The Hindu Business Line : NGO shows the way for craftswomen in Kutch

The journey
Many of them, who successfully negotiate the deals, had begun their journey for a decent livelihood with the NGO and later worked their way up.
"Srushti," a well-known NGO, working in 110 villages across the arid district of Kutch, had made it possible for them to get remunerative prices for their products.

Bhuj (Kutch) , Sept. 13

An average annual wages of Rs 6,857 per head may not be a big sum these days but when it comes to the poor craftswomen of Kutch district who weave and embroider their dreams in fascinating patterns on clothes and beads to create masterpieces, it a substantial amount for those who were a exploited lot until a few years ago.

Several families are engaged in this traditional craft across Kutch.

Thanks to an NGO, which took up the cause of empowering poor and illiterate women of the Kutchi villages, making them self-reliant some three decades ago.

It is no surprise that some craftswomen in sparsely populated villages now discuss prices of their product in terms of dollars, pound-sterling, yen, marks and francs when foreign tourists in search of ethnic craft reach them each year! Some even use calculators and know the exchange rates.

Many of them, who successfully negotiate the deals, had begun their journey for a decent livelihood with the NGO and later worked their way up.

"Srushti," a well-known NGO, working in 110 villages across the arid district of Kutch, has made it possible for them to get remunerative prices for their products.

The NGO, which has networked the unorganised Kutchi craftswomen in the rural areas with the urban market by providing them training, material and wages, was able to fetch them Rs 2.40 crore last year.

The NGO mainly promotes Kutchi heritage, cottage industries and handicraft but has also worked recently with Nabard as well to uplift rural economy and water resources in the arid district.

"We succeeded in convincing these previously exploited women to approach the market through us. Now, we have some 3,500 craftswomen working with us," said Mr Kantisen Shroff, the 85-year-old Bhuj-based Chairman-Emeritus of the Mumbai-based Rs 600-crore Excel Industries Ltd, an agro-chemical industry major.

Speaking to Business Line here recently, Mr Shroff, who is a trustee of the non-profit NGO started in 1968 by his wife, Ms Chandraben, said the organisation's turnover was nearly Rs 4 crore last year.

Sixty per cent of this amount (Rs 2.40 crore) was paid to the 3,500 craftswomen associated with the NGO.

The Republic Day temblor of 2001 had flattened the NGO's building at Bhujodi, seven km from Bhuj.

But the organisation soon swung back with a swanky, state-of-the-art building complex that houses a design school, weaving centre and materials division. It also trains the women into the crafts, particularly embroidery, where they learn the art of earning Rs 8 per hour as unskilled craftswomen to begin with.

The NGO has also set up a showroom to exhibit the arts and crafts in the price range of Rs 150 for a designer cell-phone cover to Rs 15,000 for a wall-hanging, Mr Shroff said.

The NGO procures silk, cotton and other material from across India and decorates these with Kutchi craft.

"We drew inspiration from the Ramkrishna Mission which had come to help these people after a drought in the 1960s. We started with only 10 women in village Ranet, and the number has now swollen by 350 times across 110 villages. It was a slow journey but we made it."

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