LAHORE, Jan 20: A book titled The Kashmiri shawl: from jamavar to paisley was launched at Sukh Chain in Gulberg here on Friday evening. In attendance were much of Lahore’s glitterati, writers, columnists and artists, as MNA Sherry Rehman, the co-author of the book, took the audience through a slide show, explaining her subject matter.

Ms Naheed Jafri, the other co-author, could not make it to the launch in the city, but Mr Bipin Shah of the Mapin Publishing Pvt Ltd, India, the publisher of the book, was present. Artist and art educationist Salima Hashmi and writer and columnist Fakir Syed Aijazuddin also spoke on the occasion.

In her presentation Ms Rehman elucidated her personal passion for Kashmiri shawls and lamented the lack of indigenous research done on the traditional craft in the subcontinent. “There are only three authoritative works that were ever done on the subject and they were published from London, Paris and New York,” she revealed. Hence the need for an Indian publishing house and Pakistani authors to get together to appropriate “this very treasure of our own”.

Besides museum pieces found around the world, the book documents the exiting 18-19th century Kashmiri shawls found in possession of private collectors in Karachi, Lahore and Islamabad, as well as traces the origins of the many varieties of these and their European counterparts, the Victorian paisleys, which were inspired by the Kashmir shawl craft. “In our research spanning two years, we were sad to discover the state of decay in which some of these precious shawls are kept in the Lahore Museum, the only museum in the country to have shawls on display,” she regretted. Ms Rehman hoped that the book, a hefty and wonderfully produced research work (as opposed to being just a coffee-table book), complete with reproduced historical illustrations, miniature paintings and photographs of the varying shawl motifs, would help draw the attention of the authorities concerned to the fate of the museum collection in Pakistan. Publisher Bipin Shah, while talking to Dawn, said that at least 250 of the 4,000 first-edition copies of the book in English have already been sold in Pakistan. “Encouraged by the initial response in both India and here, we plan to bring out other language-editions of the book as well.” Collaboration between India and Pakistan in the form of collecting and documenting a common cultural heritage is another unique, but very doable, feature brought to the fore by this book. Priced at US $95 worldwide, The Kashmiri shawl is available with Vanguard Books throughout the country at a special price of Rs3,500. — Murtaza Razvi