‘We can only negotiate with fate’

Do you believe you have a special mission or purpose in this life?
My purpose never was and is not to be a fashion designer. Fashion can be quite a light-weight occupation and the industry works on making people unhappy about the way they look. Rather, acting as a catalyst in the revival of interest in textile crafts has been my passion. It happened by accident. I moved to Kolkata when I got married and discovered the most sophisticated and skilled craftspeople in the hinterland villages, with absolutely no work. So I started collaborating with them. Then I opened a shop in Kolkata, the first boutique in India, so I could sell their work. Gradually people began to copy it and along with others in the country, it created a wave of interest. Years later, those villages were full of work. I could’ve never fathomed such a transformation and success. I could’ve never engineered it myself. Someone was pushing me into it and directing my boat on that river…

What has been the role of spirituality in your life in the crafts and fashion?
It is about seeing a continuity of life and nature as expressed in the crafts designs, for instance, through the recurring pattern of the tree of life, which I have seen everywhere—on ancient Egyptian paintings, or in Peru, or in so many parts of India.

Can you tell us about a unique experience that changed or shaped your spiritual beliefs?
My move to Kolkata. My entire perspective was very Delhi and Amritsar-centred. Our priorities used to be about good meals and fun. And then suddenly I was exposed to all that poverty, to the worlds of Satyajit Ray, Tagore, the Durga pujas, the rich hinterland—it all became part of me and gave me a conscience. I discovered those areas entirely dedicated to printing, or to handlooms, or to embroidery, each of them completely poverty-ridden and with no work. And my life changed entirely. There was a clear purpose after that.

What have been your main spiritual inspirations?
There was a weaving village on the border with Bangladesh. I would sit there on the banks of the Ganga, drawing my block, and I was seeing around me the same cycles of nature that had been there for thousands of years. It opened me up. There is so much security in remaining in a tight and closed community. But we cut ourselves from the natural cycles, unaware of the larger picture. That village and others inspired me in reconnecting with it all.

If you were to be reincarnated, what would you like to be?
It does not matter, as long as it would be a completely enriching experience. When I look at nature, I can see what reincarnation is about, in a very physical way. But actually, I do not know about souls…

If there were one question you could ask God, what would it be?
What am I doing here? What does this cycle of birth, life and death mean?

What is your idea of happiness
To be at peace with my work and with myself. There was this village in Bengal which I used to visit in the Sixties, so completely poor. Years later, thanks to the revival of the interest in crafts, they were so much better off, and on my way back after a rich meal there, I think I was the happiest ever in my life.

The writer is a French traveller who has worked in international relations, classical music, journalism and psychology. But it is her particular interest in spiritual matters that has led her to devise this version of The Proust Questionnaire: “It helps us to see people who they really are inside.”