The BBC's South Asia news site has provided an update on the situation in Ladakh's Chang thang.

India's Central Government has approved the establishment of a field research station in Leh with a view to tackling some of the environmental problems faced by the region. See the Times of India article for more info.

If you are a IALS member interested in being the next Treasurer and Membership Secretary then please contact Francesca Merritt. Francesca is currently looking for someone to understudy/assist with treasurer and membership administration. If you are looking to get more involved in the IALS then this is a perfect opportunity to learn the ropes from a long standing and highly valued member of the Executive Committee.

Further to the members' news post documenting the sad loss of Dr Keith Ball, the obituary published in the Guardian can now be viewed online.

More tourists than ever before in Ladakh
February 7, 2008:

Ladakh crossed 50000 mark in tourist inflow last year, which has cast away the apprehension that the popularity of this trans-Himalayan region as a tourist destiny is declining. According to J&K Tourism Department Leh, the number of tourists visited Ladakh last year was 50185 that includes 28178 foreign and 22007 domestic tourists. This figure shows a considerable surge from the previous year’s influx of tourists (43821), which is attributed to more frequent flight operations and suddenly much cheaper air fair option available with the Deccan Airways launching its service between New Delhi and Leh last summer.

The mystic and isolated Ladakh was thrown open to foreign tourists in 1974. It gained instant popularity among them and in a short period tourist influx rose sharply touching 20000 in just about three years. This figure, however, remained constant for many years to come with disturbed periods in between (1989 mass agitation and 1999 Kargil episode) when number of visitors to Ladakh sharply went down.

The incoming of domestic tourists to Ladakh is a recent phenomenon, which was set off by a massive publicity campaign of Sindhu Festival launched by then BJP led NDA government. In 1997, L K Advani, BJP leader and former Union Home Minister, discovered that Sindhu (the Indus River) flowed through Ladakh and he decided to have an annual celebration of Sindhu Festival to give vent to his surcharged ethnical (Sindhi community from Pakistan) and religious sentiments.

This annual festival did bring in lots of domestic tourists in the following years and today the number of domestic tourists has grown almost equal to foreigners even as the rate of increase is much higher than the later. Last year’s figure tells that about 4000 more domestic tourists visited Ladakh than the previous year’s record of 17707.

With the increase in the number of tourists visiting Ladakh there has also been considerable growth in hotels, guest houses and other tourist facilities. According to J&K Tourism Department, Leh, there are 124 hotels with double-bed capacity of 1900 and 365 guest houses with similar bed capacity. In addition, there are 150 restaurants registered with the Tourism department.

These establishments together generate huge employment opportunities. Hotels only employ some 1400 staff including cooks and waiters. Apart from this, some 5000 people are engaged as travel agents, guides, taxi drivers, bus operators and pony men. Tourism department has registered 228 pony men and 165 professional guides.

Click here for news on reported Chinese activity around Demchok and detail on ceding Aksai Chin.

February 6, 2008:
T Morup, Leh

Power shortage is the biggest constraint in Ladakh preventing real industrial growth here, however, this problem will be solved to a great extent with the commencement of 45-megawatt Nemo-Basgo Hydel project expected to be completed in less than the target period.

Engineers of NHPC have told Chering Dorjey the LAHDC Leh Chairman that they should be able to hand over the power project completed in about three and a half years from now. Mr. Dorjey revealed this in his address during a one-day seminar on Entrepreneurship Awareness Program organized by J&K Entrepreneurship Development (JKED) and sponsored by SIDBI at JKED office in Leh Industrial Area today.

He hoped that with the commencement of the hydel project the “constraint” will be removed ushering in a new era of progress and employment opportunities. In his reaction to grievances against bank loans raised by a trainee with ITI unit in Leh, Mr. Dorjey said, there are many such complaints and SBI Leh despite being the second most profiting bank in the entire J&K State fail to meet their quota of subsidized loans for local enterprises. Relatively better performance by J&K Bank in this regard can be attributed to its special drive to recruit local staff, he said adding that the Hill Council’s insistence to carry out similar drive was not paid heed to by SBI.

The next biggest issue in entrepreneurship development in Leh is always ‘imitating’ others’ businesses while being afraid of starting something new. Both Mr. Dorjey and Tsering Nurboo Lampa, EC Agriculture raised this issue prevailing in Leh. Jumping into ventures without having enough capacity and plan leads to a crises situation. For example, the number of steel fabricators in Leh grew out of proportion after some initial successes leaving the new entrepreneurs unable to even pay the salaries of the workers.

At the same time the inability to ‘think big’ and refusing to actually come forward and accept the challenges in taking up major enterprises or business projects also pose a constraint in the growth of industry in Ladakh. Mr. Dorjey said, no local qualifies for major loan schemes such as those available with the National Horticulture Board of India. Similarly, a 14-crore road and bridges project in Leh being financed by ADB, on Hill Council’s insistence, was broken up into five sub-contracts, yet hardly one or two contractors qualified for it, Mr. Dorjey said.

Reported today on the BBC's South Asia news site, recent heavy snow is threatening the survival of grazing livestock on Ladakh's Chang thang. It would appear that the crisis is on a similar scale to that experienced in the winter of 1998 when similar events resulted in the starvation of thousands of yak, sheep and goat. The gravity of the situation is partly attributed to the locust activity which has decimated fodder supplies in parts of eastern Ladakh (and much of Zangskar) over the last three summers.