sambalpur his passion for the handloom is incredible while most people prefer to spend their retired lives taking it easy and pursuing their hobbies cocooned in the comfort of their homes 70yearold sashidhar meher of bhatli village in bargarh district wants to devote his time to a noble cause meher has started a museum of handloom arts and crafts with his own efforts in his native village to keep alive traditional sambalpuri handloom designs and instruments most of which are already extinct from the commercial market mehers handloom arts museum which he has named tantakala sangrahalaya is located in a building on the outskirts of bhatli village his aim is to showcase an exhaustive collection related to the sambalpuri handloom art and craft in the museum for future generations i have great passion for the sambalpuri handloom being the son of a weaver i used to watch my father weave fabrics on the loom when i was a child when i got into the profession i gradually started concentrating on the creation of new and unique designs to make the products more attractive and viable in the market said meher while talking to toi on saturday it was his lifes dream to start a museum and this became possible after his retirement he has collected sambalpuri weaves in various designs and put them on displaty at tantakala sangrahalaya the museum also showcases various handloom instruments that were earlier used by weavers my dream was to start the museum and it came true after my retirement it took about twothree years to collect all the designs and various handloom equipment here and to start the museum he saidmeher started the venture in his village after he retirement as chief designer from sambalpuri bastralaya in bargarh in the year 2000 in his long career as a designer meher has to his credit the creation of more than 10000 fabric designs of which around 2000 were totally exclusive and innovative he has received state and national awards for his unique designs last year he went to bangkok to receive an international award for one of his ingenuous designsmeher recounts how he developed the knack for creating new designs for the handloom earlier weavers had a limited number of designs and they were asked to work as per the designs available in the market but i always wanted to create my own designs when i was just 1415 years old i started experimenting with various new designs to make the product more attractive to buyers my father supported me and he wove clothes as per my designs since then there has been no looking back he said meher said he received offers from various weavers after the fabrics woven by his father received a good response in the market for a few years he worked as a private designer but later he joined the bastralaya as a designer the people of bhatli village are very proud to have an innovative weaver like meher amongst