Manish Kumar
Post News Network
Karadagadia (Khurda), May 12: Mohan Nayak, a 35-year-old carpenter from Karadagadia village in Durgapur panchayat of Khurda district, is satisfied to be making ends meet with his newfound profession, and vows never to go back to making paper masks (papier mache), a traditional art that has been the identity of the village for several generations but is now on the verge of extinction.
The village, 44 km from Bhubaneswar and home to more than 300 households who have been making the masks for generations, seems to have given up on the decades-old art form due to dwindling profits.
“Earlier, a large number of people from the village were involved in this work. But now hardly a handful of households from the village are directly involved in the business. Many have already left the traditional art as people have lost hope of the business picking up. Lack of basic support from the government added with our everyday problems in running the business is far too much to handle,” said Dibakar Mahapatra, a 48-year-old craftsman who has been working on paper masks since he was a 10-year-old.
However, Mahapatra said he was not too keen on abandoning his art for a few extra pennies. “I cannot quit my work. I have seen many people leaving it, but the tradition has been running in my village for ages. My family used to happily work on it. I too get ample satisfaction by making masks of gods and goddesses which are often dispatched to cities and are later used in religious jatras and other rituals,” Mahapatra said.
The uniqueness of the art form lies in the skill of developing utilitarian objects with the help of wastepaper and clothes. Nevertheless, it also uses natural substances like tamarind powder and natural adhesives from tree bark which help in making the masks sturdy and durable. In the process, a paste of wastepaper and clothes is mixed with tamarind powder and adhesive and is applied on a clay-made mould to give desired shapes. Earlier, the entire process would be done in the village but locals say it has now become market-based.
“Earlier tamarind powder and natural adhesives were made in the village itself but now we get readymade material at shops at Khurda. We visit these shops in Khurda, around 12 km from the village, to buy it and we then only craft the masks. This business is however not helping us earn enough. We are just able to feed us and our family. People in the village are now ditching it for other profitable fields,” says Reena Mahapatra, another craftsman from the village.
The village meanwhile lacks basic amenities to help existing artists carry out their traditional art form, which has the potential to turn waste around us into useful craft. “We have heard that villages like Raghurajpur and Sadeibereni have received government grants in order to preserve their traditional arts, but we have got nothing. No government officials ever come here. Rarely some journalists like you come to visit us. They talk to us and take our photographs but nothing has changed on the ground level,” says 72-year-old Nishamoni Moharana from the village. There are however a few bright areas. “Roads from the village to Khurda are in a good condition. The 12-km smooth stretch to Khurda helps us buy important commodities required for our daily activities. Moreover, power cuts are not very common here,” says Manasama Mahapatra, a student of Class XII from the village.
The lack of interest on the part of the government is evident from the fact that there are hardly any signboards directing visitors to the art-rich village, no concrete roads in the village, and few avenues for artists to exhibit their talent at art and craft competitions.
Unlike other craft villages, the villagers here have to sell their products on their own as very few people come to give the artists contracts for their work.
The government meanwhile also seems reluctant to lend a helping hand to the struggling artists. Talking to Orissa POST, a deputy-director level officer from the state tourism department said there are no plans to give any grant or any other help to the village. The official however refused to list details for the same.
Travel and tour operators from Orissa however are sceptical about developing the village as a potential site for rural tourism. “Many villages like Raghurajpur, Sadeibereni and others are getting prominence from government because of their proximity to famous tourist sites. Raghurajpur is close to Bhubaneswar, Puri and Konark while Sadeibereni is close to Dhenkanal, Ansupa, Maniabadha, Naraj, Nuapatna and others. In the case of Karadagadia, the nearest tourist place is Atri water spring which is also not very popular among tourists. The government often develops rural tourism sites which have a cluster of tourist attractions nearby,” said a tour operator.
