LAHORE: Sheherezad Alam, a renowned potter, on Friday held a workshop for children at the literature festival where she taught them how to make pots and also told them the importance of the Indus Valley Civilization, a pioneer in clay products.

Also present was Mohammad Bashir, a potter who hails from Harappa City. The children understood the basic techniques of pot making and clay handling.

“We do not know our history of 5,000 years,” she said. “And although Harappa is only a few hours away from Lahore, children know absolutely nothing about its importance.” She said the Harappan and Mohenjodaro civilisations had great art and people were art-conscious. They were a peaceful society without any fight within for power because there was no hierarchy, and culturally they were strong and advanced.

“History is shredded away to nothing and everything goes away but clay stays,” she said. “I am trying to make people especially children aware of the fact that the Indus Valley is retained within us, these old cities are not just a dead and dry archaeological sites. I tell children about air, water and fire and that we are all made of them: I belong to Harappa and Harappa belongs to me.”

Bashir was helping children build pots out of clay. “We collect this clay from the banks of the Ravi and some other places,” he said. “Sometimes we find yellow clay and sand which we do not use. What is needed is red clay. Then we crush it with sticks, drain it, soak it in water for an hour, drain it again and leave it on top of plastic sheets so it melds together properly and is ready for use.”

He says although the tradition of making clay pots and pans is quite old in this area, today people in general use it more for decoration but in Harappa villages, clay utensils are still used a lot even as plates.

“Other potters make replicas, but we in the Harappa region use ancient techniques which no one else knows of,” he said. He said this work does not pay much. For money he makes other things such as utensils for ‘lassi’, ‘gharas’ for water, and other popular items which sell more.

Published in Dawn, November 29th , 2014