Like always, the 13th edition of Dastkar Nature Bazaar is also a celebration of art and culture. Weaves, pottery, puppets, wood craft, jewellery, furniture, metal craft, live performances by Manganiyar kids and terahtali dance performance, craft workshops and food from Rajasthan and Maharashtra dot the Manpho Convention Centre in Whitefield. Well-appointed stalls and a neat layout allows people to walk around at leisure.
There is a lone stall selling shibori-dyed stoles, dupattas and fabric and it is available in a riot of colours. And before you cover the entire Dastkar and decide on the unique shibori stoles, your favourite colours are gone. You feel a sense of loss but as soon you move ahead, you overcome it. Elegant kurtas for women, dupattas, running dress material and home furnishings in hand-woven fabric and Bandhej technique from Urmul and Sadhna, just blow you away. While Urmul is a trust formed some 28 years ago to economically and socially empower women in Western Rajasthan, Sadhna is a women’s handicraft enterprise that began in 1988 with women of rural, urban and slum areas of Udaipur.
This time, Dastkar features 19 new craft groups and 8 designers among whom are Awdesh Kumar Singh, Chammak Challo Cool Maal, Cotton Rack, a line of Khadi clothing and Yuti’s handlooms offering tussar and linen saris. Linen saris are becoming a rage and in those earthy colours, they are show stealers. Chammak Challo’s quirky earrings, accessories are quite impressive too.
Stalls selling banana fibre juttis from Rajasthan, sea shell bangles, bowls, soap dispensers from West Bengal, ceramic pots, banana fibre table runners, baskets, and crochet earrings, hair accessories are also worth a visit. Kadam Haat, from selling wooden craft items like coconut dip bowls, fruit picks, toothpicks, wooden chopping boards was another stall that stood out.
Dastkar, a not-for-profit NGO established in 1981 by Laila Tyabji and five other women, supports and empowers traditional Indian craftspeople, many of whom are women in rural India.
(Dastkar Bengaluru Nature Bazaar is on at Manpho Convention Centre, Spectrum Grounds No. 1 &2, Near Manyata Tech Park, till August 20)
Shailaja Tripathi 