ABSTRACT
Sanganer, a famous textile centre of Rajasthan, has come a long way in mastering the art of textile printing and related works. The Kachhwaha rulers of Jaipur took keen interest in the development of trade, commerce and industries in the eighteenth-nineteenth century and as a result, Sanganer emerged as one of the calico-printing centres. A survey of the existing works on calico-printing and dyeing shows that the majority of scholars have highlighted the centres such as Surat, Dhaka, Chittagong, Sonargaon, Sironj and Chanderi but neglected Sanganer altogether because they mainly relied on Persian chronicles as well as accounts of European travellers. The dominance of the production of cotton, indigo, opium, tobacco and sugar cane, etc. demonstrates the preference of peasants for 'cash crops' which indicates the emergence of Sanganer primarily as an open commercial mart and acquiring the status of a qasba.
