Page 173 - SocialHarmony

37

Kite Flying: An Attempt Towards

Social Bonding

(Workshop for the Gujarat Kite Industry, Gandhi Labour
Institute, Ahmedabad. December 16, 2003)

We have a social economy in our country, but unfortunately,
we have forgotten a tradition of this social economy. All
our festivals have an arrangement to provide the lower classes
with a chance to earn their living. For example, Rakshabandhan.
It is a festival dedicated to brothers and sisters, but a large
number of poor people earn their living for the whole year by
making rakhis for Rakshabandhan.

The Kite Festival is organized with the same objective. The
people connected with the kite industry believe that the
government will snatch profits of 10 to 20 crores rupees in the
Kite Festival. They also worry that perhaps the government
would impose sales tax on their profit. The kite industry is worth
100 crores in Gujarat. More than one lakh families below the
poverty line have joined this business. I feel that when I keep
talking about the prosperity of five crores people of Gujarat,
their food, education and health; why should I marginalize a
certain class? Since the lower class has joined the kite industry,
we are planning to take it to an even larger scale. Like Shivakasi
is a hub for fire-crackers, I want to make Gujarat a hub for kites.
Kites are made by paper and therefore they tear, and yet, the
kite business has sustained for more than two thousand years.
But no one has tried to modernise this business so far. Innovation
has entered almost all the fields, then why not the kite industry?