Place · Monpa dzong & gompa · India
Dirang Monastery
The 17th-century Kalachakra Gompa above the old Dirang village in West Kameng district, with its stone-and-mud Dirang Dzong fortress of the Monpa headmen below, is one of the three main stations of the Monpa Buddhist landscape between Bomdila and Tawang. The dzong served as the toll and tax-collection fort of the Tawang monastery's administration over the Monpa valleys until it was taken over by the Assam Rifles in 1944. The 500-year-old sacred bodhi tree in its courtyard, the hot sulphur springs across the Kameng river that are a Monpa pilgrim bath, and the Thembang fortress village of UNESCO Tentative List fame all cluster on the Dirang-Thembang-Sangti ridge.
- Function
- Religious institution & practice
- Patron dynasty
- Monpa
- Confidence
- Established / referenced
- Location
- 27.358, 92.242
Connections (1)
- Site adjacencyBomdila
Dirang and Bomdila are two of the three stations of the Monpa Buddhist landscape of West Kameng — Dirang the lower-altitude old village with its 17th-century Kalachakra gompa and Dirang Dzong fortress of the Monpa headmen, Bomdila the modern district headquarters with the 1965 Gaden Rabgyel Ling monastery of the sixth Reting Rinpoche. The two are forty kilometres apart on the Balipara-Charduar-Tawang road, which is the only motorable route into Tawang and the pass over Sela. Both villages were briefly held by the Chinese PLA in November 1962.
Sources
Standard reference.
Open Dirang Monastery in the repository →