The fine handloom lungi villages of Dhaka

What is the national dress for men in Bangladesh? There is no official answer to this. But if you ask what is the most commonly worn garment for men, the answer would be lungi, even after the cultural transition we are going through due to globalisation, aka westernisation. 

The lungi industry is big, and most of it is mechanised today. However, some older ways still persist, where families dye the yarn, put them on traditional wooden looms and weave the lungi with astounding precision and craftsmanship. 

Whenever you hear about handlooms, you'd probably imagine someplace in Sirajganj or Tangail. But this handloom lungi industry is located in Dhaka: in its southern upazilas of Dohar and Nawabganj. 

Although semi-automatic power looms have been replacing manual looms, hundreds of families in these two upazilas are still living off these traditional machines and processes. And not only that, they are making the country's finest lungis which also fetch significantly more money than power loom-made ones. 

The warp and weft villages

In Dohar's Joypara, it is not at all hard to find a lungi factory. Here and there, one will definitely come across several activities related to lungi-making. 

Within the first minute of our entry into the Raipara, Chontek, we met Shahela and Rahima, who were warping threads in a parallel arrangement from a frame fitted with multiple bobbins in their front yard. This is the first stage of the operation where the design of the lungi becomes visible. 

Just outside on the narrow road, two men were stretching the longitudinally arranged threads before applying a sizing agent, ie rice starch on it. Later, they would brush it with an about four feet brush made with natural fibres. Sizing and brushing strengthen and smoothen the threads where there will be no fibre left. 

Wherever you go in these villages, you'll certainly see any of the at least five stages of lungi-making: bleaching and dyeing of the yarn, bobbin winding and warping, aligning and separating the threads through the slots of a reed, or winding the threads around a wooden beam. 

And of course, if you do not happen to see any of these activities if you arrive late (as the activities start at sunup and end before midday) you can locate a factory by the sound

of the shuttle of a loom, carrying the crosswise threads (known as weft) through the longitudinal threads (warp). 

According to a survey carried out by the Handloom Board of the Bangladesh Government in 2021, there are 386 weavers in Dohar and 207 in neighbouring Nawabganj. These weavers have a total of 741 handlooms in these two upazilas. There were handlooms in Ruhitpur, Keraniganj as well, but there are hardly any left now. 

However, the name and fame of Ruhitpuri Lungi are still persistent, which are basically the lungis produced in Dohar and Nawabganj today. These handlooms produce over eight lakh pieces of high-quality lungi every year, worth over Tk121 crore.

"The number may have reduced due to several factors," said Ashis Kumar Paul, the liaison officer of the Handloom Board in Dohar, which was much higher in the past. 

"Around 80% of all these households were once involved in the handloom industry," said Mohammad Alamgir Hossain, a loom owner in the Khalpar area in Joypara. 

Low wages and hard work

The handloom villages are becoming quieter as the shuttles are ceasing to fly back and forth due to a number of factors. 

In our very first encounter with the workers, Shahela, the 55-year-old woman warping the threads jokingly told her coworker, "They will photograph us, and then we will get a job. We won't have to do this anymore." 

"Why don't you want to do it anymore?" We were inquisitive. 

Turns out, workers are poorly paid for their hard work. 

Shahela gets a meagre Tk40 for her work from 9 am to 2 pm, and her coworker gets Tk60. 

Another woman from Chitaghata, Mahmuda, who was readying the threads for the loom, gets Tk100 as payment for her work per day. 

The weavers, the highest-paid workers in this industry, get Tk900 for every piece of fabric they make. One piece of fabric makes six lungis. It takes two days to make this one piece. Their work amounts to around Tk2,700 per week if they work six days a week.

About 10 people are involved in the different stages of making a lungi. Despite the low wages, the total cost is not negligible for the owner of the factory, making it difficult to secure a decent profit. 

At the same time, it bars the owner from raising the wage of the workers. As a result, newer generations are not joining the profession pursued by their forefathers. 

"Our children would rather pull a rickshaw than do this. Many would go abroad," said Firoza, a 70-year-old woman. Firoza said her grandfather, father-in-law, husband - all were involved in hand-loomed lungi production. 

"This is very hard work," she said. 

Many other workers and weavers reiterated what Firoza had to say. 

"This industry will not last long," said Abul Kalam, a weaver in Dohar's Chitaghata area. 

The decline has been occurring for a long time, and the shortage of workers is already evident. We met several weavers who are originally from Comilla. 

Even two weeks after Eid-ul-Azha, all factories were running at limited capacity as the workers were yet to return to work. 

The advances of power looms and the paradox 

There are at least four power loom factories in Dohar, each having more than 30 power looms. Each power loom can make a piece of fabric that produces 300 lungis of the same texture, while its manual counterpart makes six lungis. Similarly, the spinning wheels are gigantic, compared to those used in handlooms. 

The cost involved is also significantly lower in power looms at about one-third, workers and mill owners said. 

The power loom has its own set of challenges though. 

We asked handloom owners why they are not switching to power looms. 

"It takes a lot of investment to set up power looms," said Rima Begum, a woman who looks after the family handloom factory. 

"Space required for the power loom factory is also huge," she added. 

Then comes the quality of the product. Apparently, there is no disagreement about the superior quality of a hand-loomed lungi. There is still decent demand for hand-loomed lungis.

"The hand-loomed lungis of Nawabranj-Dohar are soft, comfortable and very durable. As the fabric lasts longer, its colour also stays intact for a long time," said Shajib Borman, co-founder of Banglar Lungi, an online shop for hand-loomed lungis. 

"In this industry, 80 and 100-count threads are used, which is extremely rare in the whole region, not only the country," Shajib added. 

It is the outstanding local processes matured to perfection through hundreds of years of practice that amount to the fine quality of the fabric. 

Despite all this, the handloom industry is slowly but surely giving up on the power loom, which is faster and cheaper. 

Yet, there is Abdul Manan, who recently started a factory with seven manual pit looms. He was a wholesale trader who sold lungi. Older lungi wholesalers of Dohar are rather rich, with their modern duplex houses vouching for their riches. 

Nowadays, however, there is an excess of new wholesalers, making the business difficult for the older ones. Abdul Mannan, one of the older ones, says he launched the factory to "save his business." The frustration in his voice and his actions contradict each other. 

While working on a stretched thread set-up, he explained how the prices of yarn and dye have multiplied in recent times. 

Then how to fix all these? "The government must ensure that weavers get yarn and dye at a fair price," replied Mannan.