‘Gharats’ or Water Mills in Dharamsala to be revived

Himachal Pradesh Art and Culture

The Rural Development Department is working in Dharamsala block of Kangra district to revive water mills, also known as ‘gharats’ in local parlance.

Many traditional ‘gharats’ in Dharamsala were in a state of decay. Therefore, the administration had decided to revive and preserve this cultural heritage of Kangra district under MGNREGA.

Five water mills — two in Rakkad panchayat and one each in Baghni, Barwala and Dhagwar — have been identified for renovation. An amount of Rs 1 lakh will be spent on each ‘gharat’ under MGNREGA. Directions have been issued that only the outside structure will be renovated, which includes the stone masonry of the wall, roof and the water channel that moves the mill. The inside structure will not be tampered with since it is based on traditional wisdom.

The flour produced using a water mill is full of nutrients as compared to that made through power-run mills. Dharamsala development block is thus trying to conserve these traditional water mills.

To give a good selling platform to flour produced using ‘gharats’, its packaging will be done under the brand name ‘’Namaste Dharamsala’’. The flour will be sold in packets of varying capacity of 1 kg, 2 kg and 5 kg bags.

Abhineet Kartiyan, BDO, Dharamsala, said that the owner of the ‘’gharats’’ would get Rs 1 lakh — Rs 60,000 as labour component and Rs 40,000 as material component — so as to renovate the structure of ‘gharat’.

Now that the work on five ‘gharats’ has started in Dharamsala, more people were coming forward to inquire about the process.

A couple of decades ago, ‘gharats’ in the Dharamsala region were a successful enterprise in terms of earnings for the owners as well as a reliable source for farmers to grind whole wheat kernels. But with the advent of electric mills in the region, the use of ‘gharats’ no longer remained in vogue.

With the availability of surplus water in the region in the form of ‘’kuhls’’ (drains carrying natural water from streams to villages for irrigation), it is easy to run a ‘gharat’ for at least seven or eight months a year with low operational and maintenance costs.

Thus, in order to promote the idea of Atmanirbhar Bharat and generate rural employment, it is a tried and tested resource available which is now being renovated via the Rural Development Department.

What is ‘Gharat’

‘Gharat’ is a water mill. Water in streams coming from mountains is channelled into a water mill, which has fan-like blades. The blades move with kinetic energy generated by flowing water and further move the flour mill. Wheat is put into the mill from top that grinds it into fine flour using the natural force of flowing water.