“I NEVER thought I’d live to see the day machines would replace humans,” said Basheer Memon, one of the very few men left in Hala who know the tradition of weaving cloth by hand. “When I started working with my father in the family business, he asked me if I wanted a regular nine-to-five job. I told him, what’s the point? I earn Rs600 a day, why would I want to make that much in a month? This was way back in the ’70s. Now, I wish I had kept my options open. The handweaver’s art is dying.”

I met Mr Memon in his brother’s house in the heart of Hala city. In tiny lanes overflowing with sewage, he was wearing a white shalwar kameez with a thick chador around his shoulders. He seemed distant until I asked him to explain the difference between handwoven cloth and what is available in the market.

“What you get in the market is polyester which is bought from Punjab,” he explained. “If I use a handloom it would take me about a week to 10 days to make 15 metres of cloth but a power loom will make twice that much in less time,” he said. “We make cloth using pure cotton thread. We buy it, dye it and weave it by hand.”

Mr Memon’s particular skill involves a wooden vertical shaft loom with heddles fixed in the shaft to warp thread. A power loom, on the other hand, is a mechanised loom powered by a line shaft and was one of the key developments of the industrial revolution.

“Our family has been in this business since [Shah Abdul Latif] Bhitai was born, nearly three centuries ago,” he said. “At our peak the family business had more than 1,600 handlooms and a workforce of 4,000. People were crazy for susi, garbi and khaddar.” These days Mr Memon has four handlooms and does all the work himself.

As we walked to his workshop a few doors down, Mr Memon mused, “Khaddi khatam ho gai hai [handlooms are finished]. There was a time when everyone in Hala had a handloom. People didn’t work. They made cloth. It was a big seller.”

We entered the small workshop which Mr Memon, who works as a loom fitter these days, set up a few years ago. The wooden structures were covered with cobwebs and squeaked upon being moved.

Mr Memon dusted off a warp machine, explaining that his father had expanded the business and used to export and import cloth too. Pakistan is one of the largest textile exporters in the region. “In 1975, we switched to power looms,” he said. “We didn’t want to but in those days and later, manpower became a real issue.” By 2008, they had to sell the power looms and now, almost a decade later, he wants to revive the family business. To achieve this, Mr Memon said he needs one big order and initial start-up money of Rs200,000.

“The Indian government encourages this tradition,” he said. “We have been asking the government to help us by at least organising a few seminars where we can teach young people the art of handweaving. This would create employment and opportunities.”

The process starts with raw materials being bought from Karachi. “We usually go to Shershah or Boulton Market to buy the raw materials, which cost between Rs40,000 and Rs80,000 depending on the order,” he said. “Then we dye the thread using natural ingredients such as onions and flowers. This can take up to two days. Then we warp it, and so on.”

Mr Memon also designs everything himself. “Susi, garbi andmothara, which is from the khes family, have relatively simple designs,” he explained. “This is why you need one man on the job — he has to weave and design the cloth in one go. It takes about a day to do 15m. People have been able to replicate this, but no one, I promise you, has been able to make this design, cloth or product. It requires a lot of work. You have to work with each colour and thread separately.”

I asked him if his children were interested in helping him, but he said no: “I wanted them to study and do well. One is an engineer and another is studying mathematics at university.”

Had he been approached by people wanting to learn about his art? “Many people have come here to learn,” he told me. “I have had PhD students from Canada and many from local universities as well. They come here for 10-15 days and want to know everything.”

During his childhood, people used to come to the family’s house to buy cloth. “Then one day, they just stopped,” he mused. “People had set up their own mills and stores, and were taking their product to other cities.”

All their lives, Mr Memon and his sibling have worn cloth woven by their father and uncles. It is a symbol of pride for them — donning the fruit of their labour of love. They won’t be so lucky anymore, he fears now. The cloth weaving industry is dying out, and with it their only source of livelihood.

Published in Dawn, February 5th, 2016