Kothakota weavers cry for govt support

There are two weaving groups with Rs 5 lakh loans and others having Rs 50,000 loans per family yet to be waived-off. As per sources, the file has been pending at highest bureaucratic-level

Wanaparthy: One of the most tearful chapters in the history of post-economic reforms era of the 90s has been the plight of handloom weavers in Telangana, many of whom had to part with their lives and livelihoods as a result of it. While statehood for Telangana had given the community some hope, lockdown has now given them a second chance. An opportunity to shore up their lives now lies with the State and Central governments, at a time when buying ‘local’ seems to be the new mantra.

The life of the handloom weavers of Kothakota has been marred with challenges for the past 30 years, ever since 25 Padmashali families started their cooperative society. They collectively bought a piece of land and took loan of Rs 50,000 per head from State Finance Corporation in 1990 to build their own houses and installed five maggams (handlooms) in their houses. Since then, they have been weaving the most attractive sarees with their signature ‘pythani pallu’ on what have been popularly known as ‘Kothakota Cheerelu.’

Satyanarayana and Rajyalakshmi, husband and wife, both residents of Weavers Colony in Kothakota have been weaving these sarees for as long as they could remember. After all these years of promoting a unique handloom art form, they now feel that their generation could be the last weaving these sarees.

“Unlike employees who work on a shift basis, we work for 14 hours at a stretch sitting on the maggam. We hardly have any social life- the reason why our contribution has been little-known in the society. Today situation is such that we find it difficult to find a bride for our son because people find our social status inferior to theirs because we are handloom weavers. We don’t have any value anymore,” Rajyalakshmi poured out her feelings, speaking to Telangana Today, about the difficulty in finding a match for their son who is an IT Engineer working in Devarakonda.

While lack of demand locally for their products, lack of government support, rising costs of raw material and infrastructural limitations in diversifying their products and lack of resources have been just some of the reasons for their present condition while absence of a marketing system has been a major bottleneck in their industry.

“Our sarees are priced anywhere between Rs 10,000 and Rs 50,000. Problem is that over the decades, people in Telangana have stopped buying Kothakota sarees. If not for some shops in Maharashtra who give us orders and pay us, our industry would have been wiped-out seven-years-ago,” Satyanarayana points-out.

Presently, 50 families are engaged in weaving these grand sarees, but the art form doesn’t seem to be passed-on to the next generation. Only 2-3 people in the next generation have been presently involved in handloom weaving.

Telangana government had taken a decision to waive-off loans amounting to Rs 50,000 per weaver’s family couple of years ago. In fact, Textiles and Handlooms Minister K Taraka Rama Rao had himself visited the Weavers’ Colony and had spoken to these weavers, assuring them complete support from the government. The Minister had also promised them of Rs 25 lakh worth immediate assistance. But till today, none of the loans of 50 families engaged in weaving have been waived-off. There are two groups with Rs 5 lakh loans and others having Rs 50,000 loans per family yet to be waived-off. As per sources, the file has been pending at the highest bureaucratic-level.

Unless these loans are waived-off, it becomes impossible for the weavers to take fresh loans from the banks. Lockdown has further crippled their lives as there has been literally no demand or orders to support their livelihoods.

To meet the growing demand and to penetrate the market aggressively, these weavers need to try new designs as per local market demand and also need to diversify their products. This would involve heavy capital investment on machinery and human resources. Working-out new innovative market strategies is another issue which needs to be worked-out at the bureaucratic-level.

These weavers have land to start a workshop by installing new maggams and have also raised its basement, but due to scarcity of funds that experiment is yet to see the dawn. To keep this art alive, the district administration had in the past proposed offering skill development training to employable youth in handloom weaving, which could train youth and be remunerative for the weavers as well. That well-intended initiative is also yet to see the light of the day.

“State government has been doing great work in improving the lives of farmers across Telangana. Even in this pandemic time, farmers at least have food grains in their homes, but we have been struggling to make our ends meet. The only thing which could help us is the loan waiver and capital investment in the form of loans again,” Satyanarayana told Telangana Today.

A ray of hope for Kothakota handloom weavers is the Centre’s allotted budget of Rs 50,000 crore as equity funding for Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) in view of pandemic. It needs to be seen how much cooperative societies like Kothakota weavers would be able to benefit from this financial bailout.

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