Art & Culture Quiz: Textiles and Sarees of India

The correct answer is A, Gujarat. Patola sarees are woven at Patan in Gujarat, where both the warp and the weft yarns are tied and dyed before weaving. Because both sets of yarn carry the design, the finished pattern reads the same on the front and the back of the cloth, which is what makes it a double ikat. Option B is wrong because Odisha weaves the Sambalpuri bandha saree, an ikat in which only one set of yarn is usually resist dyed. Option C is wrong because Telangana is the home of Pochampally ikat, known for its geometric patterns. Option D is wrong because Maharashtra weaves the Paithani saree, a brocade with peacock and lotus motifs on the pallu and no ikat work at all. Remember the pair Patan with Patola and the word double.

The correct answer is B, Bishnupur in West Bengal. Baluchari weaving takes its name from the village of Baluchar in Murshidabad and moved to Bishnupur in the Bankura district, which is its centre today. Its mark of identity is the pallu, where episodes from the Ramayana and the Mahabharata, and scenes of court life, are woven in silk. Option A is wrong because Kanchipuram weaves thick mulberry silk sarees with contrasting borders, not narrative pallus. Option C is wrong because Chanderi in Madhya Pradesh is known for light, glossy and almost transparent cotton silk sarees. Option D is wrong because Paithan in Maharashtra is the home of the Paithani, whose pallu carries peacock and lotus motifs rather than stories. The pair to hold is Bishnupur with Baluchari.

The correct answer is C, Assam. Muga is reared from the Assam silkworm in the Brahmaputra valley and is the only naturally golden silk in the world, used for the mekhela chador and for sarees woven at Sualkuchi near Guwahati. Option A is wrong because Karnataka is the leading producer of mulberry silk, the white and fine variety that makes up the bulk of Indian silk, and Mysuru is famous for its crepe silk sarees. Option B is wrong because Jharkhand, with Chhattisgarh and Odisha, produces tasar, the coarser copper coloured forest silk. Option D is wrong because West Bengal rears mulberry silk and weaves Baluchari and Jamdani, but not Muga. Assam alone also gives eri, the warm ahimsa silk. A useful rule is that Assam supplies two of the four Indian silks, muga and eri, while the other states supply mulberry and tasar.

The correct answer is B, Tamil Nadu. The saree is named after the temple town of Kanchipuram in Tamil Nadu, where it is woven from thick mulberry silk. Its body and its contrasting border are often woven separately and then joined so firmly that the joint holds even if the saree tears, and wide bands of zari are used. Option A is wrong because Kerala weaves the kasavu, an off white cotton saree with a plain gold border, at Balaramapuram and Chendamangalam. Option C is wrong because Andhra Pradesh is known for Venkatagiri and Uppada sarees and for Kalamkari painted cloth. Option D is wrong because Karnataka gives Mysore crepe silk and the Ilkal saree. Do not shift Kanchipuram out of Tamil Nadu. Examiners often shift this saree to a neighbouring southern state, so fix it to the temple town of Kanchipuram itself.

The correct answer is A, tie and dye. In Bandhani the cloth is pinched and tied with thread in thousands of tiny knots before it is dipped in dye, so the tied points resist the colour and appear as white or light dots in patterns of squares, waves and flowers. Kutch, Jamnagar, Jodhpur and Sikar are its known centres. Option B is wrong because wax resist dyeing is Batik, practised in Madhya Pradesh and West Bengal, where molten wax and not thread blocks the dye. Option C is wrong because metal thread embroidery is Zardozi, a needle craft of Lucknow and Bhopal. Option D is wrong because painting with a kalam or pen is Kalamkari of Andhra Pradesh. Bandhani is dyeing, not weaving or stitching.

The correct answer is B, Lucknow. Chikankari is the hand embroidery of Lucknow in Uttar Pradesh, worked in white untwisted thread on light cloth, with stitches that show the motif as a shadow through the fabric. The same city is the home of Zardozi, the heavier metal thread work. Option A is wrong because Jaipur and the nearby towns of Sanganer and Bagru are known for block printed cotton, not for shadow embroidery. Option C is wrong because Bhagalpur in Bihar is the silk city, known for tasar weaving rather than for embroidery. Option D is wrong because Srinagar in Jammu and Kashmir is known for Kashida embroidery on shawls and for Pashmina weaving. The pair to hold is Lucknow with Chikankari. Examiners also ask what cloth is used for it, and the answer is fine muslin and other light fabrics such as cotton voile.

The correct answer is A, Telangana. Bhoodan Pochampally in the Yadadri Bhuvanagiri district of Telangana weaves the ikat saree known as Pochampally, in which the yarn is tied and dyed to produce geometric diamonds and squares with softly blurred edges. It was among the first Indian textile products to receive a geographical indication tag. Option B is wrong because the ikat of Odisha is the Sambalpuri bandha, which uses shankha, chakra and flower motifs. Option C is wrong because Tamil Nadu is the home of Kanchipuram and Konrad temple sarees, which are brocade weaves. Option D is wrong because the ikat of Gujarat is the double ikat Patola of Patan. Pochampally is also called the silk city of Telangana. For revision, link ikat with three states, Gujarat for Patola, Odisha for Sambalpuri and Telangana for Pochampally.

The correct answer is B, Kalamkari. Kalamkari is cloth decorated with vegetable dyes, and it has two schools, both in Andhra Pradesh. At Srikalahasti the work is drawn freehand with a pen like kalam and the subjects are taken from temple mythology, while at Machilipatnam the designs are printed with carved wooden blocks. Option A is wrong because Phulkari is the bright darn stitch flower embroidery of Punjab, worked on khaddar. Option C is wrong because Kantha is the running stitch quilting of West Bengal, made from layers of old cloth. Option D is wrong because Bandhani is the tie and dye craft of Gujarat and Rajasthan. Hold the pair Kalamkari with Andhra Pradesh and remember its two towns. Note also that the word kalamkari joins kalam, meaning a pen, with kari, meaning work, which is itself a one mark question.

The correct answer is A, Punjab. Phulkari, meaning flower work, is the embroidery of Punjab, in which bright untwisted silk thread is worked in darn stitch from the reverse of a coarse handspun khaddar cloth, so the pattern fills the surface with flowers. The bagh is the variety in which the embroidery covers the ground completely. Option B is wrong because the story telling quilt embroidery of Bihar is Sujani, from Bhusura in Muzaffarpur, and Madhubani is its painting tradition. Option C is wrong because the counted thread embroidery of Karnataka is Kasuti, which leaves no knots at the back. Option D is wrong because Manipur is known for its handloom weaving rather than for a named embroidery of this kind. For revision, hold Punjab with Phulkari, Bihar with Sujani, Karnataka with Kasuti and West Bengal with Kantha.

The correct answer is B, Rajasthan. Kota Doria is woven at Kaithoon and the villages near Kota in Rajasthan, where cotton and silk yarns are alternated to make the small square checks called khat, giving a cloth so light and open that it suits the desert summer. Option A is wrong because the light sarees of Madhya Pradesh are Chanderi and Maheshwari, which are glossy and plain rather than a visible mesh of checks. Option C is wrong because Uttar Pradesh is known for Banarasi brocade and for Chikankari embroidery. Option D is wrong because Haryana has no handloom saree of this name, though it shares the Phulkari tradition of the north west. The pair to hold is Kota with Doria. The same cloth is also called Kota Masuria, and it carries a geographical indication tag of its own.

The correct answer is A, 7 August. The date was chosen because the Swadeshi Movement was launched at the Calcutta Town Hall on 7 August 1905, calling on Indians to use cloth made in their own country, and the first National Handloom Day was observed at Chennai in 2015 to honour handloom weavers. Option B is wrong because 15 July is observed as World Youth Skills Day, which has no connection with handlooms. Option C is wrong because 2 October is Gandhi Jayanti, and although Gandhi made khadi a symbol of the freedom movement, the handloom day is not kept on his birthday. Option D is wrong because 26 November is Constitution Day. Link the day to the Swadeshi call of 1905. The observance is conducted every year by the Ministry of Textiles, which works for handloom weavers across the states.

The correct answer is A, Maharashtra. The Paithani takes its name from Paithan on the Godavari, and it is also woven at Yeola in the Nashik district. It is a silk brocade in which the border and the pallu are made by the tapestry technique, with peacocks, lotuses and vines in gold thread, and the design shows on both sides. Option B is wrong because the handloom saree of Kerala is the kasavu, plain off white cotton with a gold border. Option C is wrong because West Bengal gives Baluchari, Jamdani and tant sarees. Option D is wrong because Karnataka weaves Mysore crepe silk and the Ilkal saree with its red pallu. Hold the pair Paithan with Paithani and the peacock motif. For revision, hold Maharashtra with Paithani, Gujarat with Patola and Madhya Pradesh with Chanderi and Maheshwari.