JEYPORE: For over a year now, 25-year-old Rukumani Mahanta, a weaver from Mirigan Sahi, keeps looking at her idle loom. Another weaver 30-year-old Chabi Samarath opens his godown daily only to shut it again as the sight of piled-up stock overwhelms him. Both, like many other tribal weavers from the Mirigan community, have been weaving Kotpad handloom for more than a decade only to be facing an existential crisis now, owing to the Covid-induced lockdown. They have appealed to the government to bail them out of the situation.
Compounding the woes of the weavers is the absence of market linkage. Many weavers who have enough stocks piled up are not able to send those for sale. “Each weaver here has products worth lakhs since last year but no way to send them to market. There’s no income and families with dependent members are in acute distress,” sighed Chabi.
The Mirigan community of Kotpad, a small town located around 70 km from Koraput in Odisha, has been weaving the famed Kotpad handloom, known for its exquisite organic dyes and patterns, for decades. The first item to earn the Geographical Indication (GI) tag from Odisha, every year Kotpad handloom products worth over Rs 20 crore make their way to the local and national markets, providing livelihood to around 500 weavers and master weavers.
From collecting raw materials like organic colours, threads and oil till the completion of the product, the community members do it all by themselves. Normally, a junior weaver earns up to Rs 400 daily while a master weaver makes around Rs 800. But soon after the pandemic hit, all the 134 weaving units in the community are lying idle. While some families are sustaining by taking to farming or odd jobs, many others have still not found any work.
President of Kotpad Weavers’ Cooperative Society Prahalad Mohont said most Mirigan weavers are in dire straits. He said the society members have reached out to the district administration many times for help but to no avail. Padma Shri Gobadharna Panika, a master weaver of Kotpad, has also urged the government for immediate support to the weavers.
Koraput Project Director, DRDA Pradeep Kumar Naik has said the administration is planning to support the Mirigan weavers at the earliest. “Plans are afoot to discuss with ORMAS regarding marketing Kotpad handloom products. The administration is also planning to boost infrastructure for the weavers by providing power looms and weaving sheds,” he said.