Villages in Odisha That Still Runs the Cotton Weaving Industry

India is rich in its culture and so also its states. Each state has something or the other to boast upon. Odisha is one of them, which is rich in culture, tradition, art and architecture, dance, textile and many more aspects. Each part of the state has its own traditional textile, such as sarees and dress material.

In the western part of Odisha we have famous Sambalpuri Sari that is very popular across the globe. The weaving is done by traditional charkhas and handlooms operational at households in this village. As per the report weaver families of this heritage crafts village treating weaving as livelihood for the villagers, which continues for over 200 years, it came into popularity in Gandhian era of Swadeshi and Khadi. Sambalpuri sari is further categorized and Pasapalli is one of its hit variant which is very popular and sober designer. Pasapalli sari is a hand woven sari made of silk fabric and has a beautiful and lavish ‘aanchal’, which makes it a simple and beautiful thing. The prices as the village are so low but it grows ten times when it quits the boundaries of the state. Pasapalli sari is woven mainly in places like Sonepur, Barpali and Baunshri. The specialty of the sari is, it has chess board like prints in the entire body with characteristic white and black/red squares. The sari is normally made from cotton, tassar, silk in which silk and tassar is also a combination. The sari is given additional design with the golden colored threads. The thread makes the sari look more beautiful. The borders of this sari are usually decorative and the aanchal is designed in various patterns. The excellence of this weaving is authorized to the ancient weaving art form called ‘baandhakala’. This is a very convoluted method and done physically with great vigilance. The efforts of Government of India and Government of Odisha along with their associated bodies have geared up from the 1980’s to market the traditional hand-woven saris in the national and international field. Padmanabhpur Weaver’s Cooperative Society (PWCS) was established in Orrisa on 6^th August, 1946 located in Padmanabhpur village of Ganjam district in Odisha. A social activist & local sarpanch of that time S. Rameya, who also acted as a promoter of khadi, was the main back stand behind formation of this cooperative. According to present secretary of PWCS, S. Nilakantha, at present 135 families of this village totally depend on handloom weaving of cotton saris. Some nearby villages like Bhismagiri, Tikarpara, Nimakhandi etc. are also continuing with the same tradition as the way to their livelihood. In Berhampur, Devangas are involved in silk weaving, while at Padmanabhpur they are involved in cotton weaving. Dobby booti sari is a traditional specialty of this weavers’ village. At present saris produced by this cooperative are being marketed throughout the State as well as in New Delhi and Kolkata. Whole family of weavers gets involved in the process of weaving and one sari gets prepared in one day, according to the villagers. For each sari, they get Rs.412 from the cooperative as the job work assistance and a small family weaves about 25-30 sarees in a month.

By: Anuja Arora

Content: https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/other-states/Cotton-weaving-still-survives-in-this-Odisha-village/article13984290.ece