Category: Fashion

Interviews by Mallika Chandra. Photographs by Naomi Shah.

PARAG TANDEL
Vitamin Sea

Do you think that the festival provides visitors with an opportunity to engage meaningfully with the Koli fishing community and the issues that they face at large?
The festival at Sassoon Docks acts as a site-specific artistic intervention. I create socially engaged art and it’s how you mould people’s minds that is important. The city does not know much about the Kolis, I don’t think urban dwellers are concerned about our ongoing issues; they are busy earning their livelihoods and pursuing their ambitions. This festival is an attempt to redirect attention towards the issues plaguing the community.

What was your relationship with Sassoon Docks like in your growing-up years? And did showcasing your work here bring back any memories?
My mother was in the retail fish business for over 40 years and I used to accompany her to Sassoon Docks to buy fish. I have memories of walking around the area with her and imbibing life lessons of no-escaping-hard-work. Vitamin Sea is about food and sustenance. The Kolis worship marine life. The whale shark, for example, is locally known as Bairi Dev, and it survives on turtles — who we refer to as Kasav Dev — and planktons.

Was the material chosen from a conceptual as well as a stylistic point of view?
Resin is now part of our material culture. Earlier, our boats and large vessels were made out of jackfruit wood, but now most of our fishing vessels are made of FRP (fibre-reinforced polymer) resin which, I think, is an obvious material to use. I like the material’s rooted stillness. My indigenous identity is always reflected in my art practice. The resin I use is a transparent medium — it goes well with my aesthetics and way of seeing.

Can you walk us through your creative process?
I start by drawing. My sketchbooks are not the small A4-sized ones but much larger (7 feet by 5 feet) and mounted on an easel. I keep drawing in them. The exercise involves consistent engagement. Later, this drawing is transformed into a three-dimensional large-scale clay work, for which I use Shadu clay as it is local to Mumbai. I enjoy doing everything myself, I like to work with my hands for that’s what makes us humans. It’s a long process-based work in which the whole body is engaged.

AYAZ BASRAI
The Magic Cube

Your work is motivated by how living in compact spaces might look like in the future….
From our very first conversations with Hanif [Kureshi; co-founder and artistic director of St+art India Foundation] and his team, we started developing the idea of a micro-home fit-out, more as an idea prompt for visitors. The massive potential of a festival like this is that it becomes a marketplace for ideas. We respond, critique, parody and fall in love with our city all over again. Our installation was shrunk down to mirror the flats that we spend our lives in — the concrete boxes that are provided to us by builders to conduct our life, work and play in.

We do a great disservice to our homes when we take them for granted, allowing them to become static backdrops to our lives. Our homes have the potential to make us more aware of our surroundings, create active and vibrant lives and make us more engaged and curious about the world we live in. But only if we allow them to, and if we design them to enable this. Our work at Sassoon Docks was situated in a really lovely old bungalow, perfectly square in plan. We thought it’d be fun to insert a prompt around future living, a hyperfunctional cube that collapses the functionality of an entire home into itself. The idea was to introduce a prototype future home which, ideally, visitors could ponder over, critique, discuss and maybe build — their own versions, at their own homes.

Your work raises questions about the future of compact living spaces. Are you any closer to answering these?
The Magic Cube installation is actually part of a longer iterative set of experiments that we’ve been engaged in since 2006. My first home in Ranwar village in Bandra was also an exercise in hyperfunctionality. I lived for two years in a 160-square-foot “apartment”, with sliding walls and furniture that allowed me to have a walk-in wardrobe, a walk-in library, a full-size desk and also a king-size bed, just by moving a few walls on channels. The act of living in this sort of context, where I had to actively create the spaces I needed on an hourly basis, created a sort of choreography with furniture, and a very active relationship with the home. We then worked on another project titled Folly House that engaged in these inquiries through a 4,000-square-foot space that introduced ideas of craft and hypermobility into the mix. Zameer (my brother and co-founder of The Busride Design Studio) built hyperfunctional pieces into his own apartment in Bandra.

Watching visitors walk around the cube and then discovering different entry points into the space, discovering cat doors and secret cubbyholes, was really fun. And through social media we’re able to relive a bit of each visitor’s experience. I hope that there’s some resonance, and maybe a handful of them went back with ideas they’d like to explore in their own homes. I do believe that hyperfunctionality and intense design detailing exercises will create the sort of homes we’d like to live in, in future cities. Compaction culture affects all of us, irrespective of our demographic. Even the well-heeled in Mumbai live their lives out of concrete boxes, stacked one above the other in an increasingly concretised city, and prompts like these may create small cocoons of hyper-utility in spaces that desperately need hard-working solutions. Our homes must be at least as hard-working as us, if not more. This is not just a Mumbai thing, it’s true across various megalopolises; compaction culture is playing out in increasingly interesting ways. Compaction culture is endemic, and the city is its manifestation.

Were the materials chosen from a conceptual as well as a stylistic point of view?
Through a judicious choice of material, we hoped to create The Magic Cube as a diegetic prototype. A diegetic prototype is a tool used in speculative fiction, an area of design we’re very actively exploring currently. A diegetic prototype is a work in progress and its only role is to provoke dialogue. The idea is to not create a finished product that can be sold or marketed, but rather a rough-around-the edges scaffolding that users can flesh out with their own conceptions of what a home would look like for them individually. We chose to stay away from a finished idea, as well as excessive propping. We created almost the entire structure with a single material, oriented strand board (OSB), for its rough exposed visual texture. This is offset by a bunch of products, fabrics, wallpapers and fittings from Asian Paints, our event sponsor, to complete the trappings of a future home. In going down this road, we were able to build a certain open-endedness to the exploration and stay away from subjective and aesthetically derived responses that tend to take away from the inquiry.

Can you walk us through the process of creating the installation?
Our first step in creating the installation was a site visit with the St+art team, and a sort of free-ranging curatorial chat with Hanif, who is an old friend and long-time collaborator. We were very interested in exploring the idea of a future-home set within an old-home context, to spark the imagination of what life in a city could be like. The Asian Paints Art House also served as one of the event venues for the festival, so we had to keep in mind the basic movements of crowds. A gathering space was created on the ground floor for events, lectures, discussions, product launches and the NFT (non-fungible token) gallery. And Asian Paints also used it to announce the launch of their colour of the year. As we developed the design, we created a bunch of OSB samples exploring treatments and material juxtapositions, to better visualise final outcomes. Saee [Pagar] from our studio spearheaded the entire build and worked closely with Suresh [Vishwakarma] and his team of carpenters to design and execute the entire space. There was a fun interaction with the Asian Paints team as well, to integrate some of their home products into the space, to provide much-needed context and colour to the installation. Being a time-bound, deadline-based build, it was pretty much non-stop work with daily supervision to ensure it all came together on time. The highlight for me was how the finished object blurred the boundary between being a room and an object. It sort of behaved like an object in the Art House context, but a room when you actually engaged with it.

AMRIT PAL SINGH
Toy Faces

How do you think the concept of nostalgia responded to Sassoon Docks, the site of the installation?
Toy Faces is a collection of portraits that are driven by nostalgia and childlike wonder. Toys are objects reminiscent of an extraordinary time when the word “cynical” wasn’t part of our vocabulary. The collection celebrates individuals and characters through history and fictional stories, to remind us of our first sources of inspiration and revisit the feelings that come with experiencing complex worlds for the first time.

Over the last two years, I have created several Toy Faces, playing with signature bear ears, button eyes and Pinocchio noses with several characters and avatars on an open canvas.

In this exhibit, I have extended the Toy Faces NFT to five artists — Atia Sen, Neethi, Osheen Siva, Santanu Hazarika and Zero — taking inspiration from Silver Escapade, the Asian Paints Colour of The Year 2023. The result is a playful collaboration celebrating the spirit of our youth while incorporating various styles and mediums.

This is the first time that NFTs were a part of the Mumbai Urban Art Festival. How do you think the public has responded and engaged with them?
Digital art is one of the most widely used art mediums. NFTs and blockchain have disrupted this medium and allowed it to become tradable. I have received an incredible public response with numerous shares and messages in my social media inbox. By being part of this festival, Toy Faces has shown us the potential of this medium.

What was it like collaborating with the other artists for Toy Faces? Do you see more artists collaborating in the Web3 space in the future?
I agreed to participate in the festival mainly because of its collaborative nature. At first, I was anxious about extending my collection to artists from different mediums but it soon became apparent that this would be one of my best collaborations.

Web3 is an incredibly collaborative space; it’s common to work with fellow artists in Web3 and even collect art from them. Because of less institutional involvement in Web3, artists depend on each other more here than in traditional spaces. Plus, smart contracts and blockchain make the entire collaboration very transparent.

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Related

Text by Ranjabati Das. Photographs by Bhumika Sharma. Styling by Manglien S. Gangte.

In line with our endeavour to spotlight sustainable communities, we trained our lens on Lamka and its ingrained culture of circularity. “For the people of Lamka, living sustainably comes as naturally as breathing. Doing their part for the planet, however, hasn’t exempted them from facing the consequences of climate change,” rues Delhi- and Goa-based photographer Bhumika Sharma, who derived inspiration from the local tradition “of living consciously yet unconsciously”.

In contrast with the visible and invisible effects of urbanisation are the traditional knowledge systems that dovetail with the rich tapestry of colours that form the backdrop of life here. “We wanted to document how the residents of this Manipuri town continue to live among casually kept piles of ghost peppers, corn and fermented rice. How the red soil looks against the fluffy clouds, the sunset over the Tuitha river, the scent of the crisp hilly air. And how, everywhere we went, we found whole households growing herbs and fruits in their yards,” says Sharma.

Taking centre stage in Lamka are the indigenous people, who epitomise the art of coexisting — alongside each other as well as nature. “Here, we are all each other’s keepers. Whenever my mother would prepare a special meal, we would make it a point to share it with our neighbours. And some of my favourite pieces in my wardrobe are the ones passed down by older siblings. We are constantly thinking of how to repurpose: for example, old woollen clothes are deconstructed and rewoven; cushion covers are turned into patchwork shawls or throws by mothers,” says stylist and Lamka local Manglien S. Gangte. “Each tribe has its own language, but communication is never halted because the population is largely multilingual,” adds Sharma.

The personal style of Lamka’s youth reflects the inherent culture of inclusion and ethical consumption that they are born into. “Think borrowed denims with poked holes and trimmed hemlines — an effortless style statement that is indicative of their personal belief systems. Lamka is free-flowing, like Leh Studios, the Delhi-based label featured in the shoot. The clothes from the zero-waste label are very versatile. Leh, which is almost like an extension of the designer Himi’s mind, reflects his raw point of view and clear design language. Deconstructed jeans, fuss-free crop tops, garments for all shapes and sizes,” states Manglien, adding, “The name Lamka was coined by the first inhabitants of the land. It literally translates to ‘many paths’ in the local Zo dialect. For the longest time, the markets of Lamka were filled with clothes from South Asian markets. These were not just discarded after a wear or two and are still passed down to favourite sisters, nieces, nephews and children. Naturally, any garment that has lived many lives and has many stories is of value. This ethical practice of giving clothes new life is sewn into the minds of the people where people value, enjoy, live in and pass on items of clothing.”

Featured in the shoot are Khualboi Thawmte, who is currently studying design at NIFT Mumbai, and Goumalsawm Gangte, an undergraduate student at Churachandpur College in Lamka, both of whom hail from Lamka. Pervading the shoot — “an ode to my roots,” says Manglien — is a sense of nostalgia, which ties the natives — who share a deeply intimate relationship with their land, river and tribe — to Lamka, even after they migrate to bigger cities in search of greener pastures. “It is a homage to the fading memories that flash by in your mind’s eye when you fleetingly recall your childhood in a faraway land and time,” he says. The quality is heightened by the clothing, given that Himi’s vision for Leh — which is rooted in the “think global, act local” philosophy — is also similarly informed by his memories of growing up in Farrukhabad.

In recent times, the term “sustainable” has increasingly been co-opted by brands in an attempt to greenwash their image and sway consumer sentiments informing purchases. “The ever-evolving world of fashion is continuously adopting new trends and the latest hype is about sustainability. It provides brands with a unique value. But although the buzzword may be relatively new, sustainability has been a way of life through the ages in many ancient cultures, as Lamka illustrates,” remarks Sharma.

Travel

Text and Photographs by Vanya Lochan.

We get to feel and that makes us the lucky ones…. So, far from simply existing, we can choose to keep reimagining and evaluating the quality of our existence. Improvement, I believe, is not just about the ease of materially enhancing our lives; it can also be found, as I learnt a few weeks ago on a trip to Six Senses Fort Barwara, by simply acknowledging small things that matter, and reconnecting meaningfully with what’s around us.

Excerpts from my travel diary….

Day 1: Arrival

I look forward to a lively afternoon as I land in Jaipur to a royal welcome by Baboolalji, Six Senses’ ever-so-punctilious concierge. Handling my luggage with ease — as if my overpacking didn’t weigh anything at all — he leads me to the hotel’s black Toyota Vellfire. Just three minutes in the car and I am already soaking in the vanilla and lavender scents of Six Senses. I share my seat with a little jute potli  (packet) containing eco-friendly hand cream, sanitiser and lip balm. Baboolalji offers me a bottle of cold juice and draws my attention to the trail mix placed within the armrest of my seat. As we drive out, I naturally get to a topic that has been on my mind since my trip here was planned: the big Bollywood wedding that had taken place at the resort a year ago. It doesn’t take more than a mere mention to coax him to chat about the starry event.

“Katrina Kaif sat in this car — the same place as you — but another driver was on duty that day. I drove Vicky [Kaushal] Sir and his brother [Sunny Kaushal] though! Vicky greeted me, then listened to his own music through the ride. Would you like to plug in your music?” he asks me.

I choose, rather, to chat about historical anthropology.

As we find ourselves farther from Jaipur (the airport is on the outskirts of the town), the conversation veers to his family and interesting myths from the area. I am regaled with tales of massive forts and serais (resting quarters) in and around Ranthambore, brave Rajasthani kings and Delhi sultans, mysterious goddesses, and queens who committed jauhar (self-immolation). Stories about dhonk  (a small hardy tree or shrub found in the Aravalli Hills) and banyan trees (“barwara” means “home of the banyan” in Marwari) keep me occupied, and even though I later hear the official history of the place from the head naturalist, Baboolalji’s version — the one ensconced in the memories of the locals — remains far more fascinating. Our vehicle is eating up the miles and by the time darkness begins to set in, we find ourselves on a hill, ready to be welcomed inside the fort with a chant and the ring of a bell, a greeting that reinforces the popular belief “atithi devo bhava” (guests are like gods).

My Guest Experience Maker (GEM), Shweta Yadav, takes me to the Aravali View Suite (bring it to Mumbai and it could morph into a decent-sized apartment!). I read General Manager Frans Westraadt’s letter: “To reinterpret the regal ambience of a bygone era dating back 700 years…Six Senses Fort Barwara [originally a 14^th-century fort] has been sensitively transformed by a team of archaeological restoration experts into a 48-suite resort in a conservation effort that has taken more than a decade to complete.”

It’s after a rather detailed chat with architect Parul Zaveri, and another one with the scion of the fort, Prithviraj Singh, that I begin to fully understand the decade-long labour that went into the construction of this lavish resort. But at that time, even as I put down Frans’ letter promising me an opportunity at reconnection that goes from “yum to Ommm…”, I come across another one penned by Shweta that warms my heart beyond measure.

Tucking both the letters inside my burgundy notebook, I turn my attention to the splendour of my suite. Next to the all-natural welcome snacks and drinks, there’s a remote to the automatic window screen, which takes me to my personal garden with beds of beautiful autumn zephyr lilies.

The elegant cotton bedding finely balances the polished amber of the floor, and every inch of the embroidered buttress promises to drown one in resplendence. My attention is grabbed by the raw stone wall on the right corner with a window that opens into the garden. My delight knows no bounds when I discover the marble bathtub, a closed showering space and an open shower.

All kinds of soap come in metallic bottles like the one that the sanitiser came in. Everything else is either bamboo, fibre or glass (including the tooth powder that is moulded into tablets). Siddharth Chakravarty, Sustainability Director, proudly affirms the following day that the room is zero-plastic — except for the sliver of plastic film peeking out of the tissue box that I had noticed.

“At Six Senses, our aim is to help you reconnect with yourself, others and the world around you,” I read in my copy of the Little Book of Reconnection that I find on the writing desk. Feeling motivated to find some more reconnection, I fling open the gates to my private garden at about midnight.

Taking the crisp air in, I gaze at the white flower beds and crane my neck to look at the moon outside.

A lizard on the wall stares back at me, visibly upset at the untimely intrusion into its space.

Less out of altruism and more on account of trepidation, I shut the door and rush back into the bedroom. The outdoor shower seems better suited for morning.

Even though it’s a completely new place, sleep comes easily.

Day 2: Rejuvenation

Reconnection with my body is on the agenda for the next morning as I guzzle the yummiest berry smoothie bowl I’ve had in a while along with the Glow Beauty beetroot shot at the all-day dining restaurant, The Cortile, located in the courtyard. Already feeling cleaner on the inside, I walk into the resort’s fitness studio for a session of Vinyasa yoga.

With swathes of gulmohar and jamun trees, the space feels cool and warm at once — luxurious and inviting, like an embrace. The instructor takes me and two other guests through settling breathwork and raises us to a deep stretch. By the time we get to pranayama, I am already steadier and more in sync with my pranic self. With a smile of contentment, I walk out of the room. Through the green leaves and the beautiful magnolias, the sky plays hide and seek. I capture the breathtaking blue as I head over to the Earth Lab, where the resort showcases its efforts to reduce consumption, produce locally, and support communities and the eco-system.

Photographs by Jai Goswami.

At lunch, I meet the effusive Frans who is dressed in a similar locally-made, naturally-dyed Dastkar (local artisan collective) cotton shirt as Siddharth. A Namibian native, Frans speaks about his experiences and draws all his points from his philosophy of “emotional hospitality” and the need for empathy. One can’t help but notice how he addresses all staff members with “my dear”.

Frans offers me palate-cleansing golgappas served with masala pani shots — Siddharth, a Bengali, and I, a Bihari from Bengali-dominated Ranchi, can’t resist bringing phuchkas (a spicier and tangier variant of golgappas) into the conversation. We move to risotto and wine, and Frans sticks to his “green salad” (actually, a gin and tonic with cucumber, but that’s between us!).

In the evening, we are back at The Cortile, and I am led outwards to the giant, grey-tiled dome of a pizza oven. Chef Sanjay Chaudhary is ready with the ingredients, and with a steady hand, he teaches me how to knead the dough, and when to stretch it.

Soon out of the oven, my all-cheese, all-veggies pizza is ready to be cut into about 15 mini slices for the entire restaurant to taste.

Photograph (right) by Jai Goswami.

Post pizza, I am joined by Siddharth and Shweta for a walk in the garden and to the fort gates. The stone ground beneath us is the same as it has been for centuries and on one of the steps, I spot an ancient inscription that predates Six Senses Fort Barwara. The sky is a lovely concoction of thistle and tangerine as we walk up to the manager’s residence where, to our surprise, we are gatecrashers at a farewell party!

We are joined by the resort’s head chef, Marius Ackermann, and his wife, Suryani, and the Resort Manager Sameer K. Kapoor.

At dusk, we head back to The Cortile for dinner, where we find a mehfil (festive gathering) of local Rajasthani singers, Pawan Rana and Ved Prakash Ranak who serenade us with a happy mix of popular and traditional Rajasthani folk music on their dholak (hand drum) and harmonium.

While munching on a burger that is too big and spaghetti that is easily consumed, we talk about supporting local crafts and discuss our various dreams and ambitions. I learn that Shweta wants to pursue her MBA, and Jai Goswami from F&B is a travel photographer with an awe-worthy Instagram following.

Day 3: Legends, Lore And Liqueur

With history on my mind, I am ready to take a heritage tour of Fort Barwara with Assistant Front Office Manager and resident heritage walk guide, Surya Pratap Singh. A man of many talents, and a gifted storyteller, Surya takes me through the various histories and myths attached to the fort when we meet at the old Shikar Burj, the highest terrace at the property that offers a panoramic bird’s-eye view of Chauth Ka Barwara: “‘Global sensibility, local sensitivity’ is a principle at Six Senses. We have three different kinds of wildlife tours to connect you with nature and local fauna. Besides crafts workshops, we have a village biking trail, and the guava-farm biking trail. We have three kinds of picnics and a liqueur tasting session that takes one through the history of liqueurs and brewing in Rajasthan.”

Mythological origin stories abound about the temple in the village. According to a legend, in 1451, Maharaja Bhim Singh of the Chauhan Dynasty received a divine ordinance from the goddess (devi) in his dream to construct a temple for her. Being a sceptic, the king didn’t immediately respond to the request. Then, sometime during peak summer, he got separated from his troupe and collapsed from fatigue and thirst while out on a hunting trip in the jungle. Miraculously, it began to rain, and on waking up, the king saw the girl from his dreams playing in the forest. He realised that the girl was a divine being and she appeared in her true form, that of Chauth Mata. The king went on to construct the Chauth Ka Barwara temple in her honour. Another legend dating back to 1567, speaks of Rao Surjan Hada, the then king of Ranthambore, who was cured of an incurable disease thanks to Chauth Mata’s blessings. He went on to repair the temple.

“Can you see over there?” Surya points towards the hill overlooking the Shikar Burj. “Since it’s a monsoon-type forest, the whole hill turns green as soon as the first monsoon arrives and stays green until the drought hits.” He tells me how it’s best to spot tigers during peak summer when they step out to find water. I wonder if “spotting” a tiger as a recreational activity reinstates a focus on anthropocentrism and othering. Walking through the fort, we debate the relevance of separate mardana and zenana mahals (men’s and women’s residences) and take in the fort architecture. He tells me more folk tales — that of gulmohur and banyan trees, the paras patthar (philosopher’s stone), and how Ranthambore can find its etymological origins in the names of two friends of its 14^th century king, Rai Hammir, Ranya and Thunya. “You might have read why Alauddin Khilji attacked Ranthambore but let me tell you the folk tale…,” he continues as we walk along.

He finally drops me off at the Six Senses Spa and Fitness Centre situated in the zenana mahal, where I meet Dr Jitendra Varshney, the Wellness Director and resident Ayurvedic practitioner, for my wellness consultancy. The clinic of Dr J, as he is called, houses a Chauth Mata idol. Usually, guests go through a machine-assisted wellness screening. However, since I am on medication for my autoimmune illness, we instead choose to identify my dominant doshas. It’s reaffirming to think that all the parts of my being, including my doshas, require nothing but balance. As I wait for the spa session, I flip through their menu of treatments. The opening pages speak about the ways Six Senses hopes to inspire a connection with the body in pursuit of joyful living. While the spa and massages are interesting, it’s their biohacking treatments that pique my curiosity — Six Senses offers six unique and all-natural vibration- and sensation-based methods to enhance recovery processes and improve physical and cognitive abilities.

At 4 p.m., I meet Surya at the rear gate of the fort. It’s the annual Teej festival and historically, on this day, all the villagers arrive at the fort with an idol of goddess Parvati, who is worshipped there and then carried around the village to the lakeside, where men have another special tradition — that of setting clay pots afloat and shooting them (with real rifles!). The villagers are back to their fort after three years of a COVID-19-induced hiatus and it’s a big day for all. An apparent “city madam” (as I am addressed by the children), I am generously invited to the front row to be a part of the puja ceremony. The women click selfies with me and the children wish me “good evening” just as they would greet a teacher.

During the sundowner, when I voice my concern about tiger-sighting as a recreational activity to the resort manager, the experienced hotelier introduces me to the majesty of the animal. “Inside the forest, no mobile devices work; it’s just you and the tiger. I have seen people left dumbfounded, amazed, scared, and even lose a little bit of physical control. That’s a moment of admiration and exhilaration that you never forget.”

Pulling my thoughts in a different direction, he talks about how rather than othering, it’s appreciation of the grandeur of nature.

I meet Surya at the library bar in The Rajawat Room, where he has laid out a casket of spices and glass bottles containing pink, green, yellow and clear liqueurs.

“Let’s inspect some of the ingredients on your table. There’s chocolate and these munchies to go along with the drink. Chocolates help you cleanse the palette. Coffee beans help you modify the olfactory sense from one to another one,” he begins.

“The alcohol concentration in these grain-based liqueurs is 42.5 per cent. We have several native wine companies in the country, but we also stand on a long history of brewing local liqueurs. Some are made by tribes, others by monks and pundits. However, the alcohol in Rajasthan is particularly interesting because it was distilled by the royal families.”

The first liqueur he presents has a paan (betel leaf) flavour. As I sip the herby bittersweetness, he tells me about the various communities around Rajasthan, especially the Kalal community of alcohol distillers.

“Each Kalal house had 30-40 recipes and so we can easily say that the number of recipes coming out of India was large.” Next comes the rose flavour. Surya tells me that these spirits come from the family of Maharani Mahansar in the Shekhawati region and are named after her.

A few more stories and chocolates later, it’s time to go back and pack for my early morning flight from Jaipur. The staff has been kind enough to wrap up a hearty breakfast.

Sleepy but certainly content, carrying all the stories in my heart and my burgundy notebook, I bid au revoir to Six Senses Fort Barwara. I slip the Little Book of Reconnection into my bag, hoping to live more meaningfully with these learnings of transformation that promise a joyful life.

Text and Photographs by Asad Sheikh.

Nakshatra, Fibre cover, handwoven Indian wool with hand-knotting, abrash dyeing and hand-embroidery. Designed by Ashiesh Shah – Atelier with Jaipur Rugs. 

Sutr Santati: Then Now Next, the exhibition that was showcased in the capital, presented the narrative of India through its textiles. Each one of the about-100 textiles on view, from various regions of the country, displayed a plaque with a list of names. These highlighted not only the designers, textile artists and revivalists involved in the creation of each of the works, but also, importantly, the artisans involved — the embroiderers, weavers, dyers and printers.

The exhibition — that concluded in late October — proved that textile craftsmanship in the nation is still a vibrant entity. But, the way we know or see it does bend to the will of commerce. Historically, grander techniques and materials — than the ones on display at Sutr Santati — were often used to create one-of-a-kind pieces under the art of patronage. But in a globalised, and machine-powered market, these techniques have become more streamlined, often to fit the choices of the buyers.

With commerce out of the equation, designers, artists and artisans, who participated in the exhibition, could more freely explore present-day techniques and develop newer styles of textile manipulation to further the idea of Indian craftsmanship. And so, the exhibition collection, most of which was specially commissioned for the show, did not mimic textile samples found encased in museums from India’s colonial and pre-colonial eras. It innovated, by introducing new motifs, materials, and workaround ways to achieve a similar degree of complexity in the final material, leaving us with new hope for the future of textile revivalism.

Excerpts from a conversation with Lavina Baldota, textile revivalist and curator of Sutr Santati….

How do you plan to create awareness about India’s textiles, especially among the younger generation?
The idea is to take the conversation about textiles beyond attire. Normally, we think of textiles as only related to something we wear. But in our country, textiles have always been a huge part of our art. They’ve been a huge part of our culture. We dress our gods in textiles, we have Pichwai paintings…. There has always been such a fine line between the craft and the art. I want to bring back that sensibility and give it a more contemporary context so that today’s generation becomes aware of the techniques. And I want to make it appealing to them — so that they are excited to put textiles up in their homes, maybe. Awareness creates appreciation, and appreciation will create aspiration. That’s the whole idea.

Top left: Find the Hidden Knots, Merino wool shawl with embroidery by Rahul and Shikha, created by Muzamil, Maheshwar, Madhya Pradesh and Jaipur, Rajasthan; Unity in Diversity, hand embroidery by multiple artisans, Kutch, Gujarat.
Top right: Naga Raincoat, Ashiesh Shah — Atelier X Cane Concept.

Bottom left: Sarnath, mulberry silk (warp) panels and viscose (weft) with zari. Designed by Asha Madan – Good Earth and created by Haji Kasim Mohammed Ishaque, Benaras, Uttar Pradesh.
Bottom right: Treescape, cotton warp with discarded cotton and silk in the weft. Naturally dyed indigo and madder. Designed by Ashita Singhal and Balbir Singh, New Delhi.

What part does Sutr Santati have in your vision?
Textiles have been such an important part of our freedom movement, the Swadeshi movement, and our culture. So, my first Sutr Santati exhibition was on Mahatma Gandhi, and khadi was a big element of that. This time as well, to keep the same mandate and take it forward, we used only indigenous yarns. You can see how many varieties of yarns we’ve used in this exhibition, and they’re all from the region the work was done in. For example, a Gujarati artisan would use Kala cotton, and Kandu cotton would be used in Karnataka. There are so many different kinds of yarns that people are not aware of — from camel hair and goat hair to different types of wools and wild silks. And using eco-friendly dyes was also a very important part of this exhibition so that you do not harm the environment when you create.

Historically, patronage played an important role in the flourishing of several crafts. What has changed in this day and age with rapid consumerism and fast-paced production?
The idea of slow consumerism is very important to me as a curator. Choose fewer things, but understand how they are made. And besides, textiles are quite long-lasting. They’re not in fashion or out of fashion ever, right? I mean, they are a heritage. And if you lose that craft, you will lose the culture. So it is important to have younger minds start thinking about the fact that you don’t need so many things.

Top left: Kodalikaruppur, sari in cotton, zari and natural dyes. Handwoven and hand-block printed. Chennai and Machilipatnam, Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh.
Top right: Patan Srinath Ji, wall panel in silk. Handwoven jamdani designed by Gaurang Shah, Patan, Gujarat.

Bottom left: Mughal Flowers, dupatta in handwoven silk and zari, by Naseem Ansari — ASHA workshop, Benaras, Uttar Pradesh.
Bottom right: Hanging by a Thread, fine cotton in multiple counts and zari threads, by Lakshmi Madhavan and Arvind Vijayan, Balaramapuram, Kerala.

Textile revival comes with its own set of challenges. Trying to capture and recreate the exact style of making a bygone textile might not always be possible. Have you faced any such challenges?
Yes, absolutely. The revival of anything that has been lost is so difficult. The Kodalikaruppur sari that was displayed in the exhibition, for instance, is in the process of revival. It’s been such a long path to get back that same red colour that was originally used. The environment has changed, and the water it used to be washed in has changed. The quality of the zari threads has changed. The motifs on the sari that were hand-painted have been replaced with hand-block printing. We have to be conscious not to lose the craft. It’s been a very tedious activity to revive it to its authentic self. So, if we can save a craft from languishing, we should. Rather than letting go of it completely and having no reference to bring it back.

The recent exhibition talked about “then, now, and next”. Could you share with us what is next for you, and your wider endeavours by extension?
I want this exhibition to travel around the world and my efforts at the moment are completely concentrated on that. We are collaborating with the Museums Victoria in Melbourne, and the exhibition is scheduled to be mounted from April to July 2023. I want this to be visible because it’s good to take a local conversation global. I want people abroad to understand our culture and engage with it.

Spaces

Text by Vanya Lochan.

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Photograph by Shweta Yadav.

“Everything is culture,” asserts Siddharth Chakravarty, Sustainability Director at Six Senses Fort Barwara, Rajasthan, as he welcomes me to the Earth Lab (also a key element of Six Senses properties across the world), to introduce me to the initiatives that make the luxury resort one of the greenest in India. Across the world, Six Senses is known for its resolute philosophical stand on sustainability. In their words: “…who says sustainable can’t be sumptuous?”

India’s first Six Senses resort, the repurposed 700-year-old Fort Barwara in Chauth Ka Barwara near Ranthambore, Rajasthan, has been designed to perpetuate the heritage and practices of the Barwara community as they have operated over generations. The 14th-century fort, which was originally owned by the royal family of Barwara, has been carefully restored by the leading hospitality brand in tandem with the Espire Group and the fort scion Prithviraj Singh.

In an attempt to reinterpret the rather sophisticated ancient systems of sustainable existence, the resort design has sensitively incorporated traditional elements such as rainwater collection tanks to complement — rather than detract from — the fort’s historical existence atop a hill, amid rich plant life and a functioning village that goes back centuries.

The Six Senses environmental and social sustainability policy focuses on energy efficiency, water and waste management, social commitment, the protection of its natural surroundings, air quality and noise control, and it is central to their efforts to improve their ecological and carbon footprints.

On a crisp Saturday morning, I am patiently escorted from my regal Aravali View Suite across the beauteous arcades and pristine balustrades overlooking multiple green stretches to the Earth Lab, where I meet Chakravarty. Along the way, my Guest Experience Maker (GEM) Shweta Yadav has not been able to contain her praise for the Sustainability Director and how he is one of “the wisest people at Six Senses”.

“It’s supposed to be ‘EARTH LAB’ and not ‘EARHT LAB’,” Chakravarty brings the mistake on the bronze tablet to my attention. “However, this plaque has come all the way from Maharashtra. I couldn’t help but think of the carbon emission generated, and decided that we need to do better than think about spellings. After all, we know how ‘earth’ is spelt!”

Image courtesy: Siddharth Chakravarty.

Excerpts from a conversation….

What were you doing before you joined Six Senses? Do tell me more about your role at Fort Barwara.
After completing my hotel management degree and my WSET 3 (Wine & Spirit Education Trust Level 3 Qualification), I went on to work as a sommelier and a coffee master.

But faced with a deep personal crisis then, I was confronted with too many questions that I didn’t have the answers for. It was at this time that I started reading books by Sri Aurobindo. I went to Rishikesh to study Yoga Vedanta and that’s how my journey in rural Pondicherry [now Puducherry] began. I joined as the director of Sri Aurobindo Society, where I got the opportunity to spearhead many education, rewilding and palliative care initiatives. I wanted to apply the principles I had learnt beyond the spiritual world and, to my surprise, I found that every one of them is of use in this world! One of the tenets of my learning was “everything is one” – today, while I know why I should not be using chemical-laden insecticides, I can correlate why plastics are not the right solution, why travelling as an activity is a source of Scope 3 emissions if you don’t learn something higher or don’t impact the place positively.
At Fort Barwara, I work closely with the hosts, guests as well as the surrounding community to rebuild a better and greener future. I try to build an ecologically sustainable society through employment opportunities and ensure that the resort remains at the leading edge of sustainable practices in waste management. Currently, I am developing a workshop focused on upcycling and recycling various kinds of wastes. The aim is to bring the hosts and guests together for the cause.

Photograph by Vanya Lochan.

Tell us more about the Earth Lab….
The soul of Six Senses is sustainability and our Earth Lab is the place where our property showcases its efforts to reduce consumption, produce locally, and support communities and ecosystems. Guests are invited to visit the Earth Lab to reconnect with the natural world and learn some simple life hacks that will allow them to make a difference.

At the DIY desk, guests are invited to make their own essentials and daily-use items. You can make your own lip balm and add different flavours to it — we have vanilla and lavender. We make our own toothpaste and beeswax covers (which we use in the pantry to cover food), as well as our own mosquito repellent and hand sanitisers. We recommend a lot of lifestyle changes — and making our own essentials is a big part of it.

Most of our essential oils come from our alembic. We only use materials grown inside the property, such as lemongrass, vanilla and lavender. We also have an in-house potter. He is the sixth-generation community potter at Barwara. At Six Senses, we believe in employing people who are hyperlocal and regularly invite people who work in the village to visit the fort.

To the left of the alembic is the Sustainability Oath Tree. Whenever new employees join, I do a two-day Sustainability Information Session with them and then I take their oaths wherein they state that they will abide by certain rules and not hurt the flora and fauna in any way, not just within the premises but in their personal lives as well.

How do you support the locals?
Employing them is the first step towards empowering them. The next, of course, is buying what they produce and helping them to enhance the quality. If you think about it, every fort is designed to be sustainable and self-sufficient. Because if you are attacked, the only option is to sustain yourself internally for a long time. That cannot happen without the support of the community around. This is why you have people making your shoes, stocking your food, stitching your clothes, creating utensils — and that’s how you survive.

There is a mochi [cobbler] community here that has been making shoes for the past six generations and these shoes are sent to Jaipur and other places for sale. So far, they have seen little growth mostly because of the middlemen. We consider it our duty to employ them and help them sell their products. I keep asking our upcoming in-house arts and crafts gallery to help the locals create high-quality products and market them. I am also in talks with an NGO to bring a designer here who could help the locals improve their quality and learn to do better on their own terms.

Another example is the shirt I am wearing [shows me the pink tiger block print on his white bush shirt]. Local women from Dastkar [a craft collective] have printed this shirt by hand and it’s such precise work! Printing takes a lot of focus, but they have been doing this for several generations and this is all done using vegetable dye. We have been trying to engage with Dastkar actively and hope to work more closely with them.

I encountered a lizard in the garden – some hotels would not see it as an asset. How does Six Senses, which is situated in the middle of a village atop a hill, feel about this?
You must realise that this is their space too. In fact, it’s their space that we are in. We have lizards, snakes and rodents here, and our attempt is not to kill but to coexist. This is why we have lemongrass repellents installed in the living areas. Our staff has been instructed not to get anxious upon spotting these. Instead, we simply inform our guests, and if we do spot a snake or a larger creature, we simply leave it outside the property.

We value every living being, whether it’s our insects, spiders, caterpillars or snakes — they are all part of the larger ecosystem.

Every creature has its position in the food chain, and each one is helping maintain the balance.

I have heard that you mostly hire locals. What is the work culture and hiring process like at Six Senses?
This is an industry where people are expected to work long hours – the emotional impact of working in the hospitality industry is also unbearable at times, but that’s not who we are. We want to create the kind of beautiful culture where team members assert that they are being taken care of by their employer. You will meet a local, Govind, who works in F&B. I keep asking my HR and training managers not to select only those who speak good English. Let’s not set immaculate English as a criterion. Look, people may speak in Hindi, log Rajasthani bhashaon mein baat karenge, yeh unki jagah hai, yahan hum aaye hain, humein unki tarah baat karni hai. [People will speak in Rajasthani languages; this is their land, we are the ones who have come from outside, and we should be speaking like them.] In fact, if a hotel can’t bring its guests into the back area, then the hotel doesn’t deserve to be walked into. You should know the inside story.

Here we are at the store room….

Tell us about the innovations at the resort. What are you currently working on?
As I keep telling everyone, everything is about the system and I strongly believe that deprivation creates innovation and gives way to alternative solutions. You might have seen that hotels use a lot of plastic, hai na? [Isn’t it?] That’s something we have eliminated. See [shows colourful satin bags filled with pulses], we get everything in cloth bags. I had managed to change our entire storage system but, more recently, and because it’s been raining, our chefs have been worried about sogginess and mites. This is why, two days ago, we had to get some of the pulses and grains in, as my vendor asserts, biodegradable plastic covers. These cloth bags are all tracked — they come in, get washed and are sent back to the vendor to be replenished. Mindful consumption means lesser production!

[Walks ahead and hints at the floor] The “system” I speak of also extends to the way we do things. For instance, I am strongly against regular wet-washing. The water index here is quite low, so we sweep some of the areas. I keep telling the sanitation staff that even though we are harvesting and conserving rainwater, we are not offsetting it yet. One of my visions is for Six Senses to be in a position to not just offset but to regenerate more water than we use.

I am also working towards a seed bank. Genetically modified seeds actually drain the soil of nutrients and create a cycle wherein it becomes difficult to switch back to natural seeds. Hence, a bank of indigenous, unmodified seeds.

Let’s walk over to the laundry….

What’s special about the laundry room?
Well, to begin with, our laundry is smart! What I mean is that all these washing machines have sensors and everything is calibrated to ensure that no extra chemicals or water is being consumed to clean the linen here. No manual dosing.

All the chemicals we use are taken to our sewage treatment plants where they are recycled. Our machines are so powerful that they can clean the water and make a very effective microbial solution that we use in our gardens where we grow food and flowers. Septic tanks usually have a foul smell because anaerobic fermentation takes place inside them — that is, bacteria break down the waste and generate nitrogen-laden remains. Now, the idea here is to replace generally-used expensive chemical-based bacteria with naturally-occurring microbes that do the same job of eating away the grease. That’s good science! You can generate these microbes with pineapple skin, watermelon skin, and so many other things that you would usually throw away. We put all these skins and peels in the tank and then we add molasses and let one stock ferment for one month. Then, we add an N70 soapy solution and some wet charcoal, and that’s it! We give this biochemical to the kitchen staff to put in the sinks and let the microbes eat the grease away. This way, we don’t need to order anything, everything is free and also smells nice!

It’s a bit hot here, isn’t it? Let me take you to our refrigeration unit.

I have never walked into a freezer before!
Look here [points at a dessert plate on the refrigerator shelf], the kitchen folk have started using our beeswax liners. Once we were able to establish that we are not using plastic film to cover our food, our chefs, albeit gradually and begrudgingly [chuckles], started accepting our ‘home-made’ biodegradable reusable beeswax covers. The head chef comes with his team to the Earth Lab, makes the liners we saw earlier, and brings them here.

Photograph by Vanya Lochan.

The hotel’s welcome note mentioned that you grow your own food and depend largely on local produce. Would you tell me more about it?
We grow most of the herbs and quite a bit of the produce that we use in the kitchen. We have recently installed aeroponic farming towers at the resort. It’s the future of agriculture! I am currently experimenting with a few of these to grow vegetables for the kitchen. If we just spend four or five minutes a day, with about 40 machines, we can grow all the yield locally. A motor throws the water upward every 15 minutes. All the roots are in the air and because of that, they grow very fast. In merely a month and a half, we will have eight kilograms of pak choi growing here! Once we have more machines, we won’t need to source leafy produce from outside. Do you know what I want? I want to create a culture where we are aware of the effort it takes to grow the food we consume.

We have also developed a system called SPI, which is short for Sustainable Performance Index. Everything that comes into the hotel gets tracked. One of the duties of a Sustainability Director is to conduct audits of the food and beverages we receive — what we get, how far it comes from, what the scope would be of them coming from a lesser radius and whether our procurement is helping any of the local communities. The whole idea is that if I am getting cheese from France, how am I sustaining those around me? At Six Senses, we believe in refusing first. Refusing something first is the easiest. If you are still convinced that you will be able to make use of it, then take it in. As you might have noticed, your welcome drinks and some of the other products placed in your room had a note with a barcode. We have installed this system all over the hotel for our guests to scan and learn about the products they are consuming or using.

I have been told by my Guest Experience Maker that you are strict when it comes to food wastage and maintain a board that tracks waste. I am curious to know more.
This is our staff canteen. All of the food cooked and served is weighed here. Do you see that board? “Waste = Opportunity”, we say. We have divided the board into “Total Wet Waste”, “Total Cafeteria Waste” and “Weekly Projection”, the last one being an estimate of the anticipated serving and cooking quantities for the week. Everything is on display for everyone and no one can run away from the truth [chuckles]. I know how much food is being prepared, how much is consumed, and how much is being wasted. We also know who is wasting how much. Tracking opens up the opportunity to do better, waste less, and think about just how much could have been saved for someone else to consume.

With all these complicated systems in place, how do you ensure smooth execution?
In order to make any big system work, you need to make it very easy to operate. This happens only when you have empathy for both the guests and your colleagues. The next step is to create confidence and this includes being open to failure. Finally, it all boils down to communication and collaboration — keeping the team abreast of plans, training them to accommodate new challenges and being prepared to embrace ambiguity.

At Six Senses, everyone — even the security personnel — is part of the sustainability system. After all, the security guards scan everything that comes in and goes out. I asked them to measure the different kinds of waste and share the report every day. I also made them responsible for the composting process. The micro-distribution of tasks not only ensures accountability and smoothness of execution but also makes it easier for everyone to recognise which unit needs work if something goes astray — and that’s how we know whom to catch if we find vegetable waste going out instead of being composted!

Text by Neerja Deodhar. Illustration by Gaurav Vikalp.

 

In late March this year, a video featuring Karan Johar sitting in a bright-red armchair against a flashy backdrop — reminiscent of his popular English-language talk show Koffee With Karan — went viral. He spouted part of that iconic Kuch Kuch Hota Hai dialogue: “Hum ek hi baar jeete hain, ek baar marte hai, aur shaadi bhi ek hi baar karte hai.” (We live only once, die once, and get married only once.)

In the same breath, and with his familiar, smug smile, he added, “…agar aap highly educated ho, toh aap age, caste, height vagerah dekhne se pehle, ek partner mein mental compatibility dhoondte ho.” (…if you are highly educated, you’re going to look for mental compatibility before getting to age, caste, height, etc.) As our collective Cupid and agent of love, he was here to urge the alumni of the country’s several management and engineering institutes to sign up for IITIIMShaadi.com.

The matrimonial site’s meme-worthy moment in the national spotlight came eight years after its conception. “When you marry via iitiimshaadi dot com, it’s not called a marriage it’s called an alumni association,” tweeted one user. Predictably, people were amused and outraged that a platform such as this exists and that, of all people, Johar was the one promoting it. Why was the “flag bearer of nepotism” — a heavy crown the Bollywood producer-director has unapologetically worn for more than half a decade — talking about merit and qualifications? But I suppose one could argue that his link to the brand isn’t so tenuous if you consider that his career-defining films are all sagas about heterosexual “happily-ever-afters”.

Under the ownership of the central government, the first IITs (Indian Institutes of Technology) were set up in the ’50s, and the IIMs (Indian Institutes of Management) in the ’60s (today, IITs are in 23 cities and IIMs in 20). By the early 2000s, they had begun to challenge the notion of upper-crust schooling that had existed in the pre-liberalisation era and was only accessible to a select few: a posh boarding school, a degree at a notable Delhi college and an Oxbridge stint to round it off. “A degree [in engineering] is considered a ticket to wealth and success,” wrote Vaishali Honawar in 2005. With IIT, as with IIM, each year’s cohorts are extremely small in proportion to the number of applicants, which can be in the lakhs (in 2021, a whopping 9.39 lakh candidates took the entrance test for the IITs, while 1.9 lakh candidates appeared for the IIM CAT). Depending on the programme, the cost of tuition can go up to 10 lakhs for IIT and 23 lakhs for IIM, and it is not uncommon for parents of the students to take out loans to meet the requirement.

A direct consequence of maintaining small batches is that the students at these institutes become automatic participants in the binary of perceived “in” and “out” groups — the former comprising the select few who have apparently managed to crack tough entrance tests, survive gruelling courses and bag plush jobs. This does not take into account how these entrance tests and fee structures are not wholly accessible, or acknowledge the internalised biases that can seep into these testing procedures. In a 2015 piece for Scroll.in, Mayank Jain wrote about how a significant chunk of students were looking at engineering as an option due to the “prestige and respect” associated with it, chalking this statistic to 80 per cent in the case of a small group that was interviewed to gauge this.

However, despite a continuing fixation with engineering institutes — which enjoy a cult-like following — a significant number of engineering graduates don’t end up working in their area of specialisation. Two years after the above statistic came out in Scroll.in, a Hindustan Times article pessimistically asked if the great engineering dream had died as the majority of IIT-Bombay alumni were, by then, pursuing careers in finance, consulting and the IT industry — and a mere 22 per cent were going on to work in engineering and technology.

The IITs came under criticism for “failing to align their goals with the democracy’s” and primarily supplying consulting firms and developed countries with highly qualified labour. This is due to the alumni’s propensity to prioritise packages over seeking careers in their areas of specialisation. After Independence, IITians were expected to contribute to nation-building and influence decisions related to dams and power plants. They were also positioned as points of realisation for a new Indian economic dream that had emerged after colonisation — a dream that was sold as being accessible across the lines of caste and class, displaying how a representative democracy can thrive. “It is worth noting in this context that, in an underdeveloped but mixed economy, where upward mobility is the sole guiding principle of the middle class, employment takes centre-stage and pushes research into a secondary position,” stated IIT-Kharagpur professors Gourishankar S. Hiremath and H. S. Komalesha in 2018.

After the implementation of the ’90s economic reforms, both institutes came to symbolise credibility for a swathe of the population whose dream of upward mobility rests on the pursuit of education. And in the current mixed economy — where there is also an active effort to gauge success through material acquisition — IIT-IIM degrees are at once a descriptor, a measure of one’s worth, a two-word elevator pitch, a way to earn respect and a means by which to stand apart. They’re a stand-in for a full-page CV. They’re compelling enough for a couple to specifically seek out an “IITian’s sperm”.

Shortly after I had learnt about IITIIMShaadi.com, I became aware of a website called FAANGShaadi through a sarcastically worded Linkedin post by a user of the networking site. The post claimed that it was a matrimonial website that catered to employees of companies like Facebook (Meta), Amazon, Apple, Netflix and Google (Alphabet), adding that the matchmaking site was “powered by AI” and users had to take a coding challenge to be considered eligible. A few hours after the post went viral and garnered praise from the members of the platform, the author added an edit: “This [website] was an April Fool’s Joke and along with a lot of others, they got me”.

The story of niche matrimonial websites is nearly a decade old; 2011 and 2012 saw the boom of matchmaking services geared towards first-generation entrepreneurs and employees of multinational corporations. Platforms like Mymitra, notably devised and developed for IIT-IIM-Ivy League circles, gained popularity. These early entrants into the marriage market promised authenticity: users had to sign up with college certificates, and matchmaking was supposedly driven by “machine learning, big data and psychology techniques”. Mymitra’s internal ranking mechanism even promised that “the best and the ambitious always rank higher and are displayed at the top of every search result…for the first time, highly accomplished people get more prominence over others”.

IITIIMShaadi.com allegedly has over 1,50,000 members who have paid the “until marriage” fee of 32,922 rupees, though not all have been authenticated. Currently, about 30,000 members have met the criterion of attending an approved institute on the website and are active. The FAQ page clarifies that the minds behind the platform are more invested in the quality than the quantity of matches.

Ironically, its founder, Taksh Gupta, did not attend either of the colleges whose reputations he was relying on for his brand. His own educational background became a punchline after Johar’s endorsement earlier this year (Gupta attended the S. P. Jain School of Global Management, which technically does meet the site’s criteria). Responding to a question about what he envisions for the portal’s future, he said, “We want to and are going to offer such a boutique experience to our members that people, who are currently not eligible to register, study a course which makes them eligible to register at IITIIMShaadi.com just so that they can search their partner through us.”

Anisha Kumar*, a second-year MBA student at Xavier School of Management (XLRI), believes the single-minded pursuit of upward economic mobility is encouraged from adolescence: “Most of us haven’t known any other markers of success”. She also says that within the realm of romantic compatibility, potential for compatibility is tied to the other person’s scholastic achievement. IIT-Bombay alumnus, Shivaprasad M (27), presents a view that several other interviewees also believe: “Many graduates of premier institutes reach a certain position in life after grinding it out [working hard] — they think the world owes them a spouse they deserve”.

During the second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic, a frightening number of jobs were lost according to the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE). This figure is estimated at two crores between April and May of 2021, and 40 per cent of those who lost their jobs at the start of the pandemic were unable to find employment again for at least 10 months. In the same year, 60 students from IIT-Delhi alone secured placement packages worth rupees one crore per annum on the very first day of the placement drive while graduates from some branches bagged international placements worth two crores and above. Urooj Akhlaq, a 22-year-old IIT graduate based in Bengaluru, points out that new graduates are unlikely to interview at companies that offer salaries below rupees 10 lakh per annum because “it’s not befitting of an IITian’s status”.

In 2018, an industry observer noted that a start-up founder who did not attend an IIT or IIM is likely to get attention or funding from investors only if they have a successful product or a proven track record, whereas a founder with a degree from either is likely to attract attention even without these tangible determinants.

Speaking about navigating the search for a partner while being a student and of “marriageable age”, Kumar explains the impulse to reconcile romantic desire with career ambition: “In business schools, people are mostly in their mid-twenties, and there is a want for a partner. The easiest thing to do, then, is date someone on campus, who will potentially work in a similar industry, make a similar amount of money and want similar things from life,” she told me. Several of these determinants seem utilitarian and shorn of romance, I counter. “Consultants date consultants, and they also date like consultants. They calculate how much sense it makes to date one person over another. I’ve seen people make pros and cons lists to see which boxes on the parental checklist can be ticked off,” she responds.

When it comes to a potential partner’s reactions to their ambitions and career trajectories, the average female candidate experiences a considerably greater amount of anxiety than their male counterparts. In 2014, IIT alumna and author of the books Heartbreak & Dreams! and Arranged Love, Parul Mittal, said that women who graduate from IITs want grooms whose intellect matches their own, but men “prefer a simple homemaker as life partner over an ambitious career woman as it maintains family balance”. Tales of the skewed sex ratio at the IITs have abounded since its inception. In IIM and other eminent management institutes, however, the number of women candidates is steadily rising.

Sanya Patel*, a former student of the National Institute of Technology and the Indian School of Business, hasn’t used the services of portals like IITIIMShaadi.com — but she understands their appeal. She asserts that her career is a significant part of her life, so any prospective partner will need to accept the goals and ambitions she has outlined for herself, along with her potential to earn big money. “[Normally] men don’t have to think about it, but as women in India, we really need to make sure that the fragile male ego isn’t hurt. The fear is always there,” the 28-year-old tells me, adding, “The chances that a non-tier-1 student [a student from a university that is not top-ranking] will be able to match my ambition and salary are low. Exceptions always exist, of course. I’m not being elitist, but I believe that’s a fair ask.” Across conversations with alumni of the institutes and users of exclusive matrimony platforms, I found that many believe wealth, extravagant lifestyles and promising career prospects are a “fair ask”, conflating these with romantic potential.

The dream to attend an IIT or an IIM is very likely to be parent-driven, and, in some cases, it exists only because of one’s parents. Compounding the issue is the growth of parental expectations when children get into institutions of note: “People begin interrogating these parents about what job their child is likely to get, how much they may potentially earn — and who they will eventually marry,” says Akhlaq. “They also comment on how much dowry a male child could get if he got into such a college, and how a daughter-in-law with academic qualifications and promising career prospects can potentially pay a larger dowry.”

And these expectations differ based on the family’s socioeconomic background: parents from economically strained households perceive an IIT degree as the final frontier in their child’s education and a way for the child to improve the family’s prospects, found a survey of IIT students who enrolled in 2015. While upper-middle-class families wish for their child’s success to be acknowledged and see their achievements as being tied into the family’s status.

An obsession with familial reputation also brings with it the fear of “marrying down”. “If your family wears your achievements as a badge of honour, it bolsters your sense of self-worth. You want to keep that up, even in terms of matrimony and children,” says Kumar.

The focus of these “modern” marriage portals may be on one’s educational background, but that only puts a progressive sheen on a reality that is inherently regressive. Casteism, for instance, continues to manifest in both obvious and covert ways. Ashok Singh*, a 27-year-old product manager at a leading matrimony website, says that in addition to filters like salary and professional background, most websites also enable individuals to act on their caste-based biases. “I’ve noticed that those who graduate from IITs and IIMs usually want to marry within the same caste and specify how much they want their potential spouse to earn,” he said.

Kumar reflected that those who graduate from courses like hers tend to take fewer “risks” such as marrying outside of their caste, a decision that would neither be expected nor tolerated by their parents. “They [her peers on campus] aren’t truly independent from their families…. If your family has taken out a 25-lakh education loan, you definitely feel like you owe them,” she said.

The truth is that it is difficult for such websites to not be casteist, even if they avowedly claim indifference to the social structure. Caste is at the foundation of the mainstream conversation about what we understand as academic merit. For far too long, Indian savarna society has looked down on reservations and pedestalised those who secure seats in prestigious educational establishments on their own “merit”. This reductive attitude discounts the advantages afforded to those who come from privileged caste backgrounds. It also individualises the understanding of achievement as being the result of only intelligence, perseverance and hard work. On elite campus grounds, where we seek out partners whose social backgrounds are similar to our own, we create a smokescreen that allows us to be comfortable with our biases. The question worth asking, then, is how much of our romantic desire is truly rooted in individual agency?

*Names changed on request

Interviews by Akanksha Pandey. Photographs by Asad Sheikh. Styled by Sarah Rajkotwala.

Model: Brijesh Yadav

Pratyush Kumar Maurya of Pieux
Age: 34
Hometown: Gorakhpur

Gorakhpur-born Pratyush Kumar Maurya’s luxury sustainable fashion brand Pieux, which won the R|Elan Circular Design Challenge (in partnership with UN India) back in March, presented its new collection, Illusion, at the recently concluded FDCI x Lakmé Fashion Week. The collection is inspired by the “incredible world of life under the microscope” with “illusions” created through techniques like pleating, weaving, eco-friendly digital printing and 3D printing. It reflects the brand’s core philosophy based on the concept of circularity, which means that it can be reused, recycled and upcycled till the end. The collection uses R|Elan™ FeelFresh fabric “created from specially-engineered fibres and yarns with embedded silver that inhibits bacterial growth in the garment so no more sweaty odours” as well as its own Cartex textile, GRS-certified recycled nylon, GRS-certified recycled polyester and certified organic cotton. This award-winning collection also utilises deconstructed and reconstructed old clothes to great effect in oversized and comfortable silhouettes.

The designer on his processes and vision for a greener world:

“My love for sustainable fashion started during my fashion school days and I knew that whenever I started my own label, sustainability would be one of its pillars. As a responsible global citizen, I believe that I need to give back to the environment and I try to do that with complete sincerity.”

“We create our own Cartex textile, which is an upcycled handloom textile made out of discarded carpet yarns. We are associated with a carpet export house from where we procure carpet yarns that are left behind during the manufacturing process. After the procurement, we get in touch with the weaver community and, with their expertise, convert discarded yarns into Cartex. This entire process is sustainable since Cartex is created on the handloom. We pay fair wages to the weavers, keeping the entire cycle ethical. We make sure that we can keep these discarded yarns within the circular loop so that nothing reaches the landfills or oceans.”

“Aspiring and emerging designers have become more conscious while creating products and packaging, which is a great sign. Gen Z, being more experimental and curious regarding their style and appearance, will add a freshness to fashion where everyone will look for more exclusive one-off pieces in the near future.”

“We are trying to revolutionise fashion, one product at a time, with our techniques, details, craftsmanship and the circular nature of our products…. And so, after almost 10 years of research and ideation, I was able to go live commercially with my label in January 2022.”

Next: Ateev Anand of Re-

Text by Ranjabati Das, with inputs from Akanksha Pandey and Sarah Rajkotwala. Photographs by Naomi Shah and Asad Sheikh.

The discourse around the reordering of priorities as well as long-standing power dynamics within the industry — brought on by growing consumer awareness and the democratisation of fashion through digitalisation and social media, and geared towards making fashion more sustainable and inclusive — has already taken centre stage in recent years. And, as expected, the return of the physical format of FDCI x Lakmé Fashion Week in March 2022, after two years of caution exhibited through phygital versions in a post-pandemic world, gave fresh impetus to the conversation around the relevance of fashion weeks, one of the many contentious facets of an industry in need of dire change.

In an effort to create a roadmap for the future, Verve brings to you a motley collection of opinions to dissect the legitimacy of the pride of place fashion weeks have come to enjoy over time and across the world despite the dissonance created by an outdated model that leaves much to be desired in terms of access and financial yields. Pointing towards a spate of changes deemed vital to make fashion weeks more current, experiential and interpersonal, these reiterate the need to challenge the status quo and reclaim a more authentic face of fashion, most visible perhaps in fashion week’s potential to inspire and offer a space for celebration, drive innovation, mould talent, make statements and address collective cultural histories.

At the latest edition of the event, members of the fashion fraternity weigh in on the pros and cons, the return to the idea of the fashion show as spectacle powered by celebrities and influencers, and the importance of reinvention:

Rajesh Pratap Singh

“It gives us a timetable, a singular platform for designers and their communication. A calendar for the industry. And it makes the experience convenient for buyers.”
-Rajesh Pratap Singh of his eponymous label.

Abraham & Thakore

“Fashion showcases serve different purposes to different stakeholders. Firstly, fashion shows are a great platform for us designers to creatively spotlight our unique values to merchandisers, buyers and fashion industry professionals. Secondly, we get to speak to the media directly as well as through our showcase, which gives us a voice. Thirdly, in this age of social media, we also get to speak directly to the consumers, who can participate remotely.”
-David Abraham and Rakesh Thakore of Abraham & Thakore.

Eka

“At the moment, there aren’t many buyers. Fashion week is more of a media exercise nowadays. Thanks to the amount of stimulation we receive on social media in terms of the influx of labels and fashion imagery, the creative industry has been pushed to a corner. Perhaps we need to reinvent the model of fashion weeks. As much as I enjoy presenting on the runway, it does not always translate into business.”
-Rina Singh of Eka.

Pankaj & Nidhi

“Fashion shows should experiment and take risks. They ought to inspire upcoming designers and not just target the influencer market. Designers get to tell their stories, achieving creative satisfaction. But, somehow, glamour has taken up a large space, the showstoppers are ready before the garments.”
-Mohit Ahuja, influencer.

Satya Paul

“Fashion week was a refreshing experience after so long. After the gloom of the pandemic, everybody needed a cause for celebration, and fashion week solidified the fact that fashion is not dead. It proved the relevance of designers, old and new.”
-Ankith ES, stylist.

Studio Medium

“The interaction and engagement rate on social media is higher during these events and it helps your page reach new audiences. They lead to a lot of new enquiries, some of which do turn out to be fruitful!”
-Riddhi Jain of Studio Medium.

Interviews by Akanksha Pandey. Photographs by Asad Sheikh.

John Roberts, The Woolmark Company

Tell us about The Woolmark Company’s recent developments with sustainable wool.
At The Woolmark Company, we are constantly working on innovations that bring positive change in the fashion industry. The natural colouration technology is one of the process innovations, where we worked with our partner BioDye from Samantwadi. The raw materials, like plant leaves, flowers, stems, etc., are all grown locally by BioDye. Focusing on sustainable dyeing processes with minimal impact, BioDye seeds scientific breakthroughs using the best of nature to create 100-per-cent natural dyes and biodegradable ingredients through eco-friendly processes. This innovation helps in making fashion more sustainable as designers can use 100-per-cent natural fibres like wool and process it in vibrant natural colours to get desired results.

The other innovation is in the shoes category, where The Woolmark Company has used advancements in knitting technology to facilitate the use of wool in footwear. Combining wool with different yarns in a shoe upper draws on wool’s natural properties to promote dryness, breathability, freshness (anti-odour), comfort and warmth. With fully fashioned knitwear uppers, waste is reduced by directly mounting the shaped piece onto the sole of the shoe. Filament-wrapped wool yarns add strength and resistance to abrasion, extending the wear of the shoe.

Are you collaborating with any Indian designers?
We constantly collaborate with designers to educate and inspire as they are an integral part of our supply chain in our farm-to-fashion journey. The Wool Lab, which is a wool trend forecasting and sourcing tool from The Woolmark Company, is a valued resource for designers. In the past we have collaborated with Péro, Rajesh Pratap Singh, Eka, Dhruv Kapoor, to name a few. Pre-COVID-19, Péro and The Woolmark Company did a show at Lakmé Fashion Week with a handwoven merino wool collection with Bhuttico [a wool weavers’ cooperative society].

What does sustainable design mean to you?
Sustainable design means following these three steps. First, designing for the long life of the garment with fibres, yarns, fabrics and constructs that are durable in garments that don’t go out of fashion (choose slow fashion). Secondly, educating consumers on best-practice care, repair and reuse of garments. Finally, designing for the afterlife of the garment by choosing natural fibres that are biodegradable and designing for disassembly so that components of a garment can be reused and recycled. The Woolmark Company has developed a toolkit for designers to help them implement circular design in their workflow.

Kirti Poonia, Relove

What is the process through which you are enabling sustainability in the industry?
Our approach is to build circular tech that can help brands become more sustainable. We are doing this in three ways. Relove, a brand-owned resale programme, which helps brands to increase the lifespan of their products and acquire new customers. Rescue, a digital factory outlet, which helps brands liquidate slightly defective items. And take-back models, where brands take back their items in exchange for store credit. The brands then upcycle these items to ensure they don’t make their way to the landfill.

How did you arrive at this idea?
Sustainability can become easy to imbibe into businesses through technology. Brands today want to do the right thing, but are often very overwhelmed while trying to achieve their sustainability goals. So, we were looking for a tech-first solution that could be smoothly executed. Since I have worked in sustainable fashion, I understood the problems of customers — being able to wear only 20 per cent of their wardrobes 80 per cent of their time. Co-founder Prateek Gupte worked in technology that was making the lives of brands and consumers easier. Together, we built this solution to make fashion more circular.

What does sustainable design mean to you?
It’s the future — a future for businesses and the planet is only possible if we learn to co-exist. Sustainable design is the only way for all of us to survive.

Himansha Singh, Craste

What is the process through which you are enabling sustainability in the industry?
Our vision is to provide an alternative to timber (to save forests), to offer a solution to crop burning, and to put waste to work. At Craste, we innovate to utilise waste to produce value-added products. We have pioneered the novel technique, FuMa Solv, which converts any type of crop waste into food-grade pulp (patent pending) and can be transformed into paper for packaging and other applications. We have also extended our R&D to use textile waste, sanitary pads waste and any other plant-based waste. Our pulping technology is based on circular economy principles and adheres strictly to green manufacturing, further lowering carbon footprint at the manufacturing level.

We have also innovated with developing India’s first tree-free E0 engineered boards for furniture and construction applications. Usually, MDF and particle boards contain high amounts of formaldehyde, a known carcinogen. Our boards are E0, which makes them formaldehyde-free (CARB-certified) and therefore, a much healthier alternative. We also offer circular packaging to the industry, where their waste can wrap their products.

How did you arrive at this idea?
My brother Shubham Singh (co-founder and CEO) was a student at Imperial College London, where he was working on carbon-capturing technology as an advanced chemical engineering student. At the time, news of crop burning in India and the pollution it caused in the capital was all over BBC and The Guardian. Shubham, who was already working on projects related to reducing the burden of greenhouse gasses on the environment, decided to work on crop stubble to focus on finding a solution for crop burning in our country. I was a PhD student and a research fellow at the University of Cambridge and I was working on drug development and microbiology. I joined Shubham when he set up his laboratory in Venture Center, Pune and from there Craste was born to bring scientific innovation into the conventional sectors of paper and board-making.

What does sustainability mean to you? 
Sustainability should be part of everyone’s life and become the norm. It should be as much of a priority as drinking clean water, and people should autonomously opt for it without compromising or thinking of it as an option.

Vishal Tolambia, Humanity Centred Designs

What is the process through which you are enabling sustainability in the industry?
India is the second-largest apparel and textile manufacturing destination worldwide. Ninety per cent of the production takes place at micro and small-scale factories, which currently operate in an unorganised and decentralised way. One challenge they face is accumulating pre-consumer textile waste at the manufacturing stage; over 1,600 thousand tonnes of textile waste is generated even before a garment reaches a consumer, and directly ends up in landfills. Humanity Centred Designs has designed and developed an innovative local circular recycling technology that utilises the pre-consumer textile waste from these marginalised MSEs (Micro and Small Enterprises) and converts it into a recycled range of 100-per-cent low-impact luxury textile materials, which we call HCD-Tex. A highly durable, flexible, and strong range of recycled materials that can be utilised by any fashion brand for sustainable product development. Developed at London College of Fashion during my master’s studies, Humanity Centred Designs is working alongside London College of Fashion researchers to transform their low-impact materials into net zero-impact materials in the future.

What does sustainability mean to you?
For us, sustainability means enabling sustainable operations. To fulfil this commitment, we provide training, support, guidance, and workshops to the partner MSEs for advancement towards a circular economy. Sustainability also means that we care for the planet and protect it, by making sure that 80 per cent of our production is through renewable energy sources, responsible consumption of water, and minimised resource utilisation. We’re on a journey to make all fashion MSEs in India circular.

Priya Krishnamoorthy, 200 Million Artisans

What is the medium through which you are enabling sustainability in the industry?
200 Million Artisans (200M) is an impact-first ecosystem enabler reimagining the potential of handmade in India. As a social enterprise dedicated to accelerating growth for craft-led Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (brands, impact enterprises and producers), we bridge gaps in information, innovation and investment in India’s artisan economy with a clear focus on addressing the livelihoods, gender inequality and climate change nexus. By leveraging new media and creative storytelling, we also work towards making information accessible to the larger public, and getting them interested and invested in the long-term sustainability of the artisan sector and the communities that make up this rich, vibrant, creative universe of handmade.

How did you arrive at this idea?
200 Million Artisans started out as a COVID-19 platform to help connect the Indian diaspora who were keen to support artisan communities and enterprises in India but didn’t know how. 200M served as a platform to reduce some of the many information gaps in the sector. We did this by listing resources, creating visibility for fundraisers, and by championing enterprises employing and supporting artisan communities. India’s artisan sector is the second-largest employer after agriculture but simply does not attract the same level of investment or innovation. Our focus on research is to bridge the information asymmetry and leverage data to communicate its sheer size and potential. We believe that the artisan has the potential to usher in a more equitable, sustainable and green economy. It’s time investors, corporates, and policymakers view this in a new light and direct much-needed capital and resources to plug in gaps and build infrastructure.

What does sustainability mean to you?
More than 56 per cent of artisans in India are women, and this is because the artisan sector is designed to offer meaningful employment opportunities at the doorsteps of women in rural India. For us, sustainability means empowering our many creative and social enterprises working with handmade in India to address the ever-present challenges of livelihoods, climate change and gender equality by helping them grow and scale sustainably. Not to mention, handmade inherently champions small-batch production, eco-friendly or sustainably sourced raw materials, thoughtful processes and traditional skills that have been passed down the generations.

Ankit Agarwal, Phool

What is the process through which you are enabling sustainability in the industry?
Fleather is a biomaterial. It is a sustainable, animal-free and non-plastic alternative to conventional animal leather. The process of manufacturing Fleather is based on the principles of biomimicry — a naturally occurring biological process replicated in the lab. We utilise waste flowers, a source of pollution, as our raw material. These flowers serve as a source of nutrition to a particular microbial species, which grow over them. As an end result of this growth process, sheets are formed, which are further treated with certain plant extracts and vegetable dyes. The manufacturing of Fleather is carbon negative and does not incorporate any harmful or hazardous component whereas its conventional competitor, the animal leather, undergoes tanning as a part of its manufacturing process and this tanning involves usage of a lot of toxic chemicals, heavy metals, etc. that wash away with the tannery effluents and mix in river water. Fleather is a step forward in the direction to stop such environmentally degrading practices and establish sustainability.

How did you arrive at this idea?
It was serendipity. Initially, we identified temple flower waste as a source of pollution and started making incense sticks and cones out of it. In the beginning, production capacity was small and a lot of collected flowers remained unutilised. One day, we observed a thick, white, fluffy lump over an unused flower pile. We were intrigued. A deeper dive into it allowed us to understand the microbial growth phenomenon. We also noticed that the velvety touch of this fluffy layer was familiar. The texture resembled that of leather. We were curious to replicate the same in the lab and experiments in that direction led us to the invention of Fleather.

What does sustainability mean to you?
A circular economy model with triple bottom-line benefits along social, economic and environmental lines is sustainability for us.