Dolls have been a part of Indian heritage for a long time. There are diverse styles across regions, made from cloth, clay, terracotta, paper mâché, even glass. Ordinary cottons, rags, and buttons to create a variety of dolls have also been a part of Indian culture. Skilled artisans have crafted intricate cloth dolls with lac, clay, or painted terracotta faces by sewing fabric layers together, filling with cotton, and stitching carefully.

The history of cloth dolls dates back to ancient Egypt, coinciding with the start of using fabric itself. Doll making traditions in India vary from region to region, often imbibing cultural rituals and beliefs. The cloth dolls of Jhabua in Madhya Pradesh, for instance, represent the Bhil tribe, and are made from fabric scraps collected from local markets. Faces are shaped from clay, painted, covered with cloth, and secured on wooden bases using wires. Female dolls are decorated with Bhagoria bridal attire, while male dolls wear dhoti and kurta. In Assam, asharikandi dolls are made with hiramati clay by using simple tools like kodal, knives, and sticks, by combining them with basic pottery techniques. In Rajasthan, dolls are made of unbaked clay, while in Madhubani, Bihar, dolls are crafted from sikki grass. The ghurni clay dolls of Krishnanagar, West Bengal are made from a blend of clay and bronze.

Admired by the Mughals and exported to Europe in the 16th century, glass was also chiselled and engraved to make dolls. In Saharanpur, Uttar Pradesh panchkora or glass dolls are filled with coloured liquid. Artisans in Kashmir, Ujjain, Jaipur, and Chennai are known for their handcrafted papier mâché dolls. Created with pounded paper and epoxy resin, the dolls are brightly painted and varnished.

In Delhi, Shankar’s International Dolls Museum has a collection of more than 6,000 dolls from 85 countries. The costume dolls at this museum received the prestigious Golden Peacock Feather award at the Dolls Biennale in Krakow Poland, many decades back in 1980. Silaiwali, a unique enterprise launched in Delhi in 2018 manufactures and exports handmade cotton rag dolls and decorations upcycling the city’s fabric waste from the garment industry.

Any information on this page is anecdotal and based on publicly available details. If you're interested in learning more, click here.