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Journalism of Courage
THE Diamond Zari Centre is the rough version of its namesake. It resides on two floors of a house in an alley behind Noor Mahal, in Bhopal8217;s Old City.
Along the walls inside, there are more than a hundred jars filled with a thousand stars. In comparison, the silk, mounted on a frame, looks stark.
I8217;m waiting with owner Mahmood and his sister Zareen for the workers. Some will come from school, others after lunch. Together, they8217;ll spill the stars on the silk and sew their childhood dreams on reels of fabric.
Wasi 16 tells me the basics of working on a karchob8212;the frame that resembles an iron bed8212;also called an adda. Wasi came from Kanpur to join Mahmood8217;s workshop. 8216;8216;First the needle,8217;8217; he says, and picks up the odd-shaped needle that8217;s fitted with a wooden holder muthiya. It8217;s made from the spokes of bicycle wheels. Only one man in Bhopal makes them8212;he files the point and then carves a qatra a fine crochet needle point at the end naka. 8216;8216;Follow how I go,8217;8217; says the little master.
I place the point on the silk surface, while the 16-year-old hands me some gold thread. I try to run the most common aari stitch on it. To create an aari, I pierce the needle through the surface of the fabric while with the other hand, I wrap the thread once around the qatra. Pull the needle up and you get a loop. Pierce again, this time through the loop. The aari work is best for a paisley motif.
The girls work the sequins with longer needles. I turn to Wasi; he8217;s ready with one for me. I watch others dig it into the heap of sequins and fish out several tiny discs in one go. I follow, but nothing comes on. Instead, I pick out one at a time and put each through the needle8212;an array of stars on a metal axis.
I take one off and bite it. It folds then chips off. The plastic shows. 8216;8216;If they were real, I wouldn8217;t have allowed you this,8217;8217; says Mahmood, the patriarch of the plastic galaxy. Real? 8216;8216;Earlier, we used real gold and silver sequins, salma sitare. The thread was also of silver or gold. Now we only have disco sitare. But the group working upstairs are sewing real rubies for a bride8217;s dupatta,8217;8217; Mahmood says airily.
And that8217;s where I8217;m headed via the rickety metal staircase that juts out of the building. The men look up from the busy adda. They8217;ve made a web of roses8212;the petals in silver beads, leaves shaped like rings. 8216;8216;The roses are in zardozi, the leaves in dabka,8217;8217; Wasi explains. I nod, and Wasi returns it with a you-obviously-need-a-lesson look.
Downstairs, the girls have set up an adda of sky-blue tissue. I am handed a stencil with an ink-sketched pattern. I trace it out in 20 minutes. Nearby, the girls are fighting with a karchob of chiffon. 8216;8216;Hum dore daal rahein hain,8217;8217; says Yasmin. I can8217;t help smiling; dore daal rahein hain is a metaphor for flirting.
8216;8216;Why do the men work on a separate floor? Are they observing purdah,8217;8217; I ask. The girls laugh while Mahmood bhai explains, 8216;8216;It8217;s after they started eloping from my workshops. I had to organise the nikah of an ape with a hoor. No way now.8217;8217;
No one laughs. They are struggling with the pattern on the tissue. With a cotton ball, I press zinc and silver powder mixed in kerosene on the stencil. The pattern comes out sharper. Behind me, a group of 10 is stitching large sequins on georgette. 8216;8216;These are aable,8217;8217; says Yasmin.
The plastic of the aable, literally blisters, reflects the face of the needle-worker8212;on pay day, when novices get Rs 30 and seniors Rs 180 per day of work; when a bridal lehenga is decorated for Rs 800 and sold for Rs 10,000; and when boys weave roses and girls escape to sequinned gardens.
