Chip off an ancient block: How a Bagru artisan family stamped out Covid blues | Meta Stories of Strength 2022 News,The Indian Express
Meera Devi Titanwala knew they would have to carry on with their Bagru family business, if only for the sake of artisans dependent on them. That is when she turned to WhatsApp to reach out to the 'community' of their long-time customers.
Meera Devi Titanwala knew they would have to carry on with their Bagru family business, if only for the sake of artisans dependent on them. That is when she turned to WhatsApp to reach out to the ‘community’ of their long-time customers.
In a small town in Rajasthan, the afternoon sun is beating down on the yard of a house. Water gurgles in several cement tanks. In a corner, three women bend over a sloshing pot, chattering. Over all of this is a rhythmic thump-thump-thump, sharp, evenly spaced.
This thump-thump is the reason why the name of the town is familiar to many, though not always as a geographical location. If you like block-printed fabrics, you have probably come across the word Bagru, in the description box of kurtas you look up online. The centuries-old hand-block printing technique — which roughly involves carving wood blocks into intricate patterns, daubing them with colour and stamping them on fabric – takes its name from the town Bagru, some 30 km from Jaipur.
In the past few decades, the artisans of Bagru have weathered several storms: the onset of machine-printing, dwindling interest among youngsters to carry on with a labour-intensive craft, falling water table in and around Jaipur – the traditional process needs a lot of water – and then, Covid-19.
“Covid was a calamity like none other,” says Meera Devi Titanwala, the owner of the house. “My own family, my in-laws, have all been Bagru artisans for generations. But never before had our earnings come to a standstill. For months, we couldn’t create or sell a single fabric,” Meera Devi narrates.
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