If the road to hell is really paved with good intentions, I’ve always believed many of those paving stones would be laid by aid agencies and their well-meaning projects. A couple of years ago in Benares, I met a whole lot of craftsmen who were practically on the road after Oxfam stopped placing orders with them. Thing is, how does a village artisan support himself given the lack of nearby markets and government support, once a lucrative foreign project comes to its inevitable end? It can’t be easy.
Once a while, though, I’ve met people like Mukhtiar Ali Sidhar, Nopa Ram and the redoubtable Kaluji of Bikaner, who’ve shown me how boring easy can be. All three received training from an NGO in Rajasthan in the craft of puppetry and puppet-making (and we aren’t talking about those small wimpy puppets so ubiquitous in fairs and birthday parties, but giant, life-size puppets that need tremendous skill and artistry to manipulate). Some years ago, when the NGO cut back operations, the trio found themselves out of a job. Needless to say, this was a blow. “I didn’t want to go back to cattle-tending, which is what I was doing before I got interested in puppetry,” said Kaluji, “and I wondered what else I could do.” Mukhtiar and Nopa Ram had similar doubts.
“We also feared that puppetry alone was not going to be enough to earn a decent living,” said Mukhtiar, “after all, in the days of multiplexes and DVDs, it does seem a little old fashioned…” They began experimenting with the raw material they used to make puppet heads, essentially paper pulp mixed with ground fenugreek leaves that imparted an earthy green colour to the dried product. “We realised that this mixture can be moulded into shapes other than puppet heads — and began making tiles, planters, penholders and other decorative items,” said Nopa Ram. All these, they embellished with terracotta, white lime mixed with Fevicol (filled into what looked exactly like a cake icing cone) and mirrors.
The results were so interesting, they began flying out of their shelves. Kaluji the erstwhile cattle tender discovered a talent for decorating, while the other two furiously got cracking on moulding the basic tiles and vessels. They formed a group — Maru Kalawant Samiti, based out of Bikaner and slowly became involved in other community projects as well. “Then we realised we needed to expand our market to grow further,” said Mukhtiar. So the trio began travelling to Delhi with their products. “At some point then, we found we could also make nameplates instead of tiles,” said Nopa Ram, “Kaluji started writing not only in Hindi, but in English as well! Today these customised nameplates in olive green, white and red are our hottest selling items!” Mukhtiar discovered a talent for salesmanship, charming customers with his ready repartee.
All three men speak of the deep gratitude that they have towards the NGO which gave them hope for a better life. “It also gave us the opportunity to meet a lot of socially-committed and creative people we won’t have met otherwise,” said Mukhtiar. “We could have done nothing but curse our fate when we found ourselves jobless,” said Nopa Ram, “which we did for a while to be honest. But we eventually realised we were responsible for our own welfare.”
Talking to this trio, I realised that by terminating their jobs, their NGO had, in fact, given them a chance to forge their own future. Sometimes, maybe puppets perform better when they break away from their chains…
