A 'Khunn' 'खण' is a blouse piece offered to the Goddess at any temple in Maharashtra and North Karnataka. Guledagudda Khunn is the name of the fabric which is GI tagged. Guledagudda is a town in Karnataka which was first in Badami taluk, but is now the headquarters of Guledagudda taluk of Bagalkot district.
'Khunn' is a unit to measure the fabric.
It is 1/2 mt in length. And a warp of 20 khunn is set on the loom at a time. So, the weaver weaves 10 mts of yardage in one go.
“The structure of a khunn Fabric is like this:
1. Extra Warp: It is usually in viscose with yarn count of about 75/2. Sometimes silk of 16/18 denier is also used.
2. Ground Warp: It is usually of silk of 16/18 denier or polyester 80s or 30s count.
3. Border Warp: It is usually of silk of 16/18 denier or polyester 80s or 30s count. Sometimes mercerised cotton of 120s count is also used.
4. Weft: Most of the time it is of cotton of 40s or 60s count.
A lady weaving Khunn
#Motifs used in Khunn fabric
Most of the designs, motifs used are extracted from nature, ancient stone sculptures of Badami and the hindu Mythology. Most popular once are Suranarayana Mukta (Sun God), Siddeswar Mukta (Siddeswara God), Adike( beatel nuts), Theru (Chariot), Ane Hejje (Footsteps of elephants),Tulsi Pan, Sooji Mallige ( Jasmine flower), kamal (lotus), Sewantige, Navalpari (navilgari, feather of a peacock),Kedage gari(Kewada), Deepa (Diya, light), Local weed flowers like Kavali huvu (carissa carandas), Putani huvu (coat button plant), Bairi huvu, Kilavar (Clover, Spades), Motichur, Karimani tikkie sara (mangalsutra), Tengingari (coconut palm leaves). These are woven by Devanga and Veerashaiva community.”
(Sushma Shrihari Bhat, 2020)
Clover and Areca nut motif
Clover, Spade and Kedagegari (Kevada) motif
Siddeshwara Mukta motif
#Weavers of Khunn fabric
None of the weavers knows when the Khunn style of weaving came to Guledagudda and its neighbouring Illkal town. According to a research paper Khana: The blouse material of north Karnataka, published in 2017, the style is believed to have come into being around 8th century A.D.
From then to about two decades ago, it was only hand-woven as a saree blouse material. Rural women and farm hands in northern Karnataka, southern Maharashtra and some parts of Madhya Pradesh used the fabric to stitch blouses.
Though most of Khunn fabric business is powerloom oriented, there still are few weavers like the Mallagi brothers .. Siddharamappa and Jagannatha. Except the younger generation, their entire family is involved in weaving handloom Khunn fabric. They use only pure silk and cotton threads and azzo free dyes. It increases the cost of the fabric.
The मारवाडी community of Guledagudda is doing business there for almost 100 years. They speak the local language, kannada, and of course मारवाडी and हिंदी.
Sampath Rathi, one of the partners of M/s S.K. Rathi and sons mentions in his interview to Priya Krishnan Das that his grandfather migrated to the town of Guledagudda in 1924 from Rajasthan and made his home since then. Their family is the sole distributor of wholesale Khunn fabrics in India. They have hundreds of weavers who buy yarn from them and give them the Khunn fabric back. Their cotton yarn comes from Hindupur in Andhra Pradesh, silk yarn from Bangalore and artificial silk from Gujarat.
(Pic.Courtesy: Priya Krishnan Das..Riding-a-rainbow.blogspot.com)
PraShant Daga
at Ilkal is yet another dealer in Khunn fabric. A person true to his profession, he has complete clarity in mind, guiding the customer to an educated decision.#Market loss
Just as the other hand-woven fabric in the country lost markets, Khunn also faced challenges of escalating production cost and a shortfall in demand. Many set up power looms to increase production and cut cost by using less labor and turning to cheaper yarns like viscose and polyester.
Guledagudda has 200 power looms at present, and only about 50 pit looms or hand looms. With the use of cheaper raw materials and the ability to weave faster, power looms present a stiff competition to the pit loom weavers.
While many fashion designers worked with handloom fabrics such as Chanderi, Jamdani, Ikkat, Benarasi and Kanjeevaram, Khunn did not find any patrons in the fashion world. The reason could be the width of the fabric being only 32”, meant as it was, for making saree blouses.
Though there were efforts and consultations with NGOs and designers earlier, the attempts to give a boost to khunn weaving started in 2018. “If these changes and awareness had started a decade ago, we wouldn’t have lost our artisans to cities’’(Siddaramappa Mallagi, With Urban Patronage, Khun Weavers Hope For a Better Market, 2018).
Earlier, the weavers sold the fabric for Rs 300/m. They sell the new wider fabric for Rs 400 to 450/m. The weavers weave 15 to 20 meters per week in one loom, by working for 12 to 14 hours a day. For the designers, they weave 500 to 600 m per assignment, which may be once a year or more depending on the designers’ market.
The designers’ support has started the trend of experimenting with dyeing the yarn with new colors and using only natural silk and cotton yarns. The weavers continue to sell in their regular markets in Pune, Sholapur, Mumbai, Kolhapur, Bengaluru, Dharwad and Hubbali also.
The slow transformation of Khunn as the mainstream fabric was manifested when Maharani Radhikaraje Gaekwad of Vadodara sported a Khunn saree. So the humble khunn used by farmhands has reached the royals. But more planning is needed, to keep the hand-woven Khunn alive.
Bibliography:
1. Facebook Groups. (2020). Facebook.com; Facebook Groups. https://www.facebook.com/groups/381886322213644/permalink/972104326525171
2. With Urban Patronage, Khun Weavers Hope For a Better Market. (2018). The Wire. https://thewire.in/.../with-urban-patronage-khun-weavers...
3. Priya Krishnan Das. (2020, November 17). In Search of the Weavers of Khun. Blogspot.com. http://riding-a-rainbow.blogspot.com/.../in-search-of...
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