Is it only two years since we first heard about Kothuru Ikkat weavers’ plight through the TOI article ‘Kothuru’s weavers barely make a living but their fabric is to die for’ dated 8th January 2023. Later in the month, was when we at CCAP committed ourselves to the weavers of Kothuru that we would stand by them to build a brand and take their unique fabric globally. Well there’s more to this story than what merely makes headlines…
Rarely did an opportunity come our way in the past ten years of the formation of CCAP, but Kothuru was an exception. This little village in Palnadu district has a cluster of skilled tie and dye weavers and dyers who got isolated and left to outsource to the larger clusters after bifurcation of Andhra Pradesh. It was during this time that CCAP reached out, bound by our founder’s ideology to revive, restore, market and support local weaves.
Our first visit to Kothuru village was to meet the weavers, dyers and artisans and see for ourselves their products, work/living conditions and understand their concerns. They came across as a group of people with an open minded attitude, eager to know more and a bit of vulnerability that was so endearing and look what we found… exquisite workmanship
No dearth of skills..
Weavers of Kothuru are the first generation skilled artisans who worked with khadi and later shifted to ikkat 30 years ago. Much later they preferred to work with dupion silk and pure silk.. They have remained as a small group for quite some time, outsourcing to Puttapaka, Koyalgudem and Pochampally. In spite of the hardships they never compromised on the quality of their product. A resident journalist Shri Ponna Krishna Murthy garu, a journalist who described their unique fabric with an eye-catching caption, drove the conscience of ngos such as ours to go and explore.
The newspaper article got us curious and our initial visits were about enquiry and exploration of weaves and craft. As CCAP members, we used to frequent Weaver’s Service Center often and Late Shri Ravindra, Director, suggested that we do a health camp in a remote place near Macherla where ikkat weavers got displaced from the mainstream. We fulfilled his wish eventually at Kothuru after our first meeting when we conducted a health camp in the village school. We took with us a team from Vijayawada consisting of eye specialists, orthopedic doctors, general physicians etc., They examined and treated about 200 patients, dispensed
medicines, prescribed glasses, with a follow up for serious ailments.
Health Camp
Team CCAP headed by S Ranjana along with Sowbhagya, Jayasree and resource specialist Mrs. Jagada Rajappa and Shri Satish Poludas of Kora Design held several meetings online and in person with other members to strategize on the way forward. The collective inputs and expertise helped on strategy, training, design, marketing etc.,
Satish took on the role of chalking out a strategy which would adapt to a co-operative society in stages. In a meeting with team ccap, weavers, dyers and family of weavers, Satish sought to find out about their skills, samples of their products, their consent to follow the new system, cooperation of family members, accountability and remuneration. He also proposed not to disturb the current setup for their livelihoods depended on it. He insisted that weavers should own at least one of their products. All felt that the success of the project had to not only be transformational but sustainable, humane and constantly monitored. Having received positive feedback from the artisans about their commitment to change, new designs, remuneration, training and upgrading skills, Satish and ccap followed up by conducting a natural dye workshop by none other than the renowned expert Smt Jagada Rajappa. The workshop was done in two sessions with several weeks of training in small batches. An added advantage was their proximity to Nallamala forest which could be explored for natural dyes in future. They were taken to several clusters to study fine
techniques and dyeing methods.
Sri Satish Nagendar Poludas in conversation with weavers
Smt. Jagada Rajappa training weavers in natural dyes
Learning the graphic way…
Kothuru being an arid region tree plantation was not only discussed in meetings but we also got down to planting saplings around the cluster.
Tree plantation
In Magh Maas of the Hindu calendar the weaver community celebrate Bhavana Rishi Jayanti, who is their kul dev/devata and the first known sage to have woven as per Markanda Purana. Kothuru weavers invited our team for their festival. A common thread among Hindus is reverence to our ancestors. We were happy to join in their celebrations…
Introducing a good co-operative system to this weaver cluster has immense possibilities. It not only gives them dignity of labor, self-reliance in management, designing, marketing, keeping in touch with latest trends but also training the next generation to carry forward their trade and help them find career opportunities within the group wherein craft tourism is
expected to play a big role.
We at ccap also look at our weaver clusters through a different lens – that of craft tourism. To our amazement Kothuru is situated near Macherla-Nagarjunasagar, Hyderabad highway. This is an arid region but in close proximity to a picturesque lush Nallamala forest, Ethipothala falls, (3 km) and Nagarjunasagar dam (9 km) across Krishna river. A reservoir with boat rides to Nagarjunakonda which is a legacy of the Buddhist Era and the remains of a flourishing land during the reign of the Satavahanas can also be seen. For travel enthusiasts it is an ideal weekend spot which is approximately three hour’s drive from
Vijayawada and Hyderabad.
Ethipothala waterfalls
The journey since the first visit upto introducing the brand name in Vasantham was long, exciting, arduous and worth the effort.
Having successfully completed the 1st and 2nd phase of Project Kothuru and the practice session with promising results, we felt that it’s the right time for assessment, brand building and awareness. Slowly and gradually Kothuru products/sarees to begin with, which are unique and simple ikkat on cotton were draped/displayed during our AGM, handloom bazaar, Vasantham, National meet of 2025 and Akruthi Vastra, Telangana 2026. The weaver families also interacted with our members and other weavers of AP. In Vijayawada Vasantham, our chief guest Sri Nara Lokesh, IT Minister of AP inaugurated the brand name and had a first hand look at the sarees and fabrics that were produced and displayed by Kothuru weavers.
Members came up with a unique logo for the brand name ‘Vasantha Varna’ which blends well with our telugu alphabet వ(Va) (Va-santha Va-rna). The products were also showcased at Aakruthi Vastra, the sales platform of CCT in the Natural Dye category. At ‘Kausalyam’ 2026 in Hyderabad, CCAP had their first sales outlet for brand Vasantha Varna which included the names of all those weavers, dyers and family members who worked relentlessly to make it possible. The excitement among the team was palpable as the entire stock was sold out.
Kothuru family at Vasantha Varna Logo launch at Vasantham Vijayawada 2025
CCAP stall at Kausalyam 2026, Hyderabad
…..It’s just the beginning… 🥻..🙏
