BHUTAN

officially Kingdom of Bhutan, Dzongkha Druk-Yul sovereign kingdom in the Himalayas, bounded by Chinese-ruled Tibet on the north and west and by India on the south, southwest, and east. It has an area of 18,150 square miles (47,000 square km). From 1865 to 1949 Bhutan was under the guidance of the British government in external affairs and received a British subsidy. In 1949 it concluded a treaty with India in which the British role in this relationship was transferred in essence to the Indian government. The population was estimated in 1991 to be 1,476,000. officially Kingdom of Bhutan, Dzongkha Druk-Yul, kingdom of south-central Asia, located on the eastern ridges of the Himalayas. The country has an area of about 18,150 square miles (47,000 square kilometres). Bhutan's undefined northern and western boundary with Tibet follows the crest of the Great Himalaya Range for the most part. Its boundary with India lies to the south of the Himalaya Range in the Duars Plain. Directly south lie the Indian states of West Bengal and Assam. To the east, Bhutan borders Arunachal Pradesh, and to the southwest it borders the Indian state of Sikkim. Thimphu is the capital. The historic isolation of Bhutan is rapidly disappearing, and forces of change are accelerating. King Jigme Dorji Wangchuk (reigned 195272) made drastic alterations in the system of government that led to the establishment of a constitutional monarchy. Progress has also been made in the development of transportation since 1960, when the trip from the Indian border to the Bhutanese capital, Thimphu, took six days by mule. Now the journey can be made in six hours by car along the 120-mile winding mountain road from Phuntsholing, on the border, to Thimphu. The economic core of Bhutan lies in the fertile valleys of the Lesser Himalayas, which are separated from one another by a series of high and complex interconnecting ridges extending across the country from north to south. The political nucleus of Bhutan lies in the Paro and Thimphu valleys in the Lesser Himalayan region. Its location between the Assam-Bengal Plain of India to the south and the Chinese-occupied Plateau of Tibet to the north gives it considerable geopolitical significance. Additional reading Pradyumna P. Karan, Bhutan: A Physical and Cultural Geography (1967), is a concise but broad survey, with maps and illustrations. Nagendra Singh, Bhutan, a Kingdom in the Himalayas: A Study of the Land, Its People, and Their Government, 3rd rev. ed. (1985), is a more detailed geography. Franoise Pommaret and Yoshiro Imaeda, Bhutan (1991), offers an informative travelers' guide. Other useful descriptive works include V.H. Coelho, Sikkim and Bhutan (1971); Dilip Bhattacharyya, Bhutan, the Himalayan Paradise, rev. ed. (1982); and Tom Owen Edmunds, Bhutan: Land of the Thunder Dragon (1988).Analyses of economic conditions and social and cultural policies are found in H.N. Misra, Bhutan: Problems and Policies (1988); Pradyumna P. Karan, Bhutan, Environment, Culture, and Development Strategy (1990); and Pradyumna P. Karan and Shigeru Iijima, Bhutan: Development amid Environmental and Cultural Preservation (1987). On the country's politics and administration, see Leo E. Rose, The Politics of Bhutan (1977); and Nari Rustomji, Bhutan: The Dragon Kingdom in Crisis (1978).Nirmala Das, The Dragon Country: The General History of Bhutan (1974), offers a brief historical survey. Michael Aris, Bhutan: The Early History of a Himalayan Kingdom (1979), is a more detailed exploration. Peter Collister, Bhutan and the British (1987), focuses on Bhutan's foreign relations in the 19th and 20th centuries. Pradyumna P. Karan Administration and social conditions Government Bhutan is a constitutional monarchy whose sovereign is styled the druk gyalpo (dragon king). The present king, Jigme Singye Wangchuk, is the fourth in a royal line that was established in 1907. The government of Bhutan was traditionally autocratic, with no law codes, courts, or any of the features of modern public administration. In the 1950s and '60s, however, King Jigme Dorji Wangchuk took the initiative in adapting the country's system of government to the modern era and began to share administrative responsibility, which was formerly his alone. In 1953 a national assembly known as the Tshogdu was established in Bhutan through the king's initiative. It has 151 members who are elected by village headmen or are chosen by the king and the country's official Buddhist monastic order. The Tshogdu meets twice a year and passes legislation enacted by the king. A Royal Advisory Council was established in 1965 to advise the king and his ministers on important questions and to supervise the implementation of government programs and policies. A Council of Ministers, set up in 1968, is composed of the ministers of the various government departments. The council's ministers are appointed by the king, and their appointments must be ratified by the Tshogdu. The state Buddhist monastic order is also involved in government at many levels, and its priests, or lamas, exert considerable influence. For administrative purposes Bhutan is divided into a number of districts, each with a district officer who is responsible to the minister of home affairs. Village headmen are elected by the people of their villages for a three-year term. Bhutan's legal code is based upon traditional Buddhist precepts. In 1968 the judicial system was separated from the executive and legislative branches, and a high court was established. Education Until the early 1960s, no formal schools existed in Bhutan except those for religious instruction. Since then considerable progress has been made in education, and primary and secondary schools have been established throughout the country. Sherubtse Degree College at Kanglung in eastern Bhutan is affiliated with the University of Delhi. There are also several teacher-training schools and technical-vocational schools. Despite this progress, Bhutan still lags behind other developing nations in Asia in terms of enrollment ratios and literacy rates. Only one-fifth of primary-school-age children are enrolled in school in Bhutan, and only about 2 percent of the country's secondary-school-age children are enrolled. The Bhutanese adult literacy rate is only about 20 percent, and the number of Bhutanese who are trained in medicine, engineering, education, and agriculture falls far short of the nation's needs. Cultural life The three main ethnic groups of Bhutan display considerable variety in their culture and lifestyles. The Bhutia, or Ngalops, share a common heritage of Tibetan culture, language, and religion. They form the largest of the three ethnic groups. Most of the political and social leaders of Bhutan are of Bhutia heritage. Bhutia houses are built of timber and stone and have thick, pounded mud walls to keep out the cold. Most such houses have two stories: livestock are kept on the ground floor, while the family lives above. Inside the house a family will usually have a shrine consisting of a small Buddhist image in a corner. While the Bhutia family system is basically patriarchal, family estates are divided equally between sons and daughters. Both men and women are free to choose whom to marry, and members of both sexes can initiate a divorce. Ordinary Bhutia villagers may not be able to afford meat in their daily meals and often must rely on a dish of rice, potatoes, and chilies. Besides meat, the yak also supplies milk, from which butter is made for use in lamps on the shrine altar. The Sharchops are closely linked to the Bhutia because they share a common religion in Tibetan Buddhism, though among the Sharchops there is often a strong element of the older pre-Buddhist Bon religion. Sharchops build their houses of stone and wood, often on stilts on the hillslopes. They generally clear the land for agriculture by burning the vegetation, use a plot for several years, and then move to another site when the productivity of the soil declines. The Nepalese are predominantly Hindus and have caste and family ties to Nepal and India. Because they live in the warmer climate of southern Bhutan, their houses are made of bamboo and thatch. The Nepalese do not eat beef, and some of them abstain from meat altogether. Instead, they eat the rice and curry dishes common to the Hindus of Nepal and India. Their caste system separates different social levels and influences the choice of marriage partners and other social relationships. The Nepalese in Bhutan lack the same loyalty to the monarchy that is predominant among the Bhutia and Sharchops. In response, the government has tried to integrate the Nepalese into the national life. For example, a government order has made the Dzongkha language compulsory for all Nepali-speaking Bhutanese. On their part, the Nepalese have protested this and other attempts at national integration under the hegemony of Bhutanese language and culture, and a serious political and cultural division between the Buddhist Bhutanese majority and the Hindu Nepali-speaking minority continues to exist. The major impulse in Bhutanese art comes from Buddhism. The mystic pattern known as a mandala is a favourite subject. The mandala adorns the walls and ceilings of Buddhist temples or is painted, embroidered, or appliqued on the scrolls known as thangkas. One of the most popularly depicted figures is Padmasambhava, who brought Buddhism to Bhutan, and another popular theme in the visual arts is the eight auspicious symbols of Tibetan Buddhism. Dancing is the centre of all religious festivals in Bhutan and is used to depict the tales and legends of Buddhist history and mythology. The castlelike dzongs, with their gently tapering walls, large courtyards, and long galleries, are among the finest examples of Bhutanese architecture. Chortens, or stupas, small shrines built originally to house sacred relics, are also a common architectural sight in Bhutan; their designs range from simple square structures to large, multilayered, pyramidal shapes. The skill of Bhutan's craftsmen is working with bronze, silver, and other fine metals is seen in statues of deities, the doors and pillars of temples, bells, trumpets, swords, tables, candlesticks, rice boxes, and jewelry. Every Buddhist temple contains large, brightly painted and gilded statues of the Buddha and his saints. Folk songs of itinerant minstrels, the low chanting of Buddhist monks, and the sounds of long horns echoing across the valleys are all an integral part of Bhutanese music. Many of the ancient Tibetan musical forms have been preserved, though the instruments have been modified. For example, trumpets once made of human thighbone are today constructed of metal. Among other instruments used are drums and cymbals.