Newindpress

Mangalore, Jul 21:  Such richness and diversity in skills, scattered within a radius of one kilometer near Beltangady, should have been the envy of other districts and states.

Viveknanda Nagar near Beltangady, 57 kms from city, reverberates with a rhythmic ‘pit, pat’ sound as skilled artistans turn the pottery wheel and flatten earthen pots used primarily to cook delicious curry.

Making earthen pots is the main livelihood of over 90 homes in the colony with 150 houses. The skill still survives as craftsmen had eliminated the role of middlemen from sourcing their raw material to marketing their wares. The market is shrinking and unlike in past, only a few youth evince interest to continue the family tradition of making pots, rues 30-year-old Harish Kulal.

Further down in Nekarapete, a stone’s throw from Vivekananda Nagar, craftsmen here have no peers in making fishing nets. Their finest fishing nets grabbed in local shanty, exchange many hands before reaching customers. While middlemen make merry, artisans spend the meagre money on liquor.

The craftmanship caught in a web of debt and despairness is on a wane. Further up near Dharmasthala, intricate clay models made in 35 houses in Kayarthadka is sure to take your breath away. These models which would lives up any surroundings has a huge potential.

But a huge gap in demand and supply has stiffled growth. Similarly, other indigenous craft technologies like versatile products from cement, dolls of export quality and plates from areca sheath in Sishila despite a lot of promise are wilting primarily due to lack of institutional support.Many promises and lengthy figures on boosting indigenous craft techniques are sadly confined to being a mere lip service.

‘‘An environment to kindle entreprenurship and facilitate growth of an enterprise does not exist,’’ rues Beltangady Small Scale Industrial Association Secretary S D Rai. KCCI fills a void partly The Kanara Chamber of Commerce and Industry (KCCI) working out of its ambit submitted a proposal to ‘Fabindia’, on sourcing indigenous craft items from ‘Kumbodyama’ in Kayarthadka near Dharmasthala. If the proposal gets a green signal, the intricate craft models in clay would adorn in Fabindia’s 66 showrooms on craft traditions in India.