Basel Mission, Mangaluru

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Weaving establishment

Vinobha KT, Dec 3, 2022: The Times of India

The word khaki has been synonymous with police since British times but few know the dye that started this convention was first made in India, in Karnataka’s coastal city of Mangaluru. 
 The year was 1851. John Haller, a German textile engineer and missionary, had been working at the city’s Basel Mission Weaving Establishment in Balmatta for some time. That year, Haller was placed in charge of the Establishment, says Dr Peter Wilson Prabhakar, former principal of Vivekananda College, Puttur, who researched the Basel Mission in 1989. 


“Haller’s major achievement was the invention of khaki dye, and under his leadership the weaving establishment started producing khaki cloth from 1852,” Prabhakar, who wrote the Kannada book ‘Bharathadalli Basel Mission (Basel Mission in India)’, told TOI. 
Khaki is an Urdu word that literally means dustcoloured (from khaq, dust), and Prabhakar says it appeared in the Oxford dictionary as early as 1848. But it was left to Haller to make the dye of that name with oil extracted from cashew shells – plentiful in Dakshina Kannada – three years later. 
The dye became popular in no time. The ‘21st Report of the German Evangelical Mission in South Western India’, published in 1860 and preserved in the Karnataka Theological College archives, records: “The Weaving Establishment has continued. . . in its flourishing condition; all kinds of cloth manufactured find a ready sale, and Br Haller’s kakhee has got a name inmilitary circles on account of its durability. ”


Around the same time, khaki cloth made by Haller at the Establishment was adopted for the police uniform of the Canara district in the erstwhile Madras Presidency that covered Kasaragod, South Canara, Udupi and North Canara. 


On hearing about the dye, the British governor of Madras Presidency, Lord Roberts, “visited the weaving establishment and recommended khaki as a uniform for the British Army,” says Prabhakar. The British government accepted his recommendation and khaki became the colour of British soldiers under the Madras Presidency, before being mandated for soldiers of all British colonies across the world. Later, other militaries and Indian government departments also introduced khaki uniforms for their junior-level staff. Indian postmen and public transport workers come to mind immediately. 


STAMP OF HISTORY

The Basel Mission’s history in Karnataka goes back 188 years. The first three missionaries from the Mission reached Mangaluru on October 30, 1834, says Rajendra Kumar S, chief postmaster general, Karnataka Circle. The postal department recently released special covers commemorating the invention of khaki dye and ‘Managlore tiles’ at the Mission’s Balmatta centre