The Agarias are a community of iron smelters They also call themselves Lohar (or blacksmith from the word loha, meaning iron) and believe that their caste has existed from the beginning of the world. They mainly live in the Northern and Central states of India-Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Bihar and Jharkhand. In the late 19th century, a series of famines devastated the dry tracts of India.

Francis Buchanan described the production of Wootz steel as follows:
(i) In a smelting furnace, iron was mixed with charcoal and put inside small clay pots
(ii) By an intricate control of furnace temperatures, the smelters produced steel ingots.
(iii) These steel ingots were then fashioned into swords with very hard and sharp edges.

Tipu Sultan's sword was different from normal swords because it was made of Wootz steel, which had a very hard and sharp edge that could easily rip through an opponent's armour. This property of Wootz steel came from very small carbon crystals embedded in the iron during the smelting process used for producing this variety of steel.

Some of the traditional spinners and weavers became agricultural labourers, while others migrated to cities to search for work. Some others migrated abroad to work in plantations in Africa and South America.
Some handloom weavers also found work in the new cotton mills that were established in the cities, starting in 1854.

In the early years of its development the Indian textile industry faced several problems:
(i) The Indian textile industry found it difficult to compete with the cheap textiles imported from Britain, as it was in its infancy.
(ii) Unlike other countries where governments allowed local industries to grow by imposing heavy duties on imports, the British colonial government in India did not protect or support the local textile industries in any way.

The development of cotton industries in Britain affected textile producers in India due to the following factors:
(i) Competition in Foreign Markets By the beginning of the 19th century, English-made cotton textiles ousted Indian textiles from their traditional markets in Europe, Africa and America. This threw thousands of Indian weavers out of employment.
(ii) High Import Duties/Ban on Imports Exporting textiles to England became increasingly difficult due to the very high duties imposed on Indian textiles imported into Britain.
(iii) Capture of the Indian Market By the 1830s, British cotton cloth flooded Indian markets. By the 1880s, two-thirds of all cotton clothes worn by Indians were made of cloth produced in Britain.

The origins of the names of different textiles tell us about their histories. For example, (i) Muslin is a word meaning any finely woven textile. The name of this cloth is derived from Mosul (a town in Iraq), where European traders first saw fine cotton cloth from India, which was brought from India by Arab traders.
(ii) Calico is a generic name for all cotton textiles. This is derived from Calicut, a port town in Kerala, where the Portuguese first landed in India. They took back Indian cotton textiles to Europe, where these came to be called calico.
(iii) Chintz, a printed cotton cloth, is a term derived from the Hindi word chhint, a cloth with small and colourful flowery designs.

From the 1680s onwards, cotton and silk textiles had a large market in Europe. Such textiles made in India were popular because of their excellent quality, fine craftsmanship and low price. Among various varieties sold in the European markets, chintz, cossaes (or khassa), bandanna and jamdani were the most well-known.

In 1764, the spinning jenny was invented by John Kaye. The 'spinning jenny' was a spinning machine with multiple spindles, which significantly increased the production of yarn over the traditional spindles. The steam engine increased the speed of woven cloth production manifold, compared to the earlier manual weaving machines, also at a lower cost.
Thus, these two inventions revolutionised the textile industry in England by increasing significantly the production of cloth at a lower cost.

Jamsetji Tata, an Indian industrialist, wanted to set up a modern iron and steel plant in India, for which a good source of iron ore deposits and plentiful water were required. The Tatas set-up this plant in what is now known as Jamshedpur, which started production in 1912.
Expansion of the railways gave TISCO a ready market for steel rails during the First World War, which started in 1914. Soon they started producing carriage wheels and shells for the war effort.
By 1919, the British colonial government was buying 90 percent of the steel manufactured by TiSeO. Soon TiSeO became the biggest steel industry within the British empire.

The steps due to which the international market for traditional Indian textiles was eroded were:
(i) Very high duties were imposed on Indian textiles imported into Britain.
(ii) Due to this, English and European companies stopped buying Indian goods
(iii) British cotton textiles made on automatic machines were very cheap and captured European and American markets which were earlier captive markets for Indian textiles.
(iv) By the 1830s, British cotton cloth flooded Indian markets. Within another 50 years, two-thirds of cotton clothes worn by Indians were made of cloth produced in Britain.
(v) This rendered many weavers and spinners jobless.