WEBVTT 00:31.880 --> 00:33.760 My name is Pankaj Sekhsaria 00:33.760 --> 00:37.760 and I teach at the Centre for Technology Alternatives for Rural Areas 00:37.760 --> 00:42.160 at the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay in India. 00:42.160 --> 00:47.120 Every semester I offer a course titled Technology, Society and Development 00:47.120 --> 00:49.120 an integral component of which 00:49.120 --> 00:51.400 is a three-day hand-spinning workshop 00:51.400 --> 00:53.520 where students use the spinning wheel 00:53.520 --> 00:57.360 to convert cotton fibre to cotton yarn. 00:57.360 --> 00:58.600 While spinning wheel, 00:58.600 --> 01:00.840 known in Indian languages as the "Charkha" 01:00.840 --> 01:03.800 is an integral part of modern India's imagination, 01:03.800 --> 01:06.320 very few people have actually seen the object, 01:06.320 --> 01:08.840 leave alone having worked with it. 01:08.840 --> 01:10.800 There is also a huge discussion on 01:10.800 --> 01:13.400 the irrelevance of this technology in modern times 01:13.400 --> 01:15.960 because it is hand-driven, slow 01:15.960 --> 01:18.920 and low on output and productivity. 01:18.920 --> 01:20.720 The attempt in the three-day workshop 01:20.720 --> 01:22.880 is to churn this narrative of irrelevance 01:22.880 --> 01:25.160 on its head through a combination of 01:25.160 --> 01:26.680 discussion and debate, 01:26.680 --> 01:29.760 but more importantly, experiential learning and 01:29.760 --> 01:31.440 the possibility of creating 01:31.440 --> 01:36.280 tacit knowledge and understanding. 01:36.280 --> 01:38.600 What is particularly fascinating is to watch 01:38.600 --> 01:40.800 how the process of learning unfolds 01:40.800 --> 01:42.760 and what experiences and memories 01:42.760 --> 01:44.800 the students take away. 01:44.800 --> 01:47.280 The highlight of course is a small length - 01:47.280 --> 01:50.260 100 to 200 meters on average of cotton yarn - 01:50.260 --> 01:52.360 students take with them 01:52.360 --> 01:54.680 as a real, tangible output 01:54.680 --> 01:57.489 of what they have created, themselves. 01:57.489 --> 02:00.000 ... 02:00.000 --> 02:03.292 And... your hank is done! 02:23.720 --> 02:26.160 This thing... spinning thing... 02:26.160 --> 02:28.640 cannot be learnt... online. 02:28.640 --> 02:30.280 You need hands-on experience, 02:30.280 --> 02:33.040 like you have to like 02:33.040 --> 02:36.160 devote your time daily to like 02:36.160 --> 02:40.275 attain a level of... perfection. 02:48.748 --> 02:51.240 When I start spinning, 02:51.240 --> 02:54.920 I don't know when one hour passes, 02:54.920 --> 02:57.240 so that was very different. 02:57.240 --> 03:00.080 When I do code, I feel like 03:00.080 --> 03:02.560 wasting a lot of time or 03:02.560 --> 03:04.560 I sometimes, sometimes I give up 03:04.560 --> 03:07.320 and sometimes I just go out and walk. 03:07.320 --> 03:11.040 But... this is different, this is not screen. 03:11.040 --> 03:14.920 This... involved a lot of focus, 03:14.920 --> 03:18.571 focus and patience I think. 03:23.209 --> 03:26.200 And I got to know that 03:26.200 --> 03:30.560 my... grandmother also used to do this and 03:30.560 --> 03:34.320 maybe I'll gift "Charkha" to my mom 03:34.320 --> 03:38.120 because she knows how to spin but she never did 03:38.120 --> 03:40.200 ... 03:40.200 --> 03:44.560 Like, straight-forward answer is yarn-making but 03:44.560 --> 03:46.200 spending time with yourself 03:46.200 --> 03:48.640 is one thing which I learnt, like 03:48.640 --> 03:52.240 that happens when I sketch. 03:52.240 --> 03:56.760 I attended a charcoal drawing workshop once, so 03:56.760 --> 04:00.000 I felt like that, like the feeling was similar. 04:05.550 --> 04:09.160 Like yah! Like in one and half hour 04:09.160 --> 04:12.160 a beginner like me can prepare this much. 04:27.480 --> 04:29.040 Like hands on 04:29.040 --> 04:30.840 was not something that we experienced 04:30.840 --> 04:32.440 until probably we entered 04:32.440 --> 04:34.640 our architecture school. 04:34.640 --> 04:37.240 So when there are encounters like this, 04:37.240 --> 04:39.880 we are able to actually 04:39.880 --> 04:42.240 experience how... 04:42.240 --> 04:45.307 we ourselves can contribute to creating something. 05:02.600 --> 05:04.880 Like you know you, you need to be in a 05:04.880 --> 05:06.240 certain sense of a rhythm, 05:06.240 --> 05:10.840 with your body and... what is happening. 05:10.840 --> 05:12.640 I think at an emotional level 05:12.640 --> 05:15.080 it's actually this alienation you know, this 05:15.080 --> 05:17.800 response to alienation that is 05:17.800 --> 05:22.120 happening when I engage and try to 05:22.120 --> 05:23.520 like, work with this 05:23.520 --> 05:25.760 or else, I think it's also when I'm knitting, 05:25.760 --> 05:27.815 it's the same thing. 05:35.080 --> 05:37.782 And it's very nice, it's very beautiful that 05:37.782 --> 05:39.518 we can actually use our hands and 05:39.518 --> 05:42.101 we've like sort of just forgotten all of it and 05:42.101 --> 05:44.440 So, in fact, I was... like 05:44.440 --> 05:45.681 going to ask you later, that 05:45.681 --> 05:48.000 tomorrow can I bring my daughter also? 05:49.585 --> 05:54.000 I have been working on threads itself... ... insect threads. 05:54.000 --> 05:56.937 This kind of was a different domain 05:56.937 --> 06:00.494 because unless you touch the cotton yourself you're not aware how 06:00.494 --> 06:02.771 how the thread is made out of it 06:02.772 --> 06:06.584 ... and it's still a mystery 06:06.584 --> 06:08.871 You knew it before hand or 06:08.871 --> 06:11.033 First time... learnt now. 06:11.033 --> 06:11.879 Great! 06:15.674 --> 06:19.264 The entire process kind of is very cognitive and you 06:19.264 --> 06:21.483 need to have the intuition to 06:21.483 --> 06:24.638 to know when the thread will break or when it will not. 06:24.638 --> 06:27.148 Had it twisted inside my hand or 06:27.148 --> 06:30.764 do I need to allow the cotton to be pulled first and then... 06:30.764 --> 06:32.319 or do I need to rotate the "Charkha"? 06:32.319 --> 06:37.450 So I think that better understanding I could feel from the fabric in my hand. 06:37.450 --> 06:40.758 And as a child I would... make small-small pots 06:40.758 --> 06:44.840 and it has like a similar kind of understanding, like when you're trying to shape the pot. 06:44.840 --> 06:49.836 So... yeah... that is my memory of working with the hands. 06:49.836 --> 06:53.811 It is very natural when you're working with materials like this 06:53.811 --> 06:55.817 where they are feeble, but then you 06:55.817 --> 06:58.470 with your own hands, are shaping them. 06:58.470 --> 07:05.654 So I think with any material, when you're working with hands, it would do the same thing for you. 07:05.654 --> 07:09.766 I think after a point of time the 07:09.766 --> 07:14.959 your cognitive sense of what is happening, like from a purely mechanical experience, 07:14.959 --> 07:17.718 where you're just trying to understand the movements 07:17.718 --> 07:20.238 to more cognitive experience where you 07:20.238 --> 07:22.595 now feel the cotton and understand the 07:22.595 --> 07:27.092 pulling of the thread and the rotation simultaneously. 07:29.884 --> 07:33.402 I told my grandmother that I went for this 07:33.402 --> 07:37.280 you know, spinning class and she was quite happy 07:37.280 --> 07:42.965 that such kind of a thing exists in technical institutes like ours and... 07:42.965 --> 07:46.213 she, she was, she went back into her days when 07:46.213 --> 07:49.726 she would spin such things and then take it to the shopkeeper 07:49.726 --> 07:51.380 and in exchange of that, 07:51.380 --> 07:55.125 the amount that she has reached, she'll get a equivalent amount of cloth. 07:55.125 --> 07:58.216 And that is how her clothes used to get stitched. 07:58.216 --> 08:01.419 Every child in home would be doing it. 08:01.419 --> 08:06.702 ... and then, since she belonged to the Pakistan side of the border, 08:06.702 --> 08:10.690 she remembered the atrocities that happened at that time and she was explaining that, 08:10.690 --> 08:15.848 that the weavers' thumbs were cut by the Britishers. 08:15.848 --> 08:18.930 So as a revolt they started this thing 08:18.930 --> 08:23.522 where everybody would be spinning at home and taking their own cloth. 08:33.325 --> 08:36.131 Yesterday I thought - Okay, I got the technique! 08:36.131 --> 08:43.620 Today I'm like... still learning like... my first day, so 08:53.631 --> 08:59.607 So... When I first came to know about this spinning workshop, I did not have any idea that 08:59.607 --> 09:02.164 it's based on Gandhi's ideologies and all, 09:02.164 --> 09:04.248 which we have studied in history and 09:04.248 --> 09:06.134 I've seen the pictures, that's it. 09:06.134 --> 09:08.530 I have always been into academics and 09:08.530 --> 09:10.530 not like beyond that, mostly. 09:10.566 --> 09:13.273 It was really difficult to actually get the 09:13.273 --> 09:14.734 yarn out of it. It's like, 09:14.734 --> 09:16.127 it is really a scientific process, 09:16.127 --> 09:18.090 to actually measure the tension 09:18.090 --> 09:20.636 and then you need to extend it. 09:37.440 --> 09:43.917 Today, the third day, I was able to do it on my own and I felt like, I was independent. 09:43.917 --> 09:50.322 Basically, it's like you need to feel the process. You need to feel the vibration in your fingertips 09:50.322 --> 09:53.817 so that you can actually get the yarn out of it properly. 09:56.734 --> 10:02.923 Aaah, it's a gut feeling actually, it depends on the practice, can't express it in values. 10:02.923 --> 10:06.647 So it's just a feeling that we need to get it on our own. 10:06.647 --> 10:12.080 And like other students who were saying like their grandmothers and all... they used to do this. 10:12.080 --> 10:14.964 But I did not get any opportunity to actually see it. 10:14.964 --> 10:21.462 So maybe, I will be passing on to my generation and my brother is also there, I'll be telling this experience, so yeah. 10:27.970 --> 10:34.363 It is really relaxing and it's just a good feeling, which everyone should have. 10:51.572 --> 10:55.824 See, being a mechanical engineer 10:55.824 --> 10:59.560 I could... when after I learnt it 10:59.560 --> 11:04.008 I could... understand the basics of it. 11:04.008 --> 11:07.419 And this is much more relevant in today's scenario about 11:07.419 --> 11:11.895 energy crisis and the climate change and so many other things. 11:11.895 --> 11:16.070 And most of this being a productive art, 11:16.070 --> 11:18.907 whatever you produce you can consume it. 11:18.907 --> 11:26.081 This way you learn to optimise your needs and optimise your consumption pattern. 11:26.081 --> 11:28.750 Some strands, they will break 11:28.750 --> 11:30.369 but if pull out 11:30.369 --> 11:35.820 See when you say I am independent on my fabric, you are dependent on somebody else's as well. 11:35.820 --> 11:39.794 This inter-dependence is built into your independence. 11:39.794 --> 11:45.289 The farmer, spinner, weaver, dyer, tailor - all this chain! 11:45.289 --> 11:50.424 Then I must always see that, whatever product I'm doing, for whom, 11:50.424 --> 11:53.243 he should not be in a trouble or he should be at comfort. 11:53.243 --> 11:57.000 Realising the value of our efforts and somebody else's efforts also. 11:57.000 --> 12:01.607 So, all these small connections, I could make it while I was doing it. 12:01.607 --> 12:08.406 It has got... medicinal values or physiotherapy, therapeutic values, 12:08.406 --> 12:11.422 economic considerations, social considerations. 12:20.652 --> 12:23.677 It's a kind of a meditation 12:23.677 --> 12:28.927 Sometimes you lose yourself... totally, immerse yourself totally, into it for hours 12:28.927 --> 12:31.126 if you do it regularly. 12:44.874 --> 12:46.717 It's a measured lifestyle. 12:46.717 --> 12:51.324 So this seed is sown into their mind. 12:51.324 --> 12:55.523 During three days or four days workshop, people learn the technique. 12:55.523 --> 13:00.441 But the discussions which go around, that stays with them for long. 13:01.600 --> 13:05.806 While working in IIT, since they have come on their own they... 13:05.806 --> 13:10.692 they can understand the nitty-gritties of the process... quickly. 13:10.692 --> 13:15.857 Frequency of... teaching them or going to them and guiding them 13:15.857 --> 13:19.492 is much less over here compared to other places. 13:27.700 --> 13:30.208 Start rotating and keep pulling. 13:37.973 --> 13:40.461 Of course, first day, most of them get frustrated 13:40.461 --> 13:45.061 because the yarn breaks so many times and 13:45.061 --> 13:47.901 "Somebody else is doing, but I could not do that" 13:47.901 --> 13:49.901 - so that comparison also does it. 13:58.013 --> 14:00.415 But! When we say that 14:00.415 --> 14:02.031 how much is not important, 14:02.031 --> 14:05.734 how much time you enjoyed it, doing it, that is important! 14:05.734 --> 14:08.870 Then they start shifting their focus on something else. 14:08.870 --> 14:12.448 Second day about 80% of them can... do it. 14:12.448 --> 14:15.734 Third day 101% can do it. 14:15.734 --> 14:20.750 And third day everybody is from within 14:20.750 --> 14:25.241 so satisfied into... you can read on their faces. 14:25.241 --> 14:28.084 So much satisfied that they could do it, 14:28.084 --> 14:31.095 and that is the real reward for us! 15:16.320 --> 15:22.073 Beyond technology is human relationship and that is what is much more important. 15:22.073 --> 15:27.034 So, in CTARA, particularly with these people, after graduating from this place, 15:27.034 --> 15:30.662 they will go at higher places in policy making. 15:30.662 --> 15:35.031 So for them it is very important, realizing the value of efforts and 15:35.031 --> 15:40.609 this concept of non-elimination of the human aspect in pursuit of technology. 15:40.609 --> 15:44.105 That time when they are there to take a decision, 15:44.105 --> 15:49.895 they might realize that - Oh this! This is what is more important than this. 15:49.895 --> 15:55.658 That is why I feel that these kind of workshops in IIT kind of institutions 15:55.658 --> 16:00.341 are much more important, than in any other places. 16:00.341 --> 16:04.532 The whole crux lies into whether you really enjoy what you are doing. 16:04.532 --> 16:07.508 How much yarn you make - it doesn't matter! 16:07.508 --> 16:09.317 How much time you enjoyed into it (does). 16:09.317 --> 16:13.010 Because this gives you a quality thinking time. 16:13.010 --> 16:15.267 Particularly in spinning, if you enjoy it, 16:15.267 --> 16:18.000 then next time nobody will have to tell you that you do it. 16:18.000 --> 16:21.197 You, on your own, will sit down and do it and... 16:21.197 --> 16:24.929 the, the "Charkha" will drive you! 16:24.929 --> 16:29.888 Instrumental music - "Vaishnav jan to"