Kullu - The End of the Habitable World

Thoughts on handmade textiles in the Kullu Valley, fakery, and changing patterns of tourism.

I originally found myself in the Kullu Valley through work, twenty-five years ago. I lived in a company house south of Manali. Manali has been an important historical trading point on the route out of the Tibetan plateau down to the plains of the Punjab in India, and now is a hub for domestic tourism and the trekking industry locally. It sits on the River Beas, which rushes past at an unseemly speed to join the Sutlej River in the Punjab. It is a beautiful place, with apple orchards and villages with old slate roofs and gorgeous brown and tan Himachali Gaddi, the local sheepdogs.

From my office window I often saw large herds of sheep being moved to higher pastures, led by nomadic communities called Gujjars. At this point I hadn’t made the connection between the trading routes of the Western Himalayas, the relationship between pastoral communities, Himalayan textile identities and raw materials on the hoof, but over time I have come to appreciate these woven connections and value their existence in an increasingly modern world. And to fall in love with my brown shawl, bought from Kinnauri Weavers and my good friend SitaRam, made from a chocolate yak-wool blend with fabulous red and orange Kullu stripes woven into the borders.

The Geography
Himachal Pradesh is located in the northernmost part of India, the Western Himalayan geography ranging from hilly to mountainous regions and altitudes ranging from 350 to nearly 7,000 meters above sea level. To the northwest is Kashmir, to the south is Uttar Pradesh, and Punjab lies to the southwest. Himachal Pradesh forms India's eastern border with Tibet and Nepal. Locals speak Pahari, and have a strong textiles tradition where historically, most homes have had either a pit loom or more recently a frame loom to make shawls of different sizes to ward off the winter cold.

Kullu is an ancient Rajput kingdom in Himachal Pradesh and gives its name to the valley of the Beas River which rises in the Rohtang Pass. The original name of the Kullu Valley was Kulanthapitha meaning ‘the end of the habitable world’ — as anyone who has stood at the top of the Rohtang Pass, bounding Kullu and Lahul, will understand. The mountains rise and the terrain becomes less hospitable.

The textiles tradition of this region absolutely comes out of cold mountain winters, and the wool road that linked China, Central Asia, and Tibet to the plains of the Punjab.

This route, originally just a donkey road as described by Penelope Chetwood in her 1972 travel book ‘Kulu’, wound its way through the valleys of Kullu and Kinnaur. This traditional route was the original Hindustan-Tibet road which eventually has become one of the main road from the plains into Ladakh, and onto what is now the Indo-Chinese border. From Leh, early trading routes went up into the high mountain passes, eventually finding their way to Tashkent and Samarkand, trading posts on the Silk Route. The Wool Route is perhaps less glamorous and more local.

The widening of the road boosted trade and access. As wool (and pashmina, see other blogs on this) traded its way south to the plains, those using the wool locally for weaving were able to trade it onwards. Cultural and religious influences found their way into these textile expressions of the Himalayan visual narrative.

Two groups of artisan weavers previously only loosely connected by the porous trade routes of the region in the lower Himalayas were those regions of Buddhist Kinnaur, and Kullu. As Patterson-Copley (2002) put it: “Their strategic location on these routes caused their weaving to be greatly influenced by the ancient trade and traffic along it. Their weaving traditions have a long and intertwined history and their shawls are quite famous throughout India; however, their distinct and skillful weaving is nearly unknown to the outside world”.

This is one of the reasons we’re visiting the region, to explore these textile traditions and understand the historical trading connections through the Western Himalayas. As responsible, sensitive tourists, we have a unique opportunity to support the handloom communities through workshops and through buying these remarkable textiles.

Patterson-Copley notes that there is an interrelated history of Kinnauri and Kulluvi weaving, and that
weaving may have been practiced in the region for at least 5,000 years. There are motifs used in Kinnauri weaving that point to as far north as Tashkent, influenced by China and Tibet along the way. One of the motifs is the diwar-e-chine, which translates as the Great Wall of China. Kinnauri styles of weaving and decoration bled into those of Kullu, as a result of religious and political persecution causing the re-location of Kinnauri weavers into the Kullu valley in the 1830s. (See following Dispatch on the design lexicon of the Western Himalayas).

It took almost a hundred years for the simple weaving of Kullu shawls (in plaids and herringbone) to start to reflect these changes, and these mostly borrowed the colours and patterns found on the Kinnauri textiles. Designs include intricate geometric patterns, along with religious iconography that has roots in the design and technique found in Tibet and Central Asia. The basic weave for the shawl is twill, including basic, pointed, herringbone and basket weaves. The finer and heavier the design, the wealthier and better the boys background is, and shawls are used to judge the family’s wealth.

In various sources online (including www.gaatha.org) it is reported that the Kinnauris are deeply upset about the cultural theft that has gone on and maintain that the Kullu shawl being a diluted and appropriated Kinnauri design. They feel the theft happened a hundred years ago and the Kinnauris feel the Kullu designs are disrespectful of their beliefs and traditions. The Kinnauris Shawl is now also GI tagged.

Local weavers simplified and enlarged these designs, eventually developing their own graphic designs specific to Kullu.

I’d like to think that we can appreciate a Himachali shawl as more than just handloomed wool. Woven into the warp and weft are the biotic and abiotic components of the environment. From sheep, to Himalayan river water, to trading and trans-Himalayan culture, spinning, cleaning and carding, the woven wool turns into a shawl made by a local Pahari artisan. This is a textile totally connected to its environment and its people. These shawls represent a valuable commitment to supporting local and authentic products.

Despite the alleged cultural theft from Kinnauris, the unique styles and motifs of these Kullu shawls have become a regional woven fingerprint. In an attempt to protect the market from machine-woven knock-offs, and the regional identity of Kullu shawls, (and specifically their weaving community), there has been a government-led geographical identifier scheme or GI tagging. In the same way champagne is only made in Champagne, France, Kullu shawls purchased through registered outlets or from registered weavers are the only original Kullu handmade textiles.

This is a subject I return to.

If domestic tourism in India cares little for real shawls, this is led by price alone. Fake Ludhiana power-milled shawls currently flood the market and are killing the handloom trade. The value of GI Kullu Shawls as a financial sector is down. Over the past ten years it has dropped from 20 crores IRS or approximately 2 million pounds sterling to 1 crore IRS, or about an hundred thousand pounds, according to the head of the Bhuttico Weaving Cooperative. As domestic tourism has grown in the Kullu Valley over the past twenty years, there may be an exact correlation with the declining value of the handloom market in the region. Looking at the numbers - If a shawl averages at £50, and if a weaver makes 26 a year (as an average), the 1400 weavers in HP bring in 1.82 million annually. The numbers of weavers have remained roughly stable over the last decade, where overall the wool weaving industry has grown but commercialisation has caused an overall decline in quality. The tourist numbers read as follows: a 300,000 or so drop between 2008 and 2023 in foreign tourists, and a 6.5 million increase in domestic tourists.

If there are those who say international tourism has negative impacts, there is this as an argument:
Foreign tourists pay to come and explore India. They bring in foreign exchange and employment on the back of the wider tourism industry. Foreign tourists by extension often wish to take home a reminder of their experiences. This (to an educated eye) might be an authentic, GI-tagged Kullu shawl. They are often happy to pay the appropriate price for an handmade shawl that is providing local employment, income, and supporting the continuity of India’s textile heritage.

By extension, authenticity is a luxury item. Handmade, GI Kullu shawls are about as authentic as you can get.

The cultural value of these textiles needs explaining to the domestic tourism market, and the Kullu fake shawls shamed.

Responsible tourism has a role in educating and exploring the value of handloom, where tour leaders take guests to meet the makers and understand the process. By understanding why the Kullu shawl is intrinsically special, and buying an authentic textile, international responsible tourists are supporting the handloom industry, and become its ambassadors.

Authenticity is therefore valuable in a range of ways.

Questions that keep me awake at night include how might the Himachal handloom industry work to further its cause? Can government step in and explore copyright infringements? By shaming the cheap product through an advertising campaign? By encouraging hotel associations to provide educational material explaining the value of handmade? These are questions I do not have answers to. But that need to be raised.The current law relating to the Geographical Indication of Goods Act 1999 states that there is a 2 lakh IRS fine or imprisonment up to three years or both. The government have shown their hand in the debate on intellectual property rights over design and economic ownership. This, however, does not appear to have slowed the flood of cheap power loomed shawls that can be churned out in their hundreds, compared to the week it takes a cottage industry to make one.

A short trip around the internet throws up inauthentic shawls being openly described as Kullu-style, made in faux wool, sold (for example) by a company calling itself ‘Handicraft Palace’. The price points range from £45-80, appropriately expensive for a ‘handmade’ item, and the website refers to having ethical morals and sustainable, slow fashion. Instagram reels offer ‘Kullu’ shawls at R/s 585, an impossible cost to compete with. I feel no guilt at screenshots I’ve taken and used here of these cheap fakes. This is a slow fashion bandwagon, in this case totally dishonest, and operators such as these are irresponsible fakers killing the handloom industry.

You need sharp eyes to spot the fakery in the description.

In the markets of Manali, the domestic tourism nerve centre of the Kullu Valley, the fakes are everywhere but the cooperative sales outlets. People do not necessarily understand the time it takes to weave a shawl, or the importance of uncut, handloomed garments that connect us in a generational, unbroken warp of millennia. Or have deep enough pockets to buy an authentic textile.

Suppliers of the original wool are under threat as nomadic communities struggle in the 21st century. Transhumance is now rare, and foreign wool such as merino is finding its way onto the looms of traditional weavers in the region.

I believe there is room for change. Local artisans have a need to keep up with market demands for softer shawls made from angora or merino if they are to survive. In my opinion the need to protect handloomed makers from power loomed cheap shawls pretending to be the real thing is more critical.

There is also a need to keep traditional motifs and natural colours alive in the current weaving space, as a point of historical reference and more than a nod to slow, sustainable techniques. Textiles evolve, this we know. The influence of Kinnaur on the Kullu shawl has demonstrated this clearly.

In a complicated tangle of the weaving technique from handloom to mechanised, the economics of weaving, and the ownership of designs, comes the Kullu design in power loomed shawls. Weaving evolves. The Ludhiana power loom is part of this shawl’s story. Critically, though, it does not have to be the final iteration.

The design and development influences, pre-industrialisation, happened within the context of community weaving within the Himalayan communities, driven by availability of locally grown wool and extremely cold winters. The cracks and fissures in the handmade textile economy have been forced wide open by the acrylic-wool mixes and power looms of the Punjabi mechanised mills.

Domestic tourists come in huge numbers, stay briefly and return home to the plains with a man-made fibre, lightweight, plains-made Kullu shawl. The nights are not anywhere near as cold as in the hills, and their cheap machined shawl is soon put to rest in a tin trunk where even the moths won’t touch it.