Swedish national Helena Norberg-Hodge formed Women’s Alliance of Ladakh to make
the local youth feel proud of their heritage. Today WAL members help women produce
traditional garments. They have also vowed to fight climate change,
reports Kumar Rakesh from Srinagar

Sonam Yangzon breaks into an easy laugh and stretches her hands wide apart when asked how much impact Women’s Alliance of Ladakh, of which she is the president at present, has made on the lives of Ladakhi women. For somebody who needs an interpreter to talk to anyone, not knowing the local language of Ladakhi, Yangzon communicates rather well. For her and her colleagues, the sight of hundreds of their village women growing up from doing nothing to their social and economic empowerment, where they can tell government servants what "so-called development" work is good and what not for their villages, is very fulfilling, she says animatedly as much through her speech as her expressions.

Since its inception in 1991, WAL has come to occupy a central space in the cultural and developmental milieu of Ladakhi society as it tries valiantly to ensure that winds of outside influence do not blow apart the ancient way of life of this huge but sparsely-populated region. "They have been a good advertisement for the Ladakhi culture. Not long before, the new generation seemed diffident of their spiritual heritage which, they believed, was at odds with the modern way of life that westerners brought here. They sought material affluence of ours and did not seem proud of their society’s age-old contentment. WAL deserves the credit for being an important contributor for reversing this slide," says Mark Jen, a European tourist, who has been coming to Leh for several years and has attended a few WAL’s workshops for tourists.

It is as much ironical as a reflection on our apathy for our tradition that it was a conscious Swedish national, Helena Norberg-Hodge, who, concerned by the eroding value system of Ladakhi society, started a movement to empower the locals and make them feel proud of their heritage. When in mid 1970s, the government opened Ladakh to foreign tourists, Indians would then hardly visit this isolated land. They thronged the Buddhist region. Male members left their families and villages behind and
lived a difficult life in Leh town, where they could cater to tourists and earn some money, nothing short of a revolutionary idea for a Ladakhi that time. "People in town preferred western food to their traditional meals. They would be delighted if a tourist gave them their old jeans and thought their traditional dresses were a burden. Consumption of alcohol and cigarettes was fashionable, and the new generation was madly aping the outsiders. For the first time, people started thinking in terms of rich and poor. We were adrift," Tashi Namgial, a senior government official says.

WAL was Helena’s idea because she thought only women, who were running the family in the absence of men, could bring the balance back to Ladakhi society, WAL’s secretary Rinchen Dolkar says. "Helena learnt
Ladakhi, reached out to women, raised their awareness and WAL came into being in 1991," she says.

"We welcome development but it should not compromise our environment and way of life," Dolkar says, as she supervises the several village women undergoing training in traditional Ladakhi tailoring and knitting.

Long before the idea of polythene ban became raison-d’`EAtre of environmentalist groups, WAL took to streets for it in the early nineties and enforced a complete shutdown in Leh as it grew in strength. The administration’s decision to ban polythene in 1998 was its first major victory. Soon WAL was to open restaurants in Leh where Ladakhi foods were served, and as it found encouragement from the tourists, it began inviting them for workshops to open them to Ladakhi way of life, including the use of traditional loos,
which facilitated use of human waste as manure.Women often came to streets against liquor shops in villages and fought against use of skirts among girls. Isn’t it retrogressive? "Ours has been a positive campaign. We told our young generation to be proud of their ways as they are best suited to us," Yangzon says. Youngsters in Leh will tell you how they feel wary of getting cosy with their girlfriends in cars or restaurants, lest a group of women affiliated to WAL subject them to a longharangue.However, the real achievement of WAL has been in reaching out to over 100 villages across Leh, which, with 45,110 sq km of area, is bigger than Haryana but has a population close to only 1.15 lakh. WAL has over 5,000 members.

These members guide other village women in producing traditional Ladakhi woollen works, juices of local fruits like apricot and the famous Leh Berry, all of which have a market. During the tourist season in the summer months, these women run their own restaurants. Most of the government works in villages are carried out in consultation with them.

WAL has also been a pioneer in preserving traditional seeds against the mixed breeds, which may yield more but require increasing use of pesticide and fertilisers, and in propagating organic farming. "I earn Rs 3,000 a month in season. And I also have this satisfaction that I am helping preserve our traditional life style," says D. Tsering, a 28-year-old-woman, who became associated with WAL after dropping out from college.

A visit to WAL office and talks with its office-bearers more than anything underlines their sincerity for the cause— whether it is small matter of exhorting villagers to refrain from washing clothes in streams used for drinking water, or their campaign against liquor consumption. "We are a very small population. We have to be extra alert in preserving our culture," Yangzon says. It has now joined hands with noted environmentalist, Vandan Shiva, to study the environmental damages and fight against
climate change.

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