Ladakh, India’s cold desert and land of rugged mountains crisscrossed by ancient passes, has stories buried deeper than those found in history books. Once a vibrant hub on the Silk Route, Ladakh connected markets stretching from Russia to eastern Europe. Today, the trade routes are quiet, but their stories remain, waiting to be told.
“Ladakh is blessed with beautiful mountains and lakes, but the stories behind them remain untold. Anyone travelling to Leh should understand and know the stories of people, of communities that have made Ladakh possible,” says Adiba Jahan, a young Ladakhi entrepreneur, who quit her job at an investment firm to start Dastan–e-Karwan, a storytelling project that seeks to connect visitors with the region’s cultural heritage. For her, sustainable tourism means preserving not just nature, but also the unique cultural identity of Ladakh.
“Travel has the power to change one’s perspective on life and its multitudinous aspects. We aim to broaden the definition of travel, transforming it from a mere journey to a profound experience that deepens one’s understanding of the destination,” Adiba says.
In September, Dastan-e-Karwan presented the history of the Arghon community, an ethnically diverse Sunni Muslim community rooted in Ladakh. Their origins trace back to the 17th century, when traders from Yarkand and Kashgar (now in western China), and Tibet intermarried with local Ladakhi women. These mixed-race descendants settled in Ladakh and are called Arghons.
The Arghons took precedence over Shia Muslims and Buddhists after the Mughal subjugation of Kashmir in 1586. In 1666, Mughals built the first mosque of Leh, the Tsas Soma Mosque, and that’s when a whole satellite community of Sunnis settled there from outside, including Kashmir.
“Actually, there are several streams that have gone into the making of the Arghon DNA. The intermingling and resultant marriages were because of the Central Asian trade route and also the other wool route with Tibet,” says Elijah Gergan, President, CBSE Schools of Leh. Gergan explains that the intermixing of races was between people from the plains, Kashmir, Rawalpindi, Iran, and beyond.
In his paper titled, The condition of the Argons of Leh, author Gerhard Emmer says, “Islam began to spread into Ladakh in association with long-distance trading at the beginning of the 17th century. Muslim merchants from Kashmir established a whole system of caravan routes and settled in different places, including Leh. Some Ladakhi kings embraced Islam.”
Dominance of Sunnis and Sunni mosques in Leh, Lhasa, Yarkand, Khotan, and other places along the trade route created cultural affinity making ease of movement and trade easier for Arghons.
Emmer writes, “The Argons were able to benefit from an extended and elaborated network of traders in Kashmir, Tibet and Central Asia. This was important for them because they did not possess cultivable land, and had to rely completely on trading.”
Gergan elaborates that since agricultural land mostly belonged to higher castes, the Arghons, who were considered lower castes, took on risky trading journeys to create wealth. “The initial stages of their settlement in Ladakh were filled with difficulties. They were viewed as foreigners by the local Buddhist community. Nobody likes to have another community, another religion settling down in their locality,” he says.
Ghulam Mustafa, an Arghon, who runs the famous Dragon hotel in Leh, has somewhat of a different tale to tell. The Arghan impact on Ladakh started during the reign of the Buddhist Namgyal dynasty. “The Kings of that dynasty invited and, some historians say, coerced traders and Zarkars (who specialised in gold and silver coins and jewellery), to leave their native lands in far places like Kishtwar to settle in Ladakh. When they arrived they were given land to build mosques. Their highly specialised skills gave them special status in the King’s court,” says Mustafa.
The Arghons also served as spies for the British during the colonial period. Fearful of Russian expansion into India, the British recruited Arghon traders, sometimes forcibly, to gather intelligence. Disguised as merchants, explorers, botanists and sometimes even sportsmen hunting ibex and snow leopard, they travelled deep into uncharted territories. “So the trade route also ended up serving as a spying and pleasure route,” notes Gergan.
But mostly Arghons were great traders. “Such was the sturdiness of their spirit and their skill in navigating mountains and high passes, that sometimes they carried huge loads of trading goods on their back,” explains Mustafa.
Despite their initial struggles, the Arghons became traders of goods like pashmina wool and crystal salt, found in Rudok, now in Tibet. Rudok salt found its way to far places like Afghanistan, Baltistan, and Kashmir.
A handwoven carpet exhibited at the Central Asian Museum in Leh. Carpets like this were traded via the Silk Route.
Climate change and urbanisation
After the Silk Route closed in the 1950s, the Arghons redirected their trade towards other Indian states, especially Kashmir. They supplied pashmina wool, which was processed by Kashmiri artisans into garments. However, cooperatives have since replaced many traditional traders, disrupting the old supply chains.
Over the years Pashmina trade has changed. It is now under threat from both climate change and industrialisation. Due to the establishment of cooperatives in villages, the role of the traders has been eliminated. Earlier, the Changthang people were dependent on Arghons and in turn Arghons were dependent on Kashmiris to buy wool. Not any more. Pashmina wool can be directly handed over to a cooperative now.
Climate change too has impacted trade. Shrinking pastures, due to reduced snowfall and melting glaciers, are making it harder for nomadic herders to sustain their flocks. Dr Haji Mohammad Ali Khan, Ladakhi historian and writer, laments the drying up of grazing land impacting the Pashmina goat pastures.
Nearly a decade ago, scientists like Mohd Iqbal Yatoo warned about shrinking and dying pasture land in Ladakh. In a paper published in the Indian Journal of Animal Sciences, he warns, “Keeping in view the contribution of Pashmina goats to the livelihood of the Changthang region, there should have been progress in this farming but the situation is alarming as the farmers especially youth are losing interest in it because of fodder scarcity, pasture shrinkage, poor yield, lack of facilities, lack of labour, harsh climate, diseases and mortality.”
He also talks about the alarming ground situation where every year thousands of Pashmina goats are dying. “The pack animals for tourists and car rally teams also destroy the fragile topsoil as is evident from the condition of pastures surrounding Tso Kar in Samad area and Ldad in Kharnak, which are turning into deserts. Tyre marks can be seen all over Loma, Rongo, and Anley as well.”
The changing lifestyle of nomadic herders is also reshaping the pashmina industry. As education and urban migration increase, fewer young people are interested in goat rearing.
Dr Sameena Iqbal, principal, EJM College, Ladakh, attributes the nearly fifty percent fall in pashmina wool growth and growing areas to not just lack of grazing land but also to education and upward mobility of the nomadic goat herders. “The nomads are beginning to settle in cities like Leh. They own huts that they rent out riding on the ever growing tourist wave.”
“There is also the impact of the jean and chip culture that dissuades the younger offspring of the nomads from taking to grazing and rearing pashmina goats,” says Mustafa.
Urbanistaion is also leading to the decline of the pashmina industry. Construction, infrastructure development and solar power industries are taking up large tracts of land, creating issues for pashmina goat herders. Setting up solar energy requires sprawling land. In any other state that would mean huge investment but in Ladakh, land is free, making solar energy a lucrative business. Currently, 20,000 acres of land stretching over 80 kilometres is being readied for a ground-mounted solar project. “Already massive road building projects have bifurcated mountains and rivers forcing animals to cross the busy road, killing many. The biological metabolism of animals is disturbed by vehicular sound. Locals are losing grazing land for their animals,” says Gergan.
So have these challenges made the Arghons vociferous climate activists? “No,” says Gergan, adding that “Arghons are mostly traders and not impacted so much by climate change.
The Arghons have embraced new economic opportunities, including hospitality and transport. “Their early journey in Ladakh is dubious and is an inherent part of their upward mobility. Today they are an affluent successful community. Most of the top hotels in Ladakh are owned and run by them. But these hotels have strange beginning histories of their possession.” says Gergan. On probing further, he replies, “The Arghons at some point in time became money lenders and many a time inability to pay back made their debtors exchange whatever land they had to repay debts.”
Preserving stories and heritage
There are barely 10,000 Ladakhi Arghons now. The intermingling with Central Asian countries on the trade route is a thing of the past. Slowly, the very profile of Arghon is being redefined.
“During the Namgyal dynasty we ran the kingdom, not like the King but by carrying out most of the important tasks like making coins, trading and even negotiating on behalf of the King… Today we have no political voice or representation,” says Dr Abdul Qayum, president of Anjuman Moin-ul-Islam, Leh, one of the oldest socio-religious organisations in Ladakh.
Many Arghons have also served in the Indian Army. Adiba’s 93-year-old grandfather Abdul Rashid fought the Chinese and the Pakistanis. “In the 1940s, unlike in these days, we did not have sophisticated weaponry. We would meet and fight our enemy face to face. We had to wade through five to six foot high piles of snow and (for) three to four months of the year we had no option but to have snow water. Those days, to be a soldier, you had to have courage, strength and guts,” reminisces Abdul Rashid.
Ghulam Rasool, who served the Indian Army during the 1962 Indo-China war, narrates the near-death incident when he was stationed close to the China border. He says Ladakhis have gone through a lot of hardship protecting the Indian territory.
As Adiba puts it, the stories are far too many and she is hopeful that even a decade from now Ladakh will continue to speak its history through spellbinding stories.
Adiba’s efforts to preserve and share the Arghon legacy reflect her belief in the power of storytelling. For the first Dastan-e-Karwan event, she restored her great-grandmother Mariam’s house in Saboo village. Mariam, a widow, had saved every penny sent by her grandfather — a trader in Yarkand — to build the house.
“And I think at a time like that, when women didn’t have that much agency, I think that was surprising in itself, right? The house is the testimony of resilience, love and determination. It took me 41 days to restore it. The foundation was strong. I did just basic mud and clay plastering, and the rest is the same,” says Adiba.
When asked what she wanted tourists to take home from her first narrative of the Arghon traders, Adiba replied that she marvelled at their resilient spirit. “Despite extremely harsh weather and terrain, these traders travelled 4-5 months a year. Today, despite better weather conditions and sophisticated travel means and technology I would not be able to travel for so long. I marvelled at how they managed it. So I thought, what would be the best way to tell the story. That’s when I thought of my ancestral house which is 110 years old. I thought that should be the perfect spot for me. So I started restoring that house.”
As for future plans, Adiba aims to expand her storytelling initiative to other parts of Ladakh, such as Kargil.
Ladakh may no longer be the bustling centre of trade it once was, but through projects like Dastan-e-Karwan and its stories will continue to unfold for future generations.
(Sunita Kaul Zutshi is a freelance journalist and has written extensively on various topics for several media publications for over two decades. She has reported on business and politics events from a dozen countries across the globe, including Canada, Turkmenistan, Saudi Arabia, UAE, Oman, Kuwait and India.)