There is a life after death & only a few have the ability to revive it. The bone carvers of Lucknow & Barabanki have been carving spell binding intricacies over centuries now. From adoring the royal courts of Mughals to finding a special place among Nawabs, they have seen it all! Well-crafted Jali work with floral vines leave a legacy behind of magic & charm. Every household of this small village joins hands to breathe a new life into these otherwise lifeless bones, carving magic out of them. Taking inspiration from all around, these carvers try to keep a harmony between the past & the present.
The art of bone carving goes back to pre-historic times, when each & every part of the hunted animal was used & like this it was believed that a part of the animal stays with them forever. Times have changed; man no longer hunts these animals for basic necessities in these regions. Animals that die natural death are put to use. Bones have been used from ancient times for making ornaments & utility articles by man. Some notable prehistoric art figurines like Venus figurine, swimming reindeer are made of bones and ivory. And in recent times with the ban on elephant tusk, bone carving received an enormous response as a cheaper and legal alternative to ivory in Indian market.
The craft has been practiced in Lucknow & Barabanki since the Mughal era in India but due to its gradual downfall it is vanishing from Lucknow & has shifted to Barabanki entirely. It is a beautiful but rarely talked about craft. Many expert carvers have won State & National awards for their fine work. These small roofs of Barabanki hold several valuable mentions which will go down in the history with them but day after day these recognitions are turning into a mere memory & the carvers are failing to fulfill their basic needs. A domain mainly of the Muslim communities so far, this craft is also being taken up by Hindus now. Their product range includes Lamps, Jewelry, Jewelry boxes & with the intervention of design, the product range has expanded to Wall Clocks, Pen drive cases, Knife cases, accessories for women, coasters & many more objects. The craft is also famous in other states like Rajasthan, Odissa, Kerala, Kolkata & Delhi.
Bones of buffalo & Camel are used as the raw material. Tools used for carving are; Basuli – a hammer that is used for cutting the bone in desired shape and size, Reti-files & sand paper – used to plain or smooth the surface of the bone, Chausi - for carving intricate Jali work, Tekora - for filing small holes of Jali work, Thiya - a circular wooden block used as a base for the Jali work, Prakar - a compass used for making design on bone, Drilling machine for drilling holes in the bone, Buffering machine to polish the final product & finally for coloring they use pigment colors & to give it an ancient look, the product is boiled with tea leaves as it gives a brownish vintage tinge to it.
The craving process involves the following steps. Firstly, the cutting is done, once the bone is brought from the market, it is cut with a Basuli into desired pieces, then the upper layer is removed by scraping. These cut pieces are further shaped using a cutting machine. Bone smells foul during cutting and buffing. After the cutting, bones are boiled for 3-4 hours in hot water along with soda to remove fat & other greasy elements from the surface of the bone. This also helps in removing the foul stench to some extent.
After cleaning, the bones are dipped in a solution of hydrogen peroxide and kept in sun for 6-7 hours for whitening. Now, bones are cut into desired shapes & joined together with the help of adhesives. After drying, patterns are drawn with the help of a compass, holes are drilled & craving begins with different tools. Lastly, the product is buffed to bring a shine on the product. The whole process takes around 4-5 days to finish. The left-over bone dust is later recycled & used as manure for farms.
Many factors are leading to its extinction, ban on bones and lack of communication with the Government bodies and retailers, no or bad promotion of the material in Indian marker. But there is a huge demand for these products in the international market. Many of the carvers are withdrawing from the craft & shifting towards Chikankari, Mukesh work, silver work & other crafts for a better livelihood. But there are still few who believes that the craft will again stand on its feet.