MANDAVI: cotton BANDHANIS

Mandavi in Kutch has been a centre for cotton bandhani production, mostly for local use. Women from different communities wore cotton bandhani odhanis and ghaghras, with each community having their own specific designs. But in the early 80s, when I first started interacting with the artisans there, I discovered that there were very few bandhani craftsmen left. The local communities had stopped wearing the bandhanis, and had shifted to using mill produced cotton prints in bright new designs and colours that were flooding the market. These fabrics were cheaper than the locally produced, labour-intensive, tie-dyed textiles. Often, the mill prints were offered in similar designs and colours as the traditional patterns, and in time, the cotton fabrics were replaced by even cheaper synthetic materials.

Over the last 40 years, I have been collaborating with artisans in Mandavi to create fresh new textiles for urban markets. In the mid 90s, I started a mail order business, with Bandhani outfits prominently featured in our catalogues, and these were distributed all around the country. In many ways, the catalogue helped build our brand, BANDHEJ, and popularised cotton bandhani countrywide. Mandavi became identified as the source for the fabrics we used and many merchants from various cities, carrying copies of our catalogue, travelled to Mandavi to place orders.

Bandhani fabrics have continued to retain their charm and today, all the dyers of Mandavi have more work than they can handle, offering regular work to over 10,000 women who are meaningfully employed, tyeing bandhani dot before the fabrics are dyed.

I had chanced upon meeting Ismailbhai Nironawala while walking thru the lanes of Mandavi in the early 1980’s. Since then, I have been collaborating with him to create textiles for my clothing company, BANDHEJ. My association with Ismailbhai’s family continues, his Sons see a value and financial benefit in pursuing this work and through them we work with around 150 women artisans. There is a sense of satisfaction in seeing that our intervention has played a modest role in the revival of the bandhani technique.