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The feel-good fabric
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Visit the Khadi Utsav and you will be doing a favour to the artisans of rural India
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WHY DID my late grandfather buy khadi? Because he was a Gandhian. Why does 65-year old Somu Mama wear khadi? Because it suits his middle-class budget. And why must Ashish wear khadi to college? Because it's cool man, cool! And real chic too, adds his sister Bindu.
Khadi Utsav 2004, is drawing crowds at Fort High School, Chamarajpet. The national level exhibition organised by the Khadi Village Industries Commission (KVIC) and Karnataka State Khadi & Village Industries Board (KVIB) has on sale not just khadi in silk, cotton, wool, and blends, but also a range of leather accessories, home products, handicrafts, pottery, and food products. The readymade clothes have become better, and so have the carpets and dhurries. A theme pavilion and a demonstration pavilion are also part of this neatly organised fair. But, why should we buy khadi?
"When you buy a mill-made textile, the profit goes almost entirely to the mill owner. When you buy a khadi yardage, 35-45 per cent of the price goes to the producer in some faraway village. And the charakha popularised by Gandhiji has become a production tool in the hands of the masses," explains khadi-clad Mr.V.G. Joshi, Chairman of Karnataka Khadi Workers Association. "It is one of the best ideas ever to increase employment in the country — today, KVIC is the largest consumer goods manufacturer in India!"
Mahatma Gandhi got the idea of reviving the spinning wheel as a means to further the swadeshi movement when he found a spinner called Gangaben to teach people to spin. Now KVIC has well-developed training centres to teach the craft. Gandhiji got top scientists such as C.V.Raman, Visvesvaraya, Meghnad Saha, and P.C.Ray to get involved in his Saranjamshala at Sabarmati Ashram. Today, KVIC has tie-ups with the six IITs, IISc, the NIITs, and national laboratories for research in science and technology. The introduction of technological practices in the village industries sector has been made in such a way that the resultant cost and quality benefits reach both the consumer and the producer. This does make khadi more expensive than mill-made fabric.
The relevance of khadi is even more today when everyone is involved, or at least talking about this eco-friendly production. "In an era of degenerating environment, efforts are on to produce 100 per cent eco-friendly textiles where even cotton will be grown without chemical fertilisers. But, surprisingly, this is already being done in India — in the form of Ponduru Khadi which is produced from wild varieties of cotton found in the mountain terrain of Eastern part of Andhra Pradesh, in the South of India," reads the blurb in KVIC's website.
Almost all the 200 or so stalls at Khadi Utsav 2004 are manned by... well, men. "But it's the women in the villages who are able to sit tight and work eight hours and do the spinning, and now even the weaving too," says Mr. Joshi, a member of the Central Certificate Committee of KVIC. "The khadi movement has directly empowered a good percentage of rural women, and because of their wage-earning capacity, their men folk have become much more co-operative when it comes to sharing household duties," he adds.
This Republic Day, set out to do something for yourself — dream of winning the lottery on your entry ticket, buy the most comfortable fabric (khadi), wear eco-friendly footwear, eat traditional goodies from all over India (like hot chilli bajjis with tamarind chutney), wash it down with fresh sugarcane juice or jaggery made in front of you, sit through a cultural programme — and you'll automatically be doing a favour to artisans in India.
Khadi Utsav is on at Fort High School Grounds, Chamarajapete, up to February 15, 2004. Total special rebate on khadi between 20 to 35 per cent is available up to March 5 at all certified Khadi Bhandars. It is open between 10 a.m. and 9 p.m..
MALA KUMAR
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