: Fighting Biting Cold, 4 Engineers Bring Electricity to Himalayan Refugee Village Near LAC #IndiaNEWS #Ladakh In the aftermath of the 1962 India-China War, 30 families from Tibet migrated to Ladakh

Fighting Biting Cold, 4 Engineers Bring Electricity to Himalayan Refugee Village Near LAC #IndiaNEWS #Ladakh
In the aftermath of the 1962 India-China War, 30 families from Tibet migrated to Ladakh and settled in the village of Dungti to form among the very first Tibetan Refugee (TR) villages in India. Located in the picturesque Changthang region of Ladakh on the Nyoma-Demchok circuit, Dungti lies perilously close to the Line of Actual Control (LAC).
Residents here are predominantly herders of the Pashmina goat and their primary source of livelihood comes from selling the fine Pashmina wool that comes from it. Despite playing a pivotal role in bordering India’s borders for decades, this settlement has lived in complete darkness since 1962 with no access to basic electricity.
All of this changed on the night of 4 February 2021, when a team of four Ladakhi engineers working with the Global Himalayan Expedition (GHE) brought light to this village by harnessing the power of solar energy. For the first time in nearly 60 years, this village experienced what many of us city folk take for granted—the magic of electricity.
Surveying the village
It takes about seven hours by road to reach Dungti from Leh. After passing Nyoma, you cross the Loma Bridge and take a left from there on an unpaved road to Dungti and Demchok, which was recently in the news during the recent tensions on the border.
“In the past eight years, we have electrified about 100 villages in Ladakh with solar-based DC electricity. But we realised that not a single project was done in a TR village. In the past, we had crossed Dungti while travelling to Demchok. We knew of its existence but weren’t sure whether the village had electricity or not. Prior to the project, we surveyed the village and found that it was in darkness for nearly 60 years,??? says Shakir Hussain, the lead engineer of this project from Chuchot village.
While surveying the village, Shakir and his team found that of the 65 plus homes in this village, only 52 were occupied with permanent residents. The rest either lived as nomads in rebo tents or left for Leh in search of work. Although the village boasts of stunning scenic beauty, people there live in extremely difficult conditions. Situated at an altitude of 13,000 to 14,000 feet above sea level, temperatures in the winter range between -25 to -30 degrees Celsius.
Shakir tells The Better India that in the past, the village was given a diesel generator by the local administration but it was left unused because there was no fuel to run it. In addition, no transmission lines were running through the village.
A solar electrified home in Dungti village. (Image courtesy Iftikhar Hussain)
Electrifying the village
Establishing an 8. 6 KW setup for the entire village, each house received a solar nano grid with three LED lights and two LED batons alongside USB charging facilities.

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