At the National Handloom Day celebration in Chennai on August 7, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, among other things, said, “A weaver weaves a sari just as a mother brings up her daughter.”
With initiatives such as the #IWearHandloom selfie campaign, that generated adequate digital buzz last week, and the government’s commitment to the textile and garment industry sealed with a promise of $ 4.25 billion, there’s no denying that reviving handloom is its clear mission. But will handloom ever drive the “India Cool” dialogue and win over the high earning, high spending Indian millennial?
Unlikely, says industry veteran Tarun Tahiliani. “One should analyse why people stopped wearing handloom in the first place. There’s a reason for that. I was at the Mumbai airport recently and there was not one person wearing handloom except an 85-year-old lady, because she’s used to. People don’t want to wear handloom because it’s not fashionable. So there needs to focus on teaching new technology to the weavers.”
No real policyAccording to the government, India has the highest loom capacity with 59 per cent of the world’s market share. Are we doing enough to leverage the capacity? Designer Ritu Kumar observes that India is lagging behind even Bangladesh in the export market because we are bogged down by huge labour laws. “There’s little sense in having this capacity if the handloom garments produced by the mills are un-buyable,” says Kumar, a Padma Shri awardee. “The textile policy of the government should become more flexible. The chikankari workers should not be asked for excise duty, for instance. There’s need to incentivise those who use handloom by means of a retail relief. The government needs to protect power and mill looms.”
The domestic textile and apparel industry is estimated to touch $ 100 billion by 2016-17, up from $ 67 billion in 2013-14. But these numbers don’t mean much to the design community. “Clearly there’s no real policy. Everyone’s switching over to western clothes; only bridal wear is becoming bigger. It’s a Jodha Akbar costume party,” says Tahiliani.
Fellow designer Anamika Khanna, a favourite with Bollywood style-influencers from Sonam Kapoor to Deepika Padukone, while calling the Make in India initiative “brilliant” also feels fashion in the country is in a confused state. “There’s no direction,” she says. “There are some cool, chic stylish brands in India who are reviving handloom, but they are too few. Most others are struggling to survive and opting for the wedding wear route.”
The handloom community in India — barring a few pockets such as Benaras, where the government’s attention is currently focused — is fast dying out with artificial fabrics ruling the retail space. Khanna says it’s time the weavers got back their dignity of labour. “Handloom is a matter of pride for us. It is who we are as a country, this is where we started. Any new initiative obviously will take time. But it needs to be realistic and in depth to actually succeed,” she states.
That entails rigorous ground work at the grassroots, strong financial and technological support and shift in mindset that demolishes the age old idea that fashion is frivolous. A handloom selfie campaign is great for social media eyeballs, but perhaps not enough to make handloom relevant. And the onus lies equally with the fashion community.
Designer Anavila Mishra has managed to make handloom cool with her casual linen saris currently a rage with the poster women of indie cool like Konkona Sen Sharma, Kalki Koechlin and Kiran Rao. Mishra has a pertinent question. “How many designers are actually going into the clusters and working with handloom? Most of the weavers in the villages of Phulia (West Bengal), Bhuj and Hyderabad, continue to do what they have done for years,” says Mishra. “They don’t know what to make for modern India. There’s not even a large enough domestic market for the saris they are making. Constant design intervention is needed.”
The designer, who works with weavers in the interiors of India, continues, “There are stories of rats eating up handloom in villages, delaying delivery of products. While Benaras is getting attention because of Modi, looms in the rest of the country need support too.”
Still a long way to goMost fashion insiders describe the current state of the industry as “unorganised”. With the second largest manufacturing capacity in the world, it’s still a while before India becomes a fashion super power. “I don’t think we will become a fashion super power soon, to be honest. The Indian government has too many big problems to focus on rather than the fashion industry, which is largely seen as frivolous,” says Khanna.
Yet, not all is lost. The day we realise that the idea of luxury comes from a point of authority, not subjugation, is the day we become a fashion super power, feels designer Sabyasachi Mukherjee. “Fashion from India will always be craft based. We’ve all made our millions because we are craft dependent, and the world seeks it out,” he says. “Unfortunately, what fashion has done to this country is that it has made it socially dysfunctional. India has always been a maximalist country. We like embellishment and handicraft, and so when you bring ideas like minimalism from the West — which do not belong here — you confuse buyers. They start to feel that being Indian is not such a good thing, which is unforgivable. It disrupts the DNA. You lose the very strength that could make you a superpower.”
The author is a freelance writer
