Aditya Saikia, an award-winning mukha shilpakar, or mask maker, laments how unpredictable the weather is. “Kabhi bhi tez dhoop ho jaati hai, aur kabhi bhi tez baarish. (It gets very hot at times followed by torrential rain)”, says the 21-year-old from Majuli, Assam. On the world’s largest inhabited riverine island, the creation of a mukha—used primarily in Vaishnavite performances of bhaonas or folk theatre—doesn’t rely solely on the skill of the artist. Nature plays just as significant a role in this craft tradition, which dates back 500 years.
Artists such as Saikia, under the mentorship of master mask maker and guru Hem Chandra Goswami, are keeping this legacy alive in Samaguri Satra—one of the many monastic centres and cultural hubs that came up in Assam during the 15th-16th centuries. The making of a mask starts with the splitting of three-year-old bamboo into 26 sticks to form the frame. The makers use clay from the Brahmaputra, the lifeline of Assam, along with cow dung. After drying the masks in the sun, a paste of dung and clay is used to give form to mythological characters such as Hanuman and Krishna.
Rising temperatures and unpredictable rain don’t just make the drying of the masks difficult but also create challenging working conditions for artists. Traditional plant extracts are also declining due to severe ecological shifts, making natural pigments like red hengul expensive. To survive, master craftspersons must learn to adapt.
Assam is no stranger to rain or floods. However, the frequency and intensity of rainfall and floods along with drastic riverbank erosion have transformed the region and scuppered any predicted patterns or expectations of rainfall. According to a 2020 paper in Science Direct on protecting the vanishing geo-cultural heritage of India with Assam’s river island as a case study: “Majuli originally had 65 Satras but now only 23 survive…The rest have either moved out of the island or closed completely because river Brahmaputra eroded the land on which they existed.”
This kind of climate vulnerability is being seen across the state. The National Climate Vulnerability Assessment Report published by the Department of Science and Technology in 2021 states that 24 out of Assam’s 27 districts were classified as highly vulnerable to climate change. This year, while Majuli has not witnessed flooding yet, between late June and early August, Sivasagar and Jorhat districts witnessed spurts of heavy to extremely heavy rainfall followed by waves of flash floods.
While the Brahmaputra is the main river in the state, it is fed by smaller rivers from Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland, and other neighbouring states. “The courses of these other rivers have started changing more frequently now than before,” says Akshit Sangomla, senior correspondent, Down to Earth, who writes about climate change.
Agriculture and other nature-dependent craft livelihoods such as pottery have always relied on the silt deposited by rivers on the floodplains. Now, because of extreme rainfall events, coarse sand is being deposited instead of fertile alluvium. In contrast, some areas, which require a certain level of flooding, are going dry, thus impacting the cultivation of rice, black lentils and mustard. “Rising temperatures also mean that Assam and large parts of the North-East are drying up. Flowering and the character of trees is changing, as a result any craft such as silk weaving that depends on plants is being impacted,” says Sangomla.
To truly understand the effect on fragile ecologies, climate change has to be considered in conjunction with other factors, such as unplanned urbanisation, deforestation, poor drainage and inadequate flood management measures. This year’s rainfall in Assam isn’t unprecedented; therefore, to devise preparedness strategies, these human factors have to be kept in mind along with changing weather patterns.
Meanwhile in Majuli’s Salmora—home to a community of kumhars or potters—river bank erosion caused by climate change and some state-led measures has affected their practice. To get rich clay, they often need to make deep pits in the river bank. However, to combat the problem of erosion, the local administration has added restrictions on extraction. With economic viability taking a hit, the youth of the community is moving away from the profession.
Guwahati-based documentary filmmaker Nitin Pegu, whose parents are from Majuli, has been engaging with boat makers and potters in Salmora and adjoining villages for nine years now. He has viewed climate change from a sociological lens in films such as Majuli, Tales From an Island (2017). “They’ve done pottery and boat making for generations. But shortage of farm land due to soil erosion has made those occupations vital to survival,” says Pegu. This impact can be seen in the neighbouring villages as well where people are engaged in buffalo-grazing. Earlier, there were sizeable chaporis, or mid-channel sandbars, left by the river, covered with lush vegetation. As they started shrinking due to erosion, there is no place left for grazing.
And now there is a cap on digging the earth for pots. Multiple livelihoods are being impacted,” says Pegu. As a result, the cost of soil has gone up. Potters need to ferry earth from Sivasagar and Dibrugrah instead of being able to source it locally.
A nuanced assessment
Assam serves as a case study to understand tangible and intangible, economic and non-economic impacts of climate change on craft communities. “The case of Salmora is also an indicator of why the ‘loss and damage’ mechanism should be inclusive of noneconomic damages such as climate-induced trauma, loss of traditional community livelihood and indigenous knowledge system,” states a 2023 media report.
Akriti Tyagi, director, strategic communications, Council on Energy, Environment and Water (CEEW), feels that when a climate shock damages a traditional livelihood, the loss may not end with that year's income. It can threaten knowledge that has travelled through families and communities for generations. “A loom, a craft technique, a building practice, a song or a performance tradition is not easily captured in an economic-loss assessment. Yet these are also forms of capital: cultural capital, community memory and accumulated knowledge,” she elaborates. That is why the climate conversation needs to expand its definition of what is at risk. We should be asking not only what infrastructure or income we stand to lose, but also what knowledge, skills and cultural inheritance become vulnerable in a hotter world increasingly shaped by climate risks.
Master weaver Jamini Payeng from the Mising community is known for conserving traditional weaving techniques—she is currently devising ways to revive designs that were prevalent nearly 500 years ago and is also educating young college students on natural dyeing techniques. Having imbibed the skills from her mother and grandmother, Payeng also got trained in social work from the late Sanjay Ghose, a rural development activist. In 2007, the area of Majuli that she called home was swallowed by the river. She had to move to another part of the island. Payeng, who is touching 50, laments the loss of indigenous architecture made with wrapped mud. The naturally cooling technique would have helped with the rising heat. “In the past few years, temperatures have touched 38-42 degrees Celsius, which modern-day concrete structures are not able to withstand,” she says. “Whether it is too hot or too wet, both conditions are adverse for weavers as we have to shut our looms down.”
Another sector facing similar problems is the state’s signature silk weaving. Muga is known the world over for its natural goldlike sheen. However, unseasonal hail and storms in the past few years have resulted in loss of silk crop for the entire season.
“Eri silk, also known as ahimsa silk with its soft off-white colour, is seeing a major challenge too, as it requires average temperatures of 29-30 degrees Celsius. Assam has always had these ideal conditions. However, now the temperatures have gone up to 32-34 degrees as a result of which cocoons are not surviving,” says Rishiraj Sarma, founder, Maati Community, a social enterprise dedicated to capacity building and empowerment of indigenous communities across the North-East.
In some instances, due to destroyed crops, weavers have had to source silk from Bhagalpur in Bihar, which leads to higher production costs. To cater to the demand for eri, a new set of rearers are coming up in Meghalaya, where temperatures have risen from 24 degrees to 28 over the last two decades, offering optimal conditions for the raising of silkworms. “Aisa raha tho muga aur eri Assam se lupt na ho jaaye (I sincerely hope that muga and eri don’t disappear from Assam). This is certainly a wake-up call,” says Sarma.