URMUL Desert crafts dazzle Delhi

Delhi is known for it's markets. And the market in clothes has not only a distinct identity of it's own but is much in vogue these days. The market in the megapolis and the dresses, fashion shows and big garment companies that dominate the scene lure you in every possible way to buy their product.


In the glittering lights over the ramp the Capital creates new celebrities every day. Fashions come and go, and every day the city gears up to meet new desires. There is so much happening there to satiate the consumerist urges of the city dweller. For the well-placed city dweller clothes are, after all, primarily a subject of desire and fantasy.


And amidst all this showbiz arrive the craftspeople, with their colourful products, from the Thar desert and the images of sand dunes and folk music. For the discerning buyer Rajasthan has been synonymous with a rich and colourful craft tradition. The trucks laden with all the products, travelling all night that arduous journey, arrive early in the morning. Hopes of striking good fortune for the rural artisans from Rajasthan are writ large on their eager faces.




The URMUL Desert Crafts Exhibition held from December 12 to 15, 2001 in Delhi had a different ring. The exhibition represented the interest of hundreds of artisans who had to toil very hard to survive. These artisans created primarily to fend for themselves. Traditionally most of this creation was either tied to rites of passage or was a way of occupying oneself in those long hours of leisure. These products were objects of desire made for the most loved, and for marking special occasions. But the drudgeries of daily life have changed all this. The meaning of these meticulous creations had altered. Now most of this colourful creation is mass produced for daily wages and sold in the open market.


The year 2001 was in one very important sense, not like all the previous years. The artisans from the Thar have faced the worst effects of the drought since 1998. A majority of them are still facing it. The drought has meant that there was no water for months at a stretch. Their livestock had perished. The majority of the families had to reconstruct their lives anew. Most of their creations bear testimony to this difficult period. A tale of human misery hides behind these deep and attractive colours. Summer in the Rajasthan desert has been long unbearable and gloomy. Surviving it had been ordeal. Craftsmanship is an alternative livelihood to the humiliating and hard option of digging a earth for low wages. These craft products have provided some respite in the otherwise miserable scenario.


The URMUL logo, of a woman sitting on a spinning wheel, symbolises time rolling by and the ceaseless efforts of the woman to survive. And in the desert, time really rolls and survival is difficult. Opportunities to eke out a living are really few. And on top of it droughts are quite frequent.


The URMUL Trust founded in 1987 by Sanjoy Ghose (who was abducted by the ULFA in Assam in 1997) has been trying to facilitate the survival of the poor in some of the most backward areas of the state of Rajasthan. After the 1986-87 drought, the most severe in recent years, women from the villagers in the Bikaner district were encouraged to spin wool into yarn as relief measures. Therein lay the genesis for a search and exploration for families scattered over not only Bikaner district but also the entire western Rajasthan.


The URMUL Desert Crafts looks after the interests of the weavers from Bikaner, Churu, Jodhpur, and Jaisalmer district, and the leather workers from Sikar. The collectives also work in the field of primary health care and education, rural livelihood, thrift and credit support, action research and advocacy on the key issues of the desert.


In Thar, every third year is a drought year. When it is declared a drought year the majority of the population have to, in order to survive, dig earth or migrate to unknown territories. Imagine having to dig earth for 120 hours a day in the gruelling heat just to survive for the next day. Only then does one get a daily payment of Rs 30 and some 4 kg of wheat. It is not only tough but also thoroughly inhuman. And this year thousands of men and women have done precisely that to survive. There is no other possible source of livelihood that is available to the ordinary people.


The 'marusthali', has always posed formidable challenges for human settlement. True, there has been arable expansion but there has been phenomenal population growth and resource degradation too. for the fragile balance that characterises this ecosystem, human survival has become quite unsustainable over the last few decades.


The harsh physical climate presents very little scope for any opportunities of livelihoods to thrive. Most of the agriculture is a gamble with the rain gods. Livestock rearing is tough, not very popular with the young generation and anyway becoming difficult with all the shrinkage of pastures and resource degradation. Due to poor infrastructure the scope of non-farm economic activities is fairly restricted.


URMUL has also experimented with design interventions at promoting 'sustaining livelihoods'. The Thar was known for it's traditional skills in dyeing, printing, weaving, embroidering, woodwork, leatherwork and painting.


Meanwhile, the products of these artisan families were being pushed out by the industrial commodities that had penetrated even the small village Bazaars. The demand for these traditional handicrafts was increasingly getting reduced in the rural exchange circuits. That is when, with innovative design inputs, the village co-operatives have been able to compete in the urban markets.

Bright and deep colours from the sandy land of Rajasthan carry within them the quaint smell of the sands of the remote village settlements. The rustic mud houses are the 'studio's, where these colours of add new vigour to a life beaten by the harsh vagaries of their landscape. In these craft products can be heard echoes of hundreds of artisans, a reminder to the fact that we, who live in the big cities have a social responsibility towards desert people, cut off from civilisation and fighting hard to live.


Supporting crafts is not necessarily the solution to the problem. But it is definitely one of the solutions.




Source: Deccan Hearld, 30.01.2002, Charkha Features