Mohammed Rafik Khatri Biography 
Mohammed Rafik Khatri is a craftsman from Bagh of Madhya Pradesh best known for his contributions towards Bagh printing. He is the son of Ismail Sulemanji Khatri, a renowned painter and internationally acclaimed artist and craftsman from Madhya Pradesh who re-invented and re-established Bagh print, a part of the centuries-old hand block printing practice. Ismail Sulemanji Khatri revolutionised the art of Bagh printing taking inspirations from Taj Mahal and common jali patterns, used on bed sheets, saris and fabrics and also improvised and discovered new colour shades of dyes used for this purpose.
He was born on 1 February 1970 in Bagh, Madhya Pradesh as the son of Ismail Sulemanji Khatri. Among his 4 siblings, Mohammed Yusuf Khatri and Mohammed Dawood Khatri are leading names in this field. Mohammed Rafik Khatri is the third among the siblings. His nephew Mohammed Bilal Khatri is the successful Bagh printing artist from his family belonging to this generation. After Mohammed’s father employed numerous people in this industry, he carried forward the tradition which has popped up to multiple proportions from hundreds in the 1970s to 12,000 in Dhar district alone. His brothers are also associated with the same field.
Earlier the family prefabricate different traditional dresses for different groups of people based on caste, religion, tradition etc and they used to be identified by the type of dress design chosen. In the 1990s, Khatri family started experimenting with foreign clothing as well for international market. Some of their experiments include incorporating modernity in the wooden blocks and colours, block printing with hand and designing cultural clothing firstly, printing on bamboo mat, leather, jute etc.
He is a recipient of several state level and national awards. In 2002 he received State Awards from the government of Madhya Pradesh. He also received National Award 2005 and National Merit Award 2004, both given by ministry of textiles, government of India.
Published: January 22, 2019
Updated: January 22, 2019
