IMPRESSIONS OF A TOUR IN THE PUNJAB – III
J.C. Kumarappa
Glue and Guts
Glue making and gut making are good side industries to tanning. Sialkot consumes a very large quantity of glue and guts. They also prepare these articles. If properly trained, men can teach this work to village tanners. There is no reason why a large number of them should not take to these industries. The processes involved are simple and no elaborate equipment is needed. The Ashram at Shahdara has made a good start in glue making. It should go forward and train many others to carry on this industry.
Gold lace work
Men and women of shoe makers, families embroider the uppers of slippers most beautifully. This forms a very good industry, especially for women. They can earn about 5 to 6 annas per day.
Cutlery
At Sialkot, Wazirabad, and other places excellent cutlery is being made out of old rails, discarded band saws, worn out files etc. Even fine surgical instruments are being manufactured in the cottages. The skill is there and it requires only to be helped. In one cottage we found the artisan was stamping “Best Sheffield make” on his knives. It may be true the old steel was Sheffield-made, but the finish of the articles itself was so good that the casual buyer would not have noticed that it was handmade. The artisan was quite innocent of what he was doing as he was given that stamp by a merchant who was marketing the goods. The artisan was illiterate and was under the impression that the stamp was the name of the merchant.
Locks
Dozens of German and Japanese locks can be seen in most village hardware shops, while many artisans can and do prepare beautiful brass and iron locks which ought to be popularised. The blacksmiths do quite good work. I have seen them casting the basins of oil engines, water pumps etc. They make tools and agricultural implements, the iron wheels of bullock chakkis and Persian wheels and other articles of everyday use. There is no lack of precision or skill. The raw materials they use are largely broken cast-iron wares.
Soap
Formerly most villages of the Punjab had their own cleaning agent. Kangra valley has a large number of Retha nut trees. About 40,000 maunds of these nuts are exported annually from that district. These are good for washing woollens
and silks. Several villagers were preparing soap formerly from sajimatti. The saji is prepared in most desert areas from the saji or luna plant. This green plant is roasted in a pit covered over with lime and sand. The residue, a coke like substance, is the sajimatti sold in the bazaars.
At present most of these soap makers have turned to caustic soda which is easily available in a convenient form. Effort should be made to encourage the use of sajimatti and ghani oil in the place of mill oil used now.
(Gram Udyog Patrika, November 1939)