Visiting Ettayapuram

We recently visited Ettayapuram to know the needs of the village. My travelogue that appeared in Valaippoo Magazine (a Tamil Blogzine) is here. Here is the travelogue of Sanjeeth .

Hai mitrans,
At last we(Sundar, Santhosh and Myself) made the visit to Ettayapuram. And to those of you who were in the dilemma whether to join us or not and in the end decided not to,you guys missed "something". There were quite a few things to learn,see,experience and think about. We talked to a few people- Sundar's grandfather who had been and continues to be a great reformer in the place, Sundar's father who gave us quite a few inputs about the possible ventures we can make and insights into the government support for such ventures, and to a few localites from the place, predominantly weavers.

Greenery is the last thing that one can attribute to Ettayapuram. And even if you did attribute it would be because of those thorny bushes that most of you would have seen in vacant plots in the the cities you live. (They seem to be a amazing species. They seem to thrive anywhere) . The place is very dry . The soil looks brownish black. Water scarcity prevails here too because of the consistent failure of rains. Agriculture has reached a standstill. Reviving Agriculutre would really require a huge effort. We would have to look at crops that thrive in dry areas, check if there is a demand for such crops and where we can market these? Santhosh had brought information about a flower called "Palmarosa" which is said to grow in such dry areas and is beleived to have a huge market in the Scandinavian countries. But a barrier is the huge initial investment that needs to be made-nearly 15 Lakhs. In fact Santhosh had taken an effort to get more information . He had mailed "The Hindu" which had a forum for this and got the following response. We need to follow up on this and also appreciate Santhosh's efforts on this front.

Getting back to the trip to Ettayapuram, The predominant entity that you will find is the hand loom. You can find atleast one loom in every 3 homes. We had a really close look at the process and its really a "tiring" one. Playing around 5 sets of tennis would be much easier. Just because I said there are hand looms almost everywhere, dont get on with the impression that its booming. The primary production are dhotis and plain cotton sarees. Currnetly, NIFT(National Technology for Fashion Technology) is training them on how to add designs in Sarees. But while they provide training on this,marketing and sales are left to the weavers and the co-operative society. But still there is a problem with the production of "design sarees".The loom used has a few add -ons to it. These are simple add-ons that are made to the top of the looms (these are called frame looms). The additional height means that this wont fit inside most of the houses in Ettayapuram. The roofs are pretty low.


There are also a couple of powerlooms (or is it just one? Sundar correct me if Iam wrong with my data). Power looms is a sheer engineering(mechanical) marvel. The speed at which they "produce" is amazing and it is impossible for hand(looms)s to compete with these in terms of production. (But not everyone can invest on a power loom because of the cost factor).Here it needs creative and quality products to keep the competition alive. Though it may look like Iam painting a pretty gloomy picture, I can tell you it is not that gloomy. The primary problem with weaving is a lack of market for these weavers. This is a problem that can be tackled easily , if a creative approach is followed. It is here that the educated faction can contribute. An ingenious approach or a "cracker of an idea" can turn around things and revive an entire industry. To be specific, we can help here by "mining" out a market for them. The current scheme, by itself seems to be a bit "funny". The weavers hand over the production to their customers which is primarily the "Co-optex". The weavers get their "pay" only when the Co-optex succeeds in selling of these products.

Another alternative would be bio-fuel. This can be the conventional production from cow-dung or animal wastes or the growth of some specific crops which serve this purpose. The Government is also aiding a lot in training and providing subsidies.

I thought the trip would bring before us a daunting task in hand, but strangely the visit has made us very optimistic. It impressed on us the point that people like us can help in a great way by showing them the right directions. The primary difference betwen people there and us is we have access to information. If we can help them with infomation,providing necessary pointers and giving the initial thrust social changes will happen like "magic"!

We had a discussion among ourselves and I also talked to Vinodh and my parents. I felt Vinodh has a really strong idea. But let me wait for your views and ideas. And then let Vinodh himself elaborate on his idea. Mm.. we too (myself, sundar and Santhosh) have ideas. But let me hold them back a bit!

Sanjeeth