Context: Recently, the Khadi and Village Industries Commission (KVIC) distributed 80 electric potter wheels to 80 potter families in Pokhran which has a rich heritage in terracotta products.
Key Points

• The Khadi and Village Industries Commission (KVIC) distributed 80 electric potter wheels to 80 potter families in Pokhran which has a rich heritage in terracotta products.
• Pokhran, in Jaisalmer district of Rajasthan, has over 300 potters’ families that have been engaged with pottery for several decades, but potters had started looking for other avenues due to heavy drudgery in the work and no market support.
• Apart from the electric wheels, the KVIC also distributed 8 blunger machines, used for mixing the clay which can produce 800 kg clay in just 8 hours. Manually it takes 5 days to prepare 800 kg mud for pottery making.
• The 80 potters were also given 15-days’ training to help them come up with exquisite pottery.

About Rajasthan potteries

• Rajasthan is famous for terracotta items. Diverse forms of pottery are made in different regions of Rajasthan.
• Alwar is known for producing paper-thin Kagazi pottery, while Pokhran is renowned for white and red clay articles with geometric designs. Bikaner is home to painted pottery, tinted with lac colours. Jaisalmer is famous for stoneware pottery.
• Rajasthan is also known for its Blue Pottery.
• Turko-Persian in origin, the art of blue pottery is said to have flourished in Jaipur under the 19th century ruler Maharaja Ram Singh II.
• The special feature of blue pottery is that, unlike others, it is made of ground quartz stone and clay is not used at all. The traditionally used colours are blue (extracted from oxide of cobalt), green (from the oxides of copper) and white.
• Some pottery is semi translucent and in addition to the traditional colours, other combinations have now been evolved, such as canary yellow, dark blue and brown.
• The conventional designs are floral or arabesque patterns, sometimes with figures of animals.

About Kumbhar Sashaktikaran Program

• Kumbhar Sashaktikaran Program is an initiative of the Khadi and Village Industries Commission(KVIC) for empowerment of potters community in the remotest of locations in the country.

Target beneficiaries

• The program reaches out to the potters in : U.P., M.P., Maharashtra, J&K, Haryana, Rajasthan, West Bengal, Assam, Gujarat, Tamil Nadu, Odisha, Telangana and Bihar.

Benefits provided

• Training for advanced pottery products
• Latest, new technology pottery equipments like the electric Chaak
• Market linkages and visibility through KVIC exhibitions

Outcomes

Due to the supply of electric chaaks, the potters have reaped the following benefits.

• More production with less hours of work.
• Less noise and better health benefits
• Less power consumption with smooth transition to higher speeds