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India has its own rich heritage of rural artisans with their
traditional skills and ethnic creativity. These are unique in
styles, design and craftsmanship. These handicrafts bear its
distinct marks of the history, culture, folklore and lifestyle
of their own. The range of Indian handicrafts are quite
mind-boggling.
Sadly enough that the present picture is not so promising. The
artisans are not getting a fair value of their traditional
handicrafts for a number of reasons. The situation compelled the
poor artisans either to stop creating such nice products or
looking for other jobs for their livelihood or they have to fall
in prey to the middlemen. These unscrupulous middlemen are
supplying them raw material and taking the finish products
against a very nominal labour charges. The poor artisans have to
maintain their livelihood for such a meager wages with a great
difficulty. On the other hand these middlemen are selling these
products to corporate houses or to some other exporters with a
high price tag. At times the corporate houses and exporters buy
these goods directly from the individual artisans at a nominal
price and in turn sell these products in domestic or
international market at an astronomical figure. Thus the
middlemen, corporate houses and exporters are reaping the
benefits of the hard labour put by the poor artisans. In this
way the producers are being exploited by the middlemen as well
as by the corporate sector.
Sometime it happens that an artisan makes a nice product by his
own creativity and sell it to the middleman/exporter for a good
price with an expectation of good response from the market. In
case of getting a good response from the customers these
middlemen/exporters procure the goods not from the original one
but from the other artisans with a negotiated lower price for
the plagiarised art work. In this way the developer of the
products is exploited instead of being rewarded.
Sometime it also happens that an individual artisan may directly
contact the corporate sector or exporter for order of their
products. Even if they get orders they hardly execute the order.
In commercial market no organization will pay them advance for
procuring raw materials but three months after the supply of
finished products. It is very difficult to a poor artisan to
procure raw materials due to lack of fund. Bank too is not eager
to help them by providing loans at a reasonable interest rate.
The bankers ask for security against the loan amount which the
poor artisans cannot comply. In this situation they do not have
any option but to ask the local moneylenders for the loan who in
turn charge an exorbitant interest rate.
Many artisans had already switched over to other occupations for
such reasons. The process is still going on. And the scenario is
very grim for the Traditional Indian Handicrafts.
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