2.21 The Lacware Sector

 

Channapatna, situated on the State Highway approximately 62 kilometres from Bangalore in the Bangalore Rural district, has been home to the traditional lathe-turned wooden toys industry, known as lacware, for more than a century. Lacware refers to wooden articles that are turned on the lathes and finished with lac, the sap of an insect, which is mixed with colour pigments. The lac-coated wooden products, such as toys and napkin rings, are sturdy, with a glossy, finished appearance. As a traditional handicraft form of Karnataka, the production of lacware products is the source of livelihood for nearly 3,000 people in Channapatna. Each year Channapatna produces lacware products valued at approximately Rs. 25 crores. Workers remain semi-skilled and poorly paid; they have, in fact, remained so for decades now.

In the government’s ‘sectoral taxonomy’, the lacware industry is considered to be a handicraft. Despite this designation, the sector has received no long-lasting, strong support from the government, industries, or markets. Whatever meagre support the government has given to the workers has been more in terms of promoting skilled workers through exhibitions and fairs, a measure which has little impact on the majority of the lacware workers. Each year, an estimated 10 per cent of lacware workers in Channapatna are forced to move to other jobs in search of more stable income. The industry has long ceased to attract new entrants. Workers have little confidence that the sector can thrive as an industry capable of providing them with a decent livelihood.

 

Modes of Production

 

Many of the 2,500 to 3,000 workers working in toy-making in Channapatna are in the 30-35 age group, and have, on an average, worked for nearly 10 years at wood-turning. While wood-turning is a fast-developing art in the rest of the world, Channapatna has seen only slow development in lacware. Historically, the wood-turners of Channapatna worked on the traditional hand-operated lathes called patris. Even now, there are many workers in remote areas of Channapatna who are still dependent on traditional patris for production. The patri, by the very nature of its design, can be used to make only small or medium-sized products, while power lathes can be used to make large and complex shapes. While today nearly 90% of turning in Channapatna happens on power lathes, workers, especially those still dependent on patris, suffer from low productivity and a limited range of products which they can make.

 

Lathe turners are not the only workers involved in the toy-making process. Other related businesses include artisans who paint the lacware, product finishers, and suppliers. While the turners are the primary producers, artists form an integral part of the industry. Their work in the industry begins once the turners finish theirs.

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Artists give the products a ‘finishing touch', either by drawing on the figures or colouring them. These artists seek work from private enterprises and operate as independent workers.   Status of Work and Wage Patternse   Small, private entrepreneurs usually own between four and ten lathes, and employ 5-6 dependent workers. Currently, there are about 300 of these private enterprises active in Channapatna.