January, 2016
I bought a Kani shawl for myself, in Pune. I show it around at home, as usually happens, I get asked the price, the shawl is inspected, a machine one, but okay type. The discussion revolves around if it is authentic. I hear about the intricacies of the real shawl world. To dispel my naiveness, finally, to prove a point, mother brings out something that I didn’t know even existed – a heirloom. My mother’s great grandmother Kud’maal had a pheran, a handwoven Kani pheran. Over the generations the pheran was cut into pieces, added as border to shawls. The Kani shawls so crafted were given over the generations as gift to daughters. I post the photograph without her approval. Kashmiris treat these things as too intimate a secret to be shared. A rich tapestry of history lost.
