An Environment Engineer is turning a nuisance weed to beautiful fusion sarees

An Environment Engineer is turning a nuisance weed to beautiful fusion sarees

A life changing event can make you a better version of the identity we actually have, similar incident happened to an environment engineer Shri Gaurav Anand, a resident of Jharkhand. In 2018, he got an opportunity to be a part of a one-month-long Namami Gange mission to clean River Ganga, where he covered more than 1,500 km of the waterway. “After the mission, all team members went back to their respective work but he didn't, this was a life-changing expedition. He started dedicating every Sunday towards cleaning rivers. 

Jharkhand’s Gaurav Anand left his 16-year-long corporate career to make unique handloom sarees by extracting fibre from water hyacinths, a type of freshwater weed, while helping 450 women earn a livelihood. acting fibre from water hyacinths, a type of freshwater weed, while helping 450 women earn a livelihood.

A nuisance for water bodies, water hyacinth is a freshwater weed with a massive growth potential that blocks sunlight and chokes the aquatic ecosystem.

A nuisance for water bodies, water hyacinth is a freshwater weed with a massive growth potential that blocks sunlight and chokes the aquatic ecosystem. “Water hyacinth is known as the terror of Bengal. This weed grows in still pond water, and almost every household here has a pond in their backyard. Aquatic life can survive only when dissolved oxygen in water is at least five mg per litre, but it decreases to one mg per litre in the presence of Water hyacinth. This threatens aquatic life and deteriorates water quality.

He developed a sustainable solution for this problem as already water hyacinth is used to make paper, mats and other handicrafts. So, digging much into the depth, he observed that stem of hyacinth has cellulose presence and this can be used to make yarn, like jute and thus fabrics. He contacted many weaves in order to meet the desired results. They use 25kg of water hyacinth to weave one fusion saree. 

How Fusion Sarees are made?

Process of converting water hyacinth into a fusion saree is arduous work. First, the stems of the plant are collected and dried in the sun for a week.

How are fusion sarees made?

They keep the soft cover of the stem to make paper while they use the pulp to make fibre. Fibre from the stem is extracted after hot water treatment to remove insects from the pulp. These fibres are used to make yarn, which is then coloured. Weavers then weave the saree on a handloom. They need around three to four days to make one saree. It is a first-of-its-kind product in the world

As it is a labour-intensive work so to sustain the cost of saree up to Rs.2000-3500 in order to make affordable to middle cost they are keeping the ratio 25:75 (Water Hyacinth : Cellulose ) whereas with future anticipation of ration 50:50 (Hyacinth : Cotton) to make it more sustainable.

Besides this, he is empowering 450 rural women to be an entrepreneur and improving their livelihood.