Road connection is still a distant dream for Dzong’o villages

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Gangtok (Sikkim): A decade has passed since the land collapse and Sikkim, especially northern Sikkim, has been hit hard in terms of infrastructure damage.

Until September 2011, the 32 families in Bentung, the last village in Upper Dzungu, could access via a narrow, car-only road, to a concrete bridge linking Bentung to the Bay and the rest of Sikkim and the world.

Dzongu is an area reserved for the indigenous Lepcha people. “Reserved” status means the protection of their language, culture and way of life. About 8000 people living in this region practice their unique traditional and sustainable way of living, keeping in close contact with nature.

years of neglect

In September 2011, the only bridge connecting the Bay to Pentong as well as the famous Tholung Monastery, which is located in the remote wilderness of Dzongu, was broken by rocks that fell due to the earthquake. In the days following the September 19 earthquake, a temporary bamboo bridge was built across the raging Tulung River. Multiple landslides in two places on the way to Pentong made it immobile, so people from the village were left with no options but to walk the village road to the bay.

This has been the reality for the past ten years. The bridge linking Bentung with Bay has not been reconstructed. The vehicles that were there in the evening before the earthquake were seen on the other side of the Tulung River deserted as the vehicular road had disappeared in some places, as bridge-shaped communication had not become a reality.

Bentong Village. Photo: in order.

A visit to Bentung Village reveals the weaknesses of the people who live there. Although the villagers produce the vegetables they need for their needs (and also sell them in markets via Tholung), they are forced to go to Mangan, the county seat of North Sikkim, for many other things essential to their life.

Mangan is very far in terms of accessibility. To reach Mangan, the villagers have to travel to the Bay, and cross the Tholung River to balance whatever they carry to trade on their backs or on their heads. From the bay only jeep service is available daily, which is also unpredictable. So they went to the next village, Lingam, five kilometers away on their way. These paths are filled with leeches during the rainy season (which is most of the year) and it’s perfectly normal to see bloodstains on their clothes. From Linjam, taxis are available, although not many and not available on request.

From Linjam they reach Mantam, the next bottleneck. A cloudburst in 2016 followed by a massive landslide not only created an artificial lake in the area, but also wiped out the bridge across the river, the only way to cross the river to Mantam. A temporary suspension bridge was built over the river linking 10 villages: Bentung, Sakyung, Pile, Lingam, Tengvung, Lenko, Kosong, Payal, Nambrek, Nong and Mantamtu Mangan. This bridge also connected these villages to the only functioning health center in Lingetum.

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One villager said that this same suspension bridge was new. Earlier, a temporary bridge was built of bamboo and it was very low, as a result, the water in the river touched their feet while crossing the river, and during the monsoon it became ineffective.

The villager in question told us this interesting story of a man who was crossing this makeshift bridge with a bag of rice on his back and a beer crate on his head. When he lost his balance, he had to quickly decide which one to give up on, so he decided to give up the bag of rice.

There are very impressive health centers built in almost all the villages, but they are still not used due to the lack of doctors or other medical facilities. The doctor is supposed to visit the centers once a month, but it never happens that way. Villagers say doctors visit twice a year at best. The building was only helped by the contractors who built it.

The nearest health center with a resident doctor is Basington, Lingam, and it takes three to five hours of flight for many of the villagers who live outside of Mantam. The lack of a drawbridge to go to the Primary Health Center (PHC) adds to the misery of people suffering from diseases. This primary health care center in Bassington also suffers from an irregular drug supply and inadequate facilities.

This is the reason why people prefer to go to the district hospital in Mangan. The condition of this county hospital is very poor in terms of testing facilities, etc. Those with better transportation take patients and their families to Gangtok, the capital.

In Bentung Village, the lady at the Homestay where we stayed told us that she had just returned from Mangan Hospital where her infant son was admitted with a high fever. They had to carry the baby on foot 12 kilometers, daring the treacherous path, the bamboo bridge and many more kilometers in a communal taxi to get medical care for their infant. The journey that began in the early morning ended in the evening.

She was also told that she was no longer interested in growing potatoes as she had to carry a big bag of potatoes to the far market. Instead, I started growing ‘Dal’, Sikkim’s proud contribution to the chili world. A 2kg dalle can fetch 1,000 rupees while she has to pull, on foot, a bag of potatoes to earn that money.

Carrying anything heavy is a difficult task in the area due to the lack of proper connectivity and accessibility. One of these nearly impossible tasks is to get cooking gas from the respective warehouses to the homes. They use wood for cooking, but gas stoves are also used for cooking. Interestingly, there are no agencies that distribute cooking gas to these areas. The villagers have to reach Mangan which is 20-25 kilometers from these villages to collect the cooking gas while carrying the empty cylinders back.

indifferent management

The normal logistics are as follows: Mangan to Lingam, people travel in a shared taxi, then cross the suspension bridge with a gas cylinder on their backs, a balancing act, and then wait for another shared jeep, which takes them to a certain point and then walk from there to their villages .

A friend who lives in this area told a harrowing story of carrying his cousin’s body across this suspension bridge. The person who died at Lingtheme Health Center was carried on a stretcher across a 200-meter suspension bridge. The bridge kept swaying and they couldn’t hold up anywhere in order to keep their balance. They thought it was endless work.

It is very unfortunate that in the past ten years or so, the government has made no effort to rebuild the bridge connecting the bay to the last village of Upper Dzungu Monastery, Bentung and Tholung where valuable Buddhist relics and lines are kept. The same is the unfortunate reality with no automated bridge being built over the Teesta River in Mantam.

Nearly 10 villages across the river have suffered incredibly because of this carefree attitude of the government since 2016. There have been proposals to build a new bridge but it has not materialized yet. The government built the Bailey Bridge in 2020, but it was swept away by the following monsoons. The existing steel pedestrian suspension bridge was built after that.

The same massive landslide that locals attribute to the two massive hydropower projects in Dekshaw, the fifth phase (500MW) project by the National Hydropower Corporation (NHPC). It was built between Dzongu and Dichu. Because of this project, the lower part of the Dzongu suffered greatly. Landslides and river breaches have become a normal phenomenon during the monsoons since the project was implemented. The Phase 3 project in Chumthang has also had massive environmental implications for the entire region. Tunneling has contributed to landslides in the Himalayan fragile region.

A total of six projects have been proposed to be built here. Four of them have been canceled, and two have been suspended due to protests. But the government is now reviving the two stalled projects despite the protests.

The Dzongu region happens to be a biodiversity hotspot. The indigenous people of Dzungu, especially the new generation, took the lead in protesting against this move.

This clearly indicates that the development concerns of the Sikkim government lie elsewhere.

EK Santha teaches at SRM University, Sikkim and is the author of ‘Democracy in Sikkim: The Untold History’.

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