TRAVELS IN THE ARUISACHAL HIMALAYA

Western Arunachal Himalaya

P. M. DAS

AFTER A WAIT OF ONE and a half years for the necessary clearance for a visit to the Western Arunachal Himalaya, August 1993 found me driving out through forests of Pinus armandii near Rahung and marvelling at the sheen of the pine needles. At Dirang, a halt, and time enough to get into the Dirang chu waters with an Abu Cardinal, to cast for a couple of hours for elusive trout. Driving on over the Se la (4195 m), a brief stop at the trout hatchery at Nuranang, past the town of Jang where I would complete my walk-about ten days later, and Tawang is reached.

At Tawang, the Circuit House itself is located at 3025 m and is a good place to get one's systems tuned up after arriving from the plains of Assam. A visit to the 300 year old monastery is called for after my last visit four years ago, if only to meet again and obtain the blessings of the abbot — Gaisai Jamba Thinley Rimpoche. This gompa, Asia's largest at one time, was also called Galden Namgyal Lhatse and is now under renovation. It draws importance from the fact that it is the fountainhead of the Gelugpa sect of Buddhism, to which the Monpas and Sherdukpens — the people of this region — belong.

From Tawang, the road to the McMahon Line climbs through denuded slopes of fir where all that remains of these forests are ugly stumps — reminders of avaricious mankind. We go past the Penganteng Tso (P.T.) which is reportedly well stocked with fish and a signboard which declares that it is a tourist resort! Driving past memorials of fallen soldiers, we are reminded of 1962 when the Chinese army over-ran the area. In fact I am able to pick up after 31 years, some shell splinters as mementoes from the spot where a company of Indian soldiers were wiped out. A board tells me as I walk up to Bum la (4632 m), that the road stretches on to Beijing for 4272 km and that Lhasa is 472 km away.

The walk begins near Bum la and in the next 9 days, I travel with two load carriers and a Monpa veteran of 1962 for company, between the altitudes of 3050 m and 5180 m. The trail, when you look at a map appears as an inverted U-shaped curve, rather asymmetrically skewed to the right.

During the walk-about, one crosses 9 Himalayan passes, sometimes along the ridges. This includes reaching and walking along the Thulung la (5180 m) which forms part of the 'Bailey Trail'.¹ From this pass, I tried to get a look at the Gorichen group of peaks to the southeast, but my view was obstructed by a beautiful ice peak in exactly that. direction and which is marked as Pt 6190 m on the map. From my vantage point on a rock pinnacle on top of the pass, it seemed that the Goshu chu flowed out from the basin of this peak. Soaking in the warmth of the sun, I made a pen sketch of this and an adjacent rock and ice peak, lower down and east of the pass. The latter peak lay along the watershed and its dark, rust-coloured rock contrasted sharply with the white of the snow and the russett of the stony approach to the Thulung la.

 

The entire area being very close to the sensitive McMahon Line, it is therefore not easily accessible even to Indians, but the brighter side of these restrictions is that the biosphere is relatively undisturbed and the forests, dense with vegetation. The conifers at these elevations form a rich and virgin cover, the only damage noticed being where landslides and rains — natural causes, have been active. This was particularly noticeable in the valley of the Dungma chu where landslides besides damaging the forest cover, had at places even changed the course of the swollen river.

According to verification from the Encyclopedia of Indian Natural History (edited by R. E. Hawkins) the area is known for the East Himalayan Fir (Abes densa) the rare Abes delavayii (a Chinese variety), the Himalayan Larch (resembles deodar), which is the only deciduous conifer in this area, junipers, the East Himalayan Spruce (Picea spinulosa) cind the Himalayan Hemlock. Some of the cones collected by me were also analysed by the Botany Department of the Darrang College, Tezpur, but what is interesting is the local (Monpa) names given to their conifers; wangsing (fir); thengpa (used for making baskets and wooden cups); pama (juniper); pensing; gyashing; bertishing; shapshing.

As expected, the delights of walking near the snow line in the month of August are in the alpine flowers when the sun is out, and in the mixed conifer forests during a light drizzle. My herb and flower collections were identified at the State Forest Research Institute at Itanagar wjiich has an established Orchid Research Centre apart from a herbarium under its aegis.² The major specimens identified, were: Saussurea (gossipiphora or graminifolia); saxifraga; Allium casia; Meconopsis horridula (the Himalayan Blue Poppy); Anaphalis involucrata; Corydalysis sp.; Polygonum vaccinifolium; Selinum; Swertia petiolata; Cremanthodaium oblongum; Semperyivum sp.; Cerastium vulgatum; Cynanthus lobatus. Two of my specimens were found to be rare ones and while the rest have been returned after identification, these two have been retained at the Herbarium of the Research Institute with due acknowledgement to the collector, for further study: Tulipa sp. (could it be the species, var chrysantha?) and 'silu', the rare medicinal herb sought madly by the Tibetans, identified only by its genus as Fritillaria (could it be F. roylei or cirrhosa?). The latter herb has garlic-like bulbs at the base.

 

Mention must also be made of the local names of three other specimens collected: Lura Meto — an alpine flower, mauve in colour and shaped like the horns of a sheep; Tshawa Rashi — white leaves shaped like the horns of the sambar deer; and Atung Karpo used as incense by the hill people.

Avi-fauna in the mixed conifer forests was abundant but difficult to spot because of the thick foliage. Quite often it was a game of hide-and-seek following birds by their calls. In the forests above Mago, a pair of Scarletfinch were spotted. The male of the species was an unbelievable scarlet merging with black onto the wings and tail, while the female was a dull brown with bright yellow around the vent. There were Monals in large numbers around Yangtse grazing grounds and near the scree on the approach to the Khang la I spotted a covey of 9 pheasant-like birds waddling along. Grey, spotted with white, perhaps they were Tibetan snowcock (Kongmo). Himalayan Greenfinch were seen and by the road-side on the northern side of the Se la were a pair of Himalayan Nutcrackers, chocolate brown birds with white spots on their backs and under-bellies.

From the point of view of animal sightings, this was a lucky trip. On two occasions I was able to spend hours following herds —one of four and the other of eight — of Nayan or the Great Tibetan Sheep (Ovis ammon Hodgsonii). One was led by a ram, the size of a large calf or a cow, with gigantic horns. He looked at my party as an annoyed emperor would gaze at an erring subject, emitted a sharp whistle that was a danger call for the rest of the herd, and gradually shepherded them up a ravine. Some of those in the second herd had white rumps and appeared to have grey underbellies. The chowriwallahs³ told us accounts of rams with huge horns getting into their chowris (yak enclosures) with their yaks and then being unable to come out of the narrow gates of these enclosures; that on other occasions they have seen that the horns grow so large and heavy that the head becomes difficult to lift. There was therefore a doubt that these may be a strain of Marco Polo's sheep but now the matter is settled.⁴

 

On another day, while walking along the ridge between Thang la and Mera la admiring the saussurea flowers and the crags for the rock climber, I all but bumped into a startled male musk deer.⁵ The lower reaches are abundant in ghoral (Nemorhaedus ghoral).

The last leg of my walk was made excessively mobile by hard marches of 30 km a day. This was necessitated since I was running out of time and had to reach my headquarters on schedule. It was also facilitated by the gradually descending altitude and most definitely by the leech-infested foliage of the season. The only alternative to allowing them their feed of human blood was to clear out of the area as promptly as possible. Various methods of leech-evasion were tried out — salt bandages and khukri scraping included — to no tangible gain. The enemy would wave⁶ their tentacle-like bodies in the wind, sense the humans out, attach themselves to any part of clothing and make contact with the skin through boot-eyelets, putties, socks, holes in pockets, shirt button-holes, up walking sticks, anything. They even fell onto your hat from above. My friend Pema Dorji, war veteran of 1962, had evolved a unique drill to save the 'sahib' from excessive leech-bites: place a column of four persons with the sahib as number three. The first man would cut through the undergrowth with his khukri and take on any alert leech but more likely rousing those in slumber; the second bears the brunt of the leeches' assault. The sahib passes by safely, perhaps deep in thought. The fourth man removes the leeches from the back and boots of the sahib with flicks of thumb and forefinger and if there happens to be a fifth in the human column, he would be utilised for fighting off reinforcements of the attackers.

So it was fighting off the leeches that I arrived at Jang where a jeep picked me up to drive me down 310 km to Tezpur after a night's halt again at Dirang.

The Second Gireat Bend of the Tsangpo and the Upper Dihang Valley:

Accounts in Himalayan history of the discovery of Namcha Barwa (7765 m) in 1911 by the Abor survey expedition and the discovery of Gyala Peri (7150 m) at the end of the Mishmi survey expedition of 1913^7; are enough to whet the wanderlust of any mountain traveller. It became imperative therefore to see a bit of the world in which Pandit Kinthup had laboured and where Bailey and Morshead had surveyed. So, shamelessly utilising whatever means of modern-day transportation were available, I determined to take a look at Namcha Barwa and Gyala Peri from as close as the Indian border would permit and also to see the Tsangpo as it enters India. While in the latter mission I was successful, in the former I was not and the H.J. reader would have to settle for Yoshio Ogata's 3 photos as the best available of these peaks.⁸

As early as 1880, Pandit Kinthup had proved that the Tsangpo, Dihang (also known as the Siang) and the Brahmaputra are one continuous river. This also confirmed the thesis of James Rennel put forward in 1771 that the Tsangpo flowed on as the Dihang and became the Brahmaputra. My own mini-pilgrimage went up the meandering Dihang as it flowed through tropical forests and after Pasighat, which is the district headquarters of the East Siang district, broadens into the Brahmaputra of the Assam plains. I reached the place where the Tsangpo enters India as the Dihang above the hamlet of Gelling at 1060 m. The latter is overlooked by the Kepang la (1966 m) to the west on the watershed and close to Karpo Kangri la to the east (region actually marked 'unexplored' on the quarter-inch scale map). North of this point of entry into India, the Tsangpo makes a big swing from its east-west course and now flows almost north to south. Therefore we could call it the 'Second Great Bend', the first being further north where it passes through the main Himalayan heights, changes direction from its west-east course, past the sentinels of Namcha Barwa and Gyala Peri and continues southward.

There is much exploration that can still be done in the Arunachal Himalaya by the enterprising mountaineer or the naturalist: the exploration and ascents of all four of the Gorichen peaks, the Kangto basin, Nyegyi Kangsang, Takpa Shiri and a host of unnamed peaks over 6000 m; or to catch a glimpse of the elusive species of ghoral named Naemorhaedus baileyii after the famous explorer, would be challenge enough. The only difficulty of moving in this area is the security consideration today. Otherwise it remains a world sublime.

----------------------SUMMARY---------------------

Treks and travels in the unknown areas of the Western Arunachal Himalaya and along the Tsangpo (Brahmaputra) in the eastern part. The treks were undertaken by the author in August 1993.

 

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