Prasun K. Sengupta

Since 2006, Beijing has implemented large-scale programmes to ‘rehouse’ the rural population of the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) under a policy called ‘Comfortable Housing.’

Le Village constructed by China

In parallel, China has accelerated the relocation of nomadic herders in the eastern part of the Tibetan plateau, mostly in Qinghai province, and laid the ground for similar policies in other parts of the plateau, as part of ‘Building a New Socialist Countryside’. This, Beijing says, is designed to rapidly increase the living standards of rural Tibetans and boost the local economy. Construction of new settlements by China all along the India-China and Bhutan-China border began as far back as 2012.

Since then, several such townships have sprung up in Cona county and Lhunze county in the Shannan prefecture of Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR), as well as in the Gongzhangpu in Luoza County along the Bhutan-China frontier. More than 600 ‘well-off’ Mandarin (Xiaokang) border defence villages were to be constructed.

Part of a poverty alleviation effort, the strategic goal is rural revitalisation under the theme of ‘Building a Happy Home for the Guardians of the Sacred Land’. Each such township/ village is to be connected to transportation, broadband communications and public utilities grids, schools and health centres.

Most of the construction is taking place in the key border Counties of Nyingchi—which borders India’s Arunachal Pradesh state—Ngari (Ali) and Shigatse (Rikaze). Communist Party of China (CPC) cadres were to be transferred to each village. There were intensive political education sessions to undermine and eliminate the Dalai Lama’s influence, such as the training of monks in Nyingchi, on countering ‘espionage activities by the Dalai Lama.’

Zhu Hong, head of Gar County Committee, said: ‘Our goal is to build Demchog