Dastkar’s Nature Bazaar is a wonderful place for spotting interesting handicraft and chatting with craftspeople. This time, I decided to walk around and buy the product that took the maximum time and effort to create. I saw carpets and dhurries, some of which I knew could take as long as several months to make. But having seen the whole fair, the one handicraft that stood out for the time it took to make, was Ajrakh printed cloth.
Its jewel tones of crimson and indigo and gossamer soft texture attracted me first. And when I heard how Ajrakh printing was done, I was hooked. They say that the process of Ajrakh comes intuitively to traditional printers in parts of Gujarat and Rajasthan in India, and Sindh in Pakistan. It involves resist dyeing, in which portions of the textile are pre-treated so that they resist penetration by the dye. Ajrakh literally means ‘aaj ke din rakh’ or ‘keep it for today’ because that is what the process is. At every stage of the tedious dying process, the fabric should dry for three to four days.
First, the textile is steamed in copper vats overnight, then soaked in camel dung, seed oil and water.
This helps bleach the fabric and softens it. The wet cloth is then tied into an airtight bundle and kept for 5-10 days, until it gives off a smell that many liken to mango pickle. After the cloth has dried, it is again soaked in oil, dried, washed and re-soaked in a home-made mixture of dried lemons, molasses, castor oil and water amongst other things. A fortnight goes in just preparing the cloth for printing!
Nature plays an important role in the making of Ajrakh, as printers use the sun, river water, animals, trees and mud in its making. A resist mixture made of rice paste, Acacia gum and lime is used to print the pattern on both sides of the cloth. The areas on the cloth meant to remain white, red and black are covered in a mud resist paste to make them resist indigo, the first dye the cloth is soaked in. Then the cloth is soaked in madder (Rubia Cordifolia) to obtain a rich red tint. At this stage, the cloth is spread out on river banks, and alternately dried and drenched to bleach the white and deepen other colours. Then, the red portions are encrusted with mud and cow dung, and dipped in indigo again. After this, the cloth is dried, washed again, and the Ajrakh is ready to use!
One would imagine that something that takes so long to make, would be reserved for special occasions. Instead, Ajrakh is special because it is one textile craft that is an important element in the everyday life of the printers themselves. Its long process of preparation makes Ajrakh printed cloth incredibly soft against the skin. No wonder then, that in Sindh, newborns are traditionally first swaddled in Ajrakh, and Ajrakh also shrouds their dead. It is used as a turban, shawl, bed-sheet or tablecloth, and when worn out, it’s recycled as a hammock for babies or as a bullock cart cover. Used and reused till threadbare, Ajrakh is worn by the wealthy as well as the poor — the colours and patterns remain the same, only the quality of the fabric differs.
I came away with a green and red stole, a reminder not just of a laborious craft, but also of a parallel universe where people still expend time and effort to create such beautiful works of art — that too for everyday use.