Turtuk: A world apart

Under Pakistan control till 1971 and open to visitors since 2010, Turtuk, a small village at the end of Nubra Valley in Ladakh region, is slowly opening up to the world and showcasing its distinct culture and traditions.

I don’t clearly remember when I first heard of Turtuk. Nearly five years ago, when I read that the inner line permit for visitors has been extended up to Turtuk, even then the name was familiar. Probably this village entered my subconscious over four decades ago when the whole family used to huddle around a small radio during official blackouts, listening to All India Radio bulletins in the winter of 1971. I was seven years old and my father was working in Dharamsala, then a small town of Himachal Pradesh. It was in the December of 1971 that Indian army advanced in the Ladakh sector and took control of four Balti villages, Turtuk being one of the biggest among them. I think the name stayed with me since then – may be because Turtuk has a nice ring to it; the consonants and the vowels are immaculately balanced and the name rolls off the tongue in a very fulfilling rounded way.
Despite this mysterious connection, I also don’t know for certain why it took me nearly three years to visit Turtuk. On the contrary, I was reluctant to take the final step. Possibly, I was afraid that the real Turtuk would not live up to the picture of it I that had formed in my imagination. It was a picture right out of the Garden of Eden – verdant fields ringed by lofty snow peaks; proud trees with their branches bent with the bounty of juicy fruits; carpets of varied flowers stretching on the hillsides; rosy-cheeked children playing with no care in the world and benevolent elders watching over them as they went about their work with a smile on their face. It was an idyllic world.
I was shaken out of my reluctance when I chanced to meet a long lost friend one day and he was full of stories of Turtuk he had visited a couple of months ago. His description of the place more or less matched my imaginary Turtuk. I was left with no excuse… I had to go now. The urge became so insistent that I could not wait for the ‘right season’ to visit Turtuk. Against conventional wisdom, I embarked on the final stage of my decades-long journey in late November 2013, much after the chilly Ladakh winter had put the approach to Turtuk in a deep freeze. In the meantime, I had managed to convince my wife, Aruna, as well as Sohail Hashmi, a friend and a teacher both, to accompany me.
The three of us reached Leh on a November morning and after spending a couple of days there for acclimatisation, crossed the nearly 18,000-foot high pass, Khardungla, to descend into the wide Nubra Valley. After spending a night in Diskit, we started on the final 72 kilometres of the journey the next day. The well-metalled road followed the turquoise flow of the Shyok River all through. Though officially Turtuk is in the Nubra Valley, but in real it is a different world, both physically and culturally. The sense that you are going into a different world heightened when the valley narrowed down. There came a stage when it seemed there was no way forward as a wall of peaks blocked the way. Just then, when all hope seemed lost, the road veered off the river and entered into a boulder-strewn stretch. It twisted and turned and managed to find a barely visible passage through the mountains and descended to again catch hold of the Shyok coming from the opposite side. At this meeting point was the village Changmar with a few houses perched on the rocky outcrops.

Turtuk in winter

With its back now firmly to the wide Nubra valley, the route ahead was through a twisted, tortured landscape where the mountains left just enough space for the river and the road to scrape through. Extreme silence prevailed here; not a bird chirped nor an insect buzzed. The hum of the engine of our vehicle – manned by the indefatigable Iqbal who later took me to Turtuk twice again – and the Shyok were the only two moving objects in the still landscape. The only human inhabitation till the next 20 km or so was forced, in form of an army post and a police checkpost where our permits were checked. Bogdang, the next village that we crossed after about an hour of such solitude, was the last Indian village pre-1971.
Half-an-hour or so later we crossed the point where the border used to be. A bridge led over the Shyok to our right, leading to one of the many arms of Siachen glacier and prohibited to all visitors. On a ledge overhanging over the river on the other side was a green patch. “That’s Chalunka,” Iqbal told us, “the first of the four Balti villages taken by the Indian army in 1971.” A few families now live in Chalunka, but in 1971 when the Indian army reached there, it found not a soul there. The villagers had deserted the village fearing the army and had migrated towards Manthal area near Skardu, the headquarters of Baltistan under Pakistan. They never could come back as after the ceasefire on December 17, the new border prohibited any travel to and fro. Over the years, as population increased, their land and houses were taken over by people from Turtuk.
The Indian army, under Major Chewang Rinchen (he retired a colonel), found the same situation when it reached Turtuk, the biggest of the four villages. The village was empty and it seemed the villagers had fled in a hurry. But, unlike those in Chalunka, the villagers here had receded upstream into a gorge that opens up in the middle of Turtuk. It took a lot of cajoling and confidence-building rhetoric
by Major Rinchen to bring them out of their hiding place. Late Colonel Rinchen notes in his memoir, A Legend in his Own Time, that “after a great deal of persuasion, perhaps under fear, thousands of old and young people of Turtuk got down from nullah/gorge, carrying white flags and shouting Hindustan Zindabad.”
For a couple of minutes we too got the same feeling of emptiness when Iqbal stopped on the side of the road and declared, “we have reached”. We could see no village – neither people nor houses. It was just the side of a road lined with a few trees, until we spotted a signboard under a tree. Under the legend ‘An appeal for cultural harmony & understanding’, it said, “Dear guest, you are entering the conservative and fragile Balti-cultured areas. So please follow strictly the following instructions for the sake of mutual respect and comprehension.” The instructions were about length of dresses, display of affectionate behaviour “with your partner in public spaces” and asking for “permission” before taking photographs of people. Clearly, Turtuk was waking up to tourism.

Sowing season begins in March

As we were looking at this out-of-place signboard, we saw a couple coming down the hill. They turned out to be our hosts, Hussein and his beautiful wife Jamila (I had found Hussein’s number on internet while planning the trip and it was only after his go-ahead that he’ll host us that we took the plunge). It’s then we realised that we have to climb that hill to reach the village. The two, smiling effusively yet shy, took our bags and started walking uphill with not a crease on their faces. We followed huffing and panting, more so as the climb was unexpected. “The road goes to Turtuk,” is what we had read in the literature before starting on this journey. The path went up in a number of switches and after hundred metres or so, it took us to a sight which none of us expected. There was a huge plateau in front of us. These were the fields of Turtuk, lying barren at that time of the year (lush with buckwheat crop and laden apricot trees when I went in August last). The village was on the other side, snuggling at the base of a cliff so high that I had to crane my neck to see the top. 
We rested at the edge of the plateau, taking in the sight. Below us was the ‘road to Turtuk’ and beyond it the Shyok, now looking like a slender turquoise thread through the narrow valley. The peaks all around were covered in snow. “You are lucky,” said Hussein, “it has not snowed in the village till now.” Turtuk, though at 9,600 feet much lower in elevation than Diskit from where we were coming, gets its share of snow in winter. In fact, this altitude permits villagers to raise two crops in a year, possible only in one other place in Ladakh, the Dah-Hanu region towards Kargil.
We walked through the fields to the village. We had by now attracted a large number of rosy-cheeked children who followed us as we made our way through the narrow twisting lanes amidst stone village houses. Many were peering at us from the rooftops which, apart from them, seemed bursting with stored wooden logs, bales of dried grass and cackling hens. Donkeys and sheep roamed around in the fields and the lanes. Himalayan
tree-pies flew around noisily,
afraid of neither man nor beast. While women were shy though curious, men greeted us with ‘as-salamu alaykum’.
As soon as we reached K2 homestay, our home for the next couple of days, Jamila got busy in preparing tea for us. Hussein, meanwhile, took upon himself to tell us about the village and its history. Dating back to the 1200 AD according to him, Turtuk was no ordinary village. Lying on a branch of the famed Silk Route, Turtuk was the gateway to the regions of Baltistan, Gilgit and Chitral as also Yarkand via the Karakoram pass. 
The place got its name four centuries ago, according to the legend Hussein narrated to us. Two Turk warlords, Chuli and Yangdrung, looking for a territory to conquer in Baltistan, came here. “There was an impregnable fort here, and they set their eyes on it,” he said. “On March 21, when the local ruler and his guards had gone to play polo to mark the advent of the new year (called Navroz with polo still played today on the occasion), the Turks managed to find their way into the fort by climbing down the cliff. The fort was empty as no one had thought an attack possible from above. Once inside, they easily defeated the ruler and his returning forces as now they had the high ground. They then ruled from the fort and the area came to be known as Turtuk,” Hussein explained. He later showed us through binoculars the bastions of that fort in middle of a cliff near the village. It is out of bounds today; in any case it seemed difficult to reach there as there was no visible path to the ruins.
After tea, Hussein laid out the plan for our visit. It is then we learned that Turtuk was divided into two distinct parts, Youl and Pharol. We were staying in Pharol while Youl, the older habitation, lay on the other side of a rivulet below the ruins of the fort. The historical section, in the form of a 16th century wooden mosque and a huge residence of the self-claimed heir of the royal family, was in Youl while the ground for polo – an integral part of Balti culture – and the views were on the Pharol side. Pharol also had a monastery-turned-mosque-turned-temple-turned-monastery above the polo ground. “Turtuk was Buddhist before it fully converted into Islam – Nurbakshi Shias – sometime in the 16th century,” Hussein said. With this conversion, the monastery turned into a mosque. It remained so till the Indian army took over in 1971 and converted the mosque into a temple. It was only about a decade ago, after the Kargil war, the villagers and the army decided to give it back its original status of a monastery, according to Hussein. He must know as he is the sarpanch of Pharol!
The monastery was an ordinary structure but had a big surprise in store – it is from here, the only place in Indian territory, that one can see the peak of K2, the second-highest mountain in the world after Everest. Only the tip of the mountain can be seen, a perfect steep triangle that tilts at an angle!
We hurried back to our rooms as the sun went down. Not only was it getting cold, but we also wanted to recharge our camera batteries. And as Turtuk has no cabled power supply, it is only after sundown for a couple of hours that the village gets electricity through a generator. Each household pays Rs 50 a month for these hours of light during which the children study and the women not only prepare food but also catch up on their daily dose of soap operas on television. When I first went to Turtuk in November 2013, Kumkum Bhagya was the favourite show; in March, during my second trip, Balika Vadhu had taken over; and, in August, Jodha Akbar was ruling the roost in Turtuk. “What about the men,” I asked Hussein. “We don’t get the chance to watch TV,” he said with a laugh.
The next day we spent in Youl, which was linked to Pharol by a wooden suspension bridge over the rivulet. The mosque was indeed worth a visit. Its carved walnut pillars and panels spoke of a rich past. Interestingly, there were many carvings of swastika pattern carved on panels inside the mosque. A wooden tower, the tallest structure of Turtuk, stood padlocked outside. “There were cases of suicide,” Hussein explained.

The wooden roof of the 16th century mosque

Youl is also home to Abdul Karim Khali, a master stone sculptor. His works – a snow leopard pouncing on an ibex carved in relief on stone and sculpted ibexes – can be seen all over hotels in Ladakh. He also makes pressure cookers, teapots, pans, spoons, glasses, et al, in stone! Then there are a couple of craftsmen who make exquisite brass utensils and attractive wooden walking sticks with brass handles and knobs.
The most precious part of Turtuk is undoubtedly its people – beautiful to look at with their high cheekbones, chiselled faces and flawless complexion and hospitable to an extent that it seems they have risen out of fairy tales. Each time I went, I was plied with gifts – walnuts, dried apricots, apricot oil, all of which they sell to tourists – that too after I had bought the very things from them earlier; that was commerce, this was personal. The children are mischievous, playful and yet innocent; I met two sisters, twins, Amina and Shamina, in class eight, who stunned me with a query in all seriousness – “is Delhi bigger than Turtuk?” I have been there three times now and each time I came back humbled. Though things are changing with the influx of visitors, the kernel of goodness still exists. The traits that we in the mainland consider ‘impractical’, they wear with such casualness that we seem like boors from a cut-throat world. Suffice to say, I plan to go there again as the real Turtuk is much more than what I imagined it to be.

Children, the life of Turtuk

(TEXT & PHOTOGRAPHS COPYRIGHT: HIMANSHU JOSHI)

A road like no other

When the Shyok River shrinks in winter, there opens an alternative route from Nubra Valley to Pangong lake. The journey proved to be an experience of a lifetime: the winterscape lay unveiled in all its glory before us, and the icing on the cake was seeing the frozen expanse of Pangong Lake. 

The frozen Pangong Lake in Changthang plains of Ladakh

An exception to a rule is like the proverbial twist in the tale as far as travel goes. The rule of the thumb in the high Himalayas is that routes open in summer and close down in winter. The melting of snow is what drives this activity across the ranges—when the snow that fell in winter melts, roads and trails open up for travelling to and fro. But there is an exception to this taken-for-granted rule in the highlands of Ladakh. Here is a road that opens in winter and is closed in summer; and the exception exists because of the same reason—the melting of snow. But, more on this later.
For the lack of any official name, it is locally known as the Shyok Road, and takes one from the Nubra Valley to Pangong lake without crossing a high pass. It is called Shyok Road for it snakes along the Shyok River from Nubra Valley till the point the river takes a virtual u-turn—in fact, the alignment of the Shyok River is very unusual: originating from the Rimo glacier, it flows in a southeasterly direction and as it joins the Pangong range, it takes a northwestern turn, flowing parallel to its previous path. This change in direction is quite similar to another river in the Nubra Valley: the Nubra or the Siachen River flows south-east as it originates from the Siachen glacier and then shifts direction to the north-east as soon as it meets Shyok River near Diskit town. Geological fault-lines at work, apparently!
I heard about the Shyok Road during a trip to Nubra in November last year. It was my guide-cum-driver—and now a friend—Mohammad Jamshed Iqbal. We were talking about alternate routes to Nubra across the Ladakh range apart from the usual Khardung La. He listed two more routes, one across another pass called Wari La and the other being the Shyok Road towards Pangong and then across Chang La.
“Can we take one of these routes when we go back to Leh,” I asked.
“Wari La is closed,” he said, “it’ll only open in June.”
“What about the Shyok Road?” I asked, “Is Chang La closed too?”
“No, Chang La is open, but it is a very long route and you don’t have that much time,” he replied, knowing my itinerary well by then.
Iqbal promised me that during my next visit—that was to be in March—we’ll be able to do the route. “Though Wari La will be closed, the Shyok Road will still be do-able, though doing it in March will be cutting it a little fine,” he added intriguingly.
To be frank, I was flummoxed. If we could go via this route in November, we could then go through it in March and surely later, during the peak summer season!
“No, sir,” Iqbal said, “the road closes by April-May.”
“But, Chang La is open in the season,” I ventured, still not getting the point.
“Chang La is open,” he agreed, “but this road closes as summer approaches.”
Iqbal read the incomprehension writ large on my face and started explaining: “As the snow melts, the volume of water in the Shyok River increases. And as the road virtually runs on the river bed, it comes under water and closes during summers.” So, while the snow-melt opened the passes, it increased the volume of water in the river, which then starts flowing over the road! I had never thought on these lines! Though I had suffered many an aborted trip because of monsoon rains washing away a bridge, I had never applied the principle to the cold desert of Ladakh, a monsoon shadow region!
This fired up my imagination; I wanted to drive through this route. An added incentive was the chance to see the Pangong lake frozen to its depths. Further, a diversion on this road could take one to a place much in the news – Daulat Baig Oldi, where Indian and Chinese forces indulge in skirmishes on and off and where exists the highest airstrip in the world. While I had no chance of going to Daulat Baig Oldi – it being off-limits to civilians – travelling on even a small section of the legendary Silk Route was another high. It was like partaking a part of history, so to say! The name itself held a fascination for me – the place is named after Daulat Baig, a 16th-century Yarkandi nobleman who is said to have died after descending from the Karakoram Pass, 17 km from the Indo-Chinese border. Daulat Baig Oldi literally means, ‘Daulat Baig died here’. Death, clearly, figures a lot in these parts; Shyok too means ‘the river of death’ in in Yarkandi Uyghur language.
So, it was to be in March that I would travel along the ‘River of Death’, passing close by to the place where Daulat Baig died. My drive would culminate at the freezing Pangong in the dead of winter!
So, it was on March 23 this year that we started from Diskit at an unearthly hour of 6 am. It was still dark and all the woollens we were wearing did nothing much to stop the cold. A freezing wind howled through the empty streets of Diskit as we bundled into the Mahindra Xylo, rubbing our hands to generate some warmth. Iqbal had anticipated this and the heater in the vehicle was on. Soon, inside the Xylo it was all normal.
“It is about 145 km to Pangong via this route,” Iqbal informed. This meant about six hours of driving. If all went well, we could be at Pangong by mid-noon. Till Khalsar – where people normally stop for a cup of tea after driving down from Khardung La – the road was good. We took a diversion just above Khalsar and turned left on the road going to Agham. This now was new territory for me. The road was still metalled, though it had narrowed down quite a bit. About half-a-dozen twists and turns later, we came down back to the banks of the Shyok River.

Going up to Shyok village along the left bank after crossing the river

The tar on the road disappeared – it made some guest appearances on the 100-km stretch till Tangtse, about 25 km from Pangong. The track ran straight as an arrow for the next nearly 10 km, made primarily of pebbles and sand. Shyok, divided onto numerous streams, was to our right. In these early hours, its flow was lazy on the wide bed it lay on. It looked grey and not a ripple disturbed its façade. It was as if it too was waiting for the sun to come out to wake up and get ready for the world to see. Clouds delayed that hour and it was around 8 am that sun appeared in all its glory. By that time though, leaving the Shyok asleep, we had entered the narrow part of the valley – not a gorge, but shrunk appreciably from the wide swathe it presented around Khalsar. As if alive to the change in time and scenario, Shyok shrugged out of its slumber and made gargling sounds as it slipped past the boulders that had rolled down the stark, barren mountain sides. It changed its colour too – from the tepid grey, it had turned into deep turquoise.
As the scenery improved and revealed various hues and shades, the road worsened. At sections, we drove by instinct. At points, especially at turns, we even took guesses as to where our path could be. Soon, we crossed a bridge to reach a tented colony of sorts. It was a Border Roads Organisation (BRO) camp. The workers were busy getting ready for their day – some were brushing their teeth, a couple of them were shaving while a few adventurous ones were washing their faces. They looked at us with interest; apparently we were the first vehicle of the day that passed their camp. We waved to them and continued ahead.
The camp soon was hidden from our view as we took a sharp turn to the left, descending further towards the Shyok. The turn also brought into view a water channel that we had to cross. Thankfully the water was only ankle-deep. Our vehicle though rolled left and right as it went through the water that hid the small potholes that lay hidden beneath the surface. It took us a good 10 minutes to cross the 100-metre stretch, more than half of which lay under water. As the road climbed a bit to leave the loose gravel behind, we heaved a sigh of relief. This was much better for our necks and backs, which had been bobbing and twisting uncontrollably on the stretch behind.

The section that Shyok washes off every summer

The relief though was short. A large boulder lay in the middle of the road ahead. We got down to see if we could go around it, but realised even as we approached it that we were hoping for the unachievable. It was too big for us to even try and push it away, and as far as we could see, we were the only beings there. The only glimmer of hope was a big bulldozer parked a turn before. It was a BRO machine and we decided to go back and request them to clear the road. So back we went again through the gravel-water stretch to reach the tents. The BRO officers heard us out and when we told them about the bulldozer, they shook their heads. “That needs repairs,” the officer told us. “We’ll have to take one from here to clear the road.” According to him, it would take about an hour. “Have tea with us till we clear the road,” he offered magnanimously.
We took his offer for two reasons: One, the wind was bone-chilling though the sun was out and two, a cup of tea would be very welcome. We had got our breakfast packed at the hotel in Diskit but had come across no shop on the way, forget a tea shop. So, thankfully we entered a tent where a lit bukhari made it comfortably warm. I looked at the time – it was 9.30 am. If all had been right, we would have reached Pangong by 1 pm  – the condition of the road had already delayed us by an hour in our estimates.
Our gracious hosts told us innumerable stories about the work they did and the road we were travelling on. “Every year we build a section and the river washes it away in the summer,” said one who hailed from Faridabad, but had not been back home for a year. “The river even washes away the bridges built about 20 feet high,” he said, adding, “this river is deadly; many have died over the years trying to build a road here.” I understood why the Shyok is called the River of Death.
After an hour we took leave and drove back to the landslide section. Work was still going on. In the event it took around five hours to clear the road as around the turn there were boulders on the road. Also, loose gravel had started rolling down the mountain side triggered by the sound vibration of the bulldozers. It was 1.30 pm by the time we started again. We realised that it seemed difficult to visit Pangong this time. But, Iqbal had different ideas. “Let’s decide when we reach Tangtse,” he said and put his foot down on the accelerator.

Sand encroaches on the road approaching Pangong

The road improved a bit, though some stretches were as bad as the one we had already done. There were sections where the road was under hard-packed ice and some where water hurried down to meet the Shyok, to our right again as we had crossed another bridge after the landslide. By the time we reached Shyok village, the point where the river takes a u-turn and from where the road to Daulat Baig Oldi diverts along its banks, it was 3 pm. The road now entered a gorge cutting through the Pangong range to enter the

The end of the journey at a frozen vista

Changthang plains. Another hour and we were at Tangtse.
“Let’s go to Pangong,” Iqbal decided for us, “you have come so far, how can you go without seeing the frozen lake.” We reported at the post at Tangtse and rushed towards Pangong. Everything on the way was frozen – the streams, the water holes, the waterfalls; even the wind seemed so. To complete the picture, it started snowing too. It was in this state that we reached Pangong lake, a greenish-white expanse on which “a truck could be driven,” as the BRO officer had told us. We gaped at it; we shivered but we laughed. Our mouths steamed and as the snowfall turned heavy, the only word that we could think of was a cliché: “It’s cool!”
(First published in Terrascape in November 2014)
(TEXT & PHOTOGRAPHS COPYRIGHT: HIMANSHU JOSHI)

Sikkim: Capital Tales

If you are visiting Sikkim for the first time, chances are that your first port of call, so to say, would be Gangtok, the capital of this small North-Eastern hill state. It makes sense too in a way – go to the main hub and then probe the other parts of the state. But, if you want to explore Sikkim in accordance to its historical chronology then you’ll need to tweak your itinerary a bit. Instead of Gangtok, which is in East Sikkim district, you’ll need to start from Yuksom in West Sikkim. For, you see, Yuksom is where the kingdom of Sikkim was established in 1642; it was the first capital of the kingdom of Sikkim.
There are earlier mentions of Sikkim too, but they are few and far between and most are in the realm of myths and legends. The earliest historical mention of Sikkim is a record of the journey of the Buddhist saint Guru Rinpoche through the land in the 9th century. He is the one who is said to have introduced Buddhism in the land and also to have forecast the coming of monarchy centuries later.
It is an established fact that the earliest inhabitants of the land were the Lepchas. The origin of Lepchas is shrouded in mystery but it seems that they belonged to the clan of the Nagas of the Mikir, Garo and Khasi Hills which lie to the south of the Brahmaputra valley. Some believe they came from somewhere on the borders of Tibet and Burma. According to their own tradition, they came to Sikkim from the east in company with Jindaxs, who went to Nepal and shared their tradition.
The Tibetan migration in early 17th century led the Rongs to shift their habitats so as to avoid conflict. In order to avoid any possible opposition from the Lepchas, the immigrants chose Phuntsok Namgyal as the temporal and spiritual leader of Sikkim, whose ancestry they traced from a legendary prince. Phuntsok became the first Chogyal – temporal and spiritual king – of Sikkim in 1642. As the story goes, he was consecrated by three venerated lamas who came from the north, west and south to Yuksom, marking the beginning of the monarchy. They seated him on a rock slab and sprinkled water on him from the sacred urn. He was given the name, Namgyal, and the title of Chogyal. The Namgyal dynasty ruled over Sikkim as hereditary kings for 332 years.

The stone throne at Yuksom, the first capital of Sikkim

You can still see that rock slab – or the stone throne, as the locals call it today – at Yuksom, which today is not bigger than a good-sized village, albeit with varied options for stay and food. It is the starting point for the famous Dzongri trek into the Kanchenjunga National Park. On the throne you would see bowls of water, symbolising the holy water from the scared urn that was used nearly 375 years ago. This consecration site is a ten-minute walk from the Yuksom bazaar and, unlike tourist places in other parts of India, a quiet and crowd-free spot. It has a big chorten made from soil brought from different parts of Sikkim and mixed with water from the major rivers of the region. Another point of interest - there is an old juniper tree that towers above the throne. People believe the tree is as old as Sikkim! On a rock close by, there is a ‘footprint’ of one of the venerated lamas.

The second Chogyal, Tensung Namgyal, succeeded to the throne in 1670. He shifted the capital from Yuksom to nearby Rabdentse, also in the West Sikkim district. Rabdentse remained the capital of the kingdom for over the next century – till 1793. No wonder, it has today the most extensive ruins of the royal area in whole of Sikkim. Close to Pelling, the main town of West Sikkim, and Geyzing, the district headquarters - also one of the most visited spots in the state. A walk of about 10 minutes on a well-laid out path through a thick forest, brings one to the site whose location is bewitching. The ruins lie on an undulating meadow with gorgeous views of the Kanchenjunga, the third-highest mountain peak in the world. On a clear day – for, in Sikkim, it rains almost every second day – the view is one to die for. Rabdentse, declared by the Archaeological Survey of India as a heritage monument, surely is a place made for rulers!

The brick walls at Rabdentse, the second capital

The ruins mainly consist of a maze of brick walls. The 10-minute walk brings you first to three standing stones called ‘Namphogang’. This was the spot from where judgments were pronounced. The palace ruins are ahead in two segregated areas – the northern wing and the southern wing. Close to the palace ruins are three chortens, the religious place where members of the royal family offered incense to the deities. While the northern wing was for the royal family, in the southern wing, common people were given an audience by the king. A stone throne can be seen here.
The 18th century saw many wars and battles fought in Sikkim by Nepalese, Bhutanese and Tibetans. 
In 1780, during the reign of Tenzing Namgyal, Nepali forces occupied large chunks of Sikkim territory. They attacked Rabdentse and the Chogyal had to flee to Tibet. The Nepali excursions emboldened them to penetrate into Tibet. This led to the Chinese intervention and Nepal was defeated. In the Sino-Nepal treaty, Sikkim lost some of its land to Nepal, but monarchy was allowed to be restored in the country. Tenzing Namgyal died in Lhasa and his son Tsudphud Namgyal was sent to Sikkim in 1793 to succeed him as the monarch. Rabdentse was now considered too insecure because of its proximity to the Nepal border and Tsudphud shifted the capital to a place called Tumlong, in North Sikkim today. 
The ruins of Tumlong, about 40 km from Gangtok, are the least advertised in Sikkim. If you are not looking for the place, you can miss the small signboard on the right side of the road, which goes from Gangtok to Mangan, the district headquarters of North Sikkim. Keep an eye out for the signboard near Phodong, a few kilometres after Seven Sisters Waterfall, a major tourist site. You’ll have to leave the main road and drive up hill on a narrow road. Ask for directions after a couple of kilometres and you’ll come to a non-descript spot with the ruins of the third capital of Sikkim. What is left today is just a small part, smaller than a bungalow in Lutyen’s Delhi – an outer wall and shells of what would have been living rooms. It is not much to look at, but it too has a superb location. There are a few carved – rather etched – rock slabs in one corner that are the only proof that the place had seen better times. Most of the artifacts, I was told, were in the State Museum in Gangtok now. There is a beautiful monastery a kilometre ahead of the ruins and I would recommend you to visit it – it is serene and not at all commercial and with friendly monks to make the visit worthwhile.

The ruins at Tumlong, the third capital

Tumlong, which remained the capital for 101 years, though, has one milestone to its credit; the Treaty of Tumlong was signed here in 1861 between the British and the king of Sikkim. The British India had successfully befriended Sikkim, mainly in a bid to check the ever-present threat of the Gurkhas and to establish a trade link with Tibet. The British also became interested in Darjeeling, both as a hill resort and an outpost, from where Tibet and Sikkim would be easily accessible. Following a lot of pressure from the British, Sikkim finally gifted Darjeeling to British India on the understanding that a certain amount would be paid as annual subsidy to Sikkim. The gift deed was signed by the Chogyal in 1835. The British, however, did not pay the compensation as had been stipulated and this led to a quick deterioration of relation between the two countries. The relations deteriorated to such an extent that when Dr Archibald Campbell, the Superintendent of Darjeeling, and Dr (later Sir) Joseph Dalton Hooker visited Sikkim in connection with the latter’s botanical research, they were captured and imprisoned in 1849. In November 1860, the British sent an expeditionary force to Sikkim. This force was driven back from Rinchenpong in Sikkim. A stronger force was sent in 1861 that resulted in the capture of Tumlong and the signing of the Treaty of Tumlong.
In 1890, Sikkim became a British protectorate and in 1894, the then Chogyal, Thutob Namgyal, shifted the capital from Tumlong to Gangtok. The Sir Thutob Namgyal Memorial (STNM) Hospital, built in 1917 in Gangtok, is named in his memory. The hospital is a landmark in Gangtok today, which became the capital of the 22nd state of India on May 16, 1975. Gangtok is the biggest city of Sikkim and its former royal palaces and buildings today house state government offices. Not much is left of old Sikkim today in Gangtok, which firmly places you in the present. For the past, you’ll have to start your journey from Yuksom.

Gangtok, in East Sikkim, is the present and the fourth capital

(TEXT & PHOTOGRAPHS COPYRIGHT: HIMANSHU JOSHI)