About the
Book
One of the strong and best known traditions of weaving
in India is situated in Varanasi. It has had a tumultuous history of ups and
downs but has steadfastly refused to be obliterated. Many cities have risen and
fallen, but Varansi clings to its title as the oldest
living city in the world. The River Ganga flows by, offering a sense of
sacredness, continuity and eternal salvation for those whose last rites are
performed on its banks. Hundreds of thousands of visitors touch upon Varanasi
as a place of pilgrimage, to connect with history or to get under the skin of
India’s spirituality.
Against this backdrop, the author, Jaya Jailty, emphasises the need to acknowledge the beauty of
Varanasi’s textiles emerging out of age-old traditions and techniques. She
highlights the danger of the loss of livelihoods and highly sophisticated
skills. The erosion of identity and importance in the wake of machine-made
imitations being produced in other parts of the world has already begun. The
book also present, linking them to different moments in the city’s history, and
makes a powerful case for rediscovering, preserving and patronizing these
textile treasure that are inextricably bound to the ancient aura of the
city.
About the
Author
Jaya Jaitly studied in
Japan, Burma, Belgium, and the UK. She graduated from Smith Collage,
USA.
Apart from being a political and social activist, she
has an intimate knowledge of the craft traditions of the country, having worked
with crafts people for over 40 years. She is considered a leader and expert in
this field.
In 1986 she founded an association of crafts people
called the Dastkari Haat
Samiti, which enables traditional workers to gain
confidence in the marketplace through many innovative strategies. She is the
creator of the concept of Dilli Haat,
a crafts marketplace in Delhi. It enables thousands of artisans to sustain
craft livelihood and preserve their cultural heritage.
She is a prolific writer and has published books on
the Crafts of Jamun, Kashmir and Ladakh,
the Craft Traditions of India, Viswakarma’s Children,
a socio-economic study of crafts people, and Crafting Nature. She has created a
vast documentation of the arts, crafts and textiles of India through 24 highly
artistic and unique maps of all the states of India, called the Crafts Atlas of
India. She has written stories on crafts children that were first published by
Penguin and now widely distributed in many regional languages through the
well-known NGO Pratham. She has assisted in creating,
a syllabus for schools of India’s craft heritage for NCERT. Her recent
publication
Crafting Indian Script is based on a major project called Akshara
combining literacy, craft and calligraphy. A Podium on the Pavement is a
selection of her writings on a variety of subjects including politics, foreign
affairs, women and social issues. She is also the editor and publisher of The
Other Side, a monthly political journal on democratic socialist through and
action.
Preface
Our highest salute should go to the entire community
of people involved in keeping alive the traditions of handloom weaving in
Varanasi. From the lowliest weaver, who is occasionally and tragically
compelled to donate his blood to earn money to feed his family, to aged women
who continue to sort yarn and spin, despite wearing broken spectacles and
living in penury, to the elite group of Muslim and Hindu masterweavers;
add to these the zari makers, exporters, traders, shopkeepers, urban textile
designers, and dedicated activists and academics, all of them are enmeshed in
this collective strength that refuses to let honoured skills die. It may be a
compulsion for some because there is no other option for survival in sight.
Many view it simply as tradition or habit. For others it is a source of
prestige, pride and earning.
Older weavers reminisce nostalgically of the days
when the younger generation came to learn and worked hard to hone the skills
they were taught. Today they shake their heads in disapproval and despair as
they describe how young men are busier with their mobile phones than with
handwork, preferring to sit at a powerloom, provided
the power is on, reading a film magazine while the machine does the work. They
curse computerization and cheap foreign imitations of what their old naqshabands and masterweavers
used to lovingly create. One masterweaver who owns a
well-known establishment said tears had welled up in his eyes when he saw a
master piece made by his forefathers hanging at the Victoria and Albert Museum
in London.
I have made many trips to Varanasi over the years. The
first was in 1956, the year Banaras officially became Varanasi, as a fourteen-
year-old girl who had suddenly lost her father and was, in an unusual departure
from tradition, taken to the holy ghats to perform
the last rites and consign his ashes to the mighty River Ganga. For Hindus,
this task is reserved for a son or nephew. However, being an only child, others
in my matrilineal family from Kerala took an exceptional decision to place this
onerous task in the hands of a young girl. Strangely, it was an empowering one
for me.
The movement of the grand river flowing past with a
power and determination of its own, the smell of incense, ghee and other
auspicious substances thrown into a small fire at specified moments of the
recitations, sending plumes of smoke rising and mingling with the white air,
and the sound of chanting by a dozen of priests invoking everlasting peace for
the departed soul, never went away from lny irincr
memories although
I have kept away from rituals ever since. These scenes still take place on the
banks of the Ganga every day. People come from all over the world, cameras at
hand, to watch this ultimate reality show of life, death, continuum and
spirituality.
All my subsequent visits to Varanasi have been for
the cause of artisans and weavers whose sad conditions, immense potential, and
rich collective heritage have drawn me repeatedly to the narrowest and dirtiest
by-lanes of this eternal city. At first, there was comfort in being amongst a
continuing process that seemed as if it would go on forever. As years went by,
the situation gradually turned grim. Looms began to lie idle, many draped with
cobwebs that hung like grey garlands over wooden frames. The noise of the loud
whirring of powerlooms took over from the gentler clackety-clack of the handloom. The grandgaddidars still sat against their
bolsters on mattresses covered in white sheeting, but they began bemoaning the
loss of markets. Governments sporadically came in with' schemes' to tide over
their problems. But even while metres of sumptuous cloth unravel on those white
mattresses, and piles upon piles of shimmering golden-hued saris are brought
out to seduce women customers, there has been an air of quiet desperation about
their condition matched almost equally by their enterprising efforts to re
fashion production and reach out to the world as they did in better
times.
For generations, the purchase of a Banarasi sari for weddings has been a matter of habit. Mine
was no different. For all those women for whom sari wearing is a tradition,
possessing a 'Banarasi' is a necessity. Not only does
the bride have to wear a kumkum red,
fuschia pink or flaming orange and gold brocade sari,
she would also have a sheer 'tissue' veil woven all through with zari
threads over
her shoulders, for added modesty and adornment. The
bridegroom's. turban would most probably be of
Banarasi silk or tissue as well. Changes in style, habits
and other extraneous influences may have brought the number of customers down,
but when families have to buy saris in bulk to give to a number of female
relatives as part of mandatory wedding custom, the Banarasi
is always the most sought after, most appreciated. It is also the handiest to
collect from the myriad shops in the bustling noisy city or from the air-
conditioned
showrooms of the more fortunate entrepreneurs. At the same time, cries of
mechanized imitations and the dumping of cheap and tawdry alternatives in the
marketplace became louder. Globalization has made trade freer than it ever was
in the time of the Mughals or British rule. In these processes the strong
displace the weak, hands give way to machines, and creative minds give way to
computer-programmed designs.
The internet allowed competitors to pick up motifs
that were never a part of the local culture and conveyed no roots in any
particular identity or history. As far as possible, weavers have tried to adapt
and move with the times. They give the single tag 'modern' to new additions in
patterns like plain dots, zigzags, stripes, bows and English roses, as against
the more elaborate traditional ones with Urdu names that described soft mist,
the jasmine blossom or the famed nilambari
sari which is in a
particular shade of blue-black depicting the night sky, dotted with tiny
butis in silver and gold
zari
like stars
across a luminous firmament.
Fearing that the excesses of mindless globalization
would bring about the extinction of precious localized traditions in textile
manufacturing, local wisdom and techniques applied to the preparation and
preservation of food, medicinal herbs and compounds and other cultural
expressions that form a part of a country's tangible and intangible heritage,
the Government of India established the Geographical Indicators Act in December
1999. It allowed claimants to such legacies to apply for legal protection
against imitations of the same name by competitors who did not belong to that
area. Basmati rice, Haldiram' savouries, neem toothpaste, Chanderi saris,
and Banaras brocades, among others, had all come under threat. Hard work put in
by many concerned organizations and individuals won protection under the Act
for Banarasi Silks in 2009. The announcement was of
profound importance. It was communicated by Law Wire-Communicating the Law,
among other sources, on Tuesday, September 22, 2009. I reproduce an extract
from this website so that the full import of these rights can be
understood:
Banarasi Silk receives GI rights
(India) Banarasi silk products have been registered
under Geographical Indication (GI) rights with the name 'Banaras Brocades and
Sarees'. This is the first ever GI status that any product
in Eastern UP has received. Malihabadi Dussehri mango is another product that is enjoying GI
status in the state of Uttar Pradesh. The GI rights curb others from processing
or marketing any product under the same name and are as good as intellectual
property rights. The GI certificate for Banarasi silk
products have been received by the office of Assistant Director (Handloom) and
other applicants. The certificate will prove to be advantageous for exporters
and consumers, along with hand loom weavers, said Mr. Rajni
Kant, President, Human Welfare Association (HWA) who
is also one of the applicants. As GI status is the measure to restrict the
misuse of Banarasi sari brand, it would benefit
around 1.2 million people who are directly or indirectly associated with
handloom silk industry of the region. According to the certificate issued by
the registrar of GI, Banaras Brocades and Sarees come
under four classes (13-26) that include silk brocades, textile goods, silk sarees, dress material and silk embroidery. This
registration is for 10 years, which can be renewed further.
However, laws may accord rights but are only
instruments. They do not guarantee survival unless many other sustaining inputs
are available and the Act involves processes that assist easy enforcement. For
the woven treasures of Varanasi it would mean access to cotton and silk yarn at
reasonable and controlled prices, an efficient route to a wide variety of
markets, including international ones, better facilities and workplaces for
weavers, and a concerted campaign to highlight the hidden textile treasures
origin a ting from this holy city. Understanding the differences between
imitations and the real thing is also important.
While wandering along the ghats
and visiting bookshops geared for tourists in Varanasi, I found many books on
the Ganga, the holy city and its temples, but none on its weaving traditions
that date far back in history and have been carrying on unbroken since their
inception, just as the city itself has been an active living organism from an
age that no history book can remember. If all who come to Varanasi to seek
eternal bliss, enlightenment and salvation, took time to explore the interiors
of the city where weavers proudly display their creations, they would be
extending a helping hand to the tradition of fine weaving and its skilled and
hard working practitioners. My writing is to give just a small, informal
glimpse of Varanasi's textile past, present and future. It hopes to share with
the reader the vast potential still very much alive among the few thousand
remaining looms scattered in its rural and urban
workplaces.
Contents
Preface |
9 |
Varanasi
Through Time |
19 |
Types
of Looms |
83 |
Weaving
Techniques |
97 |
Handloom,
Continuity and the River Ganga |
111 |
Acknowledgements |
122 |
Bibliography |
124 |
Photo
Credits |
124 |
Glossary |
125 |
About the
Book
One of the strong and best known traditions of weaving
in India is situated in Varanasi. It has had a tumultuous history of ups and
downs but has steadfastly refused to be obliterated. Many cities have risen and
fallen, but Varansi clings to its title as the oldest
living city in the world. The River Ganga flows by, offering a sense of
sacredness, continuity and eternal salvation for those whose last rites are
performed on its banks. Hundreds of thousands of visitors touch upon Varanasi
as a place of pilgrimage, to connect with history or to get under the skin of
India’s spirituality.
Against this backdrop, the author, Jaya Jailty, emphasises the need to acknowledge the beauty of
Varanasi’s textiles emerging out of age-old traditions and techniques. She
highlights the danger of the loss of livelihoods and highly sophisticated
skills. The erosion of identity and importance in the wake of machine-made
imitations being produced in other parts of the world has already begun. The
book also present, linking them to different moments in the city’s history, and
makes a powerful case for rediscovering, preserving and patronizing these
textile treasure that are inextricably bound to the ancient aura of the
city.
About the
Author
Jaya Jaitly studied in
Japan, Burma, Belgium, and the UK. She graduated from Smith Collage,
USA.
Apart from being a political and social activist, she
has an intimate knowledge of the craft traditions of the country, having worked
with crafts people for over 40 years. She is considered a leader and expert in
this field.
In 1986 she founded an association of crafts people
called the Dastkari Haat
Samiti, which enables traditional workers to gain
confidence in the marketplace through many innovative strategies. She is the
creator of the concept of Dilli Haat,
a crafts marketplace in Delhi. It enables thousands of artisans to sustain
craft livelihood and preserve their cultural heritage.
She is a prolific writer and has published books on
the Crafts of Jamun, Kashmir and Ladakh,
the Craft Traditions of India, Viswakarma’s Children,
a socio-economic study of crafts people, and Crafting Nature. She has created a
vast documentation of the arts, crafts and textiles of India through 24 highly
artistic and unique maps of all the states of India, called the Crafts Atlas of
India. She has written stories on crafts children that were first published by
Penguin and now widely distributed in many regional languages through the
well-known NGO Pratham. She has assisted in creating,
a syllabus for schools of India’s craft heritage for NCERT. Her recent
publication
Crafting Indian Script is based on a major project called Akshara
combining literacy, craft and calligraphy. A Podium on the Pavement is a
selection of her writings on a variety of subjects including politics, foreign
affairs, women and social issues. She is also the editor and publisher of The
Other Side, a monthly political journal on democratic socialist through and
action.
Preface
Our highest salute should go to the entire community
of people involved in keeping alive the traditions of handloom weaving in
Varanasi. From the lowliest weaver, who is occasionally and tragically
compelled to donate his blood to earn money to feed his family, to aged women
who continue to sort yarn and spin, despite wearing broken spectacles and
living in penury, to the elite group of Muslim and Hindu masterweavers;
add to these the zari makers, exporters, traders, shopkeepers, urban textile
designers, and dedicated activists and academics, all of them are enmeshed in
this collective strength that refuses to let honoured skills die. It may be a
compulsion for some because there is no other option for survival in sight.
Many view it simply as tradition or habit. For others it is a source of
prestige, pride and earning.
Older weavers reminisce nostalgically of the days
when the younger generation came to learn and worked hard to hone the skills
they were taught. Today they shake their heads in disapproval and despair as
they describe how young men are busier with their mobile phones than with
handwork, preferring to sit at a powerloom, provided
the power is on, reading a film magazine while the machine does the work. They
curse computerization and cheap foreign imitations of what their old naqshabands and masterweavers
used to lovingly create. One masterweaver who owns a
well-known establishment said tears had welled up in his eyes when he saw a
master piece made by his forefathers hanging at the Victoria and Albert Museum
in London.
I have made many trips to Varanasi over the years. The
first was in 1956, the year Banaras officially became Varanasi, as a fourteen-
year-old girl who had suddenly lost her father and was, in an unusual departure
from tradition, taken to the holy ghats to perform
the last rites and consign his ashes to the mighty River Ganga. For Hindus,
this task is reserved for a son or nephew. However, being an only child, others
in my matrilineal family from Kerala took an exceptional decision to place this
onerous task in the hands of a young girl. Strangely, it was an empowering one
for me.
The movement of the grand river flowing past with a
power and determination of its own, the smell of incense, ghee and other
auspicious substances thrown into a small fire at specified moments of the
recitations, sending plumes of smoke rising and mingling with the white air,
and the sound of chanting by a dozen of priests invoking everlasting peace for
the departed soul, never went away from lny irincr
memories although
I have kept away from rituals ever since. These scenes still take place on the
banks of the Ganga every day. People come from all over the world, cameras at
hand, to watch this ultimate reality show of life, death, continuum and
spirituality.
All my subsequent visits to Varanasi have been for
the cause of artisans and weavers whose sad conditions, immense potential, and
rich collective heritage have drawn me repeatedly to the narrowest and dirtiest
by-lanes of this eternal city. At first, there was comfort in being amongst a
continuing process that seemed as if it would go on forever. As years went by,
the situation gradually turned grim. Looms began to lie idle, many draped with
cobwebs that hung like grey garlands over wooden frames. The noise of the loud
whirring of powerlooms took over from the gentler clackety-clack of the handloom. The grandgaddidars still sat against their
bolsters on mattresses covered in white sheeting, but they began bemoaning the
loss of markets. Governments sporadically came in with' schemes' to tide over
their problems. But even while metres of sumptuous cloth unravel on those white
mattresses, and piles upon piles of shimmering golden-hued saris are brought
out to seduce women customers, there has been an air of quiet desperation about
their condition matched almost equally by their enterprising efforts to re
fashion production and reach out to the world as they did in better
times.
For generations, the purchase of a Banarasi sari for weddings has been a matter of habit. Mine
was no different. For all those women for whom sari wearing is a tradition,
possessing a 'Banarasi' is a necessity. Not only does
the bride have to wear a kumkum red,
fuschia pink or flaming orange and gold brocade sari,
she would also have a sheer 'tissue' veil woven all through with zari
threads over
her shoulders, for added modesty and adornment. The
bridegroom's. turban would most probably be of
Banarasi silk or tissue as well. Changes in style, habits
and other extraneous influences may have brought the number of customers down,
but when families have to buy saris in bulk to give to a number of female
relatives as part of mandatory wedding custom, the Banarasi
is always the most sought after, most appreciated. It is also the handiest to
collect from the myriad shops in the bustling noisy city or from the air-
conditioned
showrooms of the more fortunate entrepreneurs. At the same time, cries of
mechanized imitations and the dumping of cheap and tawdry alternatives in the
marketplace became louder. Globalization has made trade freer than it ever was
in the time of the Mughals or British rule. In these processes the strong
displace the weak, hands give way to machines, and creative minds give way to
computer-programmed designs.
The internet allowed competitors to pick up motifs
that were never a part of the local culture and conveyed no roots in any
particular identity or history. As far as possible, weavers have tried to adapt
and move with the times. They give the single tag 'modern' to new additions in
patterns like plain dots, zigzags, stripes, bows and English roses, as against
the more elaborate traditional ones with Urdu names that described soft mist,
the jasmine blossom or the famed nilambari
sari which is in a
particular shade of blue-black depicting the night sky, dotted with tiny
butis in silver and gold
zari
like stars
across a luminous firmament.
Fearing that the excesses of mindless globalization
would bring about the extinction of precious localized traditions in textile
manufacturing, local wisdom and techniques applied to the preparation and
preservation of food, medicinal herbs and compounds and other cultural
expressions that form a part of a country's tangible and intangible heritage,
the Government of India established the Geographical Indicators Act in December
1999. It allowed claimants to such legacies to apply for legal protection
against imitations of the same name by competitors who did not belong to that
area. Basmati rice, Haldiram' savouries, neem toothpaste, Chanderi saris,
and Banaras brocades, among others, had all come under threat. Hard work put in
by many concerned organizations and individuals won protection under the Act
for Banarasi Silks in 2009. The announcement was of
profound importance. It was communicated by Law Wire-Communicating the Law,
among other sources, on Tuesday, September 22, 2009. I reproduce an extract
from this website so that the full import of these rights can be
understood:
Banarasi Silk receives GI rights
(India) Banarasi silk products have been registered
under Geographical Indication (GI) rights with the name 'Banaras Brocades and
Sarees'. This is the first ever GI status that any product
in Eastern UP has received. Malihabadi Dussehri mango is another product that is enjoying GI
status in the state of Uttar Pradesh. The GI rights curb others from processing
or marketing any product under the same name and are as good as intellectual
property rights. The GI certificate for Banarasi silk
products have been received by the office of Assistant Director (Handloom) and
other applicants. The certificate will prove to be advantageous for exporters
and consumers, along with hand loom weavers, said Mr. Rajni
Kant, President, Human Welfare Association (HWA) who
is also one of the applicants. As GI status is the measure to restrict the
misuse of Banarasi sari brand, it would benefit
around 1.2 million people who are directly or indirectly associated with
handloom silk industry of the region. According to the certificate issued by
the registrar of GI, Banaras Brocades and Sarees come
under four classes (13-26) that include silk brocades, textile goods, silk sarees, dress material and silk embroidery. This
registration is for 10 years, which can be renewed further.
However, laws may accord rights but are only
instruments. They do not guarantee survival unless many other sustaining inputs
are available and the Act involves processes that assist easy enforcement. For
the woven treasures of Varanasi it would mean access to cotton and silk yarn at
reasonable and controlled prices, an efficient route to a wide variety of
markets, including international ones, better facilities and workplaces for
weavers, and a concerted campaign to highlight the hidden textile treasures
origin a ting from this holy city. Understanding the differences between
imitations and the real thing is also important.
While wandering along the ghats
and visiting bookshops geared for tourists in Varanasi, I found many books on
the Ganga, the holy city and its temples, but none on its weaving traditions
that date far back in history and have been carrying on unbroken since their
inception, just as the city itself has been an active living organism from an
age that no history book can remember. If all who come to Varanasi to seek
eternal bliss, enlightenment and salvation, took time to explore the interiors
of the city where weavers proudly display their creations, they would be
extending a helping hand to the tradition of fine weaving and its skilled and
hard working practitioners. My writing is to give just a small, informal
glimpse of Varanasi's textile past, present and future. It hopes to share with
the reader the vast potential still very much alive among the few thousand
remaining looms scattered in its rural and urban
workplaces.
Contents
Preface |
9 |
Varanasi
Through Time |
19 |
Types
of Looms |
83 |
Weaving
Techniques |
97 |
Handloom,
Continuity and the River Ganga |
111 |
Acknowledgements |
122 |
Bibliography |
124 |
Photo
Credits |
124 |
Glossary |
125 |