Students roped in to boost handloom sales

College students in the city are tightening their money belts this month and cutting down on visits to their favourite eating and shopping joints. Instead, they are using their pocket money to buy handloom saris, bed sheets and towels. To help improve the plight of the weavers in Tamil Nadu, the University of Madras has tied up with the Tamil Nadu Handloom Weavers' Society (Co-optex) to make students and faculty of colleges affiliated to it to buy handloom products.


Joint director of Handlooms and Textiles and chief general manager at Co-optex, S Prakasam said, "This is part of a scheme — Kaitariki Kaikuddupam — a Hand for Handlooms. Faculty members and students are expected to buy and if possible, sell these products on the streets after January 26 in order to popularise the use of handloom. We are expecting to make sales worth Rs5 crore through this scheme and hope this will give a boost to weavers' community."

The scheme is being spearheaded by Dr G Thiruvasagam, the vice-chancellor of University of Madras. "This is a community oriented project involving all the colleges affiliated to the university," he said. "This gives the students the opportunity to do their bit for the society. They can accept it as a social service project and sell the materials and gather funds for the weavers."

Accordingly, targets have been set by the colleges. While the Ethiaraj College for Women has set a sales target worth Rs20 lakh, Qaid e-Millat college is next with a target of Rs12 lakh and Stella Maris College Rs10 lakh. The Women's Christian College (WCC) opted for a target of Rs7.5 lakh and MOP Vaishnav College hopes to achieve target sales worth Rs2.5 lakh.

However, though the University claims that no student or teacher would be compelled to make purchases from Co-optex, colleges are forced to make it compulsory to achieve their targets. "This exercise is compulsory for all students and faculty members of all colleges," said a source in WCC. As per instructions, all students are required to pay sums varying between Rs300-Rs400 depending on the college's target. The faculty members are expected to cough up between Rs2,000-Rs3,000 or Rs1,000 depending on whether the college is aided or not. The entire exercise is to be channelled through the NSS volunteers in each institution. However, Thiruvasagam denied that exercise is compulsory for all students.

Meanwhile, teachers accompanied by students could be spotted browsing the Co-optex store at Egmore as they grappled with the task of choosing the best among the available products. A teacher, who did not wish to be named, said some colleges were unhappy about the scheme. "We are expected to sell lakhs of rupees worth products besides our regular teaching duties. It is unfair to force us to shell out a couple of thousand rupees suddenly. We have many students from poor backgrounds who can't afford to donate even Rs300."

Co-optex has received orders worth Rs2.36 crore and is confident of touching the Rs5-crore mark