The dragon bites its tail – Part II
FROM THE ARCHIVES: A longform piece on Bhutan’s Lhotshampa question [1992]. A Lotshampa refugee at a camp in Jhapa District of eastern Nepal showing his Bhutanese passport.
Photo: Alemaugil / Wikimedia Common
(This article was first published in our July-August 1992 print issue. Also read Part I and Part III of the reportage.)
No more a backwater
Bhutan was still an economic backwater at the end of the 1940s. The economic, cultural and social interaction and sustenance was almost exclusively with the north. The forested southern hills, the malarial jungles of the Duars and, beyond, the India of the British Empire, held little charm to the pastoralists of high valleys.
Bhutan s hydropower exports flourish during lockdown, but for rural communities it s a mixed blessing
By Dawa Gyelmo
The pandemic may have shut down much of Bhutan’s public life, but its prime export, hydropower, has flourished. With early rainfall, Druk Green Power Corporation has recorded an estimated 14 percent increase in energy generation between January and July end, compared to the same months in 2019. Revenues increased 13 percent.
The rise in revenues will offset the losses incurred because tourism has come to a halt. In pre-COVID days, it was Bhutan’s second highest revenue earner.
But for many rural communities having hydropower stations nearby is a mixed blessing. Houses in these areas have developed cracks that often reappear even if they are fixed. Much of the damage remains unrepaired.
Rural communities have found cracks developing in their homes with the continuous blasting for construction. Dec 11, 2020 · 07:30 pm Cracks developed on the wall of a traditional house in Uma village near Punatsangchhu hydropower site in Bhutan s Wangduephodrang district. | Dawa Gyelmo/ The Third Pole
The pandemic may have shut down much of Bhutan’s public life, but its prime export, hydropower, has flourished. With early rainfall, Druk Green Power Corporation has recorded an estimated 14% increase in energy generation between January and July end, compared to the same months in 2019. Revenues increased by 13%.
The rise in revenues will offset the losses incurred because tourism has come to a halt. In pre-Covid days, it was Bhutan’s second-highest revenue earner.