Pochampally (around 50 KMs from Hyderabad), a town situated in Yadadri Bhuvanagiri district of Telangana, is popularly known as the Silk City of Bharat because of the high-quality silk sarees that are woven at Pochampally. This scenic town is situated amidst hills, palm trees, lakes, ponds and temples. Foreign tourists visit Pochampally in order to learn the craft of making silk sarees.
Bhoodan Pochampally
Pochampally has a very interesting piece of history in its fold. Acharya Vinoba Bhave (Vinoba Bhave was the first international figure to receive the Ramon Magsaysay Award in 1958. He was awarded Bharat Ratna posthumously in 1983) visited the town in the year 1951, and he was given a warm reception by the people of Pochampally. While interacting with Vinoba Bhave, the local people asked for 80 acres of land for themselves and their families as they were landless and mostly depending on daily labour to run their families.
One of the landlords of Pochampally, named Vedire Ramachandra Reddy, generously offered 250 acres of land to the people. It was this incident that happened on 18th April, 1951 triggered the Bhoodan movement or the movement of donating land. Since then, the town has always been referred to as Bhoodan Pochampally.
This incident that occurred at Pochampally snowballed into a very significant movement in Bharat post-independence. The Bhoodan movement also known as bloodless revolution attempted to persuade wealthy landowners to voluntarily give a percentage of their land to landless people. Vinoba Bhave was influenced by Sarvodaya movement and Gram Swarajya. Jayaprakash Narayan too joined the Bhoodan movement in 1954.
Ikat
This silk village, Pochampally is home to more than 10,000 weaving families, has traditional looms, patterns and techniques that have existed for centuries. Pochampally is known for the exquisite sarees that are woven through a unique style called Ikat. Ikat weaving involves an 18-step sequence of tying and dyeing sections of thread tied in an intricate pattern of predetermined colours before weaving. All Pochampally looms are hand-loomed, as the weavers strongly believe that a machine can never reproduce the work of the hand. The Pochampally weavers are popular for their traditional and geometric patterns in the Ikat dyeing style.
Ikat (in Indonesian language means “bind”) is a dyeing technique originating from Indonesia used to pattern textiles that employs a tight wrapping on the yarns prior to dyeing and weaving the fabric. The tight wrapping (binding) is applied in the desired pattern and then the yarns are dyed. The bindings are then altered to create a new pattern and the yarns dyed again with another colour. This process is repeated multiple times to produce elaborate, multi-coloured patterns. When the dyeing is finished all the bindings are removed and the yarns are woven into cloth.
The famous Pochampally Ikat sari was granted worldwide Intellectual Property Rights protection in 2005, known as Geographical Indication (GI) Certification. Pochampally Rural Tourism Project was launched by the erstwhile Government of Andhra Pradesh in the year 2007 to benefit the local community with the idea of making the tourists aware of the weaving mechanism involved.
Tourist places in and around Pochampally
Some interesting places to visit in Pochampally are the Vinobha Mandir and the 101 Darwaja House. With its interesting history, unique culture and prospects for shopping, the small town of Pochampally attracts travellers from across the country and abroad. There is a museum at Pochampally that showcases the glimpses of the art, culture, and history of the village.
Pochampally experiences tropical climate like the rest of Telangana with summers being extremely hot and winters being cool.
Best tourism villages initiative
Pochampally village in Telangana was selected as one of the Best Tourism Villages by United Nations World Tourism Organisation (UNWTO) in 2021. The concept of Best Tourism Village is a Pilot initiative by UNWTO to highlight those villages where tourism preserves cultures and traditions, celebrates diversity, provides opportunities, and safeguards biodiversity. It aims to award those villages which are outstanding examples of rural destinations and showcase good practises in line with its specified nine evaluation areas.
These nine evaluation areas are: 1. Cultural and Natural Resources, 2. Promotion and Conservation of Cultural Resources, 3. Economic Sustainability, 4. Social Sustainability, 5. Environmental Sustainability, 6. Tourism Development and Value Chain Integration, 7. Governance and Prioritization of Tourism, 8. Infrastructure and Connectivity, 9. Health, Safety and Security.
The tourism village initiative also aims to support villages to enhance their rural tourism potential through training and access to opportunities for improvement.
The Pochampally Municipality Constituted in 2nd Aug-2018 covered with Pochampally, Mukthapur and Revanapally Gramapanchayats. The municipality having population of 17079. And total House holds 4536. The Municipality has 12 habitations.).
There is a need to have a coordinated and integrated approach by the Ministry of Rural Development, Ministry of Tourism, Ministry of Micro Small and Medium Enterprises at the Centre and the Telangana State Government to take the economic development at Pochampally village to the next level, at the same time preserving the heritage of art, culture, and traditional industries.
If the Union and the States can collectively draft a national policy in this regard, then out of around 6,65,000 villages all over the country at least 3,000 villages every year could be identified for sustainable development. This would reduce the migration of people to cities in addition to ensuring economic development of the rural areas.
How to reach Pochampally?
The town is easily accessible via road from Hyderabad (around 50 KMs). The Pochampally town is located around 23 KMs from the Ramoji Film City. Ramoji Film City is spread over 2,000 acres and recognised as the world’s largest film city by Guinness World Records.
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