Chamba 'rumal' artist bags national award

Nuprur, November 29

Dinesh Kumari, a resident of ward number 7 of the town, bagged the national award for promoting the art of Chamba ‘rumal’.

Union Textile and Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal conferred the award on Kumari during the Shilp Guru and National Awards ceremony held at Vigyan Bhawan in Delhi yesterday.

As per information, Kumari had earlier bagged the state award in 1994-95 by the HP Handicraft and Handloom Corporation. She is also a recipient of Dr BR Ambedkar National Award-2017. In 2018, Chief Minister Jai Ram Thakur had conferred the Art and Culture Shikhar Samman on her.

Talking to The Tribune, Kumari said, “I started making Chamba ‘rumal’ at the age of 10. My older sister was my teacher.”

Giving details of the artwork, she said its specialty is that the same pattern is seen on both sides of the cloth. “Chamba ‘rumals’ are exquisitely embroidered art pieces, which depict scenes from epics such as Geet Govind, Bhagavata Puran or simply Radha-Krishna and Shiva-Parvati,” Kumari added.

To popularise the Chamba ‘rumal’ and pass on this handicrafts talent to the next generation, she is also training girls in the art.

Significantly, the craft came to be associated specifically with Chamba due to the patronage given by the rulers of the area. Historically, the craft mainly flourished during the reign of Raja Umed Singh of Chamba from (1748-68), a patron of miniature artists.