Dr. Mohinder Kumar
Thiksey is a big village bifurcated as Thiksey-I and Thiksey-II. This article is about Thiksay-II. Thiksey is located in Chuchot block of Leh district. It has nine mohallas (wards), of which one (Staknu) is hilly, has different topography and landscape from other mohallas in plain area. Entire area below Staknu mohalla is in plains. Some area looks exotic and is littered with huge stones lying all across the surface as if they are the impact of rolling down from surrounding hills due to flashfloods caused by cloudbursts that may have visited this area over so many centuries.
The village is situated at a distance of 25 km from Leh city. It appears as a prosperous village. Thiksay-II village is located on the way to famous ‘Little Potala’ Monastery which is a replica of Potala Palace of King of Lhasa in Tibet. The road passing through Thiksey is used to approach ‘Shey Manla’ where Sindhu Festival called ‘Sindhu Darshan’ is held every year at Shey Manla Sindhu Ghat on banks of river Indus. This road is also on the way to Nyoma, Changthang, Kharnak Zara, Dibling, etc. tribal areas and on Leh-Manali highway.
Village Weekly
Total area of village is 438 acres, of which 131 acres (30%) is common land and used as pasture for grazing cattle owned by villagers. Total population is 1000 persons in 240 households. All households are Buddhists and Scheduled Tribes. A Panchayat Ghar is under construction and community hall is already constructed on common land.
With overall literacy rate of 70%, villagers cooperate on fellow farmers’ farmland in farming operations without expecting wages. Their vision of village development is to have all amenities and modern facilities like ATM, banks, stadium, shopping mall, etc.
The state of physical infrastructure in Thiksey-II is mixed with good and bad features. Overall look, appearance, sanitation and drainage system of the village are impressive but in absence of streetlights, entire set of amenities appears failure. Being a tourist attraction, both domestic and foreign tourists visit this village and Potola Monastery. Early in the morning when it’s still dark many of the foreign tourists go to monastery to attend prayers by Lamas. However, due to darkness often some of them become victims of dog bite. It is a day-to-day difficulty but no action is so far taken for its amelioration. Other amenities are normally available, e.g. 8-10 grocery shops, one post-office, one J&K Bank branch and ATM, hotels & restaurants; but no medical shop or private doctor/clinic is available despite foreign tourists visiting everyday to this village. The village has three schools (one primary, middle, high school each) and one fair price ration store.
In 2005, villagers constructed 10-11 small check dams on two hills for storage of spring water, starting from November. In December and January, water gets totally frozen into ice due to extreme cold. Even dropping water dips get frozen. April onwards ice started melting without sun rays and villagers get sufficient water for irrigation. Few hills of Thiksey were located at such angle that some particular side of these hills never received sun rays throughout the year. Therefore, freezing of water into ice is easier and longer. These melting glaciers create artificial lake/ watershed, which is used for irrigation by the farmers. During flashfloods of 2010, all check dams got destroyed and are yet to be repaired.
Private economic assets of households in village include four tractors, 300 cows, no goats/sheep, no BPL households, no pucca houses (all kutcha), no landless households, and normal instruments of cultivation (wooden ploughs, Pankha, Peespa i.e. seed sprayer, Belcha, Ginti i.e. digger, etc.). Villagers and “BPL households” approached Gram Sabha to remove from DRDC list the names of these 27 households hitherto marked as BPL, since actually they claim they are not poor/ BPL. All households in Thiksey have good source of income and livelihoods due to tourism sector developed by them on private effort basis. There are good hotel-cum-restaurants for tourists in the village.
None of the households faces problem of warm clothing during winter. They wear woolen “guncha” (“nambu”), sweater, shirt, woolen “pabu” (shoes) and socks, woolen muffler (kids wear feather muffler and cap), etc. All households have adequate fuel wood like cow dung cake, firewood (trees are in abundance, no need to purchase wood), and all households use LPG.
Thiksay-II is one of the few exceptional villages where all households are interested in taking bank loan; 50% farm households are borrowing without using KCC mechanism; KCC coverage is 85%. Financial inclusion through credit is 100%. Villagers are interested in bank loans under dairy/ DEDS and other schemes, transport (taxi loan), housing, consumption loan, etc. since farm loan requirements are already met by the banks (mainly J&K Bank).
Three persons from Staknu mohalla (ward) of Thiksey village died in flashfloods of 2010 due to cloudburst; their dead bodies were not yet found. Other loss of property and economic assets was reported as under: fertile top soil on 900 kanals (113 acres) of agricultural land was washed away; 70 livestock got washed away; 6000 trees fell down and washed away; 15 houses got partly damaged; road length of 10 km was destroyed; three bridges on long Staknu nallah were destroyed; 13 water head works were destroyed; 11 foot bridges were destroyed; village had 25 commercial cum privatel water mills (runtuk) on nallah, all of which were destroyed and washed away even as no sign of existence of these water mills was left (each water mill cost Rs.2.00 lakh of investment). Entire landline phone infrastructure (poles, wires) in village was also destroyed. Families of three dead persons received compensation of Rs.2.00 lakh each from government. Out of 113 acres, land reclaimed with the help of government assistance under MNREGA was 78 acres. Balance 35 acres land was not provided any assistance. Government did not provide compensation for the loss of livestock. Out of 15 damaged houses, 13 got compensation from government. Link road is yet to be reconstructed. Water head works, water mills, bridges, foot bridges, phone lines, etc. are also yet to be reconstructed. Villagers depend on government assistance for creation of these public and private assets.
Insects (“chha”) destroyed barley and wheat crops of villagers and caused economic loss each year. Villagers, particularly farmers, are yet to find any extension service of any sort from the agencies concerned (KVK; Agriculture Office, Leh). Villagers lived in severe cold conditions due to heavy snowfall every year. Good local food and nutritious diet is the best defense mechanism of these people against cold. They would eat “thupa” of different varieties using homemade cheese, pea, meat, dry vegetables, cashew, almonds, with black pepper, garlic and onion for tadka (fry); some villagers used turmeric and red chilly but others did not. They would also cook “momos” by preparing flat dough of wheat flour, filled it with mutton and chopped onion like North Indians prepared samosa but Laddakhi momos (like Jammu momos) were mostly prepared in steam (instead of oil fried), and they ate it with mutton soup. Some villagers prepared “skyusar” with wheat flour and spices; it was slightly dry and cooking style was different from thupa, and eaten with potatoes and salad. These local foods rich in protein and energy kept them fit and healthy in winter.
Personal problems and difficulties of villagers are reported as pertaining to mental depression in the aftermath of cloudburst and flashfloods in 2010. Now gradually people have overtaken their depressive tendencies that emerged due to shocking and dreadful calamity of cloudburst which created havoc in those awesome 15-20 minutes. Otherwise all Laddakhis, including Buddhists of this village, are by nature calm, quite, contented, satisfied, and always without mental tension. Whatever little financial relief is received by them, they are satisfied with it. General approach to coping with adversities by villagers in Thiksey-II are, for example, collective approach (e.g. taking deputation of villagers in procession to DDC office led by Sarpanch to submit memorandum of demands), expect government assistance, and efforts by individual households -all three methods were used by villagers in this order. Sometimes nothing worked or materialized. Then religious teachings came to their support to induce calmness.
Thiksey has good economic potential. In non-farm sector, there is good scope of food processing, particularly vegetable processing (potato, pea and all other types of vegetables) at small scale. Villagers are political and demand full Union Territory (UT) status for Laddakh region. Until then they wished (though not practicable) that annual “Darbar shift” of State Administration should also include three months shift to Leh. This wish overlooked two aspects: (i) cost; and (ii) extreme winter (more cold) in Laddakh in winter as compared to Kashmir valley. Villagers demand Engineering College, Medical College and University for Laddakh region as they find it difficult to send their wards to Jammu, Srinagar, Chandigarh, etc. for higher education, particularly in view of poor road connectivity and costly air traffic fare. Over 3000 Laddakhi students are studying in cities outside Laddakh. Thicksey-II being a progressive, prosperous and forward looking village considered itself representative of the political, cultural and educational aspirations of the people of Laddakh, particularly Leh district.
Streetlights are urgently required since village has famous Potola monastery where foreign tourists visited in large number. Early in the morning or before dawn when it was still dark, they visited monastery for the morning-‘pooja’ (worship), and at that time street dogs posed menacing threat to commuters on the road or in street corners; therefore, tourists hesitated or could not go to monastery for morning ‘pooja’. If street lights are provided, dog-threats would be reduced. Village has one water collection chamber of 15000 gallons for supply of safe drinking water. One more chamber for storage capacity of 5000 gallons is needed in Stanknu mohalla (ward) due to increased population, and chambers getting destroyed due to cloudburst and floods in 2010. Villagers demand soil testing facility for farmers. They apprehend superstitiously that their crop gets damaged each year because of some unknown insects in water from river Indus getting into their soil and reaching crops! This example indicated non-scientific approach to farming due to absence of extension services to the villagers though Thiksey is otherwise so developed culturally, religiously and aesthetically. Thiksey by its look gives impression of a developed Punjab village; economic potential of this village can be tapped if public and private investment in agriculture is facilitated through agri-extension services.
(Author works for NABARD. Views expressed are personal)
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