The black and gold is for my new Bengal Cotton sari and the navy blue and red is for my Ajrakh. I watch as 48-year-old Islam Ahmed kneads and twists, pulls and braids lac into a bangle for me. He sits there resplendent in his pugree and launches into an explanation, as the curious gather around him.
Ahmed is from Jaipur. “When Maharaja Jai Singh built Jaipur, he wanted it to be the cynosure of all eyes. His dream was to make it a cradle of arts and crafts. That is why you have so many schools of art there: block printing, jewellery making...” Ahmed’s ancestors made a part of that dream come true, he says. They made bangles out of lac.
“We get the lac from trees and it costs ₹1,200 a kilo. One kilo makes approximately 40 pairs of bangles,” says Ahmed.
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The colours come from semi-precious stone dust. They are anti-allergic and good for high blood pressure, Ahmed assures me. “We work in a team, six people at a time. We sit facing each other and each one is assigned one specific task. By the end of the day, we make around 200 pairs.”
Like in other crafts, the younger generation is not that enthusiastic about learning bangle making. “There is little money in it. Now, only those children who are not interested in studies learn the craft.”
But this has not dented Ahmed’s own enthusiasm as he gamely explains the process and demonstrates again and again as fresh onlookers gather around him. He has just returned from Budapest where he had a very successful time, he says.
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If you visit the Crafts bazaar, ask Ahmed to show you his paraphernalia. You can mix and match the colours as you like. He made me the black-and-gold one in a leheriya pattern (like the leheriya tie and dye).
How much of art, science and history he incorporates into his work. How wonderful it would be if our text books had real-life stories of such unsung heroes.
(Lac bangles cost ₹150 a pair)