Textile minister Smriti Irani’s Twitter feed is generally used for disseminating information about the achievements of her government and, at times, to exchange barbs with her detractors, but yesterday witnessed an interesting trend. This became evident with the latest #Iwearhandloom campaign launched by the new textile minister. “It is a tribute to women who contribute to 15 per cent of cloth production in India and 95 per cent of world handloom production, it is saying thank you for their hardwork and dedication for keeping our traditions alive”, Irani said in a Facebook post.
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She urged people to follow suit and share pictures of themselves in handloom textiles, tagging five others. In an attempt to encourage support for weavers, the minister shared a picture of herself dressed in a handwoven silk saree from Bihar, hashtagged #IWearHandloom on Monday. But in contrary to all the drone her new campaign for support of Indian weavers has attracted many celebs to wear handlooms.
The latest effort by the textiles minister has received support from several high-profile personalities, who posted selfies wearing outfits made using handloom fabrics. A lot of buzzes went around the media that this will be the letdown moment for her.
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The hashtag caught on swiftly, with Twitter sharing pictures of their own, making #IWearHandloom trend.
