visakhapatnam after making idols for more than 50 years silparasetty trinadha rao who has made more than 6000 idols of lord ganesha goddesses lakshmi saraswati kali and durga is losing ground to young talent most of whom have been taught by him popularly called raghu all over ap rao makes idols the oldfashioned way sans chemicals and oil colours a reason which he feels has earned him name and fame but very little money for his art and craft however he refuses to give up on his ideals many of the idolmakers in vizag were trained by me however quite a few have deviated from the traditional methods to come up with bigger and larger idols than ever before ironically it was i who introduced the culture of crafting big ganeshas in vizag the first tall ganesha the 45foot marripalem gajaraja was my creation he says with a touch of pride elaborating on the reasons why many customers no longer come to him for big and tall idols raghu said people find it difficult to meet costs i get my clay mitti and binding grass from kolkata and the wood i use is expensive rare country wood gummidi is used for making the frames above all i dont use any chemicals to bind the idol i boil the clay and a special concoction made of natural materials many times to ensure that it glues properly most modern artists do not follow such timetaking techniques which is why their labour and material costs come down raghus fascination for idol making began at an early age i belong to a family of craftsmen and artists i began my career as a publicity artist in the movie industry in madras at the age of 19 in 1958 the going was good and there was lot of money however i returned to vizag at the behest of my parents and luckily enough landed a job with the railways in the vizag division he said later in 1962 he ventured into idol making with his first durga idol near the railway station to mark navaratri and has never looked back ever since today raghu employs 17 workers six months a year and supplies more than 300 idols to various clients across ap however despite the size of his workshop and operations he barely breaks even as his artisans demand anything between rs 400 to rs 800 per day raghu is a wellknown name across coastal ap and even at kazipet in telangana however he has deliberately kept his children out of the profession because it does not pay much my older son is a realestate broker and the younger one works with a private company i did not want them to enter this field as i know the financial hardships involved he points out when asked what drives him to continue making idols despite the hardships involved raghu confesses there is a lot of satisfaction in doing this work and most importantly the name and