Book Review: 'Floor Coverings From Kashmir' Reclaims The Lost Glory Of Handicraft Industry

While the Kashmir region is known for its beauty and is usually associated with the famed Pashmina shawls, there are other crafts that chime with and radiate from Kashmir - floor coverings like Kaleens (carpets), Namdah, Gabba and Ari Rugs and Wagoo mats. These artefacts also form the backbone of Kashmir’s handicraft industry. This appears to be the main thematic concern and message of a brilliantly lucid and well-researched monograph, 'Floor Coverings from Kashmir: Kaleen carpets, Namdah, Gabba and Ari Rugs and Wagoo Mats' by Promil Pande.

Pande’s book, richly woven with historical accounts of the genesis of Kashmir’s handicrafts is also illustrated with poignant and relevant images. This gives her thesis a real feel and the reader a ready reference to see and check out the author’s assertions and analysis. Having anecdotes like that of ‘Lasse Kachru'- a kind of a con artist who had befooled a foreigner into buying a pot that had exotic appeal to the buyer and who had to change this business nomenclature after being found out - Pande’s thesis is not a dry and sterile academic work.

The remarkable achievement of Pande’s thesis is that it not only talks about floor-covering handicrafts of Kashmir but also reclaims these from relative obscurity. While, in both general and relative terms, the Kashmir handicrafts industry and its conditions do not ‘smell of proverbial roses' - for a varied set of reasons, it is the floor coverings of Kashmir that face a great risk of oblivion. Pande’s thesis, in the least, not only reclaims these but brings them out in the public domain in an engaging idiom. The thesis is not just a delineation and typology of the floor covering industry in descriptive terms but also has analytical depth and vigour.

The main point of the thesis is that the different handicrafts from Kashmir, like floor coverings, mostly come from the unique culture of the region: Kashmiriyat, an inclusive politico-cultural and social dynamic. Alluding to the ‘social economy‘ of Kashmir where crafts play an important and indelible role, Pande covered the structure of the crafts, the nature and structure of the artisanal communities involved in these. The larger inference she draws is that the, "material culture of region plays an important role in gaining an understanding of the social and economic forces that influence its creation, giving a cultural perspective of the customs and practices in its making."

This process, in the author’s view, is defined by osmosis where one factor affects and influences the other in a symbiotic manner. This, in turn, determines or more accurately affects the identities of the persons, and communities involved in the handicrafts industry. The broad arguments and analyses delineated by Pande are complemented by detailed nuances – technical, ideational, and practical – involved in the floor-covering handicrafts sector. This is followed by the current state of the ‘industry’ defined as it is by inertia, some degree of malpractice, attrition of artisans from this craft making, lack of awareness by the end consumers, and so on. The author identifies robust branding juxtaposed against awareness of the nature of these crafts and the techniques involved along with modern elements like design thinking to imbue life into these.

However, there is little to quibble with in her thesis. She has done a wonderful job in demystifying a craft that remains obscure in both markets and society nowadays. Her writing style is engaging, accessible, and easy to read. But more could have been done in terms of elucidating the political economy of these crafts of Kashmir and positing a viable and actionable plan for reviving these - both at the policy and the ‘shop floor’ levels. It is here that the lacuna of the author’s work lies. Reviving the floor-coverings from and of Kashmir calls for broad partnerships between the policy-making elite of the region, artisanal communities, and even society. It is this 'stakeholder' approach of involving everyone interested that can help these crafts grow. The author’s thesis, in all, is an excellent one that can and should serve as a predicate for further research and action.