At ‘The Kunj’, Indian handicrafts in spotlight as artisans from across India come together

According to officials, the three month inaugural programme will provide artisans with a world-class platform to display their art, ensuring visibility. Apart from live demonstrations, workshops by handicraft artisans, cultural performances, the platform will also offer the sale and display of over 100 handicraft and handloom masterpieces by National Awardees, Shilp Gurus for sale for the first time.

Julie Devi (38), a handicraft artisan from Begusarai, Bihar proudly showed off her display of baskets and flowers, made from Jalkumbhi (Common water hyacinth). Standing with her group of friends, she said, ”We used to think that these (water hyacinths) are fallen leaves…..We were shocked to know that things are being made from this and sold in cities.”

Artists playing instruments and donning traditional dresses sit at the entrance as the melody of folk songs ring in the air. Amid the bustle of the marketplace, Devi and her friend Kareena Kumari, from Begusarai City in Bihar recalled how learning crafts was a path to empowerment.

“A team of experts from Hyderabad taught us how to turn Jalkumbhi into crafts….We take out Jalkumbhi from water, cut out the leaves, wash the stem and dry it. After drying, we paint and mould them into crafts. We learnt a skill as well as earned some money,” said Devi.

On how they discovered Jalkumbhi can be used to make crafts, Rahul Ranjan, programme officer of Export Promotion Council for Handicrafts, said, “People of a Hyderabad based agency called Creative Bee, did an assessment of water bodies of Bihar in September 2024, and found out that the water quality is great and the stem size of the aquatic plant is big.” He added that sustainable products are in demand in the international market.

At a distance, Kallu Kumar Maurya (65) sat with his friend Rajendra Prasad (70) behind strands of cotton running vertically from a wooden frame, while using a knife to cut the threads. Their final product, the renowned Bhadohi carpet is priced between Rs 3,000 and several lakhs, depending on the size and quality.

However, Maurya and Prasad, struggle to make ends meet owing to the demand for machine-made goods. “The exporters now don’t give us fair share of profit for our products,” Maurya added.

Slated to win an award at the upcoming National Handicrafts Awards, Maurya shows the carpet that bagged him the prize. “This is the image of Ellora Caves printed on the back side of the Rs 20 currency note, it took me eight months to complete it,” he noted.

At one of the stalls, Amit Tori (35) and Munna Tori (32) are busy peeling bamboo, with a knife. Through ‘The Kunj’, they are platforming the art of the Tori community of Jharkhand’s Gumla district. Prabhu Sahu, member of the Asian Heritage Foundation who brought the duo to ‘The Kunj’, said he visited their village in 2015.

“At that time, they were using bamboo to only make fish traps. The products were then sold in the local market and they were also earning less. We then trained them to make other crafts,” he added. “We make around Rs 800 a month,” said Tori.

B. Vinay Kumar from Hyderabad, a fine arts graduate is a 18th generation Cheriyal painting artist. He underlined that his scroll art preserves oral historical accounts of the southern states. A state award winner, Kumar said that the scroll on which the painting is done is made from scratch by his community.

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