 A fine monsoon drizzle accompanies me to Clement Town. Lying on the southern fringe of the Doon Valley, among the lower Shivaliks, Clement Town is not quite a suburb of Dehradun. It is more like an independent township with several educational institutions, old churches and one of the largest Tibetan settlements in northern India. Till a few years ago, it was a sleepy, rambling, almost rural place with a faintly military bearing but today, like the rest of the valley, the empty spaces and trees have given way to smart automobile showrooms, hotels and restaurants.
A drive down the busy Turner Road with its St Mary’s Church and then through the sylvan surroundings of the Air Force Selection Board Centre brings me to my destination - the oldest Tibetan colony in Dehra Dun and one of the largest Tibetan settlements in India.
 It is 6.30 in the morning, yet the place seems up and about. Small Tibetan cafeterias and grocery shops are astir and children in uniform on their way to school smile shyly at me. An old man sits with his cup of tea in the little verandah outside his cottage. Just opposite is a small board that guides me to Mindrolling Monastery, an alliterative chant in a giant leap of faith. A rather small gate opens up into a vast space dominated by the gigantic World Peace Stupa, 185 ft high and the tallest in Asia. I join the monks walking in the gardens around the stupa in a moment of stunning silence, humbled by the greatness of the cause they all represent. But the busy world summons me and I have an appointment to keep.
 In the office complex, Tenkyab Lama, a senior monk, is discussing the day's schedule with his assistant. He gives me a welcoming smile and asks me to accompany him to the cafeteria in the beautifully designed, semicircular market complex where 500 monks are having breakfast. They have just completed their early morning rituals and have an hour before classes begin. “The food is organic and vegetarian,” Tenkyab Lama tells me as we sip our tea. The rain has almost stopped but the clouds are dark and pregnant, signalling more showers. But the monk isn’t troubled by nature’s fury. Or life’s many challenges. “When I came here in 1972, this was a very small set-up. We hardly had anything. But now we have grown to become one of the largest Buddhist centres in existence,” says he. The monastery was established in 1965 by Khochhen Rinpoche and a small band of monks as the new seat of Mindrolling-in-exile. Mindrolling was first established in 1676 in the Drachi Valley of Tibet by Terdag Lingpa where it flourished until 1959.
Today, the monastery works as a charitable society, promoting Buddhist and Tibetan culture besides providing education and undertaking research. So what does it take to become a monk at Mindrolling? A boy has to be no less than a 10-year-old. I see these cherubic faces peeping through a sea of crimson, reddened by all the running around for chores. The younger ones go to school while the older ones are enrolled at the Nagyur Nyingma College where they have to spend nine long years learning Tibetan philosophy, Buddhism, history and medicine besides ritual music, chants and Lama dances. “It takes eight years to master the Tibetan language, grammar and script,” says Tenkyab.
 The rigour of a regimen is felt most at the meditation centre on the edge of a thick sal forest where monks often go into three-year retreats. “When a monk meditates, he is not allowed to go out of the room. Nobody can see him,” explains Tenkyab Lama.
 The atmosphere is very relaxed and there is a graceful flow in the routine of the monks. I can see novices memorising Tibetan texts covered in shining red cloth. Some are sitting in the lawns while others are still on the stairs of the stupa but their collective concentration is admirable. So is their cheerfulness. The elderly residents move about chanting mantras and twirling colourful rosaries between their fingers. While Lord Maitreya smiles outside, there’s a mirror image of Bodhgaya inside the stupa. The interiors are decorated with exquisite murals in the finest traditions of Tibetan Buddhist art. The chamber contains four kinds of relics, numerous dharanis and various old and sacred statues in the form of wisdom deities. Monks invoke the Shakyamuni Buddha whose doctrine forms the basis of happiness and benefits and dispels ills like sickness, warfare, turmoil, conflict, famine and earthquakes.
Green gardens surround the shrine while a cascading waterfall graces one of the corners. The waterfall drenches the statue of Yangchenma, or the Goddess of Wisdom, an important female deity within Tibetan Buddhism, holding a veena and accompanied by a swan. She is not much different from our Saraswati, the fountainhead of knowledge. The Tibetan pantheon accommodates another goddess called Tara. A large prayer wheel lends spiritual dignity to the gardens as do the eight miniature stupas, symbolic of the Enlightened One’s eight-fold path. Visitors begin streaming in, perking up business at the market. Hot pancakes with honey and little cup-cakes are being served to tourists at one café while at the other, there’s steaming coffee with cream. If you are looking for Tibetan artifacts and bead jewellery, you can spend the entire day shopping at this market. The pick of silk scarves and thangkas is strikingly attractive. You can be assured of their genuine worth here. After lunch, the lamas gather at the stupa again and begin blowing trumpets. It is a special day; the monks will be going in for a one-and-a-half month summer retreat and this is an initiation rite in preparation for it. “The men will not go out of the monastery and they will have only two meals a day, missing out on their dinner,” Tenkyab Lama tells me, explaining the virtues of denial and renunciation. The monks' “home work” hours are from 7 am to 9 pm after which the lights go off at the dormitories. Lest you think discipline is too much of a strict imposition, listen to Tenkyab Lama: “It is not easy but this is the age when the mind can learn the most and retain knowledge.” But when you have a lovely breeze blowing in from the tranquil depths of the sal forest, you tend to blow with the wind, chimes and the mantras here. One does not have to be a Buddhist or a very religious person to be able to imbibe the spirit of Mindrolling. One just has to open one's heart and take in all that is flowing towards it. Mindrolling can anchor your spirit. And steal your heart. |
Mindrolling
Uttarakhand
India
The waterfall drenches the statue of Yangchenma, or the Goddess of Wisdom, an important female deity within Tibetan Buddhism, holding a veena and accompanied by a swan. She is not much different from our Sarawasti, the fountainhead of knowledge
