01-06 May 2015
Organized by 4c5m studio, World Heritage Institue of Training and Research for Asia and Pacific region, city university of Hng Kong and Macau University.
Hong Kong, and Macau
Presented by : Kirti Pandey
The study was conducted in Banaras district of Uttar Pradesh. The sample comprised 100 weavers from different mohallas of Banaras city.
In general, weaving involved all communities but share of Muslims were high. In early days weaving was monopolized by the Hindus (Khatri Hindus, a sub-caste), who helped the migrant Muslim weavers to establish their craft. At a present mainly Muslims (73%) are involved in hand weaving which is inherited in the religion compared to Hindus
People of Different community, profession, and culture are living together in harmony. There is cluster of weaver hub, varying in their specialist field. Most of the weavers are following their ancestor’s tradition. On a generalization most of the weavers are high school pass or graduated. This area has all type of infrastructural support. Houses are generally 60 -80 yrs old as all are traditional professionals. The typical resdience layout is shown below.
Some inferences from their life style are
- Cut out for ventilation and lightning
- the most lighted room is working area.
- Light and moisture are important factors of consideration.
- Most of the weavers are from Muslim community.
- Poor socioeconomic conditions.
- Literacy rate among the weavers community is quite encouraging.
- Business size depends upon area available for working area.
- The most common problems faced by the weaver’s community were inadequate and interrupted supply of electricity (96%), and promotion of silk saree (94%).
- In addition, problems related to production were shortage of raw materials, hike in price of raw material, price instability and transportation.
