ARTIST BIOGRAPHY: Indrakala Nidhi

Indrakala Karna

 My father worked in Nepal but I was raised in a village in India. I only saw him two days a year. We were 6 brothers and 3 sisters. My father only had enough money to educate the boys. We three sisters did all the cooking and cleaning, and in our spare time made mats, baskets, mud shelves, stoves and grain containers. We ground flour with a wheel and passed much of the day husking rice with a traditional "deki." With my sisters-in-law I also learned how to make the traditional designs our caste makes for marriages. I loved learning Maithili songs. I only learned to write letters with mud on the wall, and then I'd try to make whole words from the songs. My sisters-in-law corrected my spelling and let me copy songs from their songbooks. In this way I learned to read and write. The men in my family arranged my marriage. My brother and my husband's brother both met before a priest and lifted a metal vessel (lota) together, then they hugged each other. Thisritual meant I could never marry anyone else. On that same day the husband's family took my dowry. I was seventeen.

My husband earned money from our land. For whatever we needed-- such as pencils and slate for our children in school--we sold rice. After 18 years my husband died. He used to drink a lot and then he grew ill. He was never a great husband. He cursed and beat me because he questioned what I knew, even though he didn't know too much. I knew how to feed guests, but he questioned me and beat me. He’d tell the children to study but if they made a mistake, he would tear up their books. So after he died some of his family gave me some help, but mainly I supported myself by hand rolling cigarettes for sale in a local shop. Two years later, work came to me to make the traditional paintings of my caste. Now my life is very different. My only worry is how to marry my son with a good girl.