Maryamma has tied a strand of korai grass around her head like a bandanna. “I have a headache,” she explains, “This makes me feel better.” Maryamma works on the first floor of Anil Industries in Moolakadai, which makes korai mats. A tiny figure, she is dwarfed by bales of the beige grass stacked around her. The grass is fragrant – the smell is somewhere between that of sugarcane and crushed leaves. She picks a tuft and rubs it on a coarse stone; it drizzles loose strands and short, rough flecks at her feet. “The grass is now clean. I tie bundles of these and send them to the loom in the next room,” she says.
A lone power-loom, which feeds on the long grass and cotton twine, churns out lengths of the mats. They are chopped as per requirement and sent to the ground floor, where B. Muniamma and S. Shanti soften the rough edges by stitching a nylon fabric around them. B. Chandra gives the finishing touches by snipping away the sneaky bits that poke out of the neatly-woven horizontal lines of grass.
“My father has been in the business for over 20 years,” says A. Mahesh Kumar, who manages the unit. The mats they make, some of them bearing elaborate patterns and colourful checks, start their journey in the fields of Thiruvallur. “We cultivate the grass at our patch of land,” he says, adding that Tamil Nadu is the only State in the country that makes korai mats. “Our mats are used even in Delhi and Jammu and Kashmir,” he says. He attributes this to the soil. “The grass is cultivated in places such as Karur, Mayavaram, and Neyveli. Karur’s is the most superior variety — the grass there is smooth and round. It is green when harvested and turns beige once dried in the sun for three days.” The colour of the korai grass varies according to the soil’s quality. “Neyveli’s korai is blackish, owing to the lignite in the soil,” he adds.
Korai mats are part of the wedding trousseau in several communities in Tamil Nadu. And a lot of people buy a new one for festivals such as Pongal. “Fewer people use them these days,” says Mahesh. But even today, several households own the good-old paai that’s tucked away behind a door or under the bed and extracted when there are guests.
During power cuts, people blessed with a terrace that opens out to the stars spread the mats on the sun-baked floor to ruminate over life in the golden glow cast by a candle nearby. Moon-lit dinner (nila soru) at our grandparents’ is never complete without a couple of these mats spread across the terrace. Walk by the beach at night and you can see boys from the nearby settlements sleep blissfully on korai mats. “The mats are good for the body. During summer, they are cool to sleep on; they turn warm in cold weather,” says Mahesh, adding that apart from their traditional usage, interior designers incorporate the mats in their designs. “We customise the mats based on their requirements.” These mats make for beautiful carpets too. Mahesh’s is perhaps the only functioning loom for korai mats in the city. “The others operate at Salem, Madurai, Tirruchi and Tirunelveli,” he explains. “There are about 4,000 such looms in Tamil Nadu.” Despite the craftsmanship involved, a basic korai mat costs just Rs. 250. A customer walks in then and Mahesh’s father, V. Annadurai, unfurls a mat for her to see. We almost gasp at the sheer beauty of the workmanship – a peacock, with its wings spread out is woven across the centre. This mat is nothing short of a work of art.
