Belying expectations, the powerloom weavers of Sircilla have woven around 60 lakh ‘Bathukamma sarees’ to be distributed to the women living below poverty line during the Bathukamma festivities in the State this year.
In order to provide regular employment to the powerloom weavers of the textile town, the State government had placed orders for a 97 lakh Bathukamma sarees in May. Initially, the officials could engage around 4,500 powerlooms to produce sarees. Later, it went up to 15,000 powerlooms. The officials could not secure the required powerlooms as they were already engaged with other work.
As the government is planning to distribute Bathukamma sarees to the beneficiaries on September 16 to 18 in the State, the government decided to procure the remaining 37 lakh sarees from Surat in Gujarat and has already placed the orders.
The sarees woven in Sircilla were sent to processing units in Hyderabad and the remaining sarees were being processed in Surat itself.
Talking to The Hindu on Saturday, Assistant Director (Handlooms and Textiles) Ashok Rao said: “We are very happy that the weavers could weave more than 60 lakh sarees adding up to 3.75 crore metres in such a short duration.”
This is the first time the powerloom weavers of Sircilla have secured bulk orders of producing lakhs of sarees and their income had also doubled from ₹ 8,000 per month to ₹ 16,000 and ₹ 20,000 per month, he added.
Weavers return
Incidentally, the powerloom weavers of Sircilla town, who migrated to Bhiwandi in Maharashtra State, have also returned to their native place following the availability of abundant work and good wages on a par with the neighbouring State, the AD Handlooms said adding that the workers were happy to be able to earn a living being close to their families.
With the State government providing them regular bulk orders such as school uniforms, KCR kits and Bathukamma sarees, the powerloom weavers are tuning themselves to work for the government and get good income and meet the requirements of the government accordingly.
Nagabhushanam, a powerloom weaver, said: “this is the first time we could weave sarees on looms,” and hoped that they would achieve the target from next year onwards as they had learned the trade secret now.
