Eri Silk — The fabric of well-being
In early December 2021, walking down a small hamlet of Rangia district in Assam, I was drawn towards an interesting activity happening in the street. Outside almost every home, I could see older women sitting and spinning a yarn using a traditional drop-spindle. Whenever I was introduced to any of them as a textile designer, they would start demonstrating their spinning skills with even more zeal and enthusiasm and a gummy smile. The last time I had seen yarn being spun using a drop-spindle was by the Rabari sheep herders in Kutch. In Kutch they called it “Takali” and the women hand-spinners of the North East call it “Takuri”.
The off-white-coloured yarn that these women were spinning appeared to be a small bunch of loose fibers. To me it looked like cotton lint from a distance, and the yarn wrapped on the spindle looked like hand-spun cotton. However, when I touched the spun yarn, it had the feel of a soft long staple hand-combed yarn and had a dull luster, unlike cotton. On closer look at the yarn, I got even more confused. It looked and felt closer to SILK.
ENDI, they said.
I asked them “Do you mean Eri Silk?” and they said “No. Endi. Endi.”
The local KVIC field manager who had accompanied us, informed us that eri silk was locally called ENDI in Assam. A week later, during my visit to the Winter Tales festival in Shillong, I met with a group of young local entrepreneurs working on the revival and innovation of eri silk and got to know that eri is called RYNDIA in Meghalaya.
All these are the vernacular terms for castor leaf on which the eri silkworm feeds.
Iba Malai, a young entrepreneur designer of Meghalaya, who exclusively uses white eri and red eri silk for her clothing brand Kiniho, added that “Eri silk is the heritage fabric of Meghalaya and the most sustainable, organic fibre amongst all silks.”
Eri is a conscious fibre
It is rarely known outside the region of Assam and Meghalaya, that the indigenous communities of the region reared the Eri silkworm for its worm which is a part of the high protein traditional diet for the people of this region, and not for the fibre.
An eri farmer usually sells 70%-80% of its yield in the pupae form for consumption as food keeping the eri silk cocoon which is then sold for textile development, and the remaining 15%-30% yield is allowed to fully mature to the moth stage for the next crop. The cocoon left behind by the fully grown eri moth is also then used for textile developments.
Conservationists and purists may call this process non-conscious or not-ethical and probably question the “Ahimsa or Peace” tag given to this particular silk. However, I would differ and call it a “Conscious Fibre” only because it is the indigenous community that rear the eri worm for their staple diet as well as for the fibre which they weave into textiles and they do this by maintaining a balance in the rearing and consuming so that the eri worm and moth strain still continues to exist in the ecosystem.
If we follow the purist’s ideology that every eri cocoon should be reared in a way that it is allowed to mature till the moth stage then the population of the eri moth will increase exponentially which will cause an ecological imbalance and be destructive to the vegetation in the region.
The way of living of the communities is close to nature and dependent on nature.
The native communities in the North East part of our country are close to nature as they are dependent on nature’s bounty and are custodians of indigenous knowledge. The fact that eri silk rearing is carried out by indigenous people, the know-how of its cultivation is local and takes care of the ecology of a region.
Eri is universal
Muga and mulberry silk are the other varieties found in this region but eri silk is most abundantly available and used by the communities across all classes. Muga and mulberry silk are associated with the elite and rich because of the rich lustre and high price for the textiles made from these fibres. Eri silk was also the common fibre used by all in this region at one time to weave their everyday clothing which mainly consists of shawls, stoles or wraps called chaddars or mekhalas.
In the past decade or so, with the emergence of slow and conscious fashion and the quest for moving to sustainable green energy techniques, eri silk is emerging as an indigenous and sustainable silk. It’s beautiful texture, gentle luster, and soft drape is waiting to be explored and experimented by the designers. The locals claim that eri is cool in summers and warm in winter and that makes it a fabric for all seasons.
Eri is pro-women
The hand-spinners and weavers of eri silk across the North East are women.
I was fascinated by these women who were doing hand spinning in the villages I visited in and around Guwahati, Assam and a few in Meghalaya. A sense of relief and pride made me dig deeper to understand the finer nuances of this craft before it is completely lost. Unlike other regions of India, hand spinning with indigenous tools and equipment is continuing as a practice, courtesy women of the Khetria, Boro and Rabha communities and tribes.
The two Khadi institutions of Assam that I visited in Rangia and Nalbari districts, collectively engage close to 500 women hand-spinners. It is a very low paid occupation. My conversation with the spinners revealed that it is only their unconditional love for hand-spinning that makes them want to continue the practice and preserve our heritage.
One of the hand-spinners told me “Hand spinning makes me happy!”
It is a sense of peace and meditative calm that they get by engaging in a hobby that they have kept intact after learning in their childhood.
The women were introduced to the charkha or spinning wheel but they gave that up because it restricted their movement and they were unable to maintain it. Another hand-spinner said “I can take the takuri to my friend’s house and spin with her. I cannot do that with a charkha.”
This process of hand-spinning of eri in this region is just not about productivity, mass-production and income, but more about the well-being of a society which is the true essence of sustainability, consciousness and the economy of well-being.
It has just been two months in the North East of India and I have probably just skimmed the tip of the mountain when it comes to understanding this region. There is a sense of peace that I see in the faces of the women artisans that I have met here which narrates a story of care, love and compassion for all, and it translates into their textile traditions through Eri or Conscious Silk.
credit:
Juhi Pandey, Centre Head, Shillong
