KARACHI, Jan 9: It was heart warming to see that instead of a minister or any other VIP two senior craftswomen - Gulshan Bibi from Haripur and Bismillah Begum from Landhi
- jointly perform the opening of a craft shop which stocks arts and crafts, mainly dresses produced by women from different parts of Pakistan.
The stocks displayed at the outlet, Sungi-Shirkat Gah Craft Shop, situated in the fashion street of Karachi, Zamzama, show that given a fair chance women from economically under-privileged background can compete with the best in the country.
Before the inauguration, at a function held at Shirkatgah's office Gulshan Bibi recalled the difficulties the women in Haripur had to face when the workers from the NGO - Sungi Development Foundation - approached them and persuaded them to make money from the rich embroidery that they had been doing for ages.
They were provided with cloth and thread but the men folk of the town were initially apprehensive about the scheme. "The imam saheb of the mosque preached that we were being taken for a ride by 'women of disreputable characters' who came from outside Haripur.
Instead of clashing with him we introduced the imam to the women, who in turn convinced him to let his wife join us too. That worked. The local zamindars were against us too because they thought our economic empowerment was against their interests. But we were determined to improve our lot and thanks to the Sungi Development Foundation as many as 1,500 women are now benefiting from the project."
Similar thoughts were aired by Kausar Bibi and Bismillah Bibi from Landhi, who are among the many benefiting from the handloom project launched by Shirkat Gah 17 years ago.
"Many of us who were trained by our mothers to operate handlooms had to give it up because of the competition from power looms but women such as Mrs Meher Saeed Khan, who is 'aunty' to everyone, helped us financially to restart making khaddar cloth.
They gave us raw material and bought the finished product from us, so we didn't have to go anywhere. We were happy because there was no middleman and also because we got fair returns for our efforts," said Bismillah Bibi.
These women from Landhi are laying much stress on the education of their daughters. One of them proudly said that her daughter matriculated last year. "Thanks to Shirkat Gah, our family now enjoys the fruit of supplementary income.
With the salaries that our men get, we couldn't educate our children but now we can and we do," said Kausar Bibi. "We are now pursuing with renewed zest the profession of our ancestors, which we had given up at one stage. We are also teaching the craft to some of our young girls," she added.
Ayesha Mir, who gave a brief history of the handloom project of Shirkat Gah, mentioned the names of a number of people who worked indefatigably for the project.
It was heartening to see some elderly men and women watching with pride the hand woven fabric from Landhi, hand embroidery from Balochistan, Jisty embroidery from Hazara and exquisite handcrafted products from Hunza, displayed at the Sungi-Shirkat Gah Craft Shop.
