Source: World Bank


"Handmade in India: Preliminary Analysis of Crafts Producers and Crafts Production in India; Issues, Initiatives,Interventions" is the title of a report that the authors of this chapterwere commissioned to prepare by the Policy Sciences Center, Inc., under thedirection of Frank W. Penna, in 1999. The study and the report were funded bythe Development Grant Facility of the World Bank, and were expected to provide an analysis of the crafts sector in India that would be of use to the World Bank inplanning future loan programs. The completed report was presented at a Bankworkshop in Washington, D.C., in January 2001.Much of the information in thecurrent chapter is quoted from the report or based on it. The full report andtranscripts of the workshop sessions are available at lnweb18.worldbank.org/essd/essd.nsf/Culture/CW-Agenda.


In a world that isbecoming increasingly mechanized, increasingly homogenized, and almostcompletely exposed to the scrutiny of the Internet, it is logical to assumethat the unique, the individual, and the culturally resonant will acquire evermore appeal and luster. A recent United Nations Educational, Scientific, andCultural Organization (UNESCO) symposium, in fact, has concluded that "theindustries of the imagination, content, knowledge, innovation and creation clearlyare the industries of the future they are also important contributory factorsto employment and economic growth" (UNESCO 1999). Try telling it to theweavers of Andhra Pradesh. In just one recent month, four skilled and talentedtraditional artisans in this southern Indian state died from starvation, andtwo more committed suicide (Gopinath Reddy 2002). They joined the several scoremore who have taken their own lives in recent years and the uncounted thousandswho have not yet been driven to this act of ultimate despair, but whose livesnevertheless have been devastated by financial ruin and by the hopelessness ofa world in which their skills and their knowledge, once prized and respected, havebecome superfluous.


Their stories are harshand tragic. "My husband begged master weavers for work," says onewidow. "But they could not help us. He committed suicide." Anotherweaver gave up when the last in a long string of creditors demanded payment."It was the last straw, "comments one of his neighbors." Hecollapsed, leaving his wife and children destitute. "Still another hunghimself the day after a major festival, during which his family could not eat(Gopinath Reddy 2002).




Read Full Article