THE CHARKHA
Presenting rich crafts of rural India with a vision
By HASTSHILP
A Society for Handicrafts, Bikaner

Rural textile crafts-hand made fabrics, Handloom, Hand embroidery, Tie & dye, Stitching and Hand knitting expressed in men and women costumes, accessories and decorative home furnishings, symbolizing dignity and elegance for the buyers and self reliance for the producers producing them in their homes in the villages spread across India, once revived and promoted by Mahatma Gandhi.

The story of Charkha


Charkha (spinning wheel) is a very familiar, commonly found thing in every house in India and it says a story which is of the time of pre-industrialization. Charkha had a very important place in Indian culture at that time. It represents the rural culture in which the people had producing power with them. They used to manufacture and distribute the things which are essential for life, in their own houses. For example cloth was one of the basic needs. They would run Charkha in every house for spinning threads by hand and then hand weave cloth by their own. By this way, being a source of employment and self reliance for every one in a village, the Charkha had a central place in rural economy. This was a powerful rural culture with great virtues of brotherhood, love, incredible traditions, sports & playing, lots of free time to spend together, social system of resolving disputes and check on bad behavior & crimes, a system of using natural resources and recycling them. Though having some evils like superstitions and bad rituals this culture was the God facing one, of which India put an example in the world. We lost this culture of God and have become the victim of the industrial culture of devil in which we live today.

“Industrialization is a dire curse which has given few the power to ride the back of many, and there is men’s greed behind it” was invented and said by M.K. Gandhi. For non-violent resistance of industrialization, he introduced the philosophy of Charkha and that’s why his name is permanently associated with it. The Charkha is a symbol of that old rural culture, its philosophy and beautiful handicrafts which are now taking their last breaths in the villages of India.

We are against industrialization and its fast going culture, which is making common man powerless by increasing unemployment, centralization of the power of production by machines, ruining environment, confusing and taking us away from God, and have an alternative of the rural culture to this. The Charkha is an attempt to live, support and revive the rural culture and invite all of you to be the part of this campaign to do the good of our own.


© THECHARKHA 2011-2024