User:Ahmedarifhasan

￼LADAKH:

Ladakh or the ‘Land of High Passes’ is a barren yet beautiful region located in the north Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir. Sharing its east border with Tibet, Ladakh has Lahaul and Spiti to its south and the Kashmir valley to the west. Strategically placed on ancient trade routes, Ladakh lies between the Kunlun Mountains in the north and the Himalayas in the south. The region originally comprised the Baltistan valley, the Indus Valley, Zanskar, Lahaul, Spiti, Aksai Chin and Ngari. Ladakh is renowned for its great beauty and culture. The place is full of Indian soldiers because of the border disputes with Pakistan and that the place is also cosmopolitan in nature due to the international trade activity there.

￼CULTURE IN LADAKH:

Ladakh is an oasis of nature and serenity. Arid Ladakh features a unique Buddhist lifestyle. The Buddhist monasteries built centuries ago to bring global tourists to Leh and Ladakh. The ancient rock carvings, large pillars and peace in the monasteries still leave a deep impact on the hearts of travelers. Apart from the sightseeing options, the culture and lifestyle of Ladakh is one of the reasons why tourists love to flock here. In the way to Ladakh there is a sudden and majestic appearance of Diskit Gompa – a Buddhist monastery – rising high into the heavens, a traditional Buddhist city called “the world’s last Shangri La” – an imaginary and remote paradise. Surprisingly, The pastoral life still exists there untouched by any trace of modernity. Over the years, culture and lifestyle has become the backbone that supports tourism in the state of Jammu & Kashmir. The solitary mountain ranges and extreme climate have influenced the culture and lifestyle of Leh Ladakh to a great extent. The stronghold of Buddhism has led to cultural diversification, while a sparse population has promoted tranquility in this region.

￼FLORA AND FAUNA OF LADAKH:

￼FAUNA:

India is one of the twelve mega biodiversity rich countries of the world which together supports nearly 60-70% of the world's biodiversity. Ten bio-geographic zones represent the biodiversity of India and Ladakh is considered as one of the zone. On the account of its geographical location and in spite of low biological productivity and sparse vegetation cover, Ladakh host a surprisingly diverse fauna. Ladakh's fauna exhibits several interesting characteristics which have evolved as adaptations to the region's extreme climatic conditions such as seasonal migration and herbination, as well as, amongst mammals, thick fur, thick and bushy tails, large nostril.

MAMMALS: The western and eastern Regions of Ladakh differ significantly in the distribution of mammals. While the eastern region of Ladakh is represented by mammals typical of the Tibetan Plateau, the western region is represented by the Himalayan and Central Asian Species. Ladakh, together with neighbouring areas of Tibet, is probably unique on a global scale for having preserved to this day the whole assemblage of its wild herbivores and predators alongside their domesticated relatives.

Ladakh also holds the distinction of being the only known breeding ground of Black-necked Crane in India which is the state bird of J&K. It can be sighted in the wetlands of eastern Ladakh.

FLORAL DIVERSITY:

Though relatively poor in species compared to areas of similar altitude in the main Himalayas, Ladakh's flora has a considerable biological interest, depicting, with its diversity of origin and endemic species, a high adaptability to extreme climatic conditions and biotic pressure.

Ladakh is rich repository of medicinal and aromatic plants. It is estimated that the Ladakh region may harbour close to 1,100 species of vascular plants and ferns. As many as 23 species of flowering plants are endemic to Ladakh. The western and eastern region of Ladakh differs significantly in terms of floral assemblages.

HIGH ALTITUTE VEGETATION

Ladakh comes under alpine and high alpine zones and is dominated by annual and perennial herbs, followed by few stunted shrubs and bushes. The vegetative growth starts at beginning of summer when the melting of snow provides abundant moisture. The flora is in full bloom in the month of August but starts disappearing by the end of September. The mountain slopes, meadows and alpine pasturelands give a spectacular display of flowers of cold desert barren mountains.

PLANT SURVIVAL IN HIGH ALTITUTE

Adaptation to the environment by the potential flora of a region leads to certain changes in underground and aerial parts of plants for their survival. The vegetation of the cold desert Trans-Himalayas consists of a highly specialized group of plants with metabolic and reproductive strategies suited for maximizing their activity in harsh climatic conditions. The plant of high altitude cold deserts exhibits a number of ecological, morphological and physiological adaptations which help them to counteract the impact of harsh climate prevailing in Ladakh.

HISTORY OF LADAKH

According to a local legend, Ladakh was once underwater centuries ago. A Buddhist monk, Dha Chomba Nomegung, came from Kashmir and prayed for the existence of human life there. His prayers were answered and the water receded, giving way to mountains and valleys. Then came three different races of Mon, Brokpa, and Tibetans in search of pasture and settled down in the different regions.

For close to 900 years from the middle of the 10th century, Ladakh was an independent kingdom, its dynasties descending from the king of old Tibet. Its political fortunes ebbed and flowed over the centuries, and the kingdom, was at its greatest in the early 17th century under the famous king Sengge Namgyal, whose rule extended across Spiti and western Tibet up to the Mayumla beyond the sacred sites of Mount Kailash and Lake Mansarovar.

And gradually, perhaps partly due to the fact that it was politically stable, in contrast to the lawless tribes further west, Ladakh became recognized as the best trade route between the Punjab and Central Asia. For centuries it was travered by caravans carrying textiles and spices, raw silk and carpets, dyestuffs and narcotics. Heedless of the land's rugged terrain and apparent remoteness, merchants entrusted their goods to relays of pony transporters who took about two months to carry them from Amritsar to the Central Asian towns of Yarkand and Knotan. On this long route, Leh was the stopping point, and developed into a bustling entreport, its bazaars thronged with merchants and merchandise from far countries.

The famous pashm (better known as cashmere) also came down from the high-altitude plateau of eastern Ladakh and western Tibet where it was produced, thorough Leh to Srinagar, where skilled artisans transformed it from a matted oily mass of goat's underfleece into shawls known the world over for their softness and warmth. Ironically, it was this lucrative trade, that finally spelt the doom of the independent kingdom. It attracted the greedy eyes of Raja Gulab Singh, the ruler of Jammu in the early 19th century, and in 1834, he sent General Zorawar Singh to invade Ladakh. A bitter war followed lasting more than a decade resulting in turmoil, which ended with the emergence of the British as the paramount power in north India. Ladakh, together with the neighboring province of Baltistan, was incorporated into the newly created state of Jammu & Kashmir. Just over a century later, this union was disturbed by the partition of India, Baltistan becoming part of Pakistan, while Ladakh remained in India as part of the State of Jammu & Kashmir.