Grand Plans in Gelephu

Kuzu zampo la, y’all!

Earlier this week, I was invited to accompany the six LLM (master’s) students and their faculty on a study trip to Gelephu, at the southern border with India, where Bhutan is planning the futuristic Gelephu Mindfulness City (GMC).

The invitation came just after one-quarter of my undergrad class had asked me to cancel class this week because they would be attending the Royal Highland Festival in Laya, far northern Bhutan, as part of their environmental law clinic to conduct outreach about responsible waste management.

Having heard many touting GMC as the panacea for Bhutan’s economic development and foreign direct investment, and having heard and read glowing reports about GMC in the international press, I was eager to learn more about the project.

The trip required a seven-hour bus ride (driving time only; total travel time was more like ten hours) east and south over winding mountain roads.

We left the golden autumn paddies of Paro behind…

…as we traveled east toward Thimphu, over Dochula Pass (3100 meters/ approximately 10,000 feet), down to Wangdu Phodrang (1,273 meters/ 4,177 feet), and southward following the Punatsang Chhu (also known as the Sankosh river), which tumbles down from the far north, in Gasa, where my students were headed.

The southern districts of Tsairang and Sarpang, where Gelephu is located, had formerly been off-limits to foreign visitors because of risks posed by ULFA Bodo Indian separatists who had established outposts in Bhutan’s southern jungles. In 2003, after talks with separatists failed to remove them, the Royal Bhutan Army conducted a military operation to dislodge the separatists from the jungle. All my previous trips to Bhutan had headed north or east, or both, so I was very curious to see what lay to the south of the West-East National Highway.

The Punatsang Chhu flows through the districts of Wangdue Phodrang, Tsirang and Sarpang before reaching the Indian plains.

Passing by Wangdue Phodrang’s majestic dzong, recently reconstructed after a 2012 fire, it was soon evident that we’d entered Bhutan’s engine room, where hydroelectric installations that power the country on clean energy and supply export to India are beyond the curious eyes of tourists expecting a mountain paradise. Two major dams create an industrial sacrifice zone along the Punatsang Chhu.

Descending several thousand feet from Tsairang district into the plains of Gelephu felt curiously like descending the Berkeley Hills toward the ocean: in the dusk, a vast flat expanse was barely perceptible, pulling us toward infinity.

We arrived on the southern plain where many Bhutanese of Nepali ethnicity live, on Diwali, the Hindu festival of lights. Houses were decorated with candles and strings of lights; rangoli welcomed us to our hotel, the Kuku Grand, a clean, charming, and centrally located hotel which I can recommend if you ever find yourself in Gelephu.

After visiting a water treatment plant the next day, we took in the view of the future Gelephu Mindfulness City from a lookout a few hundred feet above the plain.

Having traversed hundreds of kilometers of steep mountain terrain, I could see why the tropical plain was an appealing location for the government to develop a special economic zone to attract foreign capital.

At the same time, the sleepy, sultry town, filled with family farms and orchards growing tropical fruits and betel nut, is presently home to fewer than 10,000 people. It’s difficult to image one hundred times that many crowding into the valley – needing water, electricity, and waste and sewage disposal – per government plans over the next twenty to thirty years.

Sarpang district, where Gelephu is located, boasts more than 87% forest cover. Gelephu is bounded by two national parks – Phipsoo Wildlife Sanctuary to the west and Royal Manas National Park to the east – as well as a wildlife corridor to the north, leading me to wonder what effects a dense human population would have on the lush biodiversity these parks shelter.

Those forest denizens who suffer injury are cared for at a wildlife rescue center, where I finally got to see the Himalayan black bears that people have been warning me about all fall (much smaller than black bears in California, and cuddly looking, though reputed to be unpredictable), and gharials, similar to crocodiles, sunning themselves.

Unfortunately, the rescue center seems to be underfunded with enclosures devoid of much in the way of enrichment. The most heartbreaking was a young monkey in a room alone, with no toys, blankets, or bedding, no social, mental, or physical stimulation of any type. The monkey clung to the bars at the front of the room, peering out plaintively.

Wildlife control is critical to GMC. Our host at the wildlife rescue center interrupted the tour to check his phone, where he discovered that a 150 kg Burmese python was being removed from the airport runway under construction by means of a excavator, as the snake was far too large for anyone to handle safely.

Following a June ceremony to bless the land and the project, the government is hosting community work days to develop GMC, in which thousands of volunteers travel from all over the country to work alongside Their Majesties the King and Queen, monks, and government officials to clear land for an international airport with a runway a third longer than that of the current international airport in Paro.

One of the first orders of business for the GMC development was to build elephant trenches to keep elephants off the airport runway under construction. The ranger and his team had to remove 80 snakes from the work area during the most recent community work days.

In a meeting with the students, the governor of GMC, Lotay Tshering, who trained as a surgeon and served prime minister from 2018 to 2023, described a sustainably designed international metropolis where investors, innovators, and technologists from all over the world would converge in a “high end market.” This special economic zone will be a city five times the size of Singapore, developed and run by the world’s leading domain experts. The city will draw on the best global practices to boost Bhutan’s economic development.

In this “unprecedented project,” Bhutan will have “two systems, one country,” like Macau and Hong Kong. Systems and structures can be rapidly redesigned and implemented without typical government bureaucracy. Urban development will be based on “living in harmony with nature, no compromise,” designed to be “the safest, cleanest place on Earth.” In addition to attracting investors and young innovators, the city will be promoted internationally as a “green, clean place to retire.”

I left the meeting with more questions than answers. Bhutan has been losing bright, educated young people to Australia at a rapid clip; tens of thousands of Bhutanese now reside overseas. Could this new city generate the kinds of socially prestigious, intellectually stimulating, and well-paying jobs that would bring them back?

Would the population of Bhutan – estimated around three-quarters of a million – be swamped by international investors, technologists, and crypto bros? Where would all the service workers for this futuristic city live? How would the water, waste, and transportation needs of the city affect the other sentient beings, the wildlife living in and around Gelephu, in the nearby national parks?

The thirteen-hour journey back to the law school – slowed by a flat tire in the highlands of Tsairang district, which was blessedly replaced with the spare from a passing bus, in the typical generously synchronicitous way of Bhutan – provided plenty of time to contemplate these questions and more.

To get a feel for driving on Bhutan’s sinuous mountain roads, you can watch the videos below — or not, if you’re prone to carsickness!

While our bus tire was repaired, and the spare returned to the other bus, we stopped in Damphu, a charming mid-elevation town in Tsairang district known as the “town of gardens” for its vibrant vegetation, for coffee, then tea with locals when the bus still wasn’t ready, and then lunch when the whole crew was re-assembled.

As I mulled over what Gelephu Mindfulness City means for Bhutan, sustainability, ecology, and culture, I recalled Dasho Governor’s words about Bhutan’s persistence throughout its history.

Bhutan has repelled numerous would-be invaders, dispelling Tibetans, Mongols, the British and Indian separatists. Each successive monarch since 1907 has set up the conditions that provide a foundation for the innovations of the next monarch. His Majesty the Fifth King is building on the foundations prepared by his father, the Great Fourth, who developed the concept of Gross National Happiness and shared it with the world. GMC incorporates GNH into a global place-based enterprise. Is this the next evolution of GNH?

While historically, Bhutan repelled foreigners, now it’s inviting them in, under its own terms, to create a center of global commerce. Is it possible to create a global business hub grounded in ecological mindfulness and spiritual tradition?

How will international business tycoons influence Bhutan?

How will Bhutan influence them?

Tune in twenty years hence to find out…

May your innovations balance continuity and change until next time,

Tashi delek!