Ramappa temple’s architectural grandeur to be replicated on handloom sarees

By all means, it's an extremely difficult task. But weavers of the Kamalapur Handlooms Cooperative Society have managed to perfect the art of weaving

Hanamkonda: The intricate stone carvings in the famous Ramappa temple held everyone spellbound. And now these complex designs in stone are sought to be replicated on handloom sarees.

By all means, it’s an extremely difficult task. But weavers of the Kamalapur Handlooms Cooperative Society have managed to perfect the art of weaving so much that now the intricate designs of the UNESCO world heritage site, will be worn by womenfolk proudly. The weavers managed to get the exact replicas of the motifs onto the hand woven silk sarees, thanks to their strenuous efforts.

This move to get the temple designs onto the handloom silk sarees, which could be branded as ‘Ramappa Sarees’, is being welcomed as a refreshing effort on part of the Telangana Government to popularise the awe-inspiring carvings of the Ramappa temple, which was recognised as a UNESCO world heritage site recently.

The State Handloom Weavers Cooperative Society, more popularly known as TSCO, had painstakingly trained five weavers of the Kamalapur handlooms cooperative society in weaving the Ramappa silk saris.

The weavers were trained for 45 days in weaving the designs, which included elephants, peacocks, lotus flowers, shiv linga and other carvings found in the temple.

“They wove 23 silk sarees with these images. The saris have been sent to the TSCO officials in Hyderabad. Hopefully, they will be put up on sale shortly”, Kamalapur society manager Samala Damodar told Telangana Today here on Friday.

“Twenty three silk saris with Ramappa temple motifs including elephants, peacocks, lotus, Shiva Linga and others were made in Kamalalpur. We have handed over the saris to the TSCO officials, and they are about to sell those saris,” said Kamalapur weavers’ society manager Samala Damodar to ‘Telangana Today’. These saris costing around Rs 15000 to Rs 20000 each will be sold in Hyderabad and other cities shortly, he said.

Assistant Director of Warangal Handlooms and Textiles G Raghava Rao said the saris will be sold shortly in the market. “Our society people have recently handed over the saris to the TSCO staff,” he said.

Meanwhile, the weavers of the Kamalapur are ready to weave more saris with the motifs of Ramappa temple, if the TSCO gave them orders. “We are happy to weave them. We have learnt the intricacies in weaving the saris and proved our talent, thanks to TSCO,” said Mamidi Sammaiah, one of the five weavers who made the saris.

Another weaver, Gajula Savitha said that it had taken 10 days for her to weave a sari. “Weaving the silk saris is remunerative for us. We get Rs 700 to Rs 1,000 per day by weaving a sari,” she added.

Manager Damodar said that the Kamalapur weavers society established in 1950 had already earned a name for making Himroo saris and handloom jeans.