I am asked a lot of times that how do I know so much about handloom. Or, I am complemented upon my knowledge of handloom. I always have one reply….In India, craft changes with every 50 kilometer.  Our handloom and handicraft industry is so intertwined with nature and its aspect that the diversity is magnanimous to say the least. In a span of some 50 kilometer, the vegetation becomes different, and hence the food changes for a caterpillar that produces silk and that’s why a kataan from Benaras is completely different from Kosa of Chhattisgarh. The printing done in Sanganer is widely different from printing done in Bagru, just because the content of iron in river differs from one geographical location to the other. The embroideries of Gujarat are poles apart from embroideries of Rajasthan, because the communities settled are different. This diversity humbles me every day, and thus I am not a know it all. I am still travelling and I am still learning.

Every time I sit with a weaver, I sit as a student ready to absorb whatever I can over a plate of steaming hot crisp roti, which is accompanied by hare mirch ki sabzi in Rajasthan and gud and besan ki meethi kadhi when I’m in Gujarat. But the pride of an artisan always remains the same. The crib is always there but then that’s overshadowed by the love for the craft.

One has to travel to the small hamlets of villages, to understand how inherently sustainable we are as a country. How close to nature we are in our clothes, in our food, in our day to day lives. How meticulously our communities have learnt to cohabit together. Yet again during one of my trips covering part of Rajasthan around Ranthambore and Tonk, I witnessed a strange phenomenon. The Hindu community of these villages will hand over their dead cattle to the Muslim julahe and these artisans would pray for the spirit and make bags out of the leather and pin numerous holes in that bag. The bag is then filled with water, chuna and bark of trees grown around…the solution provides natural colour to the leather and after the whole process we get those beautiful Rajasthani jutties that’s pride of every Indian women.

This whole process is carried out so effortlessly.

These people, they don’t teach just the craft form and its intricacies. They teach much bigger lessons of life. They teach you the lesson of being son/daughter of the earth. They teach you how everything comes from nature and dissolves in nature. And that what the essence of Indian handloom and handicraft is…being effortlessly sustainable.