Raksha Bandhan now is set to have a patriotic flavour as the date of celebration coincides with the country’s Independence Day this year and hundreds of women artisans in Kalna, Bengal’s Rakhi Hub, are busy in furnishing the Rakhis (a traditional wrist band for the ritual) with the tricolour, bearing tags as Jai Hind & Jai Bangla.

Kalna’s Rakhi Hub has seen a business turnover worth Rs 250 crore in the recent years, especially after the state government in 2016 developed the Rs 75 lakh Rakhi cluster in the small municipal town beside the Bhagirathi and the Youth Affair department promoted Biswa Bangla Rakhis in 2017.

Rakhis produced in Kalna, according to the artisan’s cooperatives “are dispatched to places like San Francisco, Sacramento, Hong Kong, Bangkok and even London over the years.”

“We have received order for 6.37 lakh pieces of Rakhis from the state’s Youth Services department alone this year and the deliveries have to be made by 7 August and these will bear tags such as ‘Jai Hind and Jai Bangla,” said Tapan Modak, secretary, Kalna Weavers & Artisans Welfare Society, an artisan’s body operating in the cluster.

He added: “This year, my unit earned $ 400 from exports to Thailand and San Francisco.” The business volume of his counterparts such as Shankar Mitra and Pradip Debnath however was more than double Modak’s figure. Also, Kalna’s Rakhi business, according to Modak and his colleagues: “has crossed Rs 250 crore as large scale units are operated by private players of the municipal town. The are traders from Rajasthan and it was their families that introduced the trade here about 35 years ago.” Individual artisans like Bulti Das, and Bishakha Banerjee have been drawing wages of Rs 85,000 to Rs 1.30 lakh annually.

Every morning, more than a thousand women, mostly the housewives from the neighbouring villages like Patagachhi, Bagnapara, Samudragarh, Mondolai, Purba Satgachhia are seen making beeline to the cluster where at least a dozen Rakhi manufacturing units are operating and the trade now has become sustainable means for self-development of the women. West Bengal Khadi & Village Industries Board (WBKVIB) under the Micro, Small & Medium Enterprise department, considering the flourishing trend provided technical support for the cluster and the common facility centre was set up.

Now, according to Mr Abhijit Kar, General Manager, District Industries Centre in Burdwan: “As Kalna has shown the way, we have plans for further expansion there and we are also encouraged to set up another cluster in Katwa where we are planning to accommodate at least a hundred Self Help Groups.”

Tomorrow, a trade & commerce delegation from Bangladesh is visiting Burdwan and the issue of Rakhi export to Dhaka may also be discussed, district administration officials hinted. Mr Vijay Bharti, DM, Burdwan (East) said: “Many issues will be discussed at length on business and export with the delegation tomorrow.”