AD:

The use of the nose ornament wa introduced into India quite late, as the early
sculptures and murals do not show nose ornaments. It appears to have been
introduced by the Arabs after the tenth century and, over the years, it became
common all over India and became associated with marriage.

1500 AD to 1900 AD:

The Mughals had fine jewellery and used large precious stones. Jahangirís
treasury, described by Sir Thomas Roe, an English traveller, had 37.5 kilograms
of diamonds and 3000 kilograms of pearls and rich jewellery, often colourful
enamel jewellery embedded with precious stones.

Note- Sir Thomas Roe was an English diplomat. As an ambassador he

represented England in the Mughal Empire.

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Regional Varieties of Jewellery: Notes

Despite the fact that styles in jewellery have, on the whole, tend to develop
region-wise, we find that certain distinctive forms have been developed by
specific sections, groups or areas.

The jewellery of Kashmir is quite distinct. The most important are the ear
ornaments, known as kan-balle, worn by Muslim women . They comprise a
number of rings, which are attached to the hair or the cap. This jewellery is also
worn in Ladakh and other Himalayan areas such as Lahaul, Spiti, and Kinnaur.

Image: Kan- balle

In Punjab, women wear a special ornament, chonk. It is cone-shaped and is

worn at the top of the head with two smaller cones, known as phul, worn at
the sides.

Image: Chonk

A pattern of jewellery worn in Andhra Pradesh is known as kirtimukha.

Another pattern, which is common in Andhra Pradesh, is that of serpent-heads
which appear to be holding the earth in their mouths. The necklaces often
derive their designs from shapes of grains.

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Notes

Image: kirtimukha.

Though all the hill jewellery of Kullu and Kinnaur Districts is made in
Hoshiarpur in Himachal Pradesh, it has its own particular style. The pipal patra,
made out of bunch of heart-shaped silver leaves fastened to an enamelled
piece of silver, is worn in these areas by women on both sides of their caps.
Their necklaces are formed out of large metal plates, engraved with the
traditional designs of the region and filled with green and yellow enamel. The
most common design is of Devi riding her lion.

In Assam the tribes patronise silver jewellery, while in the plains gold jewellery
is preferred. The patterns of gold jewellery are extremely delicate. The jewels,
though few, are finely finished. The earring, known as thuria, has the form of
a lotus with a heavy stem. The shape reminds one of the traditional kamal
earrings mentioned in ancient literature. Thuria is usually made of gold and
studded with rubies in the front portion as well as at the back.

Image: Thuria

In West Bengal, the filigree work on gold and silver jewellery is extremely
delicate. The finest pieces of jewellery are the hair ornaments like the tara
kanta and the paan kanta are hair pins designed like a star and a betel leaf.

The folk jewellery of Orissa in silver and gold is rich in patterns, forms and
designs. The most popular technique is filigree. Very few head ornaments are

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worn in Orissa. The importance is on arm jewels, necklaces, nose-rings and Notes

anklets, with the finest designs found on nose ornaments. One design known
as maurpankhi, is crafted like a peacock with open feathers, made with the
processes of granulation, filigree and casting.

Kerala has a very rich variety of gold designs. The use of precious stones is not
so common here. Variety is seen mostly in necklaces. The garuda necklace
produced here bears testimony to the fine workmanship of the craftsmen of
the area.

In Tamil Nadu, silver filigree armlets worn by Vellalars of Coimbatore District

have excellent workmanship in granular work. Chettinad jewellery, made of
uncut rubies, is one of the finest. The addigai is a necklace made of a string of
uncut rubies set in gold. A central motif of the padakam imitates the lotus. The
mangai-malai is a necklace of mango-shaped pieces studded with uncut rubies
and diamonds. The plait cover often has at the top the head of a naga or snake.

Meenakari or Enamel Work:

Enamel work is a technique of decoration whereby metal objects are given a

vitreous glaze that is fused onto the surface by intense heat to create a
brilliantly coloured decorative effect. It is an art form noted for its brilliant,
glossy surface, which is hard and long-lasting.
One of the most sophisticated forms of jewellery developed in North India is
meenakari. Jaipur is the main centre, but some craftsmen practise this art in
Delhi, Lucknow and Varanasi as well. Meenakari is combined with kundan to
produce a delicate and rich effect. The meenakari or enamelled patterns are so
fine and intricate that they need to be examined with a magnifying glass. This
tradition continues even today.
The uniqueness of the meenakari ornament lies in the fact that even the back
of the piece is elaborately decorated, though it will only be seen by the wearer.

Image: Meenakari

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Notes
FIBRES

Fibres are obtained by shredding or peeling parts of plants, or pounding them

to make threads or by cutting them to make strips. Fibres from plants pre-date
cloth woven from yarn spun from cotton. Ancient communities must have used
natural fibres to build shelters and thatched roofs.

How The Fibre Craft Started:

Communities living in diverse climates and harsh terrains have creatively

responded to the challenges of their environment by transforming locally
available natural fibres to create a large variety of objects necessary for their
survival.

The ingenuity of community artists created a great variety of natural fibre

products. The products range in both scale and form. Objects made out of
fibres includes large architectural creations of homes and shelters, suspension
bridges and fences to smaller objects: baskets, mats and hand fans.

What is a Natural Fibre?

Natural fibres made of cellulose or plant matter can be obtained from almost
every part of the plant such as the root, stem or shoot, leaf, fruit and bark from
many tree species. (see following table).

Fibre obtained from Roots:

Khus: Khus (Vetiveria zizaniodes) is known for its fragrance (aroma) and
cooling properties. The roots are used for making mats, beds, and pads for

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desert coolers. The dried stems are used for making brooms, fans, hats and Notes

footwear, and for thatching.

The Khus grass has a thick root system which helps in checking soil erosion. It
is thus an excellent stabilising hedge for stream banks, terraces and rice
paddies. Khus grass grows wild in many states but is cultivated in Rajasthan,
Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Kerala, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh.

Image: Khus Grass

Fibres obtained from Stems:

Kauna is the local name for a reed belonging to the family Cyperaceae which is
cultivated in the wetlands of the Imphal valley, Manipur. It has a cylindrical,
soft and spongy stem which is woven into mats, square and rectangular
cushions and mattresses by the women of the Meitei community of Manipur.

Note- Reed is any tall perennial grass mostly found in the beds of rivers and
ponds.

Do you know: The Meitei community of Manipur is predominantly Vaishnavite

Hindus and speak Indo-Tibetian language.

Korai (Tamil Nadu) or kora (Kerala) also of the Cyperaceae family is a wetland
plant which is cultivated in the southern districts of Tamil Nadu and Kerala. The
stems are cut near the base of the plant, spliced vertically and dried in the sun.
On drying the spliced stems curl into a smooth and tubular form.

A large variety of mats with stripes, geometrical motifs, natural and dyed
colours are woven in several districts of Tamil Nadu and Kerala. The mats are
woven on horizontal floor looms. The ribbed natural-coloured mats are
popularly used as floor coverings.

Note- A wetland is a distinct ecosystem that is flooded by water, either

permanently or seasonally.

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Image: Korai Mat

In Midnapur District of West Bengal, another type of reed similar to kora called
madur kathi is cultivated, harvested and processed. Finely spliced madur is
woven into mats that have a central field enclosed by patterned borders. Both
the loom and the weaving technique used are very basic but require the use of
manual skills and craftsmanship rather than sophisticated equipment and
technology. Natural colours are used.

Image: Madhur Kathi Mat

Unlike the woven mats, shital pati or cool mats made by the plaiting technique
are made in Assam and Tripura. The mat has a smooth and lustrous surface. It
is made from the stem of murta plant.

Note- Plaiting technique is the act or process of of interweaving or braiding two

or more strands, fibers, etc.

THINK: Difference between weaving and plaiting.

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Notes

In Uttar Pradesh and Bihar women make baskets using the technique of
coiling. These compact containers are made for local use with spliced moonj or
sikki grass. Moonj baskets with multi-coloured fibres and bold patterns are
made for a daughter’s trousseau.

Note- Trousseau means clothes and other possessions collected by a woman

who is to be married soon.

Image: Moonj Baskets

In the Madhubani District of Bihar, women mak figurines of deities, animals

and birds for ritual and everyday use with sikki or golden grass used in
combination with multi-coloured dyed stalks. The imagery of these forms
echoes the folk art of Mithila, the cultural region on the northern banks of the
Ganges.

Furniture items such as the mooda or stools are examples of elegant products
made entirely from natural fibres such as sarkanda and moonj. Sarkanda is a
wild grass found in Haryana and its long stems are used in making the
indigenous mooda.

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Notes

Image: Mooda stools.

Jute, a stem or bast fibre, is cultivated in West Bengal. Jute cloth is brittle and
deteriorates with exposure to sun and rain. It has been popular as inexpensive
packaging material. In the craft sector, today, there is a renewed interest in
finding innovative applications of jute such as fashion accessories, bags and
wall panelling using crochet, braiding and other non-woven techniques.

Cane is an important forest produce found mainly in north-eastern parts of

India. It is cylindrical and of uniform thickness, solid and brown in colour. Its
properties of being tough, flexible and elastic have made whole cane suitable
for use in furniture, hats, walking sticks, fishing rods and baskets. In Arunachal
Pradesh even suspension bridges are made of cane. Canes are long slender
stems of climbing plants which belong to the palm family. India has about 30
species of cane growing in Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, the Andamans,
Nagaland, Manipur, Mizoram, Meghalaya, Kerala, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu.

The bamboo and cane crafts of the North Eastern region of India represent a
large storehouse of forms and traditional wisdom. The forms of several baskets
have evolved. Some of the examples are, open weave baskets of Mizoram
which are flexible and allow the person to carry firewood, while the close-
weave baskets of Garo hills in Meghalaya are used to transport and store rice
grains.

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Image: Basket from Mizoram

A large variety of baskets, containers, mats and furniture are made from the
leaves and stem of trees and plants belonging to the palm family. Palm trees
are commonly found in the coastal regions of India and some varieties like the
date palm grow in semi-arid regions. While coconut, arecanut and date palm
trees have feather like leaves, the palmyra or toddy palm has fan-like leaves.

Fibre made from the edible banana plant is used in weaving the traditional
Japanese fibre cloth called bashofu. The cloth is smooth, stiff and is used in
making the kimono, the traditional Japanese dress.

Image: Kimono

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Image: Bashofu cloth

The craft of extracting fibre from the banana plant, spinning the yarn, weaving
it into cloth and patterning the cloth was a highly valued craft of the Okinawa
Islands.

Do you know: The martial art of Karate originated in Okinawa islands.

In order to encourage crafts, the government of Japan started a new scheme

and great artists, who excel in the area of crafts and creativity, are honoured
with the title of Living National Treasure in Japan. Scholars, visitors and
students are encouraged to explore, research and study with these masters.
This is a wonderful example of how today the Japanese value their craft
traditions and honour the great practitioners of crafts.

Fibres obtained from leaf:

The screw pine is a tropical plant known for its soil conservation properties. It
is grown as a hedge or as a boundary wall in Kerala. It is available in abundance
and provides a source of income to rural women who make strips from the
leaves to weave mats. The leaves are also used as roof thatches. Strips are
interlaced diagonally to weave mats and large surfaces that are then cut and
sewn to make containers, bags and hats.

There are male and female species of the screw pine. The female screw pine
produces a finer quality of fibre used in weaving traditional mats called mettha
pai which are soft and cool to sleep on. The male screw pine produces coarser
fibre. In Thazava in Kollam district of Kerala, double layer mats are made
which are edged with a vivid coloured strip used to stitch the layers together.

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Image: Screw Pine

Fibres obtained from Fruit:

The coconut palm tree also has multiple uses of its stem, fronds, fruit and nut.
Coir fibre extracted from the outer husk of green coconuts is spun into yarn
and ropes while the fibre of brown coconut is used as stuffing in mattresses.

Coir producing villages are located in the backwaters habitat of Kerala which
abound in the skills of processing and spinning coir and of weaving coir floor
coverings. White coir extracted from the green husk is of superior quality and
withstands salt corrosion. It has wide-ranging applications, for instance, in ship-
building and for making floor coverings.

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Notes

Do you know: Papyrus tree is also called Indian Matting Plant.

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PAPER CRAFTS

Paper-craft objects are mainly created by people either for their personal use
or for a limited clientele with whom they are in touch.

Paper came to India with Muslim traders, in the eleventh century A.D. It slowly
and gradually displaced the Corypha palm leaf, the use of which had the
sanction of age and religion among the conservative Indian literates who
looked with distrust upon this new product.

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There is no Sanskrit word for paper. The Chinese word is kog-dz, When the Notes

Arabs, in the eighth century, learned paper-making from the Chinese, they
adopted the Chinese name for their own paper made of linen rags. The Persian
word for paper, kaghaz, became kagaj in Hindustani.

By the fourteenth century, paper became popular in India. By the beginning of

the seventeenth century paper had displaced Corypha leaves throughout
northern India.

How Paper Is Made:

Factory-made paper is now generally made of tightly packed and pressed fibres
of rags, straw, wood, bamboo etc.

Handmade paper is made of pulp (obtained from the bark of certain trees)
mixe d with glues, and waste cloth from garment manufacturers.

Paper Toys

Toy-makers, make use of materials like paper, cardboard, palm-leaf, clay,

bamboo strips, pith, and papier-mache along with other recycled materials to
create toys for children. Discarded items including newspaper, string, rubber
bands are recycled to create toys. The toymaker creates a number of different
playthings such as kites, puppets, string-manipulated toys, rattles, drums,
damrus and whistles, moving toys like windwheels, animal toys like the jumping
snake, mystery boxes, and jack-in-the-box kind of toys. Apart from toy-making,
Indian craftsmen also produce a wide variety of decorative and utilitarian items
by using plain, white and coloured papers.

Note-Papier -Mache is a composite material consisting of paper pieces or pulp,

sometimes reinforced with textiles, bound with an adhesive, such as glue,
starch, or wallpaper paste.

Image: Papier- Mache

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Sanjhi: The craftsmen of Mathura, Brindavan area make intricate paper-cut Notes

designs (locally known as Sanjhi) depicting various Krishnalila scenes.

Stencil: A stencil is a piece of paper, plastic or metal which has a design cut out
of it. When the stencil is placed on a surface and paint applied over it, the paint
goes through the cut out portions and leaves a design on the surface when the
stencil is removed.

Image: Stencil

Use of Paper Craft in Different Societies

During Muharram, a model of the tomb of Imam Hussain called the Tazia is
adorned with floral designs made out of coloured papers.

Note- Imam Hussain was a grandson of the Islamic prophet Muhammad

(PBUH).

In Poland people use paper-cuts of the Tree of Life, guarded by two cocks. The
symmetry of the paper-cut technique is said to protect the house and home.

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Note- The tree of life is a fundamental archetype in many of the world's Notes

mythologies, religious, and philosophical traditions. It represents personal

development, uniqueness and individual beauty.

The Mexicans use cut-paper flags with designs of planets, plants and a
repetitive border with triangles that symbolize male and female energies.
While sowing, farmers place a paper man to represent the male spirit of
germination, while the harvest is represented as a female doll.

In China, peasants have developed paper-cuts into a rich individual popular art.
The paper cuts are stuck on walls or window-panes of their cottages and
changed frequently. The most popular themes are the Tree of Life, cocks and
hens, etc.

History of Papier-Mache:

The tradition of papier-Mache in Kashmir began in the fifteenth century. While

in prison, Central Asian city of Samarkand, a young Kashmiri prince observed
the craft of using paper pulp as the base for painted objects. This prince soon
became King Zain-ul-Abidin and invited accomplished artists and craftsmen
from Central Asia to his court to make papier-mache objects.

Do you know: Zain -ul- Abidin also called as 'Akbar of Kashmir' was a great
patron of the Sanskrit language and literature.

The craft was originally known in Kashmir as Kar-iqalamdan, being confined to

ornamentation of cases then used for keeping pens as well as some other small
personal articles. The craft was also known as Kar-i-munaqqash since it was
used for ornamenting smooth surfaces made of paper pulp or layers of polished
paper. In the old days the technique of papier-Mache was artistically applied
to wood work, especially windows, wall panels, ceilings and furniture as is
evident from the fine ceiling at Madin Sahib Mosque, the ceiling at the Shah
Hamdan Mosque.

Note-Madin Sahib is an old mosque located near Nowshohar, Srinagar, in

Kashmir. Madin Sahib Masjid was built by Sultan Zain-ul-Abideen.

The Mughal period saw the art extended to palanquins, ceilings, bedsteads,
doors and windows. Mughal Gardens at Shalimar in Srinagar is evident of the
masterly papier-mache work of Mughal times.

Note-Emperor Jahangir built Shalimar Bagh, in 1619 AD.

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Papier-Mache in India: Notes

Nazir Ahmed Mir was born in Srinagar on 16 February 1969 in a family engaged
in this traditional craft. He developed great skill and interest in papier -mache
craft which inspired him to make many new, uncommon and delicate designs.
Nazir Ahmed Mir received the National Award for excellence in papier-mache
craft in 2000 and 2001.

In Madhya Pradesh, Khajuraho and Sanchi, Gwalior, Ujjain, Indore and Harda
are Important centres for this craft.

In Odisha, amusing folk toys with detachable or hinged parts such as nodding
tigers and elephants, old men and women with comic expressions, are made in
papier-mache. Masks of popular mythological characters are also made. The
craft is concentrated in Puri, Cuttack and Ganjam.

Subhadra Devi was born in 1936 in Darbhanga District, Bihar. She started
working with papier-mache at the age of fifteen. At first, she made idols for
festivals. As her interest, grew she joined Shilp Anusandhan Sansthan, Patna
for training. In 1980 Subhadra Devi was given the State Award in appreciation
of her artistic merits. She has exhibited her craft all over India and received the
National Award for excellence in papier mache craft in 1991.

Note- Upendra Maharathi Shilp Anusandhan Sansthan is aimed to preserve,

research & promote Bihar handicraft. It is located in Patna.

In Bihar, this craft is found in various parts of the State such as Madhubani and
Darbhanga Districts.

Papier-mache is also popular in Kerala. Trained artists in Kozhikode make a

large number of figures based on Kathakali and temple models out of paper
pulp.

The craftsmen of Purulia in West Bengal make a variety of masks of

mythological characters that are used during folk festivals by the Chhau
dancers of both Orissa and West Bengal.

Note- Chhau dance is a semi-classical Indian dance combining martial and folk
traditions that originated in the Kalinga (Odisha) area from Mayurbhanj and
spread to West Bengal and Jharkhand in various forms. It enacts episodes from
epics including the Mahabharata and Ramayana, local folklore etc. Its three
distinct styles hail from the regions of Seraikella, Purulia and Mayurbhanj, the
first two using masks.

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Do you know: In 2010, Chhau dance form was included in the UNESCO’s Notes

Representative List of Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity.

THINK: UNESCO’s Representative List of Intangible Cultural Heritage.

The Future:

Paper-craft objects are mainly created by people either for their personal use
or for a limited clientele with whom they are in touch.

Development measures that would increase and improve production are

urgently needed. Craftsmen require assistance in refining and improving their
techniques, gaining access to good quality raw materials and development of
new designs. These artists need access to credit, mdirect marketing channels,
and protection of their interests by ensuring adequate wages and socio-
economic benefits.

TEXTILES

Textiles are a part of India’s history, its past, present, and future. Indian textiles
were found in the tombs of the Egyptian Pharaohs, they were a sought-after
export to ancient Greece and Rome, they also became part of the fashionable
attire of both European and Mughal courts. Suppressing and replacing the
Indian handloom cotton trade with mill-made alternatives was a key factor of
the British Industrial Revolution. That is the reason Gandhi made handspun
khadi a symbol of the Indian Independence movement. Even today, millions of
craftspeople all over India produce extraordinary traditional textiles that
appeal to the international market.

Yarn, Threads and Fibres:

Some of the fibres commonly used in textile weaving are:

• cotton
• silk
• wool
• mixture of the above
• gold and silver thread, etc.

Cotton:
It has been cultivated in India since the Harappan Civilisation. Raw cotton is a
round fluffy white ball growing on a bush about three feet high. Earth, seeds
and other impurities are removed from the cotton balls by ginning.

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Note- In 1929 archaeologists recovered fragments of cotton textiles at Notes

Mohenjo-Daro, in what is now Pakistan, dating to between 3250 and 2750 BCE.
Cottonseeds founds at nearby Mehrgarh have been dated to 5000 BCE.

Note-Ginning is the process of separation of cotton fibres from their seeds is

called ginning of cotton. It was traditionally done by hand. These days machines
called cotton gin are being used for this process.

It is spun to the required thickness and texture and is then ready for weaving.
The thread is classified by its thickness: the thinner the thread, the higher the
number of counts, and the finer the fabric. Its fineness and its absorption
quality make it an ideal fabric for the heat of the Indian summer.

A variety of cotton fabrics were woven all over the country, ranging from,
strong gauzes to the finest of muslins, that represent the highest achievement
of the cotton weaving industry in India. Indian muslins were used as shrouds
for royal Egyptian mummies, and used as garments to adorn Mughal emperors.
Delicate muslin cottons were given poetic names like flowing water (abrawan),
evening dew (shabnam), and woven air (bafthava).

Women of the North-Eastern states weave bold black, red and white cotton
shawls with images of shields, swords, butterflies and snakes, using a narrow
loin loom which they attach to their waists with straps. Loin loom is also
referred to as backstrap or body tension loom and is one of the oldest devices
for weaving cloth.

Mostly made from bamboo, the loin looms are simple in construction and easy
to use. They have neither permanent fixtures nor heavy frames and so are
easily portable. The loom consists of a continuous warp stretched between two
parallel bamboos, one end tied to a post or door and the other end held by a
strap worn around the weaver’s lower back to regulate the tension with her
body.

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Notes

Image: Loin loom

Silk:

It is made from the cocoon of a cream-coloured moth which feeds on the leaves
of the mulberry tree. The caterpillar of the silk moth spins an oval cocoon of
very fine silk, the size of a pigeon’s egg. The silk is generally yellow, but
sometimes white.

About 1600 silk worms produce nearly 500 grams of silk and one hectare of
land produces enough mulberry leaves to feed caterpillars that can produce
46 kg of silk. It takes about seven days for the cocoon to be fully spun round
with silk.

The cocoons are collected and sorted into different qualities and then boiled.
The silk thread is reeled and twisted, dried and polished. It is then wound on a
spindle and spun. The softness, the lustre and the tensile quality of silk make it
one of the most prized materials for weaving fabrics.

There are five major types of silk of commercial importance, obtained from
different species of silkworms. These are Mulberry, Oak Tasar & Tropical

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Tasar, Muga and Eri. Except for mulberry, other non-mulberry varieties of silks Notes

are wild silks, known as vanya silks.

India has the unique distinction of producing all these commercial varieties
of silk. India is the only source of tussar silk that comes from the Antheria
Assamia moth, which feeds on the leaves of the Som and Wali trees.

Eri Silk is one of the purest forms of Silk that is a true and genuine product of
the Samia cynthia ricini worm.

Do you Know: Eri is the only domesticated silk produced in India, as the process
doesn’t involve any killing of the silk worm, also naming Eri silk as ‘Ahimsa
(ahinsa) silk or fabric of peace.

Do you know: The bulk of Eri Silk production comes from Assam, giving it the
name of Eri Silk state.

Mulberry silk is the softest and the most durable fabric.

Muga silk is a variety of wild silk geographically tagged to the state of Assam in
India. The silk is known for its extreme durability and has a natural yellowish-
golden tint with a shimmering, glossy texture.

Women weavers of Assam make their traditional mekla_chador costumes

with golden moga and eri silk, which come from worms that feed on Ashoka
and castor leaves rather than mulberry leaves.

Note- Traditionally, the Kanjeevaram is a sari that is usually handwoven in

mulberry silk and has pure gold or silver zari that renders it a festive quality.
Originating from the village ‘Kanchipuram’ in Tamil Nadu, Kanjeevaram is
considered the queen of silk sarees.

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Notes

Note- The Mashru and Himru fabric is a vibrant, handwoven mix of Silk and
Cotton textiles from Maharashtra and Gujarat.

Note-Orissa Ikat sarees are from Odisha. Also known as “Bandha of Orissa”, it
is a geographically tagged product of Orissa since 2007.

Note: Banarasi brocade is in existence since Mughal era and can be identified
with a narrow fringe like pattern, called Jhhalar, found along the inner and
outer border. This fringe resembles a string of leaves. Banarasi Brocade is a GI
protected item.

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Wool:

It is spun from the fleece of animals. Sheep wool is the most common, but in
India goat wool, camel hair, and ibex hair is also used. In North India the angora
rabbit is bred for its fine, long, very soft and silky hair. Its warmth, tensile
strength and resistance to fire, give this wool its special quality.

The Kashmiri Jamawar shawl is extremely famous. Shawl weaving in Kashmir

was introduced by the ruler Zain-ul-Abidin in the fifteenth century bringing in
Turkistan weavers to teach the twill tapestry technique to local weavers. As
many as fifty colours were used on one shawl.

The rough goat wool dhablas worn by shepherds and camel herders in Kutch
region and the Thar Desert have been reinvented into wonderful
contemporary shawls, home furnishings etc.

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Image: Dhablas

The celebrated Kashmiri shahtoosh ring shawl made from the fleece of the wild
Himalayan ibex is so fine that a metre of this woollen shawl can pass through
a finger ring. Production and sale is banned today for ecological reasons and to
prevent the extinction of the ibex. Weaving it was a fine art, wearing it now a
forbidden luxury.

Note-The Himalayan Ibex is a species of wild goat found in the trans-himalayan

regions of Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh and Himachal.

Textile Techniques:

Indian textiles may be divided into two groups:

i. loom decorated and

ii. post-loom decorated fabrics.

Loom-decorated fabrics are provided with artistic treatment when on the

loom.

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Post-loom decorated fabrics are textiles in which artistic treatment is given

after it is woven. In other words, plain textiles are decorated with techniques
such as:
• dyeing; tie and dye
• hand printing
• hand painting
• embroidery

Tie and dye

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Block Printing:

Block printing, as it is practised all over Western and Central India. Block
printing is the process of printing patterns by means of engraved wooden
blocks. It is the earliest, simplest and slowest of all methods of textile printing.
Block printing by hand is a slow process. It is, however, capable of yielding
highly artistic results, some of which are unobtainable by any other method.

Do you know: Block-printing is a post-loom method of decorating fabric.

Image: Block Printing

Like weaves and embroideries, block-print designs and colours have the special
stamp of the places from where they originate.

• Those from Sanganer in Rajasthan have designs that include delicate

floral butis in a range of colours.

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Sanganer, Rajasthan

• Farrukhabad of Uttar Pradesh has all-over paisley jaals.

Farrukhabad,Uttar Pradesh

• Dhamadka of Kutch is famous for its double-sided interlocked

hexagonal motifs.

Dhamadka,Kutch, Gujarat

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Indian Embroidery: Notes

The explorer, Marco Polo, said in the thirteenth century about India:
"embroidery is here produced with more delicacy than anywhere in the world".

Note- Marco Polo was a trader and adventurer from Venice, Italy who travelled
from Europe to Asia in the 13th century.

D0 you know: Marco Polo landed on the Coromandel Coast of India in AD 1292.

Do-rukha: are shawls from Kashmir that are magically two-sided with the
same design embroidered in different colours on each side. A single shawl may
take over two years to complete.

Image: Do-Rukha

Phulkari: Punjab is famed for its traditional embroidery called phulkari

flowering work. Using threads in brilliant colours like flaming pinks, oranges,
mustard yellows and creams, the reverse satin stitch is done on a brick-red
khadi cloth. An all-over embroidered shawl (dupatta) is called a bagh, literally
resembling a garden of flowers.

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Image: Phulkari

Sujni, from Bihar, is a form of quilted embroidery with mainly narrative

themes.

Image: Sujni

Chikan: There are 22 different chikan styles. Legend has it that Empress
Noorjehan invented chikan while making a cap for her husband, Jehangir.
Chikan-work from Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh, has many different stitches worked
on cotton mull, creating a textured relief of flowers, paisleys and star.

Image: Chikan

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Kantha, embroidery from Bengal, is made of thousands of fine stitches, giving Notes

the fabric a puckered quilted look. In Bangladesh and India kantha is used to
make quilts and coverlets.

Image: Kantha

Pipli in Orissa has its own unique form of applique of bold red, yellow and
green dancing elephants and parrots, outlined with white or black chain-stitch
on equally colourful base fabric. It was developed initially to make the rath
procession hangings for the Puri Temple, but is now used for garden umbrellas,
cushions and for other urban needs.

Note- Appliqué is ornamental needlework in which pieces or patches of fabric

in different shapes and patterns are sewn or stuck onto a larger piece to form a
picture or pattern.

Do you know: Jagannath Puri temple is called ‘Yamanika Tirtha’ where,

according to the Hindu beliefs, the power of ‘Yama’, the god of death has been
nullified in Puri due to the presence of Lord Jagannath.

The Lambani, Lambada and Banjara tribes from Andhra Pradesh and
Karnataka in South India create spectacular embroidery. They too wear
wonderful skirts, backless blouses and veils, covered with vibrant, colourful
mirrored designs, silver or metal coins and ornaments at the edges. Their

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designs are geometric. Notes

Image: Lambani embroidery

Kasuti of North Karnataka is a combination of four different stitches. Kasuti

embroidery speaks about the people of Karnataka, their traditions, customs
and professions. It is said that Kasuti resembles the embroidery of Austria,
Hungary and Spain. The motifs are pictorial in character which includes the
Tulsi plant, temple chariots, eight-pointed stars, parrots, peacocks, bridal
palanquins, cradles, and flowering trees.

Image: Kasuti

Note- The word Kasuti is comprised of ‘Kai’ means hand and ‘Suti’ means cotton
thread.

Do you know: In olden days in North Karnataka, it was a custom that the bride
had to possess a black silk sari, called chandrakali sari with Kasuti work done
on it.

Zardozi and Kamdani or Mukaish are embroidery works followed in Uttar

Pradesh.

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Zardozi or Zar-douzi, also Zardosi, is an Iranian and Indian-subcontinent Notes

embroidery type. Zardozi comes from two Persian words: zar or zarin meaning
'gold', and dozi meaning 'sewing'. Zardozi is a type of heavy and elaborate
metal embroidery on a silk, satin, or velvet fabric base.

Image: Zardozi

Mukaish: also known as Kamdani or Fardi ka kaam, this shimmering

embroidery was a part of the rich Lucknowi culture and tradition. The metal
wire embroidery was done with drawn flattened metal threads, called Badla.
This metal embroidery technique was brought to India by the Mughals in the
16th century.

Image: Kamdani or Mukaish

Ari, Tilla and Sozni are embroidery work from Kashmir which is almost
exclusively a male domain.

Ari embroidery, also known as ari work, is a type of decorative needlework

which produces a chain stitch.

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Notes

Image: Ari

Sozni with its intricate detailing of flora and fauna derives its inspiration from
the verdant, flowering beauty of the Kashmir valley.

Image: Sozni

Tilla work is now a major business for wedding costumes, movie costumes and
the fashion ramp, and it reflects the glory of the Mughal court that brought
gold wire work from the Middle East and Byzantium.

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Notes

Image: Tilla

In India, commercial embroidery made for the market was always done by men.
Even chikan work was traditionally a male preserve, with women only doing
the coarser filling details.

Today, women embroiderers are finding new empowerment and earning an

income from their embroidery skills in the market. All over India, be it Bihar or
Banaskantha, women now embroider for a living.

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Notes

PAINTING
S
The human impulse to paint is related to the need to communicate, express
and make sense of the world around.

The subject of painting can be the expression of a mood, a reality as seen by

the artist, a graphic interpretation of a philosophical idea, an invocation of
blessings from the gods, or just decoration as part of a celebration. It can be
done by an individual, a group, or a community, using different grounds,
colours, adhesives and tools. In India, community painting reflects the identity
of a region or a particular culture and follows common characteristics.

The following are the basic physical components of a painting:

• Surface on which the painting is done

• colours that make up the painting

• adhesive or glue

• tools to apply colours to the surface

Surface on Which the Painting Is Done: Right through history in India, rock
faces and caves, walls of the home, the floor, the threshold, a palm leaf, a piece
of wood, cloth or even the palm of a hand was used as a background to paint.
The ground determines what colours, adhesives, and tools should be used.

For example: Wood has an oily surface therefore water-based paints cannot be
used.

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Notes

Painting on an elephant's body

Colours That Make Up the Painting: Colours for a painting can be organic or
inorganic depending on how they are obtained or made. Colours often
represent meanings and concepts. Red and yellow are auspicious. The
Panchavarna murals are in five colours of red, yellow, green, black, blue

Note: In Kerala traditional Mural art is done based on a principle called

'Panchavarna', in which the basic 5 primary colors are used.

Image: Panchavarna Mural

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Notes

Organic Colours: Infinite colours provided by nature from flowers, leaves,

stones and even cow dung or soot collected from inside a chimney fill the
artistís palette.

Dyes: Natural dyes have been used since time immemorial to add colours to
cloth. It was India that first invented the technique of printing or painting on
cotton cloth by using a fixing agent termed a mordant.

Note-Mordant is a fixing agent used to fix colours on to cotton cloth during the
process of printing, painting or dyeing.

The most common type of mordant used is myrobalam which is made from
unripe karaka fruit and mixed with fresh unboiled milk. The cloth is bleached
with sheep or cow dung dissolved in water before it is dyed.

Inorganic Colours: Inorganic or chemical colours such as arcylic, emulsion etc.

came into existence as a result of industrialisation. They are commercially sold
and since they are easily available, they are widely used.

Adhesive or Glue: A painting is said to be permanent if an adhesive is used to

fix it to the surface.

Tools to Apply Colours to the surface: Painting is done with a variety of

implements or tools made from natural materials such as:

• thin sticks stripped from long grasses

• brushes made of bird’s feathers, squirrel’s and cat’s hair

• bamboo slivers buried in the ground until they become fibrous

One Painting for Each Day:

In India we have many impermanent forms of painting like rangoli and alpana
that are created on the floor and at the entrance to the home. Coloured
powders are used to colour the rangoli on the ground without an adhesive or
glue as the art work is not meant to be permanent but done each day. There
are special designs for festivals, to celebrate the birth of a child, or a marriage.

Note- Alpana is a form of rangoli common to the Bengal region in India, and in
Bangladesh.

Do you know: Kolam is the floor painting made by women at the entrance of
their homes with white rice powder in Tamil Nadu.

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Miniature Painting: Notes

Miniature paintings are made on a very small scale especially for books or
albums. These are executed on materials, such as paper and cloth. The Palas
of Bengal are considered the pioneers of miniature painting in India, but the
art form reached its zenith during the Mughal rule.

Royal families engaged artists to create painted books or manuscripts to

illustrate poems and stories. Great libraries of hand-written and hand painted
books were collected by rulers and kings. Often royalty had their own portraits
made to adorn their palaces, and illustrate their diaries, like the Akbarnama
and Jahangirnama.

Miniature Painting

Do you know: Murals are large works executed on the walls of solid structures,
as in the Ajanta Caves and the Kailashnath temple. Miniature paintings are
executed on a very small scale for books or albums on perishable material such
as paper and cloth.

Cloth Painting:

Kalamkari:

Kalamkari or vrathapani is a style of cloth painting from Andhra Pradesh.

Kalamkari means pen work in Persian and refers to both printed and painted
cloth. The painting is made exclusively with a pen, the kalam made out of a
bamboo sliver tied with wool on one end and then dyed with natural colours.
Black ink is used to make outlines, and jaggery, rusted iron filings and water are
used for making colours to fill in details.

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Sri Kalahasti, a town in Andhra Pradesh is the main centre of Kalamkari art. Notes

Originally large paintings on cloth served as pictorial renderings of the great

epics, the Ramayana and the Mahabharata for temples. Paintings were also
made to illustrate spiritual poems of eminent writers.

The making of a kalamkari is a strenuous process, which, if done carefully

according to the prescribed methods, produces a painting in which the colours
retain their brightness and vigour for centuries.

Image: Kalamkari

Wall Painting:

The tradition of wall paintings has been passed down from pre-historic times
to us today. As society moved from forest dwellings to agricultural-based
communities, the art of painting continued as a part of their life and to transmit
their traditional beliefs through their art.

India has the largest number of art forms, call them styles or schools, anywhere
in the world, mainly because its cultural heritage is rich, many-layered and a
vibrant, living one.

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Wall Painting through the Ages: Notes

Note -Some of the examples of pre historic paintings are Lakhudiyar in

Uttarakhand, Kupgallu in Telangana, Piklihal and Tekkalkotte in Karnataka,
Bhimbetka in Madhya Pradesh and Jogimara in Chhattisgarh.

Do you know: Pre historic means happening in the period of human history
before there were written records.

Marketing Means More than Just Selling:

Indian contemporary art has attained international recognition. Earlier

pioneers from the Shantiniketan school and artists like Amrita Sher Gill drew
upon Indian colours and themes. The work of these artists fetches lakhs of
rupees at auctions and sales in the international market.

It is worth considering why communities that practise their own traditional art
forms are barely known and earn very little compared to contemporary artists.

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One answer is that a single painting of an individual’s unique expression is Notes

worth more than many paintings on similar themes by many people. It is the
simple law of economics that defines supply and demand.

Secondly, individual, urban art explores new themes while community art
prefers to repeat traditional subject matter connected to seasons,
celebrations, festivals and popular legends. Community art was painted on
walls and floors. A change in building materials and lifestyle aspirations created
surfaces in homes that could not be painted upon. Here, the skill and practice
of community paintings declined, and along with it the knowledge and
connection with a heritage.

Community art is now adjusting to presenting itself in different ways for

commercial activity. There are interesting examples of how different
traditional art forms can be adapted to new surfaces and on to three-
dimensional products which can be sold.

Paintings traditionally applied to walls are now done on boxes or trays or

fabrics of different kinds. Traditional folk painting has even been used to
illustrate story books or make animation films. An important aspect of
appreciating the cultural heritage and art forms of different societies and
communities is to learn that adaptations must not distort the art form so that
its origins and meaning are lost.

An appreciation of the culture, the meanings and significance of particular

motifs, and a basic respect should be the foundation for adaptability. These are
all aspects that add value to traditional art works and help in fetching better
prices for its practitioners. At present the difference in commercial value
between contemporary and traditional paintings is considerable. A painting
done in a traditional style represents the heritage of a community and region.
It gains value when the person buying it knows about its special cultural
meaning and characteristics. It also helps to see the artist at work and
appreciate the painstaking manner in which the work is done.

Styles of Painting:

Almost every state and agricultural and tribal community of India has its
distinct painting style, and some have more than one.

Artists in Chittorgarh, Rajasthan make wooden temples with doors that can be
opened up to reveal elaborately painted stories of historical or religious
importance. These wooden kavads are used for worship and on festive
occasions.

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Notes

Image: Kavad

Warli tribals of Maharashtra decorate their house walls with paintings

depicting their lives: planting saplings, carrying grain, dancing, travelling to
market and other routine activities of their daily lives. Symbols of the sun,
moon and stars along with plants, animals, insects and birds show their belief
in the integration of all forms of life.

On ritual and ceremonial occasions Warli home walls are plastered with dung.
Rice paste is used with red ochre powder to tell stories and to invoke the
blessings of their goddess of fertility, Palaghata.

Note- Warli paintings are mainly dominated by basic geometric shapes like
circles, triangles and squares.

Warli Painting

Tanjore Painting grew in the region of Thanjavur, Tamil Nadu under Maratha
influence. The main colours are red, yellow, black, and white. The distinctive
features were aristocratic or religious figures adorned with jewellery and
surrounded by elaborate architectural arches and doorways.

Originally done on wood, it is encrusted with semi-precious stones. Later the

paintings were executed on glass. The glass paintings are coloured from outside
inwards. The outlines and final touches have to be done first since the artist
paints the picture from the reverse side of the glass.

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Do you know: The famous Indian painter Raja Ravi Varma practised Tanjore Notes

painting.

Image: Tanjore Painting

Mithila painting, popularly known as Madhubani art is from Mithila district of

Bihar and is now well-known all over the world. Women decorate the nuptial
chamber and the walls of their homes to celebrate festivals.

The return of Ram from exile and Krishna playing with gopis are the preferred
subject matter. Artists often show scenes of nature, an abundant harvest,
tantric images of snake worship, and even city scenes if they have visited one.

Do you know: In Madhubani paintings, a cotton wrapped around bamboo stick

is used as brush. In Madhubani paintings, the work is done on mud walls. Now
a days, for commercial purposes, it is done on cloth and paper also.

Image: Madhubani Painting

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The patachitra of Orissa depicts stories from the famous poem, the Geet Notes

Govindam, and devotional stanzas by ancient poets, singers and writers.

Stories are drawn in sections on palm leaf as etchings or as paintings on paper
and silk. Deep red, ochre, black and rich blue colours from minerals, shell and
organic lac are used in these paintings. Modern developments have
encouraged them to paint on wooden boxes, picture frames etc. for
contemporary use.

Note- Gita Govindam is an important text of the Bhakti Movement, which

depicts the relationship between Lord Krishna and Radha. It was written by
Jayadeva.

Image: Patachitra

The jharna patachitra of West Bengal is a long vertical paper scroll used to tell
stories from religious epics. The artists compose songs that they sing while they
slowly unroll each scene of the painting. Old fabric is pasted on the back of the
scroll to make it stronger. These village storytellers travelled from village to
village listening to news and passing on information much like television today.

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Note- Jharna patachitra is also known as Patua art and the artists are called Notes

Chitrakars.

Jharna patachitra

Kalighat Painting:

It originated in the 19th century in West Bengal, India, in the vicinity of Kalighat
Kali Temple, Kalighat, Calcutta from the depiction of Hindu gods, god, and other
mythological characters, the Kalighat paintings developed to reflect a variety
of subjects, including many depictions of everyday life

Contemporary events like crime were also the subject of many paintings. The
artists also chose to portray secular themes and personalities and, in the
process, played a role in the Independence movement. They painted historic
characters like Rani Lakshmibai, and Duldul the famous horse of Imam Hussain
of Karbala.

Why Snakes?

Why do traditional paintings, have so many artistic and respectful

representations of snakes?

Since there are usually many snakes in the fields and in Indian villages, Indians
propitiated them in this manner to prevent themselves from being bitten.

Western society is aggressive and would think only of attacking the snake, but
in a spiritual and non-violent society like India, this was a beautiful way of living
with nature.

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Notes
THEATRE CRAFTS

Everyone loves a good story. We have heard stories from our grandparents,
parents, family and friends throughout our childhood. In India we have
invented many ways of telling stories. A few of them are described below.

Puppetry:

A puppet is a doll or figure representing a person, animal, object or an idea and

is used to tell a story. The puppet is made of various materials and can be
moved in different ways.

Puppets are classified as follows:

String puppets: They are attached with two to five strings which are normally
tied to the fingers of the performer, who manipulate the puppets.

Types of String Puppets:

• Putal Nach – Assam

• Gombeyatta – Karnataka

• Kalasutri Bahulya – Maharashtra

• Gopalila Kundhei – Orissa

• Kathputli – Rajasthan

• Bommalattam – Tamil Nadu

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Glove Puppets: Glove puppets are a prominent Indian ritual in Uttar Pradesh, Notes

Orissa, West Bengal, and Kerala.

Types of Glove Puppets:

• PavaKoothu – Kerala

• Sakhi Kundhei – Orissa

• Beni Putul – Bengal

Rod Puppets: Rod puppets are an extension of glove puppets. Rod puppets are
larger than glove puppets and are supported and manipulated from below
using one or more rods/sticks of different sizes. Rod puppetry is famous in the
states of West Bengal and Orissa.

Types of Rod Puppets:

• Putul Nach – West Bengal
• Kathi Kundhei – Orissa
• Yampuri – Bihar

Rod puppets

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Shadow Puppets: India has the richest variety of types and styles of shadow Notes

puppets. Shadow puppets are flat figures. They are cut out of leather, which
has been treated to make it translucent.

The different parts of the puppetí's body are separately cut out of this skin.
Gods and heroes are made the largest in size, because of their importance.
Minute elaborate shapes are punched in the skin to delineate the gorgeous
costumes and jewellery of each figure. They are then dyed, according to the
different colours assigned to each of them. Carving out the eyes is done last for
this symbolises bringing the figures to life.

Types of Shadow Puppets:

• Tholu Bommalata – Andhra Pradesh

• Togalu Gombeyata – Karnataka

• Tolpavakoothu – Kerala

• Chamadyache Bahulya – Maharashtra

• Ravanachhaya – Orissa

• Thol Bommalattam – Tamil Nadu

Do you Know: The best-known leather puppets in our country are those used in
the Tholu Bomalatta of Andhra Pradesh. The origins of these puppets can be
traced back to about 2000 BCE, as they are mentioned in the Mahabharata.

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Theatre: Notes

It is a great form for story-telling in which one or more actors using the skills of
dancing, acting, singing, talking, miming and theatre crafts like masks, make-up
and costumes create a story world for us.

Every corner of India has its own unique form of folk theatre. Different types of
folk theaters in India are ,

• The lively Nautanki of Uttar Pradesh which often draws on romantic

Persian literature for its themes;

• Raw vigour and humour characterise the Tamasha of Maharashtra

• The Bhavai of Gujarat; the blood and

• Jatra melodramas of Bengal which are in great demand during Puja

(Dussehra festivities.

• Dance-drama form of Yakshagana from Karnataka.

Masks:

In many tribal societies across the world, masks still have a ritual significance.
People believe that by wearing or putting on a mask, the person becomes the
character depicted on the mask.

Masks, those magical objects with which we cover our faces and assume a
different identity, have a rich and varied tradition in our country.

From the delicate pastel-coloured masks and shimmering head-dresses worn

by Chhau dancers to the demon dance masks of the Buddhist monasteries of
Ladakh to the inexpensive animal masks of papier-mache available in our cities,
India has a vast and ancient tradition of masks and make-up for rituals and
theatre.

Excavations have revealed small hollow masks dating back to the Indus Valley
Civilisation. In fact, in Bihar a terracotta mask of the fourth century has also
been excavated. The Natya Shastra speaks of masks and their use in theatre.
Here it is mentioned that masks can be made of ground paddy husks applied to
cloth.

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How the Chhau Mask Is Made? Notes

The most beautiful masks in our country are made for the Chhau dance form.
Chhau is a style performed exclusively by men from the area of Jharkhand,
Bengal and Orissa. This is the tribal belt of India is home to the tribal groups of
Bhulya, Santhals, Mundas, Hos and Oraons. The masks they use vary
depending on the style of Chhau practised such as Seraikella Chhau or Purulia
Chhau. In the third form of Chhau, Mayurbhanj Chhau, masks are not worn.

Note- The Purulia Chhau of West Bengal, the Seraikella Chhau of Jharkhand and
the Mayurbhanj Chhau of Odisha.

The Chhau mask is made of pottersí clay (matti ghada) over which layers of
muslin are pasted followed by paper (kagaz chitano). Using a delicate wooden
chisel, different features of the mask are polished. Once it is dried it is painted
in pastel colours (kahij lepa). Then the mask is separated from the clay model
and fully dried in the sun. The clay is then reshaped to make another mask.
Finally, the mask is worn with a highly decorated head-dress of tinsel, pearls,
coloured paper and artificial flowers.

Image: Chhau mask

Musical Instruments:

Music is an important component of the performing arts like dance and drama,
and of rituals. Each community has its own style of music and tradition of songs.

There are essentially two ways to make music: with the human voice and with
an instrument.

The musical instruments are classified on the basis of the scientific principle
used to create the sound they make. They are briefly described below:

• Percussion Instruments: These instruments are struck to produce

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sound. Notes

• Wind Instruments: These need air to flow through them to produce

sound.

• String Instruments: These are instruments that use one or many tightly
tied strings that when struck vibrate to create sound.

Drums of India:

A drum is made of a membrane stretched across a hollow frame and played by

striking it. Tablas, dholaks, damrus, naggadas, chendas and many others fall in
this category.

Dholak: is a medium-sized two-sided drum. Dholaks are used by almost all

sections of society during religious festivities and on special occasions like the
birth of a child and weddings.

Image: Dholak

Damru: It is a tiny two-sided drum that often has a string and a stone fixed to
it.

Do you know: Lord Shiva is depicted playing Damru.

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Notes

Naggadda: It is a large, resounding drum used in North India as accompaniment

by folk performers in nautanki, or traditionally, to announce the arrival of
royalty. It is played using drumsticks.

Its South Indian counterpart of Naggadda is chhenda that produces the sharp
percussion that accompanies the Kathakali dance.

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Notes

Wind Instruments:

In folk music a variety of wind instruments are popular, for example, flutes
played both horizontally and vertically, algoja, pawa, satara, turhi, shehnai,
shankh, been (pungi) etc.

Percussion Instruments:

Chikka: It is an instrument unique to Punjab. The chikha is made up of 14

wooden sticks joint together as a lattice. By opening and sharply shutting the
chikkha, a sharp sound similar to clapping is produced.

Chimta: Very similar to an actual pair of tongs used in the kitchen, the chimta
has small metal discs loosely attached to it which strike against each other
when the arms of the chimta are struck.

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Notes

Mashak: It is made of the leather bag used by villagers to transport water! It is

like a basic bagpipe, the national musical instrument of Scotland! The mashak
is usually played by the Dholis of Rajasthan as accompaniment to popular folk
melodies.

Khadtaal: We often see this instrument depicted in the hands of Meerabai and
other poets of the Medieval period. Held in one hand, the khadtaal is made of
two similar pieces of wood with brass fittings. One piece of it has space for a
thumb, the other for four fingers, these are struck together to produce a simple
percussive beat. It is easy to see the close resemblance between a khadtaal and
the Spanish castanets, used as accompaniment for the famous Flamenco music
and dance.

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Notes

Manjeeras: are a pair of flat metallic disks that are beaten together to produce
a rhythmic metallic sound.

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CRAFTS IN THE PAST

A Craftsperson plays many roles in society as a designer, a problem solver, a

creator and as an innovator, leave alone the maker and seller of craft objects.
CRAFT
The craftsperson therefore is not just the maker of an object, and a craft object
is not just a beautiful thing—it has been created to serve a particular function
to meet a specific need of a client.

Relationship Between a Client and a Craftsperson:

There are three important factors to be considered in this case:

1. the client and his/her needs,

2. the nature of the problem to be solved, and

3. the craftsperson who is skilled and innovative enough to find a solution

to the problem.

Close exchange between the client and the craftsperson is very important for
the end product to be appropriate. The client has to inspire the craftsperson to
produce, innovate and create new and exciting objects all the time. The
craftsperson, in turn, needs to understand the demand of the client.

Every country in the world needs such people who are skilled in creating
practical, efficient solutions to everyday problems. Craftspersons skilled in
fabricating with different materials, and communities who can constantly
innovate and design new products to meet changing needs are necessary in all
societies, ancient or modern.

For instance, the everyday problem of having to carry large quantities of water
over long distances was uniquely solved in Kutch—the matkas (water pots) fit
into one another and can be balanced on the head of a woman, leaving her
hands free.

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Notes

India has always had a large community of innovative craftspeople from the
earliest periods of recorded history. It was the crafts communities of different
regions who designed homes for the poor and the rich that suited the climate,
built places of worship for any god that the community wished to worship, who
made cooking utensils that simplified food preparation, created items for the
home, and for people to wear, like textiles for different occasions and varying
climates, and jewellery of all kinds.

Crafts For Problem Solving:

Living Bridges: Here is how a curious problem was solved in Meghalaya, where
the climate is hot and humid most of the year, where Cherrapunji was once the
wettest place on earth. They needed bridges over their little streams and rivers
so that people could cross with their belongings and animals. As you know,
bridges around the world are built of wood, steel and concrete. However, in
Meghalaya they could not use wood because it would rot, nor could they use
metal of any kind or metal nails as these would rust. The problem was how to
make a strong bridge across fast-moving rivers without wood or metal?

They learnt how to train the aerial roots of the Ficus Elastica tree to form a
living bridge across the river that would not decay or deteriorate in the humid
rainy climate. Over several years they had to train, bind and care for their
bridge as it linked across the stream, then they placed flat stones on the cradle-
like bridge to create an even footpath. This living bridge of roots lasts years and
uses no dead wood or metal.

Note: Ficus elastica, (the rubber fig, rubber bush, rubber tree, rubber plant, or

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Indian rubber bush, Indian rubber tree,) is a species of flowering plant in the Notes

family Moraceae, native to South Asia and Southeast Asia.

Do You Know? They are known locally as Jingkieng Jri. They are included in the
Tentative List of UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Crafts Specialisation:

In India, as in most other parts of the world, the artisan as a specific social group
emerged only when people began to settle and cultivate the land. While most
people in these communities would busy themselves with actually carrying out
the various activities related to tilling the soil, a few began to specialise in
different crafts. Some would make containers with straw, reed or clay to hold
agricultural produce, another would make footwear, yet another would
specialise in iron-mongering to create scythes and sickles, and yet another in
the manufacture of cloth from flax and cotton.

Even today, in India, handicrafts form an alternative source of earning an

income, providing the backbone of the economy for many communities. In
recent years there has also been a tremendous increase in the number of
people turning once again to their traditional craft as their sole means of
income. However, others only supplement their earnings with their handicraft
products. This economic factor greatly contributes to the continuation and the
alteration of the character and the production of the same craft, i.e., to make
it market-friendly.

By the time of the Indus Valley Civilisation (3000–1500 BCE), a developed

urban culture had emerged that stretched from Afghanistan to Gujarat. Here
archaeologists have found votive figures of clay as well as clay seals, beads

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made of semi-precious stones, garments of cotton and earthenware of all Notes

shapes, sizes and design, all of which indicate a sophisticated artisan culture.

Note-Votive figures means objects offered to a god or goddess at a sacred

place, such as a temple.

The crafts community also worked out simple solutions to take waste water
out of the houses by creating clay pipes. The waste water was carried by the
drainage system under the city streets, and out of the city. To supply water to
everyone in the city, builders and masons dug wells in the courtyard of every
house.

Five thousand years ago specialised crafts communities answered social needs
and requirements with ingenuity and practical solutions that enhanced the
lives of the people.

The Sangam classics written between 100 BCE–600 AD refer to the weaving of
silk and cotton cloth. Weavers were already a recognised and established
section of society with separate streets for them named karugar vidi or aruva
vidi.

Note- Sangam literature is the name given to the earliest available Tamil
literature. Sangam literature is one of the main sources used for documenting
the early history of the ancient Tamil country.

In both the Chola and Vijayanagar empires (ninth to twelfth century) the
weavers lived around the temple complex, weaving fabrics to dress the idols,
drape as curtains, clothe the priests and the people of the locality, as well as to
cater to trade from across the sea.

The manufacture of textiles was concentrated in three areas:

• Western India, with Gujarat, Sindh and Rajasthan as its focus;

• South India, in particular the Coromandel Coast;

• Eastern India including Bengal, Orissa and the Gangetic plain.

Each of these areas specialised in producing specific fabrics and specific motifs.
There is evidence that various forms of economic organisation and methods of
integrating craft production into the macro-system of the economy existed at
different points in Indian history.

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SHRENIS OR TRADE GUILDS: Notes

The Ramayana and many plays from the Gupta period and Tamil Sangam
literature write in detail about the trade guilds or shrenis.

Note-In Ancient India, a shreni was an association of traders, merchants, and

artisans. Generally, a separate shreni existed for a particular group of persons
engaged in the same vocation or activity.

Functions of Shrenis: These were professional bodies of jewellers, weavers,

ivory carvers or even salt-makers who came together to control quality
production, create a sound business ethic, maintain fair wages and prices,
sometimes operated as a cooperative and controlled the entry of newcomers
by laying down high standards of craftsmanship and enforcing rules regarding
apprenticeship.

Each guild had its own chief, assisted by others. These functionaries were
selected with great care. Guild members were even entitled to impeach and
punish a chief found guilty of misconduct.

Occasionally, shrenis (of merchants and artisans) came together in a joint

organisation, called the nigama. (or the equivalent of a chamber of commerce
and industry of today). Some nigamas also included a class of exporters, who
transported the specialties of a town over long distances, and sold them at
higher margins of profit than those they could obtain locally.

By all accounts, the shrenis were very sound and stable institutions, and
enjoyed considerable moral and social prestige not only among their own
members, but in society at large.

The institution of guilds came under severe strain over the last five centuries.
Writing in 1880, Sir George Birdwood observed, “Under British rule... the
authority of the trade guilds in India has necessarily been relaxed, to the
marked detriment of those handicrafts the perfection of which depends on
hereditary processes and skill”.

Note-Sir George Christopher Birdwood was an Anglo-Indian official, naturalist,

and writer.

Artisans’ guilds are almost unheard of in India today. The cooperatives

promoted by the government, may be viewed as the modern avatar of artisans’
guilds, but their success, so far, has been limited.

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THE SOCIAL DIMENSIONS OF CRAFT PRODUCTION: Notes

The bulk of craft production in India, until the colonial period, was for the
immediate rural market, and craft items were produced in small units using
very little capital. Since heredity determined the artisan’s choice of trade in
most cases, the family naturally developed as the work unit, with the head of
the family as the master -craftsman, providing the necessary training to other
family members.

The Arthashastra of Kautilya (written in the third century BCE) makes a

distinction between two types of artisans: the master craftsperson who
employed a number of artisans on a wage to do the actual work for the
customer and the artisans who financed themselves, and worked in their own
workshops.

Note-The Arthashastra is an Ancient Indian Sanskrit treatise on statecraft,

political science, economic policy and military strategy. Kautilya, also identified
as Vishnugupta and Chanakya, is traditionally credited as the author of the text.

Artisans were remunerated either in kind or in cash. Nevertheless, in those

areas where the use of money had not been introduced, service relationships
and exchanges in kind may have existed. It is likely that the jajmani system
evolved from these service relations.

THE JAJMANI SYSTEM:

The jajmani system is a reciprocal arrangement between craft-producing

castes and the wider village community, for the supply of goods and services.
The caste system did not permit the upper castes to practise certain
occupations. As a result, the patrons or jajman were dependent on purjans
(cultivators, craftsmen, barbers, washermen, cobblers, sweepers, etc.) to
provide essential goods and services. In return a fixed payment in kind was
assured. This could be rent-free land, residence sites, credit facilities, food or
even dung! Since most upper-caste people owned land, the jajmani system
provided them with a stable supply of labour.

Today, this system still holds sway over several parts of the country, though
colonialism, competition, better communications and improved civil laws have
all transformed it in their own ways.

It could be said that the Jajmani system is a system of distribution whereby high
caste land owning families are provided services and products of various lower
castes such as Khati (Carpenter), Nai (Barber), Kumhars (Potters), Lobars
(Blacksmiths), Dhobi (Washer man), Sweeper (Chuhra) etc.

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Crafts during Sultanate and Mughals: Notes

In the Sultanate and Mughal empires of North India karakhanas (factories)

were maintained by the State. This practice was followed by several other
Indian rulers of the same period.

The Mughals found on arrival in India that indigenous Indian art was as
decorative as the arts of China, Iran and Central Asia. Since the number of
foreign craftspeople coming to India was small, they depended largely on the
skills of local people and the products that emerged from their work were
neither imitations of foreign forms nor a mere continuation of Indian ideals.

The Indian factor, however, became fairly strong in Mughal art and Emperor
Akbar was a particularly keen patron. The Ain-i-Akbari tells us that the Emperor
maintained skilled craftsmen from all over India. Akbar personally inspected
the work of his men and honoured the best with bonuses and increased
salaries. Special types of armour, gilded and decorated weapons, royal insignia,
and a vast range of woven and embroidered textiles were commissioned for
the royal household as well as for gifts. The shawls of Kashmir received a new
lease of life, while the artisans of Rajasthan and Delhi made the finest court
jewellery. Fine handicrafts were the most sought after objects of high Mughal
society.

Note-The Ain-i-Akbari or the "Administration of Akbar", is a 16th-century

detailed document recording the administration of the Mughal Empire under
Emperor Akbar, written by his court historian, Abu'l Fazl in the Persian
language.

The emperor, his family and the nobility were its principal patrons and it was
the indigenous artisan working in Mughal workshops who contributed
substantially to the aesthetic character of the designs, bringing to his art a
tradition of ideas and attitudes.

TREASURE TROVES OF INDIAN CRAFTS:

There are fabled royal collections of art treasures, archives and memorabilia
housed in palaces throughout India that will give you an idea of what a famous
tradition of crafts existed in India through the millennia.

In the past 150 years over 700 museums have been established in India. Of
these there are a few specialised crafts museums. Each of these has a different
focus — concentrating on one craft, a single person’s collection governed
privately, or those established by the government. Amongst the most famous
of these museums are:

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• National Handicrafts and Handlooms Museum (Crafts Museum), New Delhi; Notes

(founded in 1956),

• Ashutosh Museum, Kolkata (founded 1937)

• Calico Museum, Ahmedabad (founded 1949)

• Utensils Museum, Ahmedabad (founded 1981)

• Salar Jung Museum, Hyderabad (founded 1951)

• Dinkar Kelkar Museum, Pune (1920)

• Indira Gandhi Rashtriya Manav Sangrahalaya, Bhopal.

COLONIAL RULE AND CRAFTS

CLAY
Crafts formed a major part of India's exports throughout history. In fact, India’s
crafts communities produced such fine and artistic objects that merchants
travelled from far to acquire these goods. Seventeenth century courtly
patronage, trade, the jajmani system and the demand for everyday utility crafts
by the rural population, resulted in a steady home market and a worldwide
reputation for Indian crafts.

Tavernier, a French traveller in Mughal India, states that the Ambassador of

the Shah of Persia, on his return from India, presented his master with a
coconut shell, set with jewels, containing a muslin turban thirty yards in length,
so exquisitely fine that it could scarcely be felt by the touch.

Note-Jean-Baptiste Tavernier (1605-89) was one of the most renowned

travellers of 17th century Europe. He was from France. Tavernier was a jewel
merchant who between 1632 and 1668 made six voyages to the East. The
countries he visited included present-day Cyprus, Malta, Turkey, Syria, Iraq,
Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, Sri Lanka, and Indonesia.

He was a gem and diamond trader who travelled extensively for his trades. He
travelled till the Kingdom of Golconda in the South.

TRADE:

India has had a long history of trade in craft with other countries beginning
from the Harappan Civilisation 5000 years ago. Over the centuries, trade with

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Greece and Rome grew and historical evidence can be found in literature and Notes

archaeological excavations.

Note-The Indus people were greatly reliant on trade. They traded with many
different civilizations like Persia, Mesopotamia and China. They were also
known to trade in the Arabian Gulf region, central parts of Asia.

Flourishing trade led to overland routes like the Silk Route and brought silk
from China through Asia into Europe.

Note-The Silk Road was a network of Eurasian trade routes connecting China
with Europe. It was active from the second century BC until the mid-15th
century. Spanning over 6,500 kms, it played a central role in facilitating
economic, cultural, political, and religious interactions between the East and
West.

There are accounts of caravans, and traders speaking different languages,

meeting at trading stations along the route. Ship-building centres and ports
developed along India’s long coastline. Sea routes to the Mediterranean
countries, Sri Lanka, Myanmar, South-east Asia and China are mentioned both
in Sangam literature and foreign accounts.

In the area of textiles, to South-east Asia we exported sarongs, to the Middle

East went the finest and most expensive muslins, to West Africa went Christian
altar fronts, to Europe silk and woollen fabrics, dress materials and bed-
hangings. All these fabrics were considered ‘luxury goods’ in these countries.

Note-A sarong or sarung is a large tube or length of fabric, often wrapped

around the waist, worn mostly in Southeast Asia.

Note- An altar front is usually a cloth which hangs or is placed in front of the
altars of some Christian Churches.

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Notes

The pattern of trade from the Coromandel Coast was triangular. Arabs carried
gold and silver (bullion) to the Coromandel Coast, exchanged these for textiles,
and then exchanged the latter in Malaysia for spices, with which they returned
to the Middle East.

Throughout the ancient and mediaeval periods, the fame of Indian cotton
textiles, gems and jewels, and spices like pepper and cardamom, ivory and
sandalwood continued to make trade a lucrative business. Gems like pearls,
and precious stones like diamonds gave to India the reputation of a fabled land
of riches and natural resources. This reputation of being a land of riches and
extraordinary skills, tempted traders from Europe, who were willing to go to
war, and to risk their lives in order to get a share of the profit from Indian trade.

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Notes

Note- The Qutb Shahi Dynasty or the Golconda Sultanate was the ruling family
of the sultanate of Golkonda, which was one of the five Deccan Sultanates.

THINK: Deccan Sultanates

INDIA AS A TEXTILE PRODUCTION HUB:

“Everyone from the Cape of Good Hope (in Africa) to China, man and woman is
clothed from head to foot, in the products of Indian looms,” is how a
Portuguese traveller put it. India was the largest exporter of textiles in the
world.

In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries it was trade in textiles and in

spices, essential for preserving meat when refrigeration did not exist, that
initially brought European traders to India. A triangular trade developed with
Britain transporting slaves from Africa to the Americas, to make enough profit
and to get the bullion necessary for the purchase of Indian manufacture.

With the founding of the British East India Company in 1600, the English, and
later the Dutch and the French, started exporting Indian textiles to London, for
re-export to the eastern Mediterranean. Very quickly, they realised the huge
market for these textiles whose colours were permanent (i.e., they did not run).
In Europe at the time, the techniques of ‘fixing’ dyes were unknown to
craftsmen who applied coloured pigments to the textile, which ran or flaked off

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when the fabric was washed. Notes

Note- French East India Company was established in 1664.

Note-Dutch East India Company was established in 1602.

By 1625 a revolution in taste began in England. Most imported Indian textiles

were used to decorate beds, the most precious item of household furniture.
People were attracted by the bright colours and new floral patterns, which did
not exist in European fabrics. From the second half of the seventeenth century,
the demand for Indian chintz increased in England, France and the
Netherlands. The East India Company selected and guided the making of the
palampore.

Note-Chintz is a woodblock printed, painted, stained or glazed textile that

originated in Golconda in the 16th century.

Image: Chintz

Note-A palampore is a type of hand-painted and mordant-dyed bed cover that

was made in India for the export market during the eighteenth century and very
early nineteenth century. Only the wealthiest classes could afford to buy
palampore; therefore, the few examples that have survived are often quite
valuable today.

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Notes

Image: Palampore

FACTORIES AND TRADE:

In the seventeenth century the British East India Company and other trading
companies from France and Holland established factories and new townships
around the Indian coastline, where goods created specifically for the export
market were stored.

To produce these goods there was an increasing concentration and localisation,

and a large-scale migration of crafts communities. Urban centres and coastal
towns attracted craftsmen as a number of affluent consumers and a vast export
market could be accessed from here.

By the nineteenth century several age-old crafts began to undergo change: the
traditional patua artists of Orissa and Bengal picked up the skill of woodcut,
block printing and created what is now called Kalighat Art.

FROM CRAFT PRODUCER TO SUPPLIER OF RAW MATERIALS:

Between 1800 and 1860, the Industrial Revolution transformed the

manufacturing process across England and Europe, adversely impacting the
craft trade in India.

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Note- The spinning jenny is a multi-spindle spinning frame, and was one of the Notes

key developments in the industrialization of textile manufacturing during the

early Industrial Revolution.

Note-A cotton gin—meaning "cotton engine"—is a machine that quickly and

easily separates cotton fibres from their seeds, enabling much greater
productivity than manual cotton separation.

In 1813, under pressure from the local textile industry, the British Government
began imposing high taxes on the import of Indian textiles. British goods, on
the other hand, had virtually free entry into India. The shattering results are
well known: between 1814 and 1835 British cotton goods exported to India
rose from one million yards to thirty-one million yards.

The thriving textile towns, Dacca, Murshidabad, Surat, Madurai, were laid
waste. Britain’s Industrial Revolution demolished India’s textile trade, and from
being exporters of handloom textiles we became exporters of raw cotton and
a market for imported mill-made cloth, which even undercut domestic textiles.

The new taxes that were imposed by the British, and the shifts in textile
production left the peasants, who were now solely dependent on agriculture,
even more vulnerable. In Europe, handloom weavers who had been displaced
found jobs in the new industries, which also employed many women. But in
India even men had few such alternatives. They flooded into the already
impoverished agriculture labour market, making wages even lower. Not only
were many thousands of people affected by the collapse of the textile industry,
but also of the iron, glass, paper, pottery and jewellery industries.

“The misery hardly finds a parallel in the history of commerce. The bones of its
cotton weavers are bleaching the plains of India,” William Bentick, the
Governor General himself wrote in 1834.

THE IMPACT OF COLONIALISM ON THE TEXTILE TRADE:

Before 1860, three-fourths of raw cotton imports into Britain came from
America. British cotton manufacturers had for long been worried about this
dependence on American supplies.

In 1857, the Cotton Supply Association was founded in Britain and in 1859 the
Manchester Cotton company was formed. Their objective was to encourage
cotton production in every part of the world suited for its growth. India was
seen as a country that could supply cotton to Lancashire if the American supply
dried up. India possessed suitable soil, a climate favourable to cotton
cultivation, and cheap labour.

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When the American Civil War broke out in 1861, a wave of panic spread Notes

through cotton circles in Britain; raw cotton imports from America fell to less
than three per cent. Frantic messages were sent to India and elsewhere to
increase cotton exports to Britain. In Bombay, cotton merchants visited the
cotton districts to assess supplies and encourage cultivation. As cotton prices
soared, exports increased to meet British demand. So, advances were given to
urban sahukars, who in turn extended credit to those rural moneylenders who
promised to secure the produce.

Note-The American Civil War was fought from 1861 to 1865 between the
northern states loyal to the Union and the 7 southern states that had seceded
from the Union to form the Confederate States of America. The American Civil
War was a result of disputes between the northern and southern states over
slavery, westward expansion and rights of the state.

These developments had a profound impact on the Deccan countryside. The

ryots in the Deccan suddenly found access to seemingly limitless credit. They
were given `100 as advance for every acre they planted with cotton. Sahukars
were more than willing to extend long term loans. By 1862 over 90 per cent of
cotton imports into Britain came from India.

Note- A ryot is a person who owns or rents a small piece of land and grows
crops.

CREDIT DRIES UP:

However, within a few years the American Civil War ended, cotton production
in America revived and Indian cotton export to Britain steadily declined.

When the Civil War ended Britain resumed trade in cotton with America for
two reasons: American cotton was a superior type (due to the longer, stronger
fibres of its two domesticated native American species); secondly, cotton from
plantations in the United States and the Caribbean was much cheaper as it was
produced by unpaid slaves. By the mid-nineteenth century, in the United
States, cultivating and harvesting cotton had become the leading occupation of
slaves.

Export merchants and sahukars in the Deccan were no longer keen on

extending long term credit. So, they decided to close down their operations,
restrict their advances to peasants, and demand repayment of outstanding
debts, further impoverishing the farmers and the craftspeople.

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COLONIAL RULE AND CRAFTS: Notes

Improving technology and increasing control of world markets allowed British

traders to develop a commercial chain in which raw cotton fibres were (at first)
purchased from colonial plantations, processed into cotton cloth in the mills of
Lancashire, and then re-exported on British ships to captive colonial markets in
West Africa, India, and China (via Shanghai and Hong Kong).

The Industrial Revolution in England led to the reversal of trade in which cotton
was exported from India to England and machine-made cotton cloth was
brought back to India and sold.

The colonial policy of supporting production of raw material in India for British
industries and the consumption of British products in India greatly damaged
the Indian economy. This along with devastating famines, over taxation and
diversion of revenues back to England were the primary factors for the
deteriorating condition of the Indian crafts community.

RISE, FALL, RISE

From the fifteenth to the eighteenth century, China and India controlled almost
half of the global trade. This pattern continued till India became a part of the
British Empire in the nineteenth century, and Chinese trade came to be
increasingly controlled by those who controlled the sea routes—England,
France and the U.S. India became independent and China turned to
communism in the mid-twentieth century and both began to rebuild their
economies. In the beginning of the twenty-first century, China and India have
become the world’s fastest growing economies and the centre of gravity of
global trade appears to be shifting east again. The following pages give a
glimpse of the growth trajectory of the Asian giants over 500 years.

Sixteenth Century:

India: As per Arab traders ship Indian goods to Europe through the Red Sea and
Mediterranean ports; ‘India’s economy has a 24.5 per cent share of world
income. It is the world’s second largest after China. India enjoys a favourable
balance of trade—it earns gold and silver from the textiles, sugar, spices,
indigo, carpets, etc.it sells’.

China: Direct maritime trade between Europe and China begins with the
Portuguese, who lease an outpost at Macau in 1557. Other Europeans follow.
India and China trade with each other using overland routes.

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Seventeenth Century: Notes

India: At the turn of the century, Mughal India’s annual income was greater
than the British budget. As the Mughal Empire reaches its zenith under Shah
Jahan, Indian exports exceed its imports—it is selling many more things and
lots more of each. Chinese ships dock at Quilon and Calicut, while in Khambat
the volume of trade is so high that more than 3000 ships visit the port every
year.

China: China continues to control a quarter of world trade. The English

established a trading post at Canton in 1637. Trade grew further after the Qing
emperor relaxed maritime trade restrictions in the 1680s. By now, Taiwan has
come under Qing control. But the sea trade makes the Chinese apprehensive
of conquest.

Note-The Qing Dynasty was the final imperial dynasty in China, lasting from
1644 to 1912. It was an era noted for its initial prosperity and tumultuous final
years.

Note-Canton system is a trading pattern that developed between Chinese and

foreign merchants, especially British, in the South China trading city of
Guangzhou (Canton) from the 17th to the 19th century. The major
characteristics of the system developed between 1760 and 1842, when all
foreign trade coming into China was confined to Canton and the foreign traders
entering the city were subject to a series of regulations by the Chinese
government.

Eighteenth Century:

India: Aurangzeb’s India had a 24.4 per cent share of world income, the largest
in the world. But as Mughal power declines, the East India Company disrupts
trade relations between India’s mercantile community.

China: In 1760, as China’s share of global trade began to fall, the government
set out regulations for foreigners and foreign ships. Canton is the only port
open to alien traders. After their War of Independence (1776), the Americans
began to trade with China; this is a setback for the British.

Nineteenth Century:

India: In 1820, India’s economy was completely controlled by the East India
Company. The Indian agricultural pattern is changed by the Company. By 1870,
India had a 12.2 per cent share of the world income.

China: The Qing king refuses to open all ports to foreign traders and seeks to

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restrict the opium trade with India. War broke out between Britain and China. Notes

A defeated China accepts the opium trade and gives Western merchants
access. Tea exports increased 500 per cent in eight years, from 1843 to 1855.

Note: The Anglo-Chinese War, also known as the Opium War or the First Opium
War, was a series of military engagements fought between Britain and the Qing
dynasty between 1839 and 1842.

Twentieth Century

India: In 1913, Indian economy had a mere 7.6 per cent share of world income.
In 1952, five years after Independence, it had 3.8 per cent. Though by 1973 its
share of the world income fell to 3.1 per cent. In 1991, economic liberalisation
was introduced and as of today India is the sixth largest economy in the world.

China: Before communist China came into being in 1949, the country mainly
produced yarn, coal, crude oil, cotton and foodgrain. Mao Zedong put the
country on a communist path. In 1980, under Deng Xiaoping, China changed
track and the first Special Economic Zones were established in Shenzhen. In
1986, Deng’s ‘Open-door’ policy encouraged foreign direct investment. Today,
China is the second largest economy in the World.

Note- Mao Zedong, also known as Chairman Mao, was a Chinese communist
revolutionary who was the founder of the People's Republic of China, which he
led as the chairman of the Chinese Communist Party from the establishment of
the PRC in 1949 until his death in 1976.

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Notes

MAHATMA GANDHI AND SELF-SUFFICIENCY

POTTERY
The first article of Gandhiji’s faith was non-violence. Therefore, he could not
accept a society that produced violence. True civilisation, he said, was to be
found where industries had not entered and cast their influence. India, before
it felt the impact of industries through British rule, represented this true
civilisation.

Mahatma Gandhi’s ideas about self-sufficiency and handicrafts were directly

related to his views on industries and industrial society. Gandhiji believed that
industrial societies were based on an endless production of commodities. This
produced greed and resulted in competition. The end result of this was violence
and war.

"What I object to is the craze for machinery as such. The craze is for what they
call labour-saving machinery. Men go on ‘saving labour’, till thousands are
without work and thrown on the streets to die of starvation. I want to save time
and labour,not for a fraction of mankind, but for all; I want the concentration
of wealth, not in the hands of a few, but in the hands of all."

– M. K. GANDHI, Young
India, 13 November 1924

Even in the twentieth century, Gandhiji argued, it was possible to find large
areas in India that were untouched by industries. The future of India and of its
civilisation lay in these villages which were governed by simple norms of
reciprocity and self-sufficiency. Gandhiji wanted to revive these villages, their
craft economy and their practices and make them represent a system that was
completely different from Western societies based on industry. His ideas about
handicrafts were part of this vision.

THE MEANING OF SWARAJ:

Gandhiji described his vision of Swaraj in many of his writings, most notably in
Hind Swaraj.

Note- Hind Swaraj or Indian Home Rule is a book written by Mahatma Gandhi
in 1909. He wrote this book in his native language, Gujarati. In it he expresses
his views on Swaraj, modern civilization, mechanisation etc. The book was
banned in 1910 by the British government in India as a seditious text.

He wrote about the idea of a self-contained village republic inhabited by

individuals whose lives were self-regulated. In Gandhiji’s philosophy, swaraj for

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the nation did not mean merely political independence from British rule. Notes

Swaraj, for him, was something more substantive, involving the freedom of
individuals to regulate their own lives without harming one another. His
swaraj was one where every individual was his or her own ruler, with the
capacity to control and regulate his or her own life. This would remove
inequalities of power and status in society and enable proper reciprocity.

Gandhiji certainly did not want British rule to be replaced by another form of
rule where Western institutions of governance and civil society would be run
by Indians instead of white men. That would be “English rule without the
Englishman’’. He wrote that such a process “would make India English. And
when it becomes English, it will be called not Hindustan, but Englistan. This is
not the swaraj I want”

Swaraj, from Gandhiji’s perspective, would have to be not only outside the
domain of British political control, but also beyond the influence of Western
civilisation.

SPINNING THE IDEA OF SELF-SUFFICIENCY:

For all this to happen, Indians would have to take care to revive and preserve
all the village arts and crafts. Among the crafts, the one on which Gandhiji put
the greatest emphasis was spinning and weaving.

"A cause is often greater than the man. Certainly, the spinning wheel is greater
than myself; with it, in my opinion, is mixed up the well-being of the whole mass
of Indian humanity."

– M. K. GANDHI

He wrote, “What is the kind of service that the teeming millions of India most
need at the present time, that can be easily understood and appreciated by all,
that is easy to perform and will, at the same time enable the crores of our semi-
starved countrymen to live? And the reply came—that it is the universalisation
of khadi or the spinning-wheel that can fulfil these conditions.’’.

In order to make spinning, an integral aspect of Indian handicrafts, it should be

made an essential part of the lives of the common people. This would make the
common people self-sufficient and thus enable them to survive. The poor of
India, if they were to prosper, needed a subsidiary source of occupation and
livelihood. They could not remain solely dependent on agriculture.

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Gandhiji suggested that hand-spinning and, to a lesser extent, hand-weaving Notes

could become the subsidiary source.

He commented, “This industry flourished in India a hundred and fifty years

ago and at that time we were not as miserably poor as we are today.’’

In this way, the villages in which they lived would be less dependent on mills
and machinery. For Gandhiji this was very important since machines were an
instrument of industrial societies. Thus, the spread of khadi would challenge
the influence of mills and machines and the import of cotton to India from
England, and would enable the people of India to free themselves non-violently
from the negative influences of industries and the violence they inevitably
produced.

Note-Young India, a weekly journal was published in English by Gandhi from

1919 to 1932 to spread his unique ideology and thoughts regarding the use of
nonviolence in organising movements and to urge readers to consider, organise
and plan for India's eventual independence from Britain.

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Notes

Note- The Life of Mahatma Gandhi is a biography of Gandhi written by

American journalist Louis Fisher in 1950.

THE SELF-SUFFICIENT VILLAGE:

The idea of self-sufficiency was of crucial importance to Gandhiji. An individual,

a village, a country could become independent if only it became self-sufficient.

Gandhiji described his ideal Indian village in these terms: "Each village’s first
concern will be to grow its own food crops and cotton for its own cloth. It should
have a reserve for its cattle, recreation and a playground for adults and
children. Then if there is more land available, it could grow useful money crops,
thus excluding ganja, tobacco, opium and the like. The village will maintain a
village theatre, school and public hall. It will have its own waterworks, ensuring
clean water supply. This can be done through controlled wells or tanks.
Education will be compulsory up to the final basic course. As far as possible
every activity will be conducted on a cooperative basis".

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Gandhiji emphasised the importance of handicrafts, especially spinning and Notes

weaving. But he also spoke of other handicrafts which were part of the
hereditary occupation of every villager. The development of handicrafts would
add to the total resources of the individual and the village and thus enable both
to be self-sufficient and self-regulating. For him a world based on non-violence
could only be found in places that were untouched by industries. He found
Indian villages to be such places since, in his time, he believed, they were still
relatively untouched by industries. For him handicrafts were an integral and
vital part of his programme to revive villages, to make them self-sufficient and
to give back to individuals the dignity to regulate their lives. This is the
challenge of Gandhiji’s vision that India is yet to meet.

Mahatma Gandhi, in the twentieth century, was the single individual who
successfully prevented the total eclipse of Indian crafts by relating them to the
village economy and the concept of political freedom. He turned the humble
spinning wheel into a symbol of defiance by asking people to spin their own
cotton at home to weave cloth that was not of British manufacture. It thus
became a non-violent and creative weapon of self-reliance and independence.

HANDLOOM AND HANDICRAFTS REVIVAL

After Independence the newly elected government chose the road to

industrialisation. This emphasis on industry and development further
aggravated the damage to the crafts community caused by 200 years of
colonial rule.

However, after Gandhiji’s death, several of his followers initiated and nurtured
government schemes and programmes to protect the welfare of the crafts
community in India.

Note- Mahatma Gandhi was assassinated on 30 January, 1948 at Birla house,

New Delhi.

Do you know: Martyrs' Day or Shaheed Diwas is celebrated in India to

remember freedom fighters who laid down their lives to help make India
independent. While the death anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi on January 30
is the most prominent Martyrs' Day, there are six others as well.

THINK: The other six Martyr's days?

The Central and State Governments recognised that handicrafts, with its
labour-intensive character and wide dispersal through the length and breadth
of the country, constituted a crucial economic activity. It would, if supported,

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bring wealth to the country through trade and exports. The objective of Notes

government schemes was to provide economic and social benefits to the

craftsmen of the country and to promote their work in domestic and foreign
markets.

The four major goals of the handicraft development programmes run by the
government were,

1. promotion of handicrafts;

2. research and design development;

3. technical development;

4. marketing.

PROMOTION OF HANDICRAFTS:

In the 1950s and 60s, the Khadi and Village Industries Commission (KVIC),
Central Cottage Industries Emporium, Handlooms and Handicrafts Export
Corporation, Regional State Handicraft and Handloom Development
Corporations, All India Handicrafts Board, the Weavers’ Service Centres and
Design Centres, and the Weavers’ Cooperative Apex Societies, were set up in
every state to protect and promote Indian craft producers.

Note-The Khadi and Village Industries Commission is a statutory body formed

in April 1957 by the Government of India, under the Act of Parliament, 'Khadi
and Village Industries Commission Act of 1956', to plan, promote, facilitate,
organise and assist in the establishment and development of khadi and village
industries. Headquarters is in Mumbai. In April 1957, it took over the work of
former All India Khadi and Village Industries Board.

Today, there are 1,5431 sales outlets, out of which 7,050 are owned by KVIC.
These are spread all over India. The products are also sold internationally
through exhibitions arranged by the Commission.

It is an apex organisation under the Ministry of Micro, Small and Medium

Enterprises. Khadi and Village Industries Commission holds the exclusive rights
to use the trademark ''Khadi'' and “Khadi India”.

Note-Handicrafts and Handlooms Export Corporation of India was an agency

of Ministry of Textiles, Government of India established in 1958 with main
objectives to undertake exports of handicrafts, handlooms products, khadi and
products of village industries from India and to undertake special promotional

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measures. Notes

Do you know: On the 17th of March 2021, the Government of India approved
the closure of Handicrafts and Handlooms Export Corporation of India.

THINK: Reasons for the closure of Handicrafts and Handlooms Export

Corporation.

All India Handicrafts Board:

The All-India Handicrafts Board was set up in 1952 to advise the Government
on problems of handicrafts and to suggest measures for improvement and
development.

According to the Indian Constitution the development of handicrafts is a state

subject. Therefore, the primary initiative in the handicrafts sector was to
emanate from the states and the Union Territories.

Kamaladevi Chattopadhyay and Pupul Jayakar were the prime personalities

behind the establishment of the board.

Kamaladevi Chattopadhyay: Kamaladevi Chattopadhyay (1903–1988) devoted

her life to the preservation and development of handicrafts and the dignity and
uplift of India’s craftspeople. She was also a freedom fighter, theatre
personality and human rights activist who worked closely with Jawaharlal
Nehru and Mahatma Gandhi.

In the freedom movement she was one of the prominent personalities in the
Congress Party and later in the Socialist Party. She was the first Chairperson of
the All-India Handicrafts Board and President of the Indian Cooperative Union.
She was the Vice-President of the World Crafts Council.

She championed the cause of India’s great crafts traditions from every platform
and initiated the national awards for excellence in handicrafts. Travelling to
every corner and village of India, she discovered crafts severely damaged by
neglect and lack of patronage, and crafts that needed protection from
extinction. She received the Magsaysay Award and the Watumull Award and
was conferred the Deshikottama degree by Vishwabharati University,
Shantiniketan.

She wrote many books and articles and her book titled The Handicrafts of India
was the first detailed documentation of the major and minor crafts of India.

If not for her efforts and hardwork, many crafts threatened under British rule
would have disappeared forever and India’s craft heritage would have been
lost. She is truly the mother of Independent India’s craftspeople.

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Note- The Ramon Magsaysay Award was established in 1957 and is considered Notes

Asia’s highest honour or Asia's Noble. It is named after Ramon Magsaysay, the
third president of the Republic of the Philippines.

Image: Kamaladevi Chattopadhyay

Pupul Jayakar: Pupul Jayakar (1916–97) began her life studying to become a
journalist, but later turned to development work in handicrafts and handloom
textiles. She was a major force behind the establishment of the All-India
Handicrafts Board and served as its president. She travelled extensively and
supported craftspersons and their traditions across the country through
festivals, emporia and her erudite writings. She was awarded the Padma
Bhushan (India's third highest civilian honour) in 1967.

The series of International Festivals of India in the U.S.A., U.K., Europe and
Japan were conceptualised by Pupul Jayakar in the 1980’s. These festivals
highlighted India’s historic heritage and its continuing spiritual and cultural
strength. Several exhibitions like Vishvakarma, Aditi, Golden Eye, Pudu Pavu
and Costumes of India introduced a host of new, young designers and they, in
turn, became catalysts for the change and the revival of Indian handicrafts and
handloom products.

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Notes

Image: Pupul Jayakar

Do you Know: In August, 2020, The Union Ministry of Textiles abolished the
All-India Handicrafts Board.

RESEARCH AND DESIGN DEVELOPMENT:

For any scheme of design development, it is necessary to identify authentic

resources and materials. In India there are a number of museums that have
beautiful specimens of craft objects.

These museums provide a sound base for research and study of the history of
crafts that have developed in different regions. The study of crafts provides an
invaluable record of the innovative spirit of the crafts tradition in India, and
how it changed and evolved and responded to new challenges placed by
environmental conditions and historic constraints.

Promotion of Design:

Soon after its establishment in 1952, the All-India Handicrafts Board recognised
that among other developmental measures that needed to be adopted, the
problem of design development would be of key importance in rehabilitating
the handicrafts industry.

Craftsmen required assistance with new design ideas to suit the taste of
consumers both in India and abroad. The All-India Handicrafts Board
established Regional Design Development Centres at Bangalore, Mumbai,
Kolkata and Delhi. A technical wing for research in tools, techniques, and
materials was also added to each of these centres. The Weavers’ Service
Centres set up by the All-India Handloom Board provided design and technical
guidance to the handloom industry throughout the country.

Note- All India Handloom Board was established in 1992. It was abolished by
the government in August, 2020.

Do you know: In 2015, the Government of India decided to designate the 7th

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August every year, as the National Handloom Day. ‘To commemorate the Notes

Swadeshi Andolan that began in 1905 on this very day’.

TECHNICAL DEVELOPMENT:

The development of tools and processes in handicrafts is a very sensitive area

since a great deal of wisdom and subtlety need to be invested in most
traditional methods and equipment. Generally speaking, any new equipment
for handicrafts should,

• have a low capital outlay;

• be affordable and useful to small individual and

• cooperative units;

• improve overall efficiency;

• reduce costs;

• not cause labour displacement;

• not be hazardous to humans or the environment.

State governments have set up Design and Technical centres where craftsmen,
artists and designers jointly work out new designs and items in selected crafts.

Design Studies:

The National Institute of Design (NID) at Ahmedabad was established as a

result of the visionary advice of Charles Eames, who saw crafts as India’s
matchless resource of problem-solving experience.

Eames recommended that the Indian designers draw on the attitude, skills and
knowledge available in the Indian craft traditions, and give it new relevance in
the industrial age that was emerging in post-Independence India. It was critical
that hand production be helped to find its place beside mass manufacture.

The documentation of craft traditions begun by British scholars more than a

century ago was now needed on a national scale and the NID students were
trained to record and interpret India’s craft inheritance.

Research became the base for sensitive design, production and marketing,
along with an understanding of the craft community, its traditional practices,
markets and materials, its price and cost considerations, tools and workplaces.
Development and diversification efforts bring the craftsmen and the trained
designer together in an intelligent search for new opportunities. NID’s

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curriculum reflected this approach. Notes

Students and teachers study craft problems in order to understand traditional

skills as well as the economic concerns of large communities whose age-old
markets are undergoing enormous and permanent change. Thus, problem-
solving activities and design for new clients were linked to marketing.

Note-The National Institutes of Design are a group of autonomous public

design universities in India, with the primary institute, founded in 1961, in
Ahmedabad, with extension campuses in Gandhinagar and Bengaluru. The
other NIDs are located in the cities of Kurukshetra, Vijayawada, Jorhat and
Bhopal.

Note-Charles Eames was an American designer, architect and filmmaker.

Packaging:

Packaging, in the case of Indian handicrafts, is an important area that has not
developed much. A package design is very important since it will often
persuade a consumer to make the initial purchase.

The Indian Institute of Packaging in Mumbai with branches in Delhi, Chennai,

Hyderabad and Kolkata offers a certificate programme in packaging and a
package development service for a fee.

Today, environment-friendly packaging alternatives are being explored and this

offers new avenues for business ventures.

Note-The Indian Institute of Packaging (IIP) is an autonomous body set up by

the leading packaging and allied industries and the Department of Commerce,
Govt. of India, in May, 1966 under Societies Registration Act, 1860.

MARKETING:

In India, handicrafts derived their richness and strength from socio-economic

and cultural situations. These traditions and social networks are fast
disappearing. Crafts are particularly vulnerable to the present tempo of
economic change, the changing pattern of society, marketing, and therefore,
require specialized attitudes and measures.

It calls not only for an adequate financial outlay, but for a good measure of
imaginative skill as well. Handicraft marketing is a serious matter, for such
skilled handmade products have to compete with mass made products made
by machine and sold by high pressure salesmanship. Again, handicraft units are

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often small and produce a very wide and diverse range of products. The Notes

problems of marketing handicrafts have to be considered separately for the

domestic market and the export trade.

The All-India Cottage Industries Board, established in 1948, recommended the

setting up of Emporia at the Centre and in the States for the marketing of
cottage industries products.

In 1949, the Central Cottage Industries Emporium was established in Delhi and
a large number of states have established emporia. Today, there are about 250
emporia in the country. Besides, there are a number of Khadi Bhandar outlets,
and other showrooms for the sale of hand-spun, hand-woven cloth and
handmade products.

These emporia purchase directly from artisans or their cooperatives. The

emporia have tried to establish fair wages and prices to artisans and keep them
abreast of modern techniques of marketing including publicity and promotion.
Some important public emporia have set up their own production units to meet
growing demands. It is noteworthy that most government-run emporia in state
headquarters play an important role in inter-state trade in handicrafts.

THE CRAFTS COMMUNITY TODAY

Despite all the government schemes and policies, and the efforts of non-
government and government agencies, the condition of crafts in India is far
from desirable.

From the swift diminishing of raw materials or the natural resources that the
craftsperson is dependent on to the limited capital available to him/her to
invest in the expansion or even just the maintenance of his business; to the
shrinking marketplace—increasingly flooded with inexpensive factory-made
fabric, Chinese toys, plastic mats or stainless steel ghadas, the craftsman’s
economic situation has become increasingly precarious over the past 100
years.

This chapter analyses the reasons why the condition and the status of the crafts
community today is so poor.

ATTITUDES THAT COLOUR OUR PERCEPTION OF THE CRAFTSPERSON

The first reason for the poor status of the crafts community lies in our
understanding of crafts and the role of crafts in our society. How do people
view the craftsperson: Is he an artist or merely a labourer? Was the Taj Mahal
built by an artist or by the crafts community? Is craft mainly manual work or is
it a skill-based activity that brings together the hand, the head and the heart?

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The attitude today towards crafts and the crafts community is the first Notes

stumbling block hindering the progress of crafts in India.

CRAFT AND THE MACHINE:

In India the crafts community was recognised as a crucial and important part of
society on whom the development and enhancement of life depended. In
Europe, with the introduction of machines, the role of the crafts community
dwindled and crafts completely disappeared. Household utility items that had
once been made by the crafts community are now mass produced by machines.

Work done by the hand was considered inferior to machine work. Machines
replaced handiwork that was seen to be both demeaning and backward.

Two individuals who alerted the world to this tragic misconception were
William Morris and John Ruskin. Their denunciation of the machine as
“destroyer of the joy of hand-work” in the 1850s led to the commencement
of the Arts and Crafts Movement in England. They wrote extensively to remind
people that human beings are fundamentally creative and that machines were
taking away the joy of life. Their writing greatly influenced many thinkers in
India thus causing a new interest and study of craft traditions in India.

Note: William Morris was a British textile designer, poet, artist, novelist,
printer, translator associated with the British Arts and Crafts Movement. He
was a major contributor to the revival of traditional British textile arts and
methods of production.

Note- John Ruskin was an English writer, philosopher, art critic and intellectual
of the Victorian era.

THINK: Arts and Crafts Movement

BOUND BY CASTE:

Gandhiji had hoped that with the attainment of Independence the notion of
caste would gradually disappear, but this failed to happen and the status of the
craftsperson as manual labourer fell further.

Today, even though social mobility is on the increase, heredity, caste and
community affiliations continue to play an important role in the crafts sector.
The association between particular castes/communities and artisanal activities
still seems to be strongest in the case of pottery, metal work, leather work,
cane and bamboo work.

Where the number of workers is small, caste and community barriers are
breaking down gradually, specifically in relatively dynamic manufacturing

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activities, such as tailoring and woodwork, which are attracting a large number Notes

of first-generation workers.

A large segment of the artisanal population lives in abject poverty. Not

surprisingly, many artisans are giving up their traditional occupations, and
taking up other forms of work, mostly unskilled, daily-wage labour, which
assures them higher returns. The trend was confirmed by the survey conducted
by the NGO, SRUTI, in 1987–88, which revealed that in more than half the
traditional leather artisan households, several family members had given up
leather-work, and were working as casual labourers.

Today weavers form the largest section of the rural poor. Ironically, our history
books tell us that they were once among India’s wealthiest professionals.
Weaving guilds were once wealthy enough to sponsor the building of major
temples in South India, and even maintained their own armies.

ECONOMIC SUSTAINABILITY

The most neglected aspects in the past have been the poor income and working
conditions of craftspeople. How many people in this country are aware that the
craftsperson earns less than the average Indian factory worker?

Indeed, in some cases, he/she cannot even find sustained work or employment
through the year. Most handicraft artisans work in their own homes and many
are dependent on a consistent supply of raw material. This may depend on the
season or on their outlay. A bad agricultural season will naturally deplete the
resource and production of crafts. Added to this, landless crafts community is
market-dependent and hence extremely vulnerable to fluctuations in the
market situation.

Many surveys have suggested that artisans own hardly any assets. The major
asset owned is a house, more often than not, kuccha, or made of mud. The
incidence of landlessness is high: 61 per cent of the artisans in the SRUTI survey
did not possess any land whatsoever. In no case did the holding exceed three
acres. For most artisans, their inability to invest any surplus income in the
purchase of agricultural inputs, makes for poor yields. The other assets most
commonly owned by artisans are the tools and tackles of their respective
trades. Some of them also own livestock or cattle. Forty-six per cent of the
artisanal households surveyed did not have electricity connection.

Disappearing Raw Material:

Crafts communities across the country are finding it more and more difficult to
find adequate raw material of the right quality. With the depletion of natural
resources, they now have to buy scrap and old articles. They are unable to buy

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sufficient quantities as they lack the requisite capital. Notes

But beyond the non-availability of raw material or restriction on its use.

However, the craftsman is completely aware of his symbiotic relationship with
nature and his dependency on it for his very survival.

For instance, a wood-carver from Kerala has this to say: “We go to the forests,
and choose an appropriate tree that is not deformed in any way. Then, on the
auspicious day and hour, we take offerings of sweets and rice and place them
at the foot of the tree. In a prayer, we ask forgiveness from all the creatures,
birds, and insects who live in the tree. We assure them that though we are
depriving them of their house and food, we will use the wood for a good
purpose, not wasting even a scrap of shaving.”

The Bamboo Story:

Fishing traps, baskets, cradles, biers, bridges, rainproof hats and umbrellas,
mats, musical instruments, water pipes—Indians have always used bamboo in
numerous ways. It is used for house construction, fencing and in the making of
bullock carts. Low-cost domestic furniture and a vast range of domestic utility
items made of bamboo can be easily seen in any of our bazaars. But we do not
easily notice the countless little ways this modest material comes to be used
by rural people. One can see it being used in the blacksmith’s bellows, or as
bamboo pins in carpentry joints or in the fabrication of toys in village markets.

In the 1920s the British realised that by mincing bamboo into millimetre shreds,
cooking it in chemicals, pulping and flattening it, they could produce sheets of
paper. This would bring the British increased forest revenue and ‘development’
(as defined by them) to the so-called backward regions of India.

However, they chose to ignore the consequences this activity would have on
the health of the forest. So, while bamboo was sold at high prices to basket
weavers, it was heavily subsidised for the paper industry.

Even after Independence, supplying bamboo at extremely low prices to Indian

paper mills became a ‘patriotic’ duty of the government, and bamboo supplies
were assured for decades at unchanged prices. The disaster that this would
cause to the forests, and to the craftsperson, still remained unforeseen.

Colonialism was therefore not only about repression, it was also a story of
displacement, impoverishment and ecological crisis. The Indian craftsman is
therefore conscious of the need to reduce, reuse and recycle, and stay in tune
with the local environment that provides him with all the raw materials he
needs.

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Notes

Note- Aaptani are a tribal group of people living in the Ziro valley in Arunachal
Pradesh. They follow a sustainable social forestry system. The Apatanis
practice aquaculture along with rice farming on their fields.

THINK: Social forestry & Aquaculture.

Loss of Patronage:

Where traditionally the jajmani system of patronage or the local temple,

affluent individuals, zamindar or petty raja usually supported the craftsman
through the year or in periods of crisis—the modern state machinery fails to do
so.

The story narrated below explains the relationship of traditional musicians of

Rajasthan and their hereditary patrons.

Among the best known of all the clans of professional folk musicians in our
country are those from Rajasthan—the Langas and Mangniyars of the Thar
desert.

The most fascinating aspect of both these communities is the patronage they
receive generation after generation from the same families. A Mangniyar who
sings for a particular family is called a dhani. He must be paid a certain sum
whenever a major event like a birth, a marriage or a death occurs in his patron’s
family,and he will have to perform. This dhani right is hereditary—so if he is
attached to fifty families and has two sons, each one of his sons will become
the dhani to twenty-five of these families and so on! Even family members who
do not perform are entitled to a certain fixed payment.

But there are also some absolutely unique aspects to this relationship. Can you
believe that if a performer is unhappy with his patron, he can ‘divorce’ him? In
fact, in such a situation, the word ‘talaq’, (‘divorce’ in Urdu) is used!. As a first
step of registering his protest, the performer stops singing the verses that are
in honour of the patron’s family. If this has no impact, the performers bury their
turbans in the sand outside the patron’s house. If even this has no impact, they
proceed to bury the strings of their instruments outside the patron’s house!

This is seen as being the last straw—an indication that the Langa or Mangniyar
will never again contribute musically to any of the ceremonies in the patron’s

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household. Often this results in serious consequences for the patron—who Notes

would now find it difficult to get his sons and daughters married, or would even
find himself the laughing stock of the local society as he is parodied through
abusive songs by the angry musicians.

Credit Facilities:

Crafts communities need working capital to develop their product, buy raw
material, improve their tools and supply to new markets. There are few credit
facilities or insurance policies for the unorganised sector. Craftsmen need easy
credit to free themselves from moneylenders. More liberalised credit schemes
need to be offered by banks to get them out of debt and help them to invest in
crafts revival.

Lack of Markets:

Crafts communities can no longer produce their traditional goods at prices that
the poor rural consumer can afford. The poverty of the consumer and rural
poor is such that traditional craftspersons are losing their largest clients and
are thus divorced from the creative process of innovating for known clients and
their needs.

Today’s craftsman may find support in a small cooperative he belongs to, or

from a distant buyer in some other part of the world who may buy his product
over the Internet, but, by and large, he now has to fend for himself.

THE DIVIDE BETWEEN ART AND CRAFT:

The Archaeological Survey of India and the Asiatic Society, Kolkata were
established as interest in Indian art and culture grew. The first important
museum to be established was the Indian Museum in Calcutta, in 1814.

Note- The Archaeological Survey of India is an agency that is responsible for

archaeological research and the conservation and preservation of cultural
historical monuments in the country. It was founded in 1861 by Alexander
Cunningham who also became its first Director-General.

Note-The Indian Museum in Kolkata, West Bengal, also referred to as the

Imperial Museum at Calcutta, is the ninth oldest museum in the world, the
oldest and largest museum in India.

The earliest Indian museums had separate sections for art and archaeology, as
well as galleries for geology, zoology and anthropology where craft items of
antiquity were displayed. Museums provided safe storage and preservation of
antiquities and their collections offer a unique opportunity to study and

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research craft traditions. Notes

After 1857 the British established schools of art in Kolkata, Mumbai and
Chennai. The art schools followed the English syllabus that taught students the
principles of western art of perspective, still-life drawing and landscape
painting. Oil paintings soon replaced traditional forms of Indian painting.
Students trained in the Western style of art entered the scene; Indian elite and
royalty exposed to Western art patronised this westernised Indian art. Thus,
was born the division between art and craft in India. This led to a further fall
in status of the Indian crafts community who had so loyally served Indian
society for centuries.

The products of the textile mills, printing presses and India’s first factories
replaced handcrafted objects at home. Imported concepts taught in
westernised art schools were totally divorced from the unifying philosophy of
the Indian tradition which brought art, craft, architecture, design and
manufacture together.

A few brave efforts to turn learning towards indigenous inspiration were

attacked as stratagems to deny Indians the rewards of western progress.

During the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, some political and social
reformers recognised the importance of handicraft industries as a channel of
economic regeneration and cultural confidence in the face of the colonial
onslaught. Their vision inspired poet Rabindranath Tagore’s craft experiments
at his university in Santiniketan, and the emphasis on village industry with
which Mahatma Gandhi provided a foundation for India’s struggle towards
independence.

The swadeshi movement (‘by Indians, for Indians’) attempted to restore the
dignity of labour and human creativity. A simple craft tool—the spinning
wheel—became the symbol of national revolt.

The handloom revolution which followed was accompanied by the promotion

of village industries and by a national awareness of the need to protect and
enhance traditional skills, products and markets within a new industrial
environment.

Literacy and Education:

The craftsperson in India clearly defines the difference between education and
literacy. The craftsperson is skilled and is the repository of an unbroken but
evolving tradition. Such a definition is used for one who is educated and
talented. However, the same person skilled in his craft is not able to read or
write, rendering him illiterate.

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Our craftspersons need both continuous education and literacy to face the Notes

challenges of the future. For real progress it is imperative that the artisan
becomes literate. This important aspect of his/her development should be part
of a larger skill training scheme. We shall be failing in our duty to crafts and
society if young people, while receiving training in crafts, in private or
government centres, are not simultaneously provided facilities for adequate
literacy. Literacy is critical in the process of increasing production and
marketing, availing bank loans and understanding individual rights and
preventing exploitation by other classes.

For the next generation of craftspeople, programmes and projects need to be

developed to enhance leadership qualities within the crafts community,
provide assistance in improving technology, increasing production, creating
better working conditions and raising the economic standard of craftsmen.

Craftspeople need to learn how to understand new clients and their

requirements, how to maintain quality in their products. They need to learn
what new raw material they could experiment with. Health, schooling,
adequate shelter and work space is the right of every citizen in this country. For
it is indisputable that craft activity cannot progress without our craftsmen
receiving attention, care and recognition. It is only then that we may expect
crafts to transmit their vitality and grace on to the future.

Documentation of Indian Crafts and Arts:

The notion that India was an uncivilised country with a stagnant economy, with
a traditional way of life that had not changed for centuries was sought to be
dispelled by exhibitions and exposure of the British public to great Indian crafts.
In turn the exhibitions held in England led to greater interest in high quality
Indian crafts.

Fortunately, during this period some British officers undertook the

documentation of traditional skills, tools, workplaces, objects; encyclopaedias
were assembled; census, mapping and surveys were conducted. These records
proved priceless resources for contemporary Indian designers and for craft
revival programmes in post-industrial India. Despite the detrimental effect of
the colonial economy on Indian crafts, the documentation of crafts by British
officers during this time had important consequences.

Owen Jones’s book, The Grammar of Ornament, 1856, documented the

principles of good design in which there were examples of Persian, Indian
ornaments. Jones was also involved in arranging the great exhibitions in
London in 1851 in which the best and most extravagant of Indian crafts were
displayed to “help England to improve the poor quality of British craftsmanship

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that was suffering the damages of industrialisation.” Notes

In a book published in 1880, Industrial Arts of India, its author George C.M.
Birdwood documented the state of the textile crafts of his time in Bengal.

Birdwood’s opposition to industrialisation in India led him to believe that the

greatness of Indian crafts was a result of the “happy religious organisation of
the Hindu village” where every house of potters, weavers, copper smiths and
jewellers produced essential items of “unrivalled excellence”.

Ananda Coomaraswamy:

Ananda Kentish Coomaraswamy (1877–1974), a Sri Lankan, is considered

among the greatest historians of Indian arts and crafts.

He led a movement for reviving Indian culture of which he had deep knowledge
and had a high regard for. In 1938 he became the Chairman of the National
Committee for India’s Freedom. He contributed greatly towards people’s
understanding of Indian philosophy, religion, art and iconography, painting and
literature, music, science and Islamic art.

In his book, The Indian Craftsman, Coomaraswamy speaks about the

corrupting influences of modernisation on the craftsman and the influences of
European rule, and urges a return to the idealised pre-industrialised life in
India.

In August 1947 he made a memorable statement: “India’s culture is of value.

Not so much because it is Indian but because it is culture”.

"The craftsman is not an individual expressing individual whims, but a part of

the universe, giving expression to ideals of central beauty and unchanging laws,
even as do the trees and flowers whose natural and less ordered beauty is no
less God-given.” wrote Ananda Coomaraswamy about India’s craftsmen.

Bringing back crafts into the daily life of the majority of Indians would be the
first step to reinstate craftspersons in their rightful position in society.
Nurturing skilled educated young craftspeople is the next step to ensuring a
respectable position for crafts tradition in India in the future.

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Notes
PRODUCTION AND MARKETING

Craftpersons most important prerogative is to create objects that clients need

which can be sold so that they can earn a living and support their families. In
this chapter we will look at the various traditional production, distribution and
marketing strategies that are available to craft communities in India.

A craftsperson could be village or urban based, who procures his/her own

material, uses manual skills learnt recently or from family traditions. He/she
may produce utility items or specialised objects. The crafts community may
supply local markets, sell through village haats, or transport goods to urban
markets or for export. They may be self-employed or work as wage-earners or
as members of a cooperative organisation.

Note-A cooperative organisation is an association of persons, usually of limited

means, who have voluntarily joined together to achieve a common economic
end through the formation of a democratically controlled organisation, making
equitable distributions to the capital required, and accepting a fair share of risk
and benefits of the undertaking.

It is important to understand this diversity to appreciate the number of

problems that may arise for the craftsperson at every step of the process of
production and sale. It is important to remember how complex the system is
and how many such systems of crafts production and marketing we have in our
country.

Production and marketing are influenced by the following aspects:

PRODUCTION

Craft: This could be in metal, wood, clay, textile, gem cutting, jewellery, leather,
cane and bamboo, tailoring, etc. Each of these groups approaches its
production work in a different way.

Location: Rural, urban, semi-urban. The location determines access to raw

material, to different clients, and transport costs. Each of these will affect
production, distribution and sale of crafts.

Raw Material: Does the craftsperson procure the raw material independently
or is it supplied by a trader or the customer, as in the case of a tailor who is
given the material by the client to make a garment? The raw material may be
supplied by the government at subsidised rates or by a cooperative.

Skill and Technology: Is the craft produced manually or with semi-automated

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tools? Notes

MARKETING:

End Product: Is it a utility item that lasts a long time like a belan or urli or is it a
daily consumable item like a flower garland? Does the craftsperson also
provide services like repair and maintenance, as in the case of a blacksmith?

Markets: Can be termed village/urban, domestic, export. The craftsperson has

to adapt to the needs of different types of markets and market demands. The
client in each of these different markets has a varied set of demands.

Sales Channel: Does the craftsperson create objects for the village haat,
jajman, traders or for the cooperative? Are the craftspersons attached to one
client or many and how familiar are they with the client’s needs, changing
fashions and trends?

Employment Status: Is the craftsperson self-employed,a wage earner for a

large or small organisation, a factory, an export enterprise or a member of a
cooperative?

The combination and computation of these different scenarios is complicated

and every situation requires a suitable response in terms of production,
marketing and sales.

THE TRADITIONAL MARKETPLACES FOR CRAFTS:

RURAL:

In the rural economy the sale of crafts products plays an important role. The
crafts community is commissioned to prepare goods by a client e.g. diyas for
Diwali. The weaver may be asked to weave a set of saris for a marriage and may
be paid in kind (with foodgrain) or given a monetary advance.

In these cases, the crafts community knows the clients and is aware of their
community, status and the kind of objects they might need. Often the client is
an old customer and the craftsperson’s family may have served the family for
many generations.

MARKET OR HAAT

In the rural areas, many villages, even today, organise a weekly market or haat.
This market is organised by village artisans and each craftsperson is given a
designated place in the market to sell his/her wares. Craftspersons from nearby
villages are also invited to the weekly haat to sell their wares.

Whenever there is a festival in the village the duration of the haat is extended

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by several days. Notes

PILGRIMAGE CENTRES

Important temples, mosques, gurudwaras and even churches in India attract

devotees from near and far. Throughout the country these pilgrimage centres
draw large crowds to the market. These annual pilgrimages draw so many
people that craft communities have settled near them and whole townships
have developed that have become famous for the crafts they produce.

Kanchipuram in Tamil Nadu has many famous temples, attracting a large

number of pilgrims so that, over the centuries, it has become a thriving cotton
and silk weaving centre. Today the fame of the town and the craft is so closely
linked that the saris produced here are called Kanchi cottons or Kanchipuram
silks. The products here achieved a certain style and quality for which they are
famous and large workshops and shops have mushroomed throughout the
town.

The traditional marketplaces for crafts, described above, have the following
advantages and disadvantages for the crafts community.

Advantages:

• Production units were close to the source of raw materials.

• Transport of goods were limited so prices could be contained.

• Producer and client were often known to each other and hence the
artisan understood the client’s needs and requirements.

• Middle men had little or no role to play in the sale transactions.

Disadvantages:

• Stagnation of skills and tools.

• Stagnation of designs and ideas.

• Limitation on prices.

• Limited number of clients.

RURAL TO URBAN:

To supply the needs of the urban market, the crafts community would either
settle near urban markets or sell its wares at the local haat or bazaar, during
festivals or at a pilgrimage centre. This meant transporting goods often over

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long distances. Whenever possible or necessary, the crafts community would Notes

leave part of the family to continue production in the village where the raw
materials were available. The other part of the family would reside in the urban
city and set up shop for sale of goods to the urban community. The other option
was for the crafts community to use the services of a middle man such as a
trader. The trader would come to the village, buy goods from the crafts
community and tak the wares to the city for sale, keeping the profit for himself.

Advantages

• Opportunity to develop new sets of skills and tools.

• Opportunity to develop new designs for new clients.

• More clients.

• Chances of higher profits.

Disadvantages

• Transport of goods to greater distances caused prices to be raised.

• Producer often did not know the client.

• Producer did not understand the client’s needs.

• Middle men played a major role in the sale transactions, often taking
most of the profit from the crafts producer.

PRIVATE MARKETING:

The general pattern of marketing of handicrafts is that independent artisans

work in their homes or for workshop owners (karkhanadars, master craftsmen,
subcontractors) and sell goods manufactured by them to big stockists both
domestic and international, or to small shopkeepers directly or through
brokers. The stockists and small dealers in turn sell them either to local
consumers or outstation merchants or foreign importers, again either directly
or through specific intermediate agencies. Large dealers have relatively high
financial resources and some of them have goods made to order directly from
artisans, advancing money to them for the purchase of materials.

Artisans working on this basis are often in debt to dealers on account of these
advances. With a more liberalised credit policy being followed by banks in India
and the current emphasis on easier credit facilities being extended to the
weaker sections of society, the situation of indebtedness amongst handicraft
artisans is improving slowly.

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THINK: MUDRA Loans. Notes

The role of private enterprise in the field of handicrafts marketing has been,
and is today, overwhelmingly important. About 90 per cent of handicraft
production is handled by private agencies and the rest by public marketing and
cooperative agencies.

EXPORT PROMOTION

Planned development initiated in the country after Independence has resulted

in the present growth of the Indian economy. Building infrastructure for
economic development has been the major challenge of Indian planners.

Over the years the country’s economic base has been strengthened and
diversified. Export of Indian handicrafts has gained importance, both in
quantitative and qualitative terms. Export items include clothing, gems and
jewellery, handlooms, handicrafts and leather goods, among others. There are
established markets for Indian handicrafts in the U.S.A., U.K., West Europe,
Russia and other East European countries, while new markets, namely, Japan,
South Asia and the Middle East continue to expand. Today, Indian handicrafts
are supplied to over 100 countries.

The Government of India has several schemes for the marketing and promotion
of export trade in handicrafts. Various forms of assistance are made available
to export organisations, such as Export Promotion Councils and other
organisations of industry and trade, as well as to individual exporters. The

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scheme also provides support for export publicity, participation in trade Notes

exhibitions, setting up of warehouses and in undertaking research and product

development.

Do you Know: Export Promotion Council for Handicrafts (EPCH) was

established under Companies Act in the year 1986-87 and is a non-profit
organization, with an object to promote, support, protect, maintain and
increase the export of handicrafts. It is an apex body of handicrafts exporters
for the promotion of exports of Handicrafts from the country.

THINK: Various schemes for export promotion.

NEW COMMERCE

There is a sharp increase in demand for Indian crafts in developed countries.

The Internet and e-commerce are new forums for promotion and sales, along
with the development of the retail sector, thus creating new distribution
channels for the craft industry.

The biggest challenge is to understand the customer's preference and to spot

the next big trend in design or accessories. From working on product display,
merchandise selection to pricing or just the logistics of running a retail outlet—
all are huge challenges to independent sustenance and growth of a business.

India is one of the largest handicrafts exporting countries. It is the second

largest employment generator after agriculture, providing a key means of
livelihood to the country’s rural and urban population employing more than
seven million people. In March 2022, the total handicraft export excluding
handmade carpets from India was USD 174.26 million .

With the crafts industry growing at such a fast pace to meet the demands for
export there is need for efficient, qualified professionals to run businesses and
understand the demand and supply of the sector. Handicrafts entrepreneurs
can only succeed if they take the crafts community into their confidence, make
them shareholders and continue to motivate, innovate and explore possibilities
along with them. Training in the use of technologies, the latest equipment and

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nature-friendly techniques will also help artisans to keep abreast of global Notes

trends.

CRAFTS BAZAARS

In a rapidly urbanising India, how does one strengthen the link between the
rural crafts community and the urban consumer? This chapter highlights a few
points for discussion on marketing strategy using a case study approach.

PRINCIPLES OF MARKETING

Ideally the crafts community should be in control of the dynamics of

production, market, supply and demand. The key areas are as follows:

Market Survey

• Checking availability of products and designs

• Reviewing customer needs and demands
• Checking availability of raw material
• Researching to find untapped skills
• Providing training and skill improvement facilities
• Identifying buyers
• Financial forecasting

Good Product

The consumer or buyer will not buy a craft product out of compassion or
charity. The product must be competitive in terms of its cost, utility and
aesthetics.

Distinctiveness of Crafts

Every region has its own craft heritage, traditions, needs, resources and
capacities. The development of the crafts industry has to be based on singular;
unique skills available in the community. Mindless replication, duplication or
copying of ideas would neither serve the crafts tradition nor the community.

Design and Creation of Products

The crafts sector is already crowded and many groups are producing the same
goods, with the result that the market has become more competitive.
Therefore, design innovation has to be constantly addressed so that the
product does not become static.

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Case Study: Notes

The Tea Cosy: Europeans brew tea in a teapot. To keep the teapot, warm a tea
cosy is used. The tea cosy is a cover made to fit the teapot and is often made
of padded quilted cloth that is decorated. The most popular way of preparing
tea in India is by boiling the tea leaves in milk and water along with sugar, and
serving it ‘ready-made’ in glasses or mugs. In this method there is no use for
the teapot or a tea cosy.

Some years ago, in India, schemes for providing employment to the poor were
created and tailoring units were set up. The tea cosy was produced in large
quantities. The market was glutted with thousands of similar, useless, badly
designed and overpriced tea cosies. Indian families did not buy the tea cosy as
they had no use for it.

The producers had to organise discounts. Tribals were encouraged to

laboriously embroider tea cosies with flowers, regardless of the fact that the
intended consumer increasingly drank his tea ‘ready-made’ in a mug.

Image: Tea Cosy

Distribution System

The sale and distribution of the products is critical; the market must neither be
too small nor too large as both can be harmful to the life and development of
the craft practice.

Expanding the Market

With the overcrowding of the market with similar products, the handicrafts

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sector has to constantly expand and find new avenues—wholesale, export Notes

sales or an all-India infrastructure for franchise marketing.

Well-being of the Crafts Community

Ultimately the benefit of the marketing strategy should improve the quality of
life of the crafts community. Income generation should lead to development of
the community at large. The investment of the income should go into providing
health and safety norms in the workplace and homes, education of family
members, research and development to improve skills and tools, and to find
greener and more environmentally safe solutions for the procurement of raw
materials and alternatives, disposal of waste, packaging, and sale.

URBAN CRAFTS BAZAAR

Crafts bazaars have been organised for several decades. Agencies like the
Tourism Development Corporation, Handicraft and Handloom Boards and
NGOs have organised crafts bazaars in urban centres. Over the years such crafts
bazaars and craft promotion efforts have taught crafts communities how to
test new products, developed confidence in them to work and organise bazaars
and melas on their own, evaluate the outcome, and obtain feedback from
customers.

Case study:

An organisation named Dastkar has organised events such as the Nature

Bazaar with a diverse range of products made of natural materials like bamboo,
jute, cotton, wood and clay. They have worked with craftspeople to design new
products for the ever-demanding urban customers. The figures from these
nature bazaars do not reflect the common perception that the crafts market is
shrinking. Sales at the annual Nature Bazaar have steadily risen—from 10 lakh
in 1995 to 2.5 crore in 2004. Sadly, it is the number of craftspeople that is
shrinking—10 per cent a decade.

Note- Dastkar is a non-government organisation working with craftspeople

across India, for promotion and revival of traditional crafts of India. It was
founded in 1981 in Delhi, by a group of six women.

WHAT ARE THE ADVANTAGES OF MARKETING CRAFTS THROUGH BAZAARS?

• The most important advantage is that it is one occasion where the

craftsperson is the centre of attention—where the craftsperson gets the
kind of exposure, publicity, visibility, and focus that artisan otherwise don’t
get in urban metros.

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• The bazaar is an opportunity to highlight crafts products and skills Notes

• The bazaar experience can also bring to light the problems and potential of
the sector. It is important to use valuable exhibition space to raise other
issues regarding craft production, and social and environmental problems.

• The advantage of a large open-air bazaar in places like Dilli Haat, Delhi;
Surajkund Mela, Haryana, etc. is its ability to attract a wide cross section of
buyers, including those who would not normally buy craft products.

Note-The Surajkund International Crafts Mela is a handicraft fair

organized about 40 km from Delhi at Surajkund in the Faridabad district of
Haryana. The annual handicraft fair at Surajkund during the first fortnight
of every February celebrates everything fine in Indian folk traditions and
culture.

Case Study

• Berozgar Mahila Kalyan Sanstha (BMKS), the best-selling tussar saree group
from Bihar, participated in a bazaar in 2008. Their sales at the bazaar in
Delhi were very good and the community improved its living conditions
where just 12 years ago they had been helpless bonded labour.

• The bazaar is a learning place where the craftspeople can interact directly
with consumers, learning about tastes, trends, and colour preferences.

• There is strength in collaboration. Seeing and interacting with other crafts

groups, in the bazaar and at the guest houses where they all stay, gives
collective confidence, and they learn from each other.

• The bazaar is a good place to test market products, and to discover what
needs to be done to improve sales. It can also test and set targets for
effectiveness and impact. It provides immediate data—on growth, sales
variations and customer preferences.

Disadvantages

The main drawbacks of a crafts bazaar are

• It is a transient marketplace—lasting a few days only.

• There is a relatively heavy investment in publicity, presentation, and

promotion to build public interest and draw media attention. The
craftspeople in such bazaars are a fleeting phenomenon—here today, gone
tomorrow.

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• Having created exposure and awareness for crafts, the event often does Notes

not link craftspeople with permanent outlets and orders for their products.

• Organisers have no control over the quality of products being sold, nor are
they able to ensure that craftspeople follow up later on the orders they
receive.

• The bazaar should be part of an integrated production and marketing

process, not a stand-alone event which many of these are. Many
government departments, NGOs, and institutions today use bazaars and
exhibitions as a promotional exercise for themselves.

• In most exhibition venues there is a lack of proper display and storage

facilities that further contributes to the image of crafts as a pavement
product—a cheap trinket or souvenir rather than a work of art.
Craftspeople hesitate to invest in and bring large, expensive, or one-of-a-
kind items. Bazaar organisers must build facilities in their exhibition
spaces—stalls should be spacious and well lit, provided with racks and
stands, enhancing rather than obscuring the beauty of the hand-crafted
items. The investment is well worth making.

Case Study:

One NGO was approached to help a small group of village women in Hapur, one
of the poorest districts in UP. These were illiterate, shy women. They strung
glass beads for the export market for `10–15 per day. Through a Swedish
development project, the women had received design and skill training from
NIFT but lack of an end-market meant no orders. Their training had ended in
frustration and bitterness.

The women were invited to a crafts bazaar. Two months before the bazaar they
developed some new products targeted at the Indian retail market. Raw
material was bought with a small loan from another Delhi NGO. When the
crafts bazaar was to open, the women were so hesitant they did not want to
go to the bazaar. They complained in hesitation— “Selling in a market is against
our culture”; “What would the community say?”; “Who will look after our
children?”; “How will we speak to customers?”

The organisers declared that if they didn’t go, their products wouldn’t either.
They reached the bazaar three hours late—giggling and nervous. By evening all
their stock had sold. They worked all night making more products. The next day
those products were sold out. After 15 days of the bazaar experience, they had
turned from passive, exploited labour into confident entrepreneurs. Today
they travel all over India to bazaars, investing their own savings to make stock,

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developing new designs and adding new village members to their group. Notes

CRAFT IN THE AGE OF TOURISM

Tourism, if managed sensitively, can be a miraculous catalyst for economic and

cultural revitalisation; it not only enhances income but also establishes an
identity of the country. Two Asian countries—Thailand and India—are among
the top ten destinations in the world, and tourists to India increase by almost
15 per cent each year.

The nature of tourism itself has changed—with tourists travelling for leisure
and pleasure, rather than culture and architecture. This new type of traveller is
often looking to buy ethnic crafts or souvenirs as a memento of their travel
experience. Which crafts do visitors to India buy? Where do they buy them
from? These are some of the questions to explore.

India has over twenty million craftspeople, who create a very wide range of
varied crafts. It is possible to productively use the ever-growing tourism
industry to explore approaches to craft merchandising that will benefit and
sustain the crafts community throughout the country.

The market for crafts in the tourism sector is based on certain factors which it
is important to understand and analyse in order to develop the market
potential for crafts:

TOURISTS’ PREFERENCES

• Air travel implies limited bulk and weight of luggage for travellers. So,
they prefer to carry small, light objects. Since weight is a major problem,
the things that tourists buy have to be either unusual, or something that
they don’t get in their own country or so competitive in price that they
find them irresistible.

• Today’s travellers do not want things that are difficult to maintain,

which require frequent washing and polishing. Hence, there was a sharp
decline in recent years in the demand for Indian metal crafts like bidri,
silver and brassware.

• Sometimes, simply changing a colour or size can make a traditional item

into a best-seller.

Case Study: Some years ago, weavers from Varanasi converted the
traditional dupatta into a stole, a length of cloth worn like a small shawl

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by women in Western countries. This new product became very popular Notes

and sold well at tourist centres as it was light, the right size and
comfortable to wear with western clothes.

• Tourists and travellers do buy clothes and accessories for holidays—

casuals, sandals, cloth bags, jewellery. These items are usually cheaper
in India than in Europe and America. Tourists today are much less
conservative and enjoy experiment with local styles. Holiday clothes
and accessories are, therefore, areas that could be developed.

• Visitors would prefer to invest in and to take home truly beautiful

artistic objects. This area of artistic, high-quality products needs to be
developed rather than trying to sell poorly designed, cheap, outdated
souvenirs of the past.

HOW CRAFTS DECLINED WITH TOURISM

Kashmir is a State whose entire economy was based on tourism and craft. For
well over a century, it was the most important tourist destination—for Indian
as well as foreign tourists. Almost every family in the Kashmir Valley was in the
handicrafts business in some way, either making or selling crafts—carpets,
shawls, crewel and kani embroidery, jewellery, papier-mâché, and carved
walnut wood, silver and beaten copper items.

The tourist market was so large and constant that no attempt was made to
sustain the local market or adapt the crafts to local consumer needs and
budgets. Over the past two centuries, crafts originally designed for local
consumption, like the ornamentally carved Kashmiri ceilings made of walnut
wood, and the traditional pherans and shawls worn by Kashmiris with heavy
embroidery were gradually reduced to souvenirs and gift items aimed at the
tourist trade.

Two decades of conflict have made Kashmir a dangerous area for tourists.
Foreign tourists no longer travel in large numbers to Kashmir, and its
craftspeople have been deeply affected and the whole economy, dependent

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on tourism, has suffered enormously. Notes

A classic example is papier mâché originally developed to make light,

decorative furniture and home accessories for ordinary homes in Kashmir. The
papier mâché art was used to make simple products for the tourist market such
as pill and powder boxes, coasters and napkin rings, and Christmas tree
decorations, embellished with western motifs of cats, bells and snowflakes.

A strategy to revitalise and find new consumers and usages for Kashmiri crafts
is urgently required. It is a warning that no craft should become too dependent
on any one market—particularly international tourism.

Most tourists visit the Taj Mahal, one of the most beautiful monuments in the
world. However, this world-famous heritage site is surrounded by hundreds of
little shops and stalls full of cheap alabaster and ugly plastic replicas of the Taj,
rows and rows of small soap-stone pill boxes with poor quality marble inlay and
lids that don’t fit.

The shops are run by aggressive and persistent shopkeepers and there is not a
craftsperson or genuine craft object in sight. The same is true of all our great
tourist sites, museums and pilgrimage centres—the Red Fort, Khajuraho,
Ajanta, Varanasi, Hampi, Mathura, Mahabalipuram and the beaches of Goa and
Orissa.

NEW AVENUES FOR CRAFTS DEVELOPMENT

Crafts, in tourism, does not just mean selling things to tourists. It could also
mean crafting the spaces that tourists use such as the hotels, guest houses,
restaurants and scenic spots. Crafts of all kinds—architectural, functional,
decorative, can be used to enhance and accent these places. This way local
craft skills can be promoted and sustained in the long term.

Museums are a wonderful venue for selling quality crafts to a discerning

audience. The few museums that have shops only have a small set of badly
produced postcards and some dusty plaster casts.

Airport shops are another significant venue to capture customers for local
handicrafts. As this is the last impression visitors have of India before they
return home it is important that airport shops help them to forge a lasting and
enduring image of our country.

Dilli Haat, the government crafts bazaar in the centre of Delhi, is now being
replicated all over India. It is a wonderful opportunity for craftspeople to
become aware of consumer tastes and trends, and for urban middle-class
consumers to learn about the huge range of regional craft skills, materials and

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techniques. This type of crafts bazaar brings craftspeople from all over India, Notes

allows them to sell their own products; the programme of crafts changes every
fortnight so as to be interesting all the year round, bringing fresh products to
new audiences in the city.

Natural and cultural heritage sites can become a catalyst and an inspiration
for change. It is possible that such places can become craft production centres
where wonderful new crafts by craftspeople and designers are developed,
inspired by the historical site.

There has been some work done in this direction in Mahabalipuram in Tamil
Nadu and Konark in Orissa where skilled young craftspeople train, and produce
wonderful new pieces inspired by the monuments.

Organised craft fairs, and craft demonstrations in local hotels also link tourism
to local traditions without exploitation.

Case Study:

In Ranthambore, Rajasthan, hundreds of villagers were displaced by the

creation of the Tiger Reserve. Tourists, frustrated by the lack of entertainment
in between visits to the Wild Life Park, used to go off in their jeeps to the
villages with their cameras, disrupting the villagers’ daily routines and often
offending them with their holiday clothes. Traditional rural hospitality rapidly
turned into reverse exploitation: children began begging for presents, villagers
started asking tourists for money when they were photographed. A Craft
Centre outside the Tiger Reserve was set up employing hundreds of local rural
women. The Centre developed crafts for the tourist market around locally
available traditional materials. The Centre attracted tourists who could come
there, interact with craftspeople, see, understand and buy crafts in a natural
yet regulated environment.

CRAFTS AND SURVIVAL

Kutch in Gujarat is an example of how crafts have repeatedly been an

instrument of dynamic economic survival and revival.

Products made here range from everyday terracotta objects to fabulous

jewellery and embroideries. Formerly this craft was a way of life, made for
household embellishment in poor rural communities. It was the terrible six-
year drought in the 1980s that made people realise the potential of the skills
they possessed. In an otherwise drought-prone desert environment with little
to attract visitors, Kutch used its rich craft heritage to generate tourism. Today,
every household is dependent in some way on the production and sale of craft.
Apart from sale of products, specialised craft tours are organised to cater to

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visitors’ interests in vegetable dye, block-printing or embroidery techniques. Notes

When, in 2001, Kutch was struck by a devastating earthquake an estimated

80,000 people lost their lives, and over 2,28,000 artisans were severely affected
by the quake, losing their families, their homes, and their livelihoods.

Once again crafts came to the rescue. Craftspeople, without insurance,

pensions, provident funds, were, ironically, the first to recover from the trauma
of the earthquake, thanks to their inherent skills. Their buyers, international
tour operators and even students and back-packers, came loyally to their
rescue, sending in not just orders, but funds for earthquake relief,
reconstruction, craft development projects, and help in many ways. Today the
crafts communities of Kutch have re-established their crafts and their markets.

NEW TRENDS IN CRAFT DEVELOPMENT

India is a fast-growing economy and needs to find a prominent place for its
crafts in the global market. In this process of economic development, the crafts
communities need to be involved in finding new and innovative ways to help
their craft to survive, as they are creative people with many ideas and have
adapted to many changes over the years.

• Catering for a Variety of Tastes: Tourism does not imply just European
and American tourists. More and more Asians of all levels of society are
travelling both within their own country and to neighbouring nations—
generating new markets and new consumers.

• Promoting Cultural Values: Craft development should be a means to

promote cultural wisdom and family values. Showing respect to crafts
communities should also be a part of our concerns. It is important to
bring them and their needs into the consultative process when planning
craft promotion.

• Organic and Sustainable: Today the world is threatened by global

warming, pollution, unhealthy living conditions and destruction of the
environment. Conscientious tourists have now begun to ask if products
have been grown organically, and whether the crafts process and
production are sustainable in terms of the environment.

• Natural and Handmade: Today, ‘handloom’, ‘handmade’, ‘natural

dyed’, ‘natural fibres’ are the Asian equivalents of designer labels. This
is what India is especially famous for and for this we need to protect our
reputation and never sell something as natural dyed or 100 percent
pure cotton if it is not.

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• Design is an aspect of craft that is often ignored and not invested in. Notes

Craft has always been changing and re-inventing itself, and it must
respond to the shifts in society and lifestyles. If it remains static, it
gradually withers away and dies. Sadly, however, though craftspeople
in India still do the most incredible carving, embroidery, metal work,
and inlay work in a host of different regional traditions and materials,
product design has not kept pace with contemporary trends and styling.
Indonesia, Thailand and the Philippines have been much more
innovative and clever in adapting their traditional skills to crafts
products that are both picturesquely Asian yet contemporary.

• Presentation and Packaging is one of the weakest areas in the Indian

crafts chain. Even products aimed specifically at tourists do not have
travel-proof carrier bags or packing material. This is particularly sad
when there are so many natural materials which lend themselves so
appropriately for packaging.

• Similarly, despite our Asian aesthetic sense and warmth, shop display
and customer service in tourist centres are generally unattractive.

Well-designed information posters and labelling also help to sell products. The
buyer must know and be informed which products are hand-woven, made of
natural fibres, part of a historic cultural tradition, or made by tribal women.
This information is as valuable as the product for today’s eco-minded traveller.

DESIGN AND DEVELOPMENT

The twenty-first century has brought with it accelerated change in every sphere
of life, dependency on machines and excessive consumption of natural
resources in a manner that is no longer sustainable.

In the past the crafts sector had been rejected by many as an unviable
economic activity for the twenty-first century. Artisans still make up twenty
million of India’s working population. Therefore, this sector has to be
developed in such a way so as to offer sustainable employment to millions of
skilled artisans. Crafts producers cannot be economically viable unless their
product is marketable. The product can only be marketable if it is attractive to
the consumer, i.e., if the traditional skill is adapted and designed to suit
contemporary consumer tastes and needs. Design does not mean making
pretty patterns—it lies in matching a technique with a function.

Craftspeople must be involved in every aspect of design and production and

understand the usage of the product they are making. Voluntary agencies or
designers must also understand and study the craft, the product and the

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market they are trying to enter. Notes

WHY DESIGN INPUTS ARE NEEDED

Today most craftspeople practising traditional skills are vying with machines,
competitive markets, mass produced objects or consumers’ craze for foreign
fashions, and are no longer protected by guilds or the enlightened, hands-on
patronage of courts or religious institutions. Crafts communities are
increasingly faced with the problems of diminishing orders and the
debasement of their craft.

Crafts communities are making products for lifestyles different from their
own, and selling them in alien and highly competitive markets. Their own lives
and tastes have suffered major transformations alienating them further from
their skills and products.

A traditional jooti maker may still embroider golden peacocks on a pair of

shoes, but he himself will probably be wearing pink plastic sandals!
Consequently, craft has degenerated today. For instance, the metal diya, a
traditional ritual object of worship has been turned into an ashtray that sells
on the pavement for just ten rupees.

DESIGN INPUTS: FROM INSIDE OR OUTSIDE?

Do craftspeople with centuries of a skilled tradition need outside

interventions? Craft, if it is to be utility-based and economically viable, cannot
be static. Crafts have always responded to market changes, consumer needs,
fashion and usage.

Today with the distance growing between the producer and the consumer,
craft cannot respond to change with the same vitality that existed in the past.
It then becomes the role of the designer and product developer to sensitively
interpret these changes to craftspeople who are physically removed from their
new marketplaces and new clients.

There are professionals with formal art, design and marketing education who
have the technical expertise and tools to assist crafts communities in the
process of design, innovation, understanding foreign or urban markets and
contemporary marketing practices that can protect the interest of the artisans.

There is a need to see product design and marketing as the catalyst and entry
point for integrated development in the crafts sector. There is a growing
demand for these services from craftspeople all over the country, who wish to
learn more about their new clients and customers, of new trends so that they
can play a significant role in contemporary life.

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Many well-meaning, income-generating projects by the government and NGOs Notes

suffer because they have not taken into account the need for design and
development of crafts products and the well-being of the community in a
holistic and integrated manner.

Case Study:

Project in Madhubani

Mithila in North Bihar—one of the poorest, most backward parts of India—is

an example of changing the function, changing the design, and finding an
appropriate though radically different usage for a traditional craft through the
process of documenting its motif tradition of Madhubani painting.

Discovered in the 1960s, the votive paintings of Mithila were transferred from
village walls to handmade paper, and became an instant success. The paintings
rapidly became popular in contemporary urban Indian homes. Village women
of all levels of skill and artistry were persuaded by eager traders and exporters
to abandon farming and to take up the painting brush and mass-produce
Madhubani paintings on paper. Inevitably there was a surfeit, and the market
was flooded with Madhubani paintings of every size and colour. By the 1980s,
twenty years later, Madhubani painting as a marketable commodity was dead.
Women painters who had tasted economic independence through the sale of
their paper paintings, did not know what to do. New ways of tapping this
creative source needed to be found. The decorative motifs, the floral borders,
the peacocks and parrots, the interlocking stars and circles that embellished
their artwork provided a rich directory of design motifs and decorative
elements that could be used on products of daily usage and wear. They painted
on sarees, dupattas, soft furnishings, and tried to support their craft in
imaginative ways.

EFFECTIVE DESIGN AND DEVELOPMENT INPUTS

Creating a simple but effective design, using a small budget and limited
resources, is an exciting test of a designer’s skill. Seeing the growth and
confidence of a newly emerging crafts community successfully selling products
they have made themselves for the first time, using skills they never knew they
had, is even more exciting. These are the main principles for crafts
development,

• To make the product competitive in price, aesthetics, and function

• To so empower and train the craftsperson that he/ she becomes
independent

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• To provide ideas and stimuli for creativity and innovative product Notes

design by the crafts community

• To explain the rationale behind items developed and guidelines laid
down by market forces
• To develop a product range that incorporates the different skill levels
of all members of the group
• To keep the product usage and price applicable to the widest possible
market and consumer
• To harmoniously incorporate traditional motifs, techniques and shapes
into the design of new products
• To ensure the development of aesthetic sensibilities so that craft
designs no longer mimic or remain static, but constantly evolve by
mingling tradition with innovation.

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Note-Popularly called in the Bengali circle as Banglar Bagh or Tiger of Bengal, Notes

Sir Ashutosh Mukherjee was a great jurist, a barrister and a mathematician

and the first student to be awarded a dual Master’s degree in Mathematics and
Physics by the University of Calcutta.

Note-Gira Sarabhai was an Indian architect, designer, and a design pedagogue.

She was the co-founder of National Institute of Design , Ahmedabad. She was
the sister of Dr.Vikram Sarabai.

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Notes

Note- It was established in 1962, and houses the largest one-man collection
in the world; that of Dr Dinkar Kelkar. It took him almost 60 years to collect the
items, and he handed over his extensive collection to the Department of
Archaeology.

Indira Gandhi Rashtriya Manav Sangrahalaya:

Indira Gandhi Rashtriya Manav Sangrahalaya, Madhya Pradesh.

It is only recently that due honour and importance have been given to folk and
tribal art forms with the establishment of this museum of anthropology in
Bhopal.

Here in a complex of many acres are tribal houses from every part of the
country representing the different tribes which their members themselves
have built. There is a covered museum with samples of tribal homes with
everyday household objects.

The hand-crafted objects range from bronzes, terracottas, toys to ritual

objects. The art of everyday life in India, as it is even today, is especially
interesting, for there is a freshness and spontaneity about it that anyone can
enjoy.

Note- It is also called the National Museum of Humankind and was established
in 1977.

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