Digital India Corporation is a not for profit organization under the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY), Government of India. We bring in the ICT solutions to benefit the common man in the areas of Healthcare, Education, Livelihood Enhancement and Empowerment of Differently Abled.

• Manual to Digital Transformation
• Livelihood Enhancement
• Increase Self Employment
• Sustainability of Indian Handloom Industry
• Preserve the Handloom Heritage of India

About Software

DigiBunai™ aid's the weavers to create digital artwork and translate the saree design to be loaded to the looms. DigiBunai™ is a first of its kind Open Source software for Jacquard and dobby weaving. DigiBunai™ is customized for Banarasi Saree having the unique feature of Garment Viewer which works as a play area for designers/weavers. The software is customizable ( language and library of local designs) and also has the ability to integrate digital design tool of the user’s choice.

DigiBunai™ supports for Handloom as well as Power loom with Dobby & Jacquard weaving techniques. This is first of its kind Open Source Software which provides end to end functionality to the designers, weavers, artisans to efficient their process. The development of the software is based on the requirement received form the various user categories like Handloom Designers, Handloom Weavers, Power Loom Manufactures, Artisans & Academicians. The design library created during the usage of the application strengthen the concept of re-use and reproduce. The application has NSQF-compliant bridge course (Textile Designer-handloom Jacquard) to train the artisans of Handloom Jacquard. The functions of the developed software are shown below

• Provision creates weaves, motifs/designs & fabrics.

• Library of Weave patterns, Artworks & Fabrics.

• Flexibility to change the size, repeats & orientation of the design.

• Automatic color reduction & color replacing.

• Design repeats with mirroring & repeats fixation.

• Provision to create the customized graph based on the loom parameters.

• Area & color base weave pattern filling in Artwork.

• Auto Detection & Elimination of Yarn floats.

• Provision to print the graph and direct punching through CAM (Computer Aided Manufacturing)

• Calculate the yarn consumption for fabric production.

• Support Extra Warp & Extra Weft Jacquard Weaving.

• Function to create two layer fabric.

• Colourways to visualize the fabric with various yarn colour combinations.

• Provision to create or modify the layout of Garment (Specifically Saree).

• Option to see the front and back side view of fabric.

• Function to Print & Export the Weaves, Designs, Fabric & Garments.

• Function to customize the yarn parameters to set the fabric quality & simulation.

• Seamless integration of 3rdparty design tools

• Feature to generate compatible output for electronic jacquards weaving.

• Easily available & affordable solution
• Pre-processing time optimization of weaving
• Product quality Improvisation
• Easy to understand & operate the functions
• Predict the products before the production
• Reuse & Reproduce the Artifacts
• Single solution for Dobby & Jacquard Weaving

  Software History

India has a rich heritage of craft design and craft products. It spans from embroidery, zari, zardozi, metal work, woodcraft, stonework to toy design. But many of the traditional crafts are vanishing due to less income, time consuming manual processes, and non-reusability of designs created on paper. To overcome the above issues, intervening with localization and easy to use ICT experiences are required in the increasing digital economy. The byproduct of doing the above is conserving and growing the rich Indian heritage. Digital India Corporation(f.k.a. Media Lab Asia) along with its partner IIT Kanpur developed an ICT based tool viz. Chic™ (CAD Tool for Craft) to help the artisans for 2D design making viz. Embroidery (Chikankari, Zari, Zardozi, etc.). Chic™ CAD has been deployed in Uttar Pradesh., Madhya Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Haryana and Delhi.

During the deployment of Chic™ (CAD Tool for Craft) at Chanderi (M.P) Saree weaving cluster, Digital India Corporation recognized for reducing the time of pre-loom process and used a commercial weaving software for creating Saree designs/ weaving patterns, converting in to graphs and automatic jacquard card punching. The users feedback was multifold; complex to use, no localization (local designs & languages) and expensive (hence piracy being rampant). With our experience in Lallapura (Varanasi) on our embroidery design software training, we realized the need for weaving software customized to Banarasi cluster.

Under the aegis of R& D in IT workgroup, Ministry of Electronics and IT, Digital India Corporation is developing an Open Source Software to aid the handloom weaving community of Banarasi Sarees. The software aids the weavers to create the artwork and translate the saree design to be loaded to the looms. The product is being developed under the able guidance and support of Department of Textile Technology of IIT Delhi, WSC- Delhi, WSC-Varanasi, IIHT-Varanasi and Amity School of Fashion Technology.

The project is being monitored by the Project Review and Steering Group from 01/12/2015 onwards with the following constitution:

1. Prof. Kushal Sen, Department of Textile Technology, IIT Delhi- Chairman
2. Dr. S. K Srivastva, Scientist ‘G’, Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology, India
3. Prof. K K Goswami, Director, Indian Institute of Carpet Technology, Bhadohi
4. Sh. Muthusamy, Director, Weavers Service Centre (WSC), Delhi
5. Dr. Mukul K. Sinha, President, Expert Software Consultants
6. Sh. Tara Shanker, Scientist ‘F’, Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology, India - Member Convener

The pilot testing of the project has been started at WSC Varanasi from November 15, 2016 onwards. The punching machine was installed at WSC Varanasi on 15th November 2016 and the training session was conducted on the application and punching machine from 16th November 2016 to 18th November 2016. During the pilot test, Deputy Director, WSC Varanasi Sh. S Bandyopadhyay helped a lot along with his team. The following team members were involved in the pilot test:

1. Mr. H.K Srivastava, Assistant Director (weaving)
2. Mr. Anshuman Gupta, Assistant Director (Processing)
3. Mr. A.K Verma, Assistant Director (weaving)
4. Mr. Mohd Yasin, Technical Superintendent (weaving)
5. Mrs. Shaliha Afdi, Designer
6. Mr. Debashish Sengupta, Designer
7. Mr. J. Malakar, Junior Weaver (grade-II)
8. Other staff in the weaving section for lacing the jacquard cards and weaving the Saree sample

 Major Contributors

We immensely thank the contributions made by all the people during the course of creation of the application. We would like to thank the following specifically:

Department of Textile Technology, IIT Delhi

• Dr. Abhijit Majumdar, Professor, Department of Textile, Technology, IIT Delhi
• Mr. Prakash Khude, PhD Research Scholar

IIIT Delhi

• Dr. Ojaswa Sharma, Assistant Professor, IIIT, Delhi
• Dr. Chetan Arora, Assistant Professor, IIIT, Delhi

Jaypee Institute of Information Technology, Noida

• Prof. Sanjay Goel, Professor and Head (Deptt. of CSE)

Amity School of Fashion Technology, Noida

• Dr. Manpreet Manshahia, Assitant Professor, Amity School of Fashion Technology, Noida

BANARAS HINDU UNIVERSITY, VARANASI

• Dr. Jasminder Kaur, Associate Professor ( Visual Arts), BHU, Varanasi

Indian Institute of Handloom Technology (IIHT), Varanasi

• Mr. Panneer Selvam, Director, IIHT, Varanasi

Indian Institute of Carpet Technology

• Dr. Moumita Bera, Assistant Professor
• Mr. C.S.Bajpai, Design Lab In-charge

Weavers Service Center (WSC), Varanasi

• Shri. S. Bandyopadhay, Director
• Mohd. Yasin, Technical Superintendent (Weaving)
• Mrs. Saleha Abdi, Designer
• Mr. Debashish Sengupta, Designer
• Mr. Jagannath Malakar, Junior Weaver
• Mr. Sourav Koli, Trainee
• Mr. Sudheer Kumar, Trainee
• Mr. Anil Kumar, Trainee
• Mr. Shalendra Prakash, Trainee

Weavers Service Center (WSC), Delhi

• Mr. Muthusamy, Director
• Mr. Vikash Kumar, Assistant Director (designing)
• Mr. K.N Oniyal, Assistant Director (Weaving)
• Mr. Hirabhai Goel, Technical Superintendent (weaving)
• Mr. Rakesh Singh, Designer
• Mr. Prem Kumar, Junior Weaver

Weavers/ Designer Community Varanasi

• Mr. R.N Verma, Former Technical Superintendent (Weaving), WSC Varanasi
• Mr. Naseem Ahmed, Designer
• Mr. Mohammad Ayyub Ansari, Designer
• Mr. Abdul Quddus, Designer
• Mr. Liyaqat Ali Ansari, Designer
• Mr. Shadab Mohsin, Designer

 Pilot Test Deployment

As per the recommendations of the Project Review and Steering Group (PRSG) committee, of which the representatives of the O/o DC Handloom are members, this was decided that WSC and CFCs of Varanasi Weaving cluster may be used to pilot test the customized software and later deploy the same in the cluster. The Pilot test also involves imparting the training on digital literacy to the artisans to make them capable of using ICT for weaving. The application is being pilot tested at the following WSC and 4 CFCs of Varanasi weaving cluster.

• Weavers Service Centre (WSC), Varanasi.
• Common Facility Centre (CFC), Cholapur (Gadsara), Varanasi.
• Common Facility Centre (CFC), Pindra (Nehia), Varanasi.
• Common Facility Centre (CFC), Lohta (Harpalpur), Varanasi.
• Common Facility Centre (CFC), Ramnagar, Varanasi.

This pilot deployment fulfills the objective of CFCs to develop the innovative designs and fabric samples and conducting training programs in technological areas. These Centre also acts as support Centre to help the handloom weavers of Varanasi in pre-loom operations like designing, jacquard card punching etc along with the provision of training to the weavers on Computer Aided Textile Designing Tool on latest designs and color trends.