Watch | Why is the cricket bat-making industry in Kashmir in bother?
If you’ve gotten ever picked up a cricket bat earlier than, there is a superb probability it was one made out of Kashmir willow. For many years, the willow bushes of Kashmir have given start to 1000’s of cricket bats utilized by cricketers throughout the world
However, the bat-making industry in Kashmir, which has an estimated turnover of Rs 300 crore, is now going through an unsure future. The motive? A scarcity of willow clefts, a really important uncooked materials used for making these bats.
Clefts are items of wooden which might be lower alongside the grain of a tree and finally formed into bats. Bat makers at Anantnag district in Kashmir are urging the authorities to plant extra willow bushes to make sure provide.
The causes for the scarcity may very well be traced to a mass deforestation of willow bushes a couple of years in the past close to Kashmir’s Wular lake in order to revive the area’s largest flood basin. One of Asia’s greatest freshwater lakes, the Wular lake close to Srinagar suffered from heavy siltation and lack of water over many years and the presence of willow bushes was blamed for it.
Now, bat-makers are asking the authorities to rethink, and begin planting willow bushes once more close to wetlands and riverbanks.
Reporting and movies: Nissar Ahmad
Production: Shibu Narayan
Script and voiceover: Kanishkaa Balachandran
