Shes got the Look

Born in Madhutara village,some 7 km from Datrana where she lives now,Hansiba is one among 7,000 women artisans who have been tapped by SEWA across communities like Ahirs,Rabaris pastoral nomads,Chaudhari-Patels,Kshatriyas and Harijans. She is a complete artisan she grows cotton,gins and spins it on a wooden charkha,dyes the cloth with colours made of natural herbs before stitching the clothes all on her own. She has made at least 32 skirts for her daughters trousseau. Each skirt,right from the time the cotton is picked to when the cloth is embroidered,can take up to a month to make; so mothers start the process when the child is born. When SEWA thought of creating a line of contemporary clothes made by traditional artists like her in 2008,Hansiba was a ready inspiration and the brand was named after her.

The brand Hansiba,which aims to keep the ownership with the artisans,mainly sells kurtas and dupattas,home linen and bags,in cotton,silk or wool within the price range of Rs 900-Rs 3,000. It retails from stores in Delhi,Mumbai and Ahmedabad,but is also available in Europe,the Americas,Australia and Japan,and is regularly invited to the Santa Fe International Folk Art Market,in New Mexico,USA. The purpose of our brand is to create maximum employment and build a reliant community. We invoked Section 25 of the Companys Act which allows the firm to absorb its losses, says Reema Nanavaty,director,SEWA. Under the act,the company does not need to pay dividends out of its profits to members,and every Hansiba artisan gets 65 per cent of the sale proceeds.

Cataract ruined Hansibas vision a year ago,so she stitches little and spends her time ginning cotton. She talks about how her maternal grandmother raised her in Datrana,because her mother did not have the time to work and raise six girls. By 14,when Hansi was ginning and spinning cotton and had learnt embroidery,her father died. At 19,she married Vaghabhai from Datrana,who was lame,so all the work at home and in the fields fell on Hansibas shoulders. Of her eight children,three girls and two boys survived.

Hansiba says she is eighty and six 86 years old but vividly recalls Banaskanthas worst drought of 1925-26 when they dug out roots of wild plants,boiled and ate them. I was about six-seven years old then, she says. Many years later,after a drought in the region in 1986-87,when SEWA suggested crafts as a rehabilitation tool,the government commissioned it to conduct a census of the artisans in the region,says Sayra Baloch,coordinator of Banaskantha DWCRA Mahila SEWA Association BDMSA. The result showed chronic unemployment and access to water and food as major problems. The association was formed to revive crafts and provide livelihood to people; and several women joined SEWA. Till then,we lived like animals we never bathed,we washed clothes with mud and extracted oil from the neem seed and oiled our hair. I still use that oil, says Hansiba.

A museum named after Hansiba opened in Radhanpur,Patan district,in 2010 at the premises of BDMSA to preserve the techniques of Gujarats traditional embroidery. It stores heirlooms from womens homes such as clothes,utensils made of brass,copper and mud,wooden chests,flour mills and buttermilk churners. Ahirs,the predominant community here and to which Hansiba belongs,are experts in the soi bharat mirror embroidery. While Rabaris prefer bold shapes with generous mirror work,beads and zari,Chaudhari-Patels use more appliques and patchwork; the Mochi community cobblers practice aari embroidery with the hooked cobbler needle.

Women across communities wear backless cholis called kamkha and wide pleated skirts known as ghaghra. Rasuben,a Chaudhary-Patel from Koliwad village,shows her grandmothers 100-year-old handmade skirt weighing nearly 2.5 kg,displayed at the museum. From the days of the drought,when Hansibas daughter Puriben recalls selling a kamkha for Rs 25,their traditional craft now gets them work and money. We had no idea that our craft was so valuable. Today,one set of odhni blouse and ghaghra costs nearly Rs 40,000-Rs 50,000,she says.

The absence of colours on the womens clothes mark losses in their lives and age. Hansiba gave up yellow and her ivory bracelets after her husband died 16 years ago,and Puriben stopped wearing pink. Puriben gave up yellow when her father-in-law died and later,when her husbands sister died,green. When Hansiba goes,Ill give up red,this colourful skirt and odhni. I will wear only the umarvallo a plain dark sarong-like skirt. What is the point of wearing any colour when Ma goes? she says.