Girls Gossiping in School in Ladakh

This image was taken at the Druk White Lotus School in Shey near Ladakh in the Himalayan state of Jammu and Kashmir in India. Click on the image for a larger view. You can view and order more such images at the Kunzum Gallery.

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Imagine a school where you’re taught how to succeed in the modern world but never at the expense of your culture, your traditions, your rooting. Where you learn to cherish your environment. Where your buildings soak in solar energy instead of expending electricity, you recycle waste, you plant thousands of trees…

Just such a model school is Druk White Lotus School in Shey’s Naropa Palace complex. It was established by the Drukpa lineage in 2001. Students’ fees meet running costs and are also channelled into scholarships for the needy. Of the 506 students, 158 stay on campus. The school expands by one grade every year, and will have all 12 grades by 2014.

I attended a cultural programme at the school. Students recited English rhymes, performed Ladakhi dances and enacted an environmental play. The audience was mesmerised. The classrooms are neat and clean; all shoes stay outside. The artworks are evocative. The children respect each other and their elders. Discipline is still in fashion here, as are proper uniforms. Teachers believe in being true to their calling.

The students keep smiling, and their laughter is infectious. You never tire of their company. Why didn’t they make such schools when we were kids?

Read many more such features in Ajay Jain’s pictorial travelogue, Postcards from Ladakh.