Srinagar: The stories of workmanship were a highlight of the eighth edition of Srinagar Craft Safari held at Amda Kadal area of Srinagar downtown on Saturday.
A team of officers from the Handicrafts and Handloom Department besides academicians, scholars, tour operators, students, and players from other fields tread their way through the narrow alleyways of Amda Kadal.
Stories of workmanship followed the onlookers in the lanes of Amda Kadal and each artisan proved to be a storehouse of generations’ worth of craft heritage.
The craft safari commenced while appreciating the hard work of Ghulam Rasool Khan who has been conferred the Padma Shri award in addition to many other honours at the state and national levels. “His enthusiasm, patience, and knowledge of the colours and designs enabled him to bring out the extraordinary work into his Jamavars. The prime attraction amongst his artistic creations is a matchless Jamavar shawl made up using 360 individual Jamwar cutouts of different colours and shades to give it a pattern,” an official statement said.
It said that the team next stopped at Muhammad Shafi Tinda’s workshop of carpet weaving which has a history of carpet weaving for the past 200 years.
“Next on today’s safari was the artisan Zamrooda Ali who is a master artisan from Badamwari, Hawal. Zamrooda has been actively involved in the craft and has been operating a training centre out of her home. The team also visited the house of Kulsuma who has learned how to spin from her mother and has been doing it for a long time, despite having access to a variety of easy options to work with the equipment, she still prefers the traditional hand-woven technique of weaving a piece of Pashmina which sums up her story of hard labour and determination,” the statement said.
In the workplace of Riyaz Ahmad Khan, the team witnessed the most exquisite engraved copper utensils like bowls, samovars, and Tash-Naers.
Belonging to a family associated with the craft for the past 120 years, Mushtaq Ahmad Khan who has been an accomplished weaver and designer of Kani Shawls was the last attraction for the safari.