Phuktal Monastic School, also known as the Phugtal Monastic School, is set up by the Phuktal Gompa that provides the students of the local Lungnak Valley in south-eastern Zanskar, in the autonomous Himalayan region of Ladakh, in Northern India.
Housed in the Phuktal Gompa, it is the only centre of learning for the remote villages located in the Lungnak Valley, which is cut off from the rest of the Ladakh region and has no direct vehicular connectivity. People ferry supplies on horses, donkeys, and mules in the warmer months, and in the frozen winters, they are transported through the frozen Zanskar River. No fees are charged from the students, and the monastery bears the cost for the room, board and study materials of the students, with help from sponsors. A lot of the students are children from the local farming families in the Lungnak Valley, which are extremely poor and least educated. The older generations are nearly totally uneducated. While they understand the importance of education, they can't afford to send their kids away, outside the Zanskar Valley. Hence, a school like Phuktal Monastic School offers the best of both worlds, by imparting quality education, for free, and without the students having to leave the valley.
History
The school was set up in 1993, at the behest of Geshe Lharampa Nagri Choszed (1920–1998), a native of Tibet, who came to Phuktal in 1959 after the Chinese invasion of Tibet. Nagri Choszed brought with him a high level of Buddhist philosophical education and training, to which the isolated Phuktal monks had had virtually no access for several centuries. He restored the ancient tradition of learning and scholarship at Phuktal and instructed the monks in philosophy, traditional ritual systems, and moral discipline. He also sent out many monks to for the purpose of advance learning at other institutions, who returned to Phuktal and began to teach.
In 2014, the Phuktal Monastic School facility was completed. The new facility had student accommodation and housing, multiple classrooms, staff quarters, offices, a library, the Sowa-Rigpa medicine centre, a kitchen, a dining hall, and a prayer-assembly hall. This helped the school increase its enrolment significantly.
Curriculum and Student life
Complete education is provided, which involves a mix of traditional learning, which ensures preservation of the unique Zanskari cultural and spiritual heritage and the spread of dharma, and modern curriculum, which readies them for the world. The school currently provides primary (grades 1 to 4) and middle school (grades 5 to 8) education, after which students take a transfer to other higher or secondary schools. By that age, the students are older and more mature to leave the valley by themselves. The school has an integrated curriculum and includes natural sciences, social sciences, Hindi, English, and written Tibetan(Bhodi). It also includes traditional Tibetan subjects such as Tibetan Buddhist philosophy and Sowa-Rigpa medicine, the Tibetan science of natural medicine. The Phuktal Gompa maintains a Traditional Tibetan medical clinic and makes many of the natural medicines itself.
As future members of the Gompa, the students are trained in all aspects of monastic life and life as a monk, including prayers, rituals, festivals, hymns, among other things. The day of the student begins early, with prayers at sunrise followed by exercise, and then learning. Classrooms are often open to the air.
The teaching faculty of the Phuktal Monastic School consists of Geshes, the Tibetan Buddhist equivalent of a master's degree, and is an academic degree for monks and nuns. Geshes are responsible for not only imparting education to their students on subjects in the curriculum, but also all aspects of dormitory life, since students often live at the Monastery during their school life. At present, there are three Geshes at the school.
Phuktal River Blockade and Floods
On 31 December 2014, a landlisde occurred between the Shun and Phuktal villages. This caused the formation of a landslide dam on the Phuktal River. It was first noticed due to the recession in the water level of the Nimoo Bazgo Hydroelectric Plant down the river. The lake formed behind the dam increased in length and height as compared to the height of the blockade. In May 2015, the Phuktal River flooded and washed away the entire school campus. The building, equipment, materials, and stores were all destroyed. The monastery has applied to the Jammu and Kashmir State Government and the Central Government for grants and financial aid to help rebuild the school and monastery and undo the damage of the flood.
Ladakh is a region administered by India as a union territory and constitutes an eastern portion of the larger Kashmir region that has been the subject of a dispute between India and Pakistan since 1947 and India and China since 1959. Ladakh is bordered by the Tibet Autonomous Region to the east, the Indian state of Himachal Pradesh to the south, both the Indian-administered union territory of Jammu and Kashmir and the Pakistan-administered Gilgit-Baltistan to the west, and the southwest corner of Xinjiang across the Karakoram Pass in the far north. It extends from the Siachen Glacier in the Karakoram range to the north to the main Great Himalayas to the south. The eastern end, consisting of the uninhabited Aksai Chin plains, is claimed by the Indian Government as part of Ladakh, and has been under Chinese control since 1962.
Zanskar, Zahar (locally) or Zangskar, is a tehsil of Kargil district, in the Indian union territory of Ladakh. The administrative centre is Padum. Zanskar, together with the neighboring region of Ladakh, was briefly a part of the kingdom of Guge in Western Tibet. Zanskar lies 250 km south of Kargil town on NH301.
Nubra, also called Dumra, is a historical region of Ladakh, India that is currently administered as a subdivision and a tehsil in the Leh district. Its inhabited areas form a tri-armed valley cut by the Nubra and Shyok rivers. Its Tibetan name Dumra means "valley of flowers". Demands have been raised and BJP has hinted at creation of Nubra as a new district. Diskit, the headquarters of Nubra, is 120 km north of Leh, the capital of Ladakh.
Geshe or geshema is a Tibetan Buddhist academic degree for monks and nuns. The degree is emphasized primarily by the Gelug lineage, but is also awarded in the Sakya and Bön traditions. The equivalent geshema degree is awarded to women.
Padum is the main town and the administrative centre of the Zanskar tehsil in Kargil district, Ladakh, India. Name after the Buddhist guru Padmasambhava, it was historically one of the two main capitals of the Zanskar Kingdom, the other being Zangla. It is 235 km (146 mi) via the link road from Kargil city. The new Nimmu–Padum–Darcha road connects Padum directly to Leh in the east and to Darcha in Himachal Pradesh.
Gaden Tharpa Choling Monastery is a Gelugpa monastery situated at the hilltop in Kalimpong, India. The monastery was founded by Domo Geshe Rinpoche Ngawang Kalsang in 1912. History says that Domo Geshe Rinpoche lived in Kalimpong in 1906 when he came to India for pilgrimage and to collect medicinal plants from India, Nepal and Bhutan. At the request of the Tibetan merchants and some Bhutanese leaders living in Kalimpong to establish a monastery there, Rinpoche instituted this monastery. Gaden Tharpa Choling monastery is a non-profitable development Association, registered under the West Bengal Societies Registration Act, 1961.
Lamayuru or Yuru Monastery is a Tibetan Buddhist monastery in Lamayouro, Leh district, Ladakh, India. It is situated on the Srinagar-Leh highway 15 kilometres (9.3 mi) east of the Fotu La at a height of 3,510 metres (11,520 ft) and 19 km southwest of Khalsi.
Thiksey Monastery or Thiksey Gompa is a Buddhist monastery affiliated with the Gelug school of Tibetan Buddhism. It is located on top of a hill in Thiksey approximately 19 kilometres (12 mi) east of Leh, in the Ladakh region of northern India. It is noted for its resemblance to the Potala Palace in Lhasa, Tibet, and is the largest monastery in central Ladakh, notably containing a separate set of buildings for female renunciates that has been the source of significant recent building and reorganization.
Thekchen Choling is a registered Buddhist organisation in the Republic of Singapore. The organisation was started in 2001 by Singha Thekchen Rinpoche and a group of his initial disciples. The organisation promotes non-sectarian Buddhism, emphasizing understanding of Theravada and Mahayana teachings. TCCL is committed to the Rime (non-sectarian) movement within Tibetan Buddhism though it is of the Gelug tradition. The primary practices and teachings of this temple are from Guru Rinpoche lineage and Lama Tsongkapa lineage.
Phuktal Monastery or Phuktal Gompa is a Buddhist monastery located in the remote Lungnak Valley in south-eastern Zanskar, in the Himalayan region of Ladakh, in Northern India. It is 52 km southeast of Padum on Nimmu–Padum–Darcha road (NPDR). Solar power was installed at the Phugtal monastery in 2016.
Karsha Monastery or Karsha Gompa is a Buddhist monastery in the Padum Valley of the Zanskar region of the union territory of Ladakh in northern India. The Doda River flows past the monastery from its source at the Drang Drung Glacier of the Pensi La. It was founded by the translator Phagspa Shesrab. The monastery, also known by the name Karsha Chamspaling, was founded by Phagspa Shesrab, under the Gelugpa Order or Yellow Hats. It is 11 km north of Padum in Zanskar River valley.
Lingshed Monastery or Lingshed Gompa is a Gelugpa Buddhist monastery in Ladakh, India. It is located near Lingshet village in the Leh district. It is 84 km north of Padum. It was founded in the 1440s by Changsems Sherabs Zangpo, disciple of Je Tsongkhapa, on a monastic site previously founded by the Translator Rinchen Zangpo. The monastery has belonged to the religious estate of Ngari Rinpoche since 1779. The Jangchub Tensung Dorje Center was founded in Lingshed by Kyabje Dagom Rinpoche in 1994.
Diskit Monastery also known as Deskit Gompa or Diskit Gompa is the oldest and largest Buddhist monastery (gompa) in Diskit, Nubra Valley of the Leh district of Ladakh. It is 115 km north of Leh.
Dzongkhul Monastery or Zongkhul Gompa is located 30 km northwest of Padum in the Stod Valley of Zanskar in Ladakh, northern India. Like the Sani Monastery, it belongs to the Drukpa school of Tibetan Buddhism
Sani Monastery, Sa-ni-[tshog], is located next to the village of Sani where the Stod Valley broadens into the central plain of Zanskar in Ladakh, northern India. It is about 6 km to the northwest of the regional centre of Padum, a gentle two-hour walk. Like Dzongkhul Monastery, it belongs to the Drukpa Kargyu school of Tibetan Buddhism, and is the only one of this order in Zanskar which has nuns. It is thought to be the oldest religious site in the whole region of Ladakh and Zanskar.
Stongdey Monastery, often written Stongde, Stongday, Tonday or Thonde, is a flourishing Buddhist monastery in Zanskar, Ladakh, northern India, approximately 18 km northeast of Padum, on the road to Zangla.
Geshe Lharampa Jinpa Sonam is a Tibetan Buddhist philosopher and Spiritual Director for the Indiana Buddhist Center. Sonam was born on May 25, 1955, in Zanskar valley, Ladakh, in the Republic of India. In 1967, he became a monk at the Stagrimo Gompa, a Drukpa Kagyu monastery in Ladakh near Padum. He studied at this monastery for six years before joining the Drepung Gomang Monastery, a Gelugpa monastery in Mundgod, Karnataka India as a novice monk.
Jangsem Sherab Zangpo, also known as Jangsem Sherab Sangpo, (1395-1457) was a 15th-century Buddhist monk and teacher, and one of the six contemporary disciples of Je Tsongkhapa, the founder of one of the newest school of Tibetan Buddhism, the Gelug school. He is crediting with establishing the famed Thikse Monastery and the remotely located Phugtal Monastery in Ladakh, in the North Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir.
Kyabje Khensur Kangurwa Lobsang Thubten Rinpoche, was a Buddhist monk, Abbot of Sera Jey Monastery, and the founder of Tibetan Buddhist Institute (Adelaide). Khensur means "former abbot" and Rinpoche means "precious teacher."
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
