Gelephu Mindfulness City, Adjacent To The Border Of Assam In Northeast India, Coming Up In Bhutan

By Nava Thakuria, New Age Islam 13 January 2025 Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck, the Oxford-educated son of the Bhutan monarch who gave the world the GNH yardstick – gross national happiness instead of gross domestic product as an economic and social benchmark – is seeking to once again to revolutionize his age-old monarchy, sandwiched between India and Tibet, this time by building an entirely new city erected on international standards and designed to maintain the sanctity of its environment, tradition and peace. The monarch, now 43, made the announcement on Bhutan’s 117th National Day in December initiating the establishment of Gelephu Mindfulness City, adjacent to the border of Assam in northeast India. The city, envisioned to cover 1,000 sq km on a flatland in the southern Himalayan foothills. Gelephu is aimed at being designed as a sustainable urban venture with minimal carbon emissions, to be enriched with a culture of peace, with all basic amenities, with functions akin to Singapore for Southeast Asia and Dubai for the Middle East, a modern city hopefully with world-class infrastructure comprising residential campuses, office premises, educational and healthcare institutions and recreational facilities, superimposed on an ancient, landlocked Buddhist kingdom on the Himalayas’ eastern edge, known for its monasteries, fortresses and dramatic landscapes ranging from subtropical plains to steep mountains and valleys. Bhutan, also known as the Land of the Thunder Dragon, had slept relatively peaceably since the 16th century until the 1970s when Jigme Singye Wangchuk, crowned in 1972 and the current Dragon King’s father, determined in the 1980s that his isolated kingdom’s measure of prosperity should be GNH rather than crass GDP. Prosperity would be balanced against the health of Bhutan’s natural environment, its people and its culture, with a view to capitalize on the economic corridor linking South Asia to Southeast Asia. Businesses are to be screened based on their respect for the Bhutanese way of life, sustainable and equitable development and sovereignty. GNH has risen in stature to be adopted by the government of New Zealand and a flock of local governments in California and Oregon on the US west coast and has been recognized in the United Nations as a method to attempt to bring world leaders, experts and civil society and spiritual leaders together to develop a new economic paradigm based on sustainability and wellbeing. The 34-member nation Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development has issued a comprehensive set of guidelines for measuring subjective well-being. GNH emphasizes harmony with nature and select cultural values, as expressed in nine domains of happiness and four pillars including sustainable and equitable socio-economic development, environmental conservation, preservation and promotion of culture and good governance. It hasn’t always worked out. Bhutan has faced problems with foreign migrants that it has sought to expel, as well as problems of land degradation, biodiversity and habitat loss, high fuel-wood consumption, and human-wildlife conflicts. The young have also sprouted a yearning for more modern distractions. And in fact new cities have struggled across the globe with considerably more resources thrown at them including Indonesia’s new capital Nusantara, Myanmar’s soulless, largely empty Naypyidaw, Brazil’s mouldering Brazilia, Kazakhstan’s nearly uninhabited Astana. Those issues haven’t daunted Khesar or his plans for a public-private partnership that will resist undermining tradition and culture, developed as a special administrative region, governed by the Gelephu authority under business-friendly laws along with a separate national bank. Focusing on tourism, health and wellness, education and research, green energy and spirituality, the king says the authority will seek to ensure the rule of law and protection of investments from Bhutanese nationals to foreign individuals. Currently a small town adjacent to Assam’s Hatisar village, Gelephu is connected to other localities including the country’s capital Thimphu. For Indian traders and tourists it was an important commercial point, exporting a varied range of traditional soaps, candles, incense sticks, wooden items and other forest. Now the relatively undeveloped town is to have an international airport and other modern infrastructure to promote it as a regional economic hub. Indian authorities plan to construct an all- weather road and lay railway tracks connecting Gelephu with Kokrajhar town of western Assam, which functions as the headquarters of the Bodoland territorial autonomous council. The king told the national day crowd the Gelephu project id expected to be an economic corridor between Bhutan and the south and southeast Asian nations through India’s north-eastern region. He described it as a project in which non-resident Bhutanese nationals, particularly from the US, Canada, Australia, etc hopefully would raise US$140 million for aviation infrastructure. “I have met many people who are increasingly concerned about the state of the world and they are seeking new ideas, better options, and inspiring examples,” said the king. “The world is looking for new ideas, better options, and good examples with a sense of direction. Everyone is looking for hope. Often, some of the largest problems are solved with a single idea and sometimes that idea can emerge from a small country. Bhutan, as a tiny nation, has a unique opportunity to shine by achieving something extraordinary.” The mystic land, while focusing on the mental, emotional and social well-being of the Bhutanese, offers a refreshing idea in contrast to the global community’s growth-oriented economic model. It shares an international 699-km border with four northeastern Indian states, Sikkim, West Bengal, Assam and Arunachal Pradesh, with Assam having the longest 266 km land boundary with Bhutan with settlements in both-sides. For centuries, both regions have remained connected economically and socially as the far eastern part of India, almost severed geographically by the Bangladesh boundary, was known as Kamrup and later emerged as present day Asom. For some days, Assam’s separatist armed militants started operating from Bhutan’s southern territory and subsequently were flushed out by Bhutanese armed forces in 2003. Recently, an immigration check post was inaugurated at Darranga, adjacent to Bhutan’s Samdrup-Jongkhar locality, through which international tourists can enter and exit, akin to more recognized points like Phuentsholing or Paro. ------ Nava Thakuria is an official representative of PEC in South & Southeast Asia URL: https://www.newageislam.com/current-affairs/gelephu-mindfulness-city-assam-bhutan/d/134316 New Age Islam, Islam Online, Islamic Website, African Muslim News, Arab World News, South Asia News, Indian Muslim News, World Muslim News, Women in Islam, Islamic Feminism, Arab Women, Women In Arab, Islamophobia in America, Muslim Women in West, Islam Women and Feminism