An early 20th c house, now abandoned belonging to a lock merchant of Aligarh. Aligarh was famous as “tala-nagari”.
As Kol, an important part of the Mughal empire.
Kol had a history of production of arms & metal craft, making swords, daggers & guns and supplying them to regional courts & military centres writes Prof Lubna Irfan .
The modern lock industry took shape in 1870 when Johnson & Co., a British firm, began importing locks to Aligarh for sale in India. By 1890, the company shifted to small-scale local production, leveraging the region’s skilled metal artisans. The British government further supported this by establishing a metal workshop in 1926 to train lock-makers, formalizing the craft.
By the turn of the 20th century, Aligarh was producing 500,000 locks annually, valued at Rs 2.76 lakh (as per 1926 records). The industry became a cornerstone of the local economy, with entire families and communities, particularly from lower-caste Muslim groups in the old city, involved in production. Locks were made using traditional techniques like sand casting, with brass as the primary material.
Today, unfortunately as many other industries this is in tough conditions. During my walk there with Zeyad Masroor Khan
i saw very few small workshops.
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