Museum comes up in Darjeeling to showcase Tibetan culture, heritage

DARJEELING 14 Jul 2015: Visitors to the Darjeeling hills looking for a one-off experience will now be able to get a glimpse of the rich and diverse culture and traditions of the Himalaya region within the confines of a newly-built museum by the local Tibetan community.

Named ‘Himalayan Tibet Museum’, it is situated on Gandhi Road in the upper part of town. The museum not only explores the unique culture and heritage of various communities residing in the Himalayan belt, but also possesses one of the finest and comprehensive collections of regional artefacts. The museum showcases the richness of the culture and traditions of various communities, which is highly praiseworthy, but the idea for its coming up stemmed more from the incorrect history shown by the Chinese in the National Museum in Tibet.

The museum has been constructed with the help of donations from former Darjeeling MP Jaswant Singh from the MPLADS fund and from members of the Tibetan community. It was inaugurated by Gurung Tulku Nima Hoiser Rinpoche in celebration of the 80th birthday of the Dalai Lama.

“I was in Lhasa in 2007 and visited the beautiful National Museum built after the Chinese occupied Tibet. However, I found the history of Tibet and its people were manipulated and wrongly depicted. I wanted to correct it and so thought about establishing a museum in Darjeeling to depict the actual history,” explained Ngawang Tenzin Gyatso, president of Manjushree Centre of Tibetan Culture, which runs the museum. He added, “The artefacts and the culture shown in the national museum in Lhasa relate more to India. The Chinese will manipulate history to suit their tastes.”

On display is the history of the ancient civilization of Tibet (Zhang Zhung) and its first king Nyatri Tsenpo, who began his reign in 127 B.C, the three great ancestral religious kings, the Tibetan people’s occupation and origin of its script and priceless artefacts (statues of the Buddha, prayer bells, diamond sutra text written in golden ink) donated by the Dalai Lama, among many more.

Other interesting displays are portraits of Rahul Sanskritayan, Alexander Csoma De Koros, Sarat Chandra Das, Gendun Chopel and George Nicolas De Roerich, all prominent Tibetologists who were connected with Darjeeling. Maps and documents of Tibet with a replica of the Potala Palace, the seat of the Dalai Lama and Tibetan Government prior to the Chinese invasion in 1959, have also been showcased for visitors.

Gyatso said there are other such museums in India, but those are more dedicated to the religious aspects of the Tibetan community. “This museum is more on the historical and cultural aspects, which we want to preserve for future generations. In fact, it will not be wrong to say that India is the mother of culture, philosophy and tradition,” he pointed out.

Asked about the response the museum was getting, Gyatso said, “The museum was formally opened on July 2 and we are getting good response from people. It is the monsoon season now and we do not have many tourists. But we believe that once the tourist season starts, the museum will attract many foreign visitors.”

Roma Srivastav, a visitor from Hyderabad, was awed by the display. “The displays are very informative and give us an idea about Tibetan and other communities’ culture and heritage of the Himalayan region.  I have visited other museums in India and this one is there right on top,” she said, going through the artefacts donated by the Dalai Lama.