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Curcuma dye could never gain popularity in natural dyeing as the intrinsic nature of the colorant Curcumin did not have the requisite adhering property towards natural fabrics such as silk and cotton, thereby making it very fugitive. In this paper attempts have been made to activate Curcumin molecule by complexation with chitosan (another natural linear polysaccharide). The binding took place at intrinsic pH (7–8) very effectively without any surfactant or enzyme. Dyeing with this new composite showed excellent wash and light fastnesses as compared to curcuma dye. The novelty of this dyeing process is the remarkable enhancement of wash and light fastnesses levels by 1.0–1.5 for silk and cotton fabric dyeing in just 1 hour at 40–45 °C. It is fast and energy conserving dyeing process. Three subsequent washing of the dyed samples showed very small change in CIE Lab.
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