British Museum funds research on Kashmir’s last houseboat makers and the vanishing craft

When you take into account that houseboat construction in Kashmir has been suspended for decades, the Delhi Development Authority’s proposed ₹4-crore houseboat plan (as a permanent fixture at Baansera Park in Delhi) underscores a striking irony. Meanwhile, a British Museum-funded project has been documenting the techniques and oral histories of Kashmir’s last-remaining artisans. The research, now complete, is ready for submission this month.

Nearly four decades ago, the Jammu & Kashmir government banned the construction of new doongas (houseboats) to curb unregulated growth and pollution in Dal Lake. Since then, many master craftsmen have died, leaving behind only a few practitioners such as Ghulam Ahmad Najar. “I am bound to these boats; there is nothing else I know,” says the boatmaker from Bandipora.