P Lakshmi busily weaves a window blind at the entrance of the Medara (bamboo weavers) Street. Her deft fingers work almost intuitively on the bamboo sticks as she chats with her neighbour who gives her a helping hand. Lakshmi, like other women of the Medara community, spends her days making a livelihood from bamboo.
Medara Street (behind the Poorna Market) has been associated with bamboo weaving for decades. The narrow alley where the weavers reside is in the constant company of flies, mosquitoes and a strong stench from open drainages that run along the unpaved road. Women of the community spend their day sitting outside their home in groups, whittling bamboo and weaving baskets.
Last year, the parliament amended the Indian Forest Act to axe bamboo as a tree and recognise it as a grass. This was done to improve its cultivation and support livelihoods. The bamboo weavers, who are struggling against increased price of raw materials and the wide preference for plastic, are hoping for a change that will bring back the lost glory of their art.
Gandi Pothraj, a member of the same community, has spent all his life weaving bamboos and making a living out of it. Working on a model of a boat that will be used as a base for floral decoration, Pothraj recollects the days when bamboo products ruled every house and plastic was not known to people. “Plastic alternatives have reduced the earnings to almost nothing. People no longer need baskets, winnows or hand fans made by bamboo. When I was a child, the street had 100 families that practised weaving. Today, the population has swollen and there are 150 families but hardly anyone depends completely on this profession,” says 70-year-old Pothraj.
At one time, the community thrived and people could manage to run their households by just weaving bamboo. High demand for work kept them busy as winnows, baskets and carpets were a necessity in every household. However, with the introduction of plastic, the destiny of these weavers changed.
Earlier bamboo weaving was the main profession of families that resided in the alley. Now, the grinding poverty and dwindling income has forced the male members to take up other jobs. Most of them work as labourers at construction sites or as autorickshaw drivers. The weaving profession today is dominated by women members of the families who are taking forward the art of their ancestors.
Lakshmi learnt the art of weaving from her parents who learnt it from theirs. However, she says she will make sure that her children don’t have to do the same. “I work hard so that I can send my children to school. The long hours of work that are put in bring very less money,” says Lakshmi. She believes that the little income that the weavers earn are due to the innovations they have made in the profession. “Blinds or bamboo moulds that are used as a base for decoration are not what we learnt from our elders; these are the changes that we made to ensure survival,” she says. She believes that organising workshops for the community to understand new trends in the market, and support from the government will help the weavers sail through tough times. However, no authority has approached them to provide them any sort of help, she rues. The little help that comes is through Shanti Medara Sankshema Sangam, an association formed by the members of that alley. “As a union we help the members of the community to get loans. But apart from that we have been unable to do much as the authorities are not very supportive. We hear that other districts in the state have artisans coming from Tripura to help them upgrade themselves,” says N Prakash, a member of the association. Prakash claims that lack of efforts for revival of the art and absence of an institutionalised marketing system will eventually kill the profession. He says that unlike in the North-Eastern States such as Assam and Tripura where the government is taking initiatives in promoting the profession and helping them develop the art, the authorities in the region are hardly concerned.
However, the recent announcements of several governments in the country to ban plastic may be a hope for survival. “We wish the Andhra Pradesh government also bans plastic so that people switch to eco-friendly options again,” says Lakshmi.