When the Ram Mandir Prāna Pratishtha took place in January this year, a weaver from Dharmavaram, a humble handloom village in Andhra Pradesh, sparked intrigue as he presented a charming silk sari with stories from Ramayana weaved into the cloth. Known as the silk city of the State, Dharmavaram’s reputation is held fast by its infamous weavers and their age-old tradition of weaving silk saris. Stepping into the village today, however, one may find that the saris there tell different tales, in which the threads of the handloom weaving community are unravelling under the reign of the power loom.
Drawing on this struggle, filmmaker Santhosh Ram Mavuri makes a case for the continuance of the craft despite all odds in his short film, ‘Weave of Culture’. Recently, in a report by TINE, weavers from Dharmavaram opined that with the emerging power loom industry, sticking to the traditional ways of weaving and conserving the skills for the next generation might be a curse to them. A similar sentiment echoes in weaving communities across the country, agrees Santhosh Ram.
Take Kanchipuram, another handloom village in Tamil Nadu, where the filmmaker was first struck with inspiration for Weave of Culture. “The weavers there said that they didn’t want to pass on their craft to the next generation, as their children should do a software job where they can earn Rs 30,000 or Rs 40,000 a month. I was pretty disturbed by that”, he said.
“It was later in LA, when I saw a Sri Kala b.
