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STATES: TAMIL NADU
The First Signs Of Decline
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M. KANNAMMA
Kannamma, seen here with her nephew Rajesh, has attempted suicide
twice. After her goldsmith husband died, the amount she owed to
financiers, thanks to high interest rates, rocketed from Rs 5 lakh
to Rs 25 lakh in a year.
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B.N. NATARAJAN
Natarajan, a goldsmith, holds up a photograph of his sister's family.
His sister Bhagyalaksmi and husband Kannan, a goldsmith, killed
their three children and themselves when they could not repay their
debts.
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Gold workers began
to feel the pinch much earlier, though. As restrictions on the import
of gold jewellery were removed in the early 1990s and quality control
rules became stringent, the earnings of goldsmiths began to plunge. And
while the bullion purity checks became internationally standardised in
the following years, the Coimbatore goldsmiths continued with the old
methods. This proved detrimental as shop owners insisted on the new standards
of purity.
Compounding the goldsmiths' woes, they claim,
is the shop owners' use of machines to make jewellery as well as the changing
wastage margins, which in trade parlance is called "touches".
Gold workers maintain that they used to get eight-10 touches but now they
have to be content with six. This means a goldsmith working on gold weighing
100 gm have to return jewellery weighing 94 gm to the shop owner. "While
cutting, polishing and doing intricate work, 3 gm goes waste," says
S. Janakaraj, a worker. "The rest fetches us just Rs 1,000."
Shop owners contest the claims. While K.P. Subbayyan,
owner of Sri Laxmi Jeweller, says goldsmiths still get eight to 10 touches,
though not always, D.A. Raghunath, president of Coimbatore Jewellers'
Association, denies that jewellery-making machines have displaced goldsmiths.
"Handmade jewellery is still in great demand," he says.
That is what is so ironical. That goldsmiths
are committing suicide at a time when gold jewellery export from south
India is on the increase-from Rs 291.5 crore in 1997-98 to Rs 402.1 crore
in 2000-2001. This, many say, is largely because there is no government
agency to recognise or monitor their work.
The state Government did make attempts at one
stage to fix minimum wages and introduce a gratuity scheme but much of
it remained on paper. In the past couple of decades, people other than
those belonging to the traditional goldsmith Viswakarma caste have taken
to the craft. The proliferation of smiths has also resulted in increasing
child labour and abuse-a 14-year-old boy was recently found dead under
mysterious circumstances at a smithy. It is another sign that all that
glitters is not gold in Coimbatore. The sooner the Government takes note
of this the better.
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