Intangible Cultural Heritage, as defined by UNESCO through its 2003 Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage, includes elements of traditional craftsmanship, performing arts, oral traditions and ritual events among others and it calls for their safeguarding for a sustainable future.

West Bengal, like all the other states in India, is home to some of the greatest repositories of living cultural practices and indigenous knowledge systems in the world. These include a broad range of sub-sectors including handicrafts, handlooms, khadi and village industries.

Their geographical spread across rural areas, indigenous knowhow and cooperative nature makes them a key structural unit to enable localized sustainable development. Combined with our demographic dividend, our village industries have the potential to become one of the largest human resources in the world, with the prospect for millions of local, green and sustainable livelihoods.

The Department of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises and Textiles (MSME&T), Government of West Bengal, is the second largest sector in the state after agriculture, and has identified handloom, handicraft, khadi and village industries as specific categories to be promoted and safeguarded under its mandate. The state’s MSMEs strive to not only create employment opportunities at comparatively lower capital investment, but also help in industrialization of rural and backward areas, with special emphasis on inclusive growth and focusing on socially and economically weaker sections of the people.

In 2013, the Department of MSME&T took a significant step to strengthen the creative economy and improve livelihoods of cultural practitioners of West Bengal by inviting UNESCO to initiate the 6 Rural Craft and Cultural Hubs (RCCH) project in West Bengal. Over the years, our collaboration with UNESCO has become an institutional resource for harnessing and augmenting Bengal’s village based cultural industries resulting in strengthened local ecosystems and build-up of community capital.

The RCCH project intends to reach out to fifty thousand folk art and crafts practitioners of West Bengal, covering thirty-five different elements of intangible cultural heritage across twenty districts. The project has created a unique model in leveraging cultural heritage for local development and professionalising traditional skills for livelihood generation. This initiative has been crucial in changing rural creative economy, giving agency to our cultural practitioners and making them protagonists in their own process of development. The Department of MSME&T also actively supports sustainable commercialization and facilitates market linkage through Biswa Bangla branding and retail, fairs and festivals at state and district levels.

The project has brought to the forefront the economic viability and potential for sustainable development emerging from living heritage in the rural and remote areas of West Bengal. The project has played a significant role in fostering community and individual well-being and sustainable development.

To celebrate and commemorate a decade of the unique RCCH project, we have decided to publish ‘Creative Bengal’ which we hope will create more awareness of West Bengal’s intangible cultural heritage, as well as the immense development potential it holds.