5 months ago
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For generations, several families at Pudupalayam in Tiruchengode have relied on Gandhi Ashram for their livelihood. Located in the middle of the village in Namakkal district and founded by C. Rajagopalachari in February 1925, the ashram stands as a symbol of peace and serenity.
This place is associated with great Indian leaders of the time, including Gandhiji, who visited it twice (in 1925 and 1936); Jawaharlal Nehru; Rajendra Prasad; Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel; and K. Kamaraj. Visitors see rare photographs of leaders and events of historical significance; a collection of classic novels and biographies; the room where Gandhiji stayed for two days; and the khadi production units.
In the 1900s, Rajaji started legal practice at the Salem court after getting his law degree from the Presidency College in Madras. During this time, Ratnasabhapati Gounder, a small zamindar, donated him a four-acre land for winning him a case. Here, Rajaji established the Gandhi Ashram, the core centre of his rural reconstruction programme. It was inaugurated by his close friend ‘Periyar’ E.V. Ramasamy, who was then in the Congress and later founded the Dravidar Kazhagam.
A parched land
Former West Bengal Governor Gopalkrishna Gandhi, in an article ‘The Tiruchengode CR’ published in The Hindu in December 2011, noted that his maternal grandfather opened the ashram on a challenging part of the rocky and rain-parched (composite) Salem district. Pudupalayam then had no more than 150 dwellings, belonging to weavers, farming Gounders, and “untouchable” groups. “Christening the new settlement ‘Gandhi Ashram’, he gave himself as his goal the promotion of Khadi, countering “untouchability” in the region, and weaning men away from drunkenness — tasks that were rather more difficult than making speeches against the Raj,” wrote Mr. Gandhi. He recounted that Kasturba Gandhi visited the ashram and was delighted to see Tiruchengodu women spinning good quality khadi. “When CR [Rajaji] was showing her round the dyeing unit, she asked him in her ‘working’ English: ‘Rajaji, this colour go?’ CR replied, ‘No Ba, this no-go colour’,” Mr. Gandhi reminisced. The ashram also had the mission to uproot women subjugation that was rampant then. Rajaji lived in a small room for 10 years along with his younger son and daughter. He introduced ‘Charkha’ to provide employment to the villagers, helping them lead a dignified life.
The ashram is now under the Khadi and Village Industries Commission (KVIC), a Central government organisation. The KVIC provides financial support, in addition to raw material and research and development support. Today, a variety of products are made by the ashram, such as khadi hand-loom products, neem oil, neem oil cake powder, pillows and mattresses, organic soap, shampoo, files, scent, and incense sticks. Each product is unique and distinctive. For instance, the mattresses are made of a special kind of pure cotton called Ilavam Panju, which is brought from Yercaud. Waste cloth, collected from Tiruppur district, is converted into files, which are used at government offices. The ashram provides jobs to over 250 artisans, including spinners and silk and cotton weavers from nearby villages.
Salary based on profit
The salary for the workers and the artisans is determined by the ashram committee based on the profit from the sale of products. The artisans are paid on a daily or weekly basis or once in 15 days, while the staff members are paid anywhere between ₹10,000 and ₹18,000 a month. The ashram is managed and maintained by dedicated families living at Pudupalayam. “I have taken up my father’s position as an ashram committee member. My mother worked here, too. We will continue serving the ashram in every way possible,” says Kuppuswamy, 54. However, in recent times, the number of artisans and staff members has reduced significantly.
Reasons for drop in production
While the demand for khadi products has increased, KVIC associate director Chandra Balu says the production has dropped owing to the shortage of spinners and weavers. “Many cotton-weavers are shifting to silk-weaving as it is more profitable, and some are also switching to other jobs,” he says. He adds that villagers are hesitant to do labour-intensive work, such as weaving or spinning, on a daily basis, as they get paid under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act.
However, the Pudupalayam spinners cite the delay in the supply of good quality roving as the reason. Roving is a type of fibre, which is spun to make yarn used for weaving. “The supply of roving by the KVIC sliver plants is paused for replacement of the old machinery,” says Mr. Balu. He anticipates the work to be completed before the 2024 Lok Sabha election. To keep the production running, the roving is sourced from Madhya Pradesh, which the Pudupalayam spinners say is of poor quality. Hence, a few traditional spinners, predominantly women, have stopped spinning yarn and switched to other jobs to support their families.
“It’s been close to a year since I used the spinning machine. It’s hard to run the family with the earnings of just one person. I am stitching blouses to support my husband,” says Sumathi (name changed), a mother of two, who has been spinning since Class 10. For years, the staff and committee members have been requesting the government to recognise the ashram as a museum. “We have students visiting the ashram for academic purposes. But that is not enough. We need our products to be bought by more people because that’s how we get our salary,” says Mahalakshmi, a worker for 10 years. The committee members feel that this will help the artisans earn better.
