Bangladesh's legendary muslin fabric is in need of support, participants at a discussion on reviving the marvellous material heard on Sunday.
Speakers at the “Revival of Muslin: Policies and Institutions” workshop said government support as well as private initiative were needed to promote the legendary textile and protect the artisans who weave it.
“A major intervention is needed from the public sector to promote muslin and to protect the livelihood of muslin artisans,” researcher and rights activist Hamida Hossain said in her address at the Begum Sufia Kamal Auditorium in the Bangladesh National Museum.
The effort to revive jamdani and muslin, whose manufacture was systematically decimated by the British colonial authorities, is part of a larger process to reclaim the heritage of this textile and to promote brand Bangladesh globally, speakers said.
The workshop is one of several events this month during Muslin Festival 2016, organised by Drik, Aarong and Bangladesh National Museum.
In 2013, Bangladesh's jamdani muslin was included in the list of Masterpieces of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity by Unesco.
Artisans and investors alike need government support, preferably through a public-private partnership arrangement, speakers said. One member of the audience suggested that a Tk50 crore fund be set up to support the revival of muslin.
Speakers at the discussion admitted that little was known about the international demand for the textile and said research into this was needed.
The history of muslin goes back at least a millennium and the fabric's origins are shrouded in mystery.
Marco Polo described the luxurious fabric in 1298 in his Travels, saying it was made in Mosul in Iraq, from which it was said to take its name. Others have claimed that the textile was made in the southern Indian coastal town of Masulipatnam.
Neither claim has ever been proven.
As early as the 10th century, Arab traders described an exceedingly fine cloth originating in Bengal.
What is known for certain is that in the 17th and 18th centuries, Mughal Bengal emerged as the foremost muslin exporter in the world, with Dhaka as capital of the worldwide muslin trade.
At the end of the 16th century the English traveler Ralph Fitch wrote admiringly about the muslin of Sonargaon. Earlier in the same century, Portuguese traveler Duarte Barbosa also described the muslin of what is now Bangladesh.
In Central Asia, muslin is referred to as “daka,” a reference to Dhaka's central role in the production and trade of the fabric.
The fine gauze has several commercial applications and is used in cerebrovascular neurosurgery.
The discussion was chaired by Mustafizur Rahman, executive director of the Centre for Policy Dialogue. Speakers included Industries Secretary Mosharraf Hossain Bhuiyan and Additional Secretary Jamal Abdul Naser Chowdhury.
