GLOF Threat and sacred lakes in Sikkim
An expert team sent to assess the threat of Glacial Lake Outburst Floods (GLOF) in Sikkim faces resistance due to the sacred status of lakes under the Places of Worship (Special Provisions) Act, 1991.
A strange impasse has been facing the team of experts sent by the centre to assess the threat of Glacial Lake Outburst Flood (GLOF) which is supposed to study six high mountain lakes in Sikkim, as these are sacred lakes that have been notified under Central law Places of Worship (Special Provisions) Act, 1991, the law passed by the Parliament of India and notified by Govt of Sikkim in 1997/98.
The lakes selected are Tenchungkha, Khangchung Chho, Lachen Khangtse, Lachung Khangtse, La Tsho, and Shako Chho. The state government had planned to get a study on Guru Dongmar Lake as well, but that has been postponed because of stiff resistance from local bodies. Interestingly, the monk body, known as the Sangha has had not said anything on this.
According to the state Department of Information and Public Relations, till September 9, the team has done their preliminary studies on Lonak Valley and Khangtse Lakes, via Muguthang and a presentation is being drawn up.
However according to former state minister Tseten Tashi Bhutia, and convenor of the powerful Sikkim Bhutia Lepcha Apex Committee (SIBLAC), these are sacred lakes and one is not allowed to visit them or touch their waters. The stiffest resistance has been in the case of Guru Dongmar Lake at 17,800 feet and Tso Lhamu, at above 18,000 feet.
Tso Lhamu is considered to be sacred as it is the origin of perhaps both the sacred rivers of Sikkim, Teesta, and Rangit. Teesta is considered as their mother by the Lepcha community and besides, the entire population of Sikkim reveres these two rivers.
Bhutia reminded East India Story: “Prior to the shocking devastation due to the GLOF from South Lhonak Lake on October 4, last year, another team had visited without the permission of the Pipon of Lachen Valley. He had warned them about it, and had later said that the violation of its sacred status had caused the GLOF.”
The case of Guru Dongmar had already been highly sensitive for decades now because the Sikh Regiment posted at that part of India’s border with China had illegally constructed a gurudwara, claiming that the lake had been visited by Guru Nanak.
The history of the sanctity of Guru Dongmar started when Guru Padmasambhava, the founder of Vajrayana Buddhism, had visited Sikkim and did a major Tantric puja there so that some water would be available to the locals all round the year. It is said that prior to the tantric puja, the water would freeze and remain frozen through the very long winter in the cold desert of the Tibetan plateau.
Interestingly, the proof of the pudding is that even at the height of winters, one part of the sacred lake never freezes, and I have seen this myself. No scientist has been able to explain this strange phenomenon.
According to the Sikkim Government Notification of 1991, there are in Sikkim 108 sacred sites, ten sacred peaks, six sacred caves, eleven sacred lakes, and nine sacred hot springs. No one is allowed to defile these sites, and this is why mountaineering is not allowed beyond Green Lake, the base camp of Mount Khangchendzonga from the Sikkim side. This is for all Sikkimese, Buddhists and non-Buddhists alike, sacrosanct.
“This is not a fancy thing, these sacred sites. All this is recorded in the Denjog Neysol our ancient history text of Sikkim,” Bhutia asserted. Yapo Sonam Yongda, highly regarded as the oldest living encyclopaedia on Sikkimese Budhism had told me the same thing during my own studies on Sikkim’s spiritual and temporal history.
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