20-30 Himalayan Communities Attend Maiden Tibet-Himalaya Conference in Dharamsala
By Tenzin Chokyi
DHARAMSALA, 3 Sept: Amid growing international trends of oversimplifying and reducing the Himalayan region, participants from the region and scholars specialised in its study have come together at the Tibet-Himalaya Relations Conference to reclaim their agency in shaping how the region is perceived.
The Tibet Policy Institute (TPI), a think tank under the Central Tibetan Administration (CTA) today commenced the first-ever Tibet-Himalaya Relations Conference at the Sikyong Hall in the CTA compound, jointly organised by the Dalai Lama Institute for Higher Education, the College for Higher Tibetan Studies, Sarah, and the Monlam Charitable Trust.
The five-day conference, running from 3 to 7 September, has in attendance 80 participants and 50 observers, including scholars, students, and current lineage holders– the princes and princesses descended from the region’s former royal houses and chiefdoms.
The participants have come from 20 to 30 different communities from the Himalayan region, including Tawang, Ladakh, Spiti, Kinnaur, Bhutan, Nepal, and the Tibetan exile community, alongside professors and researchers specialised in Tibet-Himalaya relations.
Some 30 participants from the Kinnaur-Spiti region were unable to attend due to heavy rainfall and roadblocks.
The conference is described as part of the CTA’s broader campaign to reaffirm Tibet’s historical status as an independent country even though the CTA has now adopted the Middle Way approach now to resolve the Sino-Tibet issue.
In his opening address, Sikyong Penpa Tsering, the political head of the Tibetan polity in exile, noted that there exists a general ethos whereby advocacy of the Middle Way Policy often sidelines Tibet’s past. He stressed that this should not be the case, and that Tibet’s history must instead be openly discussed to strengthen and better inform the policy.
He added that the conference should not create any confusion regarding the India-Tibet border. “The Tibetans were responsible for demarcating the McMahon Line in the past, and we continue to uphold it, recognising and respecting India’s territorial claims,” he said.
The Dalai Lama, the spiritual leader of the Tibetan people, in his written message to the conference, stated that in the face of aggressive attempts to erase the Tibetan identity through language, culture, and history, the Tibet-Himalaya Relations Conference, which encompasses the centuries-old, interlinked history of Tibet, Bhutan, and India, is indeed highly significant.
The spiritual leader urged scholars to engage with the authentic history of Tibet and the Himalayan region, challenging and rectifying the misleading narratives that have been established about the region.
Speaking to the Tibet Express, Dr Tsewang Dorjee, a senior researcher at the TPI and the coordinator of the ongoing conference, said that the key agenda of the conference is to preserve and document the region’s historical memories for future study and research.
He further added that, although there has been a longstanding relationship between Tibet and the Himalayan region, very little of it has been formally documented. Much of the history has been preserved primarily through oral traditions, making the conference an important effort to systematically record and study these connections.
The official conference brochure lists 66 topics, ranging from historical trade and religious and political ties across the Himalayan region to ongoing ecological challenges. Prominent scholars participating include Prof Vasudha Pande, Dr Tsangtruk Topla, Professor Jampa Samten, among others.
