New Delhi: The Tribal Cooperative Marketing Development Federation of India Ltd (TRIFED), under the Ministry of Tribal Affairs, has now decided to collaborate with the Jatin Das Centre for Arts (JDCA) to promote hand-made fans across the country.
The Ministry organized an exhibition here Tuesday to showcase the wide range of tribal hand-made fans (pankhas) made by artistes from different parts of the country and said that steps would be taken to ensure that such products are marketed through the TRIFED-managed outlets across the country.
As per TRIFED, they have collaborated with JDCA to promote these products from all over the country and steps would be taken to showcase and market these products from its 87 retail outlets across the country besides premier e-commerce sites to boost its sales and help the tribal people from tribal-dominated states like Odisha who are engaged in the making these products.
“There are myriad types of hand-made fans in Odisha. While mostly conventional bamboo plants are used for making simple fans, decorative fans are also made by the tribals from the state. This step will help them directly,” Tribal Welfare Minister Jual Oram told Orissa POST.
Noted painter Jatin Das, who is also holding an exhibition of his collection of hand-made fans in the national capital, requested the people to maintain the genuineness of the work of the tribals and gently assist them without intruding much into their lives.
Oram during the event in the national capital advised TRIFED to market the craft through various Tribes India outlets located across the country and also through e-commerce websites like Amazon, Flipkart, Snapdeal, GeM and others. TRIFED already hosts a number of products online.
TRIFED MD Pravir Krishna told this newspaper that there are a number of tribal people who are still engaged in making the fans and expressed happiness over their collaboration with Das to carry forward his works. Das has a collection of 10,000 hand-made fans sourced from different parts of the country.
