Babu rao Babaji Tilve’s face lights up as he takes down the tarpaulin covering his loom and weaving tools. “I closed this loom down in 2015. A mild paralytic stroke weakened my legs, otherwise I would have gladly continued to weave till my last breath. This is the sacred legacy of my father that I served honestly for 68 years,” says the 85-year-old master craftsman.
Baburao and his eldest daughter-in-law, 56-year old Anuradha, now run a small grocery shop from their humble home in Paliyem, a laidback village 39 km north of Panaji. He began apprenticing at the age of 18 in 1952. When his father set up the handloom unit in a shed adjoining this house, around 450 to 500 looms were operational across Goa. Baburao’s father taught him how to identify strong yarn and good quality natural dyes in Belgaum market and how to use these to create the checked Kunbi weave indigenous to Goa.