Ashwini Gaikwad, 35, learned the art of hand-making kohl from her mother-in-law, Kusum.
Organic kohl has a better shelf-life than chemical kohl, which is banned in the US as it's deemed bad for people's health. All photos by Sanket Jain for The National
Kusum Gaikwad hand-picking the mhaka (eclipta prostrata) leaves used to make organic kohl.
In India, even young children wear kohl. There’s a superstitious belief that wearing kohl wards off the evil eye. In this photo, Kusum is applying kohl to her grandson, Yash, 5.
In order to hand-make organic kohl Kusum Gaikwad's way, the leaves are cleaned thoroughly with water.
The mhaka leaves are squeezed several times to extract the greenish-black liquid.
To ease the process of squeezing, the leaves are wrapped in a cotton cloth.
The liquid is then carefully placed at the inverted side of a concave plate to ensure it doesn’t flow away.
Now, it is left to dry for around four to five hours in the field.
Three steel bowls are arranged in a triangular form that acts as a stand for this plate.
A single clay lamp is used to heat the dried liquid on the plate. This lamp burns overnight, and what accumulates on the surface is kohl.
Now, the accumulated kohl is manually scraped off.
A few drops of either coconut or castor oil are added to the kohl.
Ashwini Gaikwad, 35, learned the art of hand-making kohl from her mother-in-law, Kusum.
Organic kohl has a better shelf-life than chemical kohl, which is banned in the US as it's deemed bad for people's health. All photos by Sanket Jain for The National
Kusum Gaikwad hand-picking the mhaka (eclipta prostrata) leaves used to make organic kohl.
In India, even young children wear kohl. There’s a superstitious belief that wearing kohl wards off the evil eye. In this photo, Kusum is applying kohl to her grandson, Yash, 5.
In order to hand-make organic kohl Kusum Gaikwad's way, the leaves are cleaned thoroughly with water.
The mhaka leaves are squeezed several times to extract the greenish-black liquid.
To ease the process of squeezing, the leaves are wrapped in a cotton cloth.
The liquid is then carefully placed at the inverted side of a concave plate to ensure it doesn’t flow away.
Now, it is left to dry for around four to five hours in the field.
Three steel bowls are arranged in a triangular form that acts as a stand for this plate.
A single clay lamp is used to heat the dried liquid on the plate. This lamp burns overnight, and what accumulates on the surface is kohl.
Now, the accumulated kohl is manually scraped off.
A few drops of either coconut or castor oil are added to the kohl.
Ashwini Gaikwad, 35, learned the art of hand-making kohl from her mother-in-law, Kusum.
