Suhail Bhat
SRINAGAR, Aug 9: For carpet weavers, survival amid COVID-19 pandemic has been difficult as the fractured supply chain and crippled market has dropped their earnings and slipped them into the quagmire of despair.
For these weavers, the work from home is nothing new as most of them are based in their native places creating hand-knotted carpets. The worry, however, has been the drop in sales and demand.
Mohammad Yousuf, a carpet weaver from Srinagar, said he has not sold a single piece in the last one and a half years. He said although he did not stop working and continued to produce the carpets, a slump in demand has badly affected his income.
“The pandemic sounded a death knell to our business as no fresh orders are coming. It is getting difficult for artisans like me to make my ends meet,” he said, adding that in the past maximum production was being witnessed during shutdowns when weavers would spend maximum time at home but things were different this time.
The situation that developed due to the pandemic came down as a double whammy for the carpet weavers as they did not get time to recover from the impact of Aug 5 lockdown. However, they said that this pandemic has hit them more due to the crippling of markets across the world.
“After the 5th August decisions our business got affected for one month and the pieces which we had already sent to the markets outside the Valley were sold. However, this pandemic has crippled the markets of the whole world and there is no demand,” Ghulam Mohammad, a weaver said, adding that Gulf and European countries form a major customer base for Kashmiri carpet dealers and they have suffered huge losses during this pandemic as no export could take place.
President Kashmir Chambers of Commerce and Industries, Sheikh Ashiq, said being the export-oriented industry the carpet industry took the worst hit due to the pandemic. “We did not receive any order. The whole chain got disturbed due to the pandemic,” he said.
He, however, pointed out that the Government did not include the weavers in any financial package. “Post-COVID 19 packages were announced by the Government but weavers were not included,” he said, adding that government should intervene and buy the material from the weavers to save them.
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