The silk thread I order from Assam now costs near double what it did two years back. My inaphi buyers in the market feel the pinch too, so I cannot raise my price much. You ask about big government schemes for weavers — I say, bring the loom co-op to the village first, where we can see the cash pass from hand to honest hand, not through some faraway office.

Nandan Nilekani’s name comes up again, and I just think of all those fancy apps that are supposed to help us small sellers. But here in Khwairamband, the tourists still like to feel the inaphi cloth before they buy, and I still count my money by hand — eche, that’s a trust that no digital card can replace. The chakcha part is they never ask a weaver like me if the new system will even work when the power goes out at

You know, I watch the throwers in the seated events, and it reminds me of pulling the weft tight on my loom—eche, that same snap of the wrist, the whole body speaking through one motion. I worry about the javelin girls who are told they cannot throw far because they sit; my sister was told she could not wear my best phanek because she had a limp from a childhood fever. Chakcha, that noise. Let them throw, let them wear what they want. We measure a thing by how it holds, not by how it starts.

Eche, that last match — I know you all want another trophy, but I saw the way our defence cracked when the pressure hit. Reminds me of when I weave a phanek too tight at the border; looks strong until the first real stretch. Let the weavers work, no? Pushing too hard only snaps the thread.

Eche, all this talk of title defence every year reminds me of when the market tried