Ladakh, India

The Power to EMPOWER Women in the Sonamling Settlement

The Background

Located in extreme northern India, Ladakh is home to more than eight thousand Tibetans, most of whom fled hardship and repression in Tibet in the years after the brutal Chinese takeover in 1950. Though its broad valleys and spiky Himalayan peaks are stunning in their beauty, Ladakh is also a harshly arid region of remorseless wind and fierce sun.

In late 2001, SELF was asked to bring solar power to Tibetan exiles in the southern Indian state of Karnataka, specifically for a new Prayer Hall at the Gaden Jangtse monastery in Mungod. Gaden Jangtse is also the occasional residence of His Holiness the Dalai Lama. His Holiness voiced keen interest in the role that appropriate technologies such as solar power can play in improving the welfare of Tibetan and other peoples. SELF was asked to confer with representatives of the Tibetan Government-in-Exile to determine what refuge communities would most benefit from SELF’s help.

The Sonamling Refugee Settlement

The Government-in-Exile’s home office was quick with a response: the Somaling Refugee Settlement in a particularly remote and depressed part of Ladakh, where 4,000 people lead a hardscrabble life eking subsistence from tine, boulder-strewn farms. The extreme cold and aridness of the area limits agriculture to a few short weeks in the summer. Over the rest of the year, economic activity is minimal, and in the winter the region is completely cut off by deep now, with air travel providing the only viable route of transportation and communication.

People in the area have asked the Government-in-Exile for assistance in diversifying their economic base. Of particular interest is information technology, which the Ladakhis understand has worked great positive change for other Tibetan refugees at the Palijorling Settlement in nearby Pokhara, Nepal.

The Goals

SELF will develop a computer center in the Sonamling Settlement of Ladakh together with the American group that facilitated the accomplishments in Palijorling, Students for Change (SFC). SFC was started in 1998 by Ms. Robyn McClintock, who saw the need and opportunity while doing field research in Nepal for her Master’s thesis. SFC defines its mission as “striving to increase the socioeconomic well being for the population of each community by providing education and tools for generating income.”

Sonamling Settlement is far removed from grid electricity; therefore SELF staff will work with local people to install solar energy to power a computer center and satellite Internet hookup. Then American college students from SFC will arrive for a semester, coaching area residents in information technology and small business management. In Ladakh, this assistance will particularly focus on women, who today have very few job opportunities beyond the home, and who face educational and cultural obstacles.

Return to this web page often to learn about how this project progresses.  Or, sign up for SELF's e-newsletter, Perihelion, to get quarterly updates on SELF's work.

The Power Is YOURS...

You can help fund SELF's project in Ladakh. Here are some examples of how your investment will help:

• $25 can purchase a full lighting kit, including ballast, fixture, and bulbs for a rural villiage home in Ladakh.
  

• $50 can purchase a deep-cycle battery that will store solar electricity for use in the evenings, or on days with heavy cloud cover.
  

• $100 can purchase high quality solar lantern that will allow Ladakhis to have portable light at night.
  

• $500 can purchase a complete solar home system for one family, including: 50 watt solar module, battery, controller, switch, wiring, and bulbs.
  

• $1000 can pay for the program to train Ladakhis in the installation and maintenance of their solar home systems.

Back to top

Did you know a gift of $10 buys two efficient fluorescent light bulbs for a village school, home, or clinic?
Learn more>>>

A study for the U.S. government calculated that the gasoline equivalent of the energy saved over the lifetime of one 24-watt compact fluorescent bulb is sufficient to drive a Prius from New York to San Francisco.