Early Times Report
JAMMU, Mar 5: To enable artisans to market their products and also to benefit directly from market feedback for better value realisation of their products, J&K NABARD will be organising five day ''Gramya''- Kala Shilp Mela (Exhibition) here at Kala Kendra from March 12 to 16.
''NABARD will be organising five-day ''Gramya''- Kala Shilp Mela (Exhibition) from March 12 to 16,'' Ms Anamika, Deputy General Manager, National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD) here said. She said that Mela is being organised to promote unique Indian rural handicrafts and handloom items and will showcase variety of items like Katha patched cloth embroidery of West Bengal, Madhubani Painting and Bhagalpuri silk from Bihar, Lacquer studded jewellery from Telengana, organic food items from Himachal Pradesh, Banarsi and Chickenkari embroidery of Uttar Pradesh, Bandhani work of Gujarart, Bamboo craft of Chhattisgarh, Organic Honey and Jute work from Jharkhand.
The DGM added that the timings of the Mela will be 1030 hours to 2100 hours while there will also be food stalls for local cuisine and daily Magic Show by Magician Rakesh Srivastava from Lucknow.
From J&K and Ladakh , the mela will display products like Basholi paintings, Kashmiri embroidery works, Namdha, Crewel, Organic food items of FPOs promoted by NABARD, handmade jute and bamboo products of SHGs, Pickles, apricot oil and Carpets, she added.
Anamika further said that more than 100 artisans from J&K, Ladakh and from across the country will be showcasing their work at the exhibition and added, ''a wide range of handloom items, metal ware, tribal craft, folk paintings, bamboo works will be for display and sale''.
Objective of the 'mela' is to honour the humble artisans and highlight India's diverse cultural heritage, she said and added, ''the artisans will get an opportunity to display and sell their products and in the process will get some bulk orders from traders and shopkeepers of J&K''.
The top officer added that over the past three decades NABARD has worked for promotion for small, cottage and village industries, handloom, handicrafts and other rural crafts and service sector in the rural areas.
NABARD supports and provides marketing platform to rural artisans/ producers to exhibit their traditional art crafts, produce and products through exhibitions and melas which facilitate the artisans to showcase their talents to urban India and also enable them to sell their products directly to the consumer without middlemen, she added.
The increased number of handicraft fairs has been managed to reduce the risk posed and ensured better market exposure for the artisans and these government organised fairs are enabling artisans to directly sell their products and increase their penetration, she said.
Anamika further said that towards this objective, NABARD Jammu and Kashmir Regional Office for the first time will be organising this exhibition at larger scale and added, ''there will be buyer-seller meet where invitations will be extended to shopkeepers and traders so that artisans can interact with them and tie-up arrangements can be made''. |
