THE COTTON PLANT 



GOSSYPIUM 



MANUFACTURES 



Hand-looms 



said of India, and with some force, that " weaving is for the most part 

 the pursuit of the bye- time of the persons who weave." That is doubtless 

 the condition in many parts of the country to-day, but here and there 

 centres of professional hand-loom weaving still exist where the village 

 weaver holds an honoured position. He, in fact, turns out a fair portion 

 of the dresses worn by the more conservative and orthodox members of 

 the community. Increased prosperity of these hard-working and highly 

 deserving craftsmen was entertained by some writers as likely to ensue 

 when the repeal (in 1896) was announced of the tax on yarn, conjointly 

 with the imposition of a countervailing duty on power-loom manufactures, 

 both foreign and Indian. It was thought that all that need further be done, 

 to restore and uphold the hand-loom industry, was to teach the Native 



Fiy-shuttie. weavers the use of the fly-shuttle and a few other such contrivances. 



A century ago or more these very contrivances had in Europe been 

 found quite useless in the contest with steam, but it was presumed con- 

 ditions existed in India that raised the possibility of hand-loom improve- 

 ment to a position of supreme importance. Hence it was urged, among 

 other considerations, that "the hope of the hand-loom industry lies 

 in the production of goods of a kind which cannot profitably be made by 

 the power-loom, such as those compounded in an intricate fashion or made 

 in a very complicated pattern. The fact that after a long struggle with the 

 products of the mills, the hand-loom industry still survives, may be helc 

 to show that it has vitality to preserve it yet for many years." It woulc 

 very possibly be nearer the truth to say that the hope of the hand-looi 

 weaver lies in the restriction of his operations to lines that are too small tc 

 tempt the competition of the power-loom worker. It may, in fact, be safel) 

 affirmed that there is nothing either too fine in texture or too complicate 

 in pattern for the power-loom manufacturer to produce. His advent 01 

 the field is alone restricted by the possibilities of profit. The finest Daces 

 muslins and the most intricate Kashmir shawls can be and have been 

 produced by machinery cheaper than by hand labour. But there ai 

 markets eminently suited to the hand-weaver, such as the productior 

 of special saris and lungis of a particular shape and size that the power- 

 loom producer does not successfully contest. 



There is this also in favour of the hand-loom weaver he can purchase 

 the very best English spun yarn and produce a quality of fabric admittedly 

 superior to the very best power-loom textiles ordinarily turned out by the 

 Indian mills. But, let it be repeated, his safety lies in the goods he manu- 

 factures being of a fancy or special nature, meeting local markets known to 

 him, rather than in regular commercial articles intended for large markets. 



Centres. HAND-LOOM INDUSTRY. It would occupy much time to review, 



however briefly, the chief centres of hand-loom production and the cla^s 

 of goods turned out. The figures given within brackets, in the enumeration 

 that follows of the cotton-weaving centres of India, denote the number 

 of steam-power mills in 1904. The square brackets show the provincial 

 totals and the round brackets the district totals, while districts without 

 figures have no power-loom mills. 



Factories The districts most famed are : PAN JAB [8] namely, Dera Ismail Khan, 



Multan, Shahpur, Kohat, Peshawar, Lahore (2), Armitsar (1), Delhi (5), Rohtak, 

 Sialkot, Ludhiana, Gurdaspur, and Jallandhar. Thus 13 districts of the Panjab 

 are noted for their cotton manufactures, and three of these possess power looms. 

 Similarly the UNITED PROVINCES [9] Benares, Bulandshahr, Sikandrabad, 

 Azamgarh, Lucknow, Cawnpore (4), Mirzapore (1), Aligarh (1), Agra (3), Fyza- 



Hopeful 

 Markets. 



Special arw 

 or lungis. 



616 





