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Urmul Seemant Samiti

"To me, joining the artisan group Urmul Seemant Samiti not only meant the opportunity to better provide for my family. Equally important, it has earned me respect within my community," artisan Paro Bai explains. She was forced to leave her home in Tharparkar, Sind, Pakistan, following the 1971 war. Living the life of a refugee in Barmer for 18 years, Paro Bai maintained the embroidery skills she learned from her mother. When she was resettled in Bajju, she joined the artisan group Urmul Seemant Samiti.

Seemant Samiti is under the patronage of the Urmul Trust, an NGO in northern Rajasthan that focuses on health, education, and welfare in the Kolayat and Bajju areas in the Bikaner region. Many refugees from Pakistan settled in this area after escaping from the 1971 war.

The local settlers brought with them a rich artistic legacy, particularly in the form of elaborate embroideries, but they were earning meager payment for their exquisite work when the organization Seemant Samiti to the task of empowering the refugees to earn a decent living through their exquisite embroideries.

Urmul Seemant Samiti developed specialized training programs to improve the quality of their work. They organized various workshops conducted by designers from India's National Institute of Fashion Technology, the National Institute of Design, and Dastkaar, an NGO training in small business marketing. The Development Commissioner for handicrafts offered further assistance by building the Craft Development Center.

The Trust provide the women with raw materials, which they embroider in a variety of traditional techniques, including the geometric Soof, in which the surface stitch is worked from the back of the fabric by inserting the needle at regular and designated intervals. The finished patterns are normally thick and clustered. The Kharek style is usually done in a black running stitch, resulting in a clustered and bar-like shape, while the Pakko is solid and more geometric. In Pakko, the outline is accomplished with a square chain stitch, but the filling is a dense variation of buttonhole stitch, which gives a raised appearance, frequently including tiny decorative mirrors.

With the further assistance of Rangsutra (another NGO), Urmul Seemant Samiti strives to bridge the gap between artisans and customers, between tradition and contemporary trends, as well as between village and city life. The artisans and producers benefiting from these programs live in the remotest corners of India, far away from airports, railway stations, and even pucca (blacktop) roads.

The program is currently made available in eight villages, with artisans involved in the various decision-making processes concerning the program and their products. These are sold in retail stores and shops in major cities like Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, Chennai, Calcutta, and Hyderabad. The artists have also been invited to participate in exhibitions throughout India and abroad, where they love to meet admirers of their work and are eager to learn from their customers’ opinions.