Batik-making suits Ramesh to a tee

Ramesh Chugani showing his pucuk rebung design which he will enter for the national competition.

KUALA TERENGGANU: The state's batik industry has long been an exclusively Malay domain, but that has not stopped Ramesh Chugani from taking more than just a little interest in the traditional craft.

In fact, the 57-year-old businessman is considered a good enough batik maker and designer to have a chance at winning a prize in the prestigious national batik design competition, the Piala Seri Iman.

The father of three said he could not muster enough courage to compete in the past three annual competition, but decided to try his luck this year and become not only the first Indian, but the first non-Malay from the state, to take part.

Ramesh, who specialises in batik T-shirts, said being born and bred here meant he was no stranger to batik and admitted to being "too comfortable" lounging at home in just 'batik sarong', although he claimed he no longer roamed the town clad in the garment as he used to in his childhood.

He said it was the business side of batik which kept him busy in the earlier years and he only started to get into batik designing in the last 10 years.
"Unlike many who paint and print batik on silk or other types of textile, I prefer to do it on T-shirts (and T-shirt material) as I feel it is the best way to introduce batik to modern times, when only a few old-timers wear 'batik sarong', batik shirts and dresses to mostly formal functions.

"On the other hand, everybody, regardless of age, sex, race and religion, wears T-shirts almost on a daily basis and the fact that T-shirts do not cost an arm and a leg also make them the best way of spreading the gospel of Terengganu batik to out-of-state visitors," Ramesh said.

"I am practically self-taught in this field but while I try to come up with new designs based on flora, fauna and marine life, I also make it a point to re-introduce the old tried-and-tested patterns such as pucuk rebung, lancang kuning, retak seribu and ketupat belah.

"For me, the key to bringing batik back to its former glory is by making batik products affordable to as many people as possible, on top of finding ways to re-kindle the love lost between batik and the many people here who find it easier by the day to ignore the craft altogether."

Meanwhile, Piala Seri Iman joint organiser Terengganu International Design Excellence chief executive officer Sulaiman Abdul Ghani said the competition had in recent years attracted a number of non-Malay participants from outside Terengganu.

However, he said none of them had yet to win in any of the categories contested so far. The categories are Batik Design, Batik Fashion, Batik Craft, Block Batik and Wood Carving.