Dastkar is a
registered society that aims at improving the economic
status of craftspeople, thereby promoting the
survival of traditional crafts. It provides marketing facilities and support
services to traditional artisans and low-income craft groups that need
assistance.
The primary objectives of the organisation were to provide a link between the
rural craftsperson and the urban consumer and to
tackle the problems faced by craftspeople in
the country through direct interaction with the artisans themselves.
Dastkar strongly believes in 'craft' as a social, cultural and economic force of
enormous strength and potential. The crux of its
programme is to help crafts-people learn to use their own inherent skills as a
means of employment, income generation and economic self sufficiency.
The craft skill and the product – its identification, development, production
and marketing - are the catalyst to help traditional
craftspeople regain their place in the Indian
economic mainstream and development process. The objective is to create
self-sustaining, viable producer groups and encourage them to market directly
and not to subsidise craft. Guiding the
process of developing a craft - from identifying the skill and creating
awareness of it's potential in both craftsperson
and consumer, developing, designing, costing and then marketing the product,
and finally (but as importantly) suggesting the proper usages and investment of
the income generated, are the various
components of the programme. It must ensure that the end product is competitive
- not just in its worthiness of purpose, or
the neediness of its producer but in cost, utility and aesthetic, because
a consumer does not buy out of compassion.
Dastkar's vision is of craftspeople especially women, running their
own lives; economically independent and self-sufficient through their own
efforts and through the production and sale of craft
products using indigenous materials and
employing inherent traditional skills that are in harmony with local social,
cultural and environmental norms.
The society was founded in 1981 by six women who had worked in the craft and
development sector. From a group of women working informally on a wholly
voluntary basis, it is today a full-time development and alternative marketing
organisation with an all-India outreach.