India can make it….and make it better!

In the days when historians assumed that history began with Greece, the Greek historian Herodotus recorded the first known reference to cotton grown in India:

“Certain wild trees bear wool instead of fruit, which in beauty and quality excels that of sheep; and the Indians make their clothing from these trees.”

Arab travelers in the ninth century India reported:

“In this country they make garments of such extraordinary perfection that nowhere else is their like to be seen….sewed and woven to such a degree of fineness, they may be drawn through a ring of moderate size.”

But weaving was only one of the handicrafts of India. Europe looked up to Indian expertise in almost every line of manufacture: wood-work, metal-work, bleaching, dyeing, tanning, soap-making, glass-blowing, gun powder, fireworks, and cement.

Much of the gold used in the fifth century BC came from India.

In 2014, let’s resolve: India can make it….and make it better!