Govt set to give Tangail sari GI status

The industries ministry is going to award Tangail sari the geographical indication (GI) status following a public outcry in Bangladesh, a week after India granted the same recognition to 'Tangail Saree of Bengal'.

The application seeking the GI status for Tangail sari has been accepted for publication in the form of a journal, according to Zakia Sultana, senior secretary of the industries ministry.

A gazette will be published about two months after the publication of the journal.

She added that if there is any objection, it can be raised within that timeframe. In that case, the final approval will be given through a gazette after dealing with the objections.

If there is any need for arbitration between Bangladesh and India over the GI status, there are some options. They can come to a mutual understanding, or appeal directly to the World Intellectual Property Organization.

Although Bangladeshi stakeholders are now discussing the next course of action, they did not take any formal steps to secure GI status before.

Yesterday, the Department of Patents, Designs and Trademarks (DPDT) received an application from the district administration of Tangail, according to officials.

The senior secretary of the industries ministry added that they were also going to publish journals for four other products: date molasses from Jashore, lotkhon fruit and banana from Narsingdi, and roshogolla sweets from Gopalganj.

Bangladesh has so far declared 21 items as GI products, including Jamdani sari, hilsha fish, and muslin fabrics.

The decision comes two days after Sultana directed stakeholders to prepare documents to seek the GI recognition for Tangail sari following a public outcry about why Bangladesh had failed to do so despite being a rightful claimant.

On January 31, India published a journal declaring 'Tangail Saree of Bengal' as their GI product.

The recognition was given based on an application from the West Bengal State Handloom Weavers Co-Operative Society Limited.

Weavers in Tangail, the northwest district of Dhaka, have been making Tangail sari, a popular cloth in Bangladesh, for nearly two and a half centuries.