Qasba Mubarakpur: Lifecycles of Weaving in Colonial United Provinces

Abstract

This paper discusses tradition of weaving in Qasba Mubarakpur of district Azamgarh, especially noted for its compound cotton and silk tussar or pure silk cloth. History of the Mubarakpur shows the rise and fall of indigenous textile products in the colonial Indian economy in relation to the social and political processes. By early twentieth century the products of Mubarakpur changed from Sangi,Galta,Jamdani, and other cotton made products to silk sari only. There was a great change in the area as the graph of making Silk saris soared to greater heights, which received national and international fame with the active involvement of officials and traders of Banaras. The invasion of power-looms in the adjoining regions like Mau, which is gradually reducing the handloom sector in the region changed the forms of production in this region. In spite of all fluctuations a kind of association with the traditional skill and a sense of prestige associated with this continuing association to weaving occupationally and psychologically as well kept Muslim Julaha weavers struck to their traditional skills. A sense of dispossession cannot be just contextualized in the Hindu- Muslim dichotomy. Here one has to observe totality of complexities of colonial economy, including industrialization, modernization and de- industrialization of traditional skills along with changing patterns of cloth consumption and use of raw material to explain the lost opportunities