Syamukapu: The Lhasa Newars of Kalimpong and Kathmandu
Author: D. S. Kansakar Hilker
Category: Biography   
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About  .

The Book

Syamukapu is a personal account about Bhajuratna and his son Gyan Jyoti. The book stretches over a period of 122 years, from 1882 to 2004 and unfolds in Darjeeling, Kalimpong, Lhasa and Kathmandu. Within this span is a period when Buddhist monks were persecuted in Nepal in 1926 and 1944.

The Story is about a flourishing trade era between Tibet and Nepal carried out by the quiet but determined Newars of Kathmandu under difficult circumstances. It was a period of trade which is little known to the rest of the world.

The Centuries old trade route over northern Nepal came to standstill with the opening of the Jelepla of the Younghusband pass for the British India in 1904. This resulted in the Newars choosing the newly open pass not far from Kalimpong for their trade to Tibet.

The period of prosperity for the Lhasa Newars and for Kalimpong came to and end with the Indian Chinese war of 1962. Deb Shova Kansakar Hilker was born in 1951 and grew up in Kalimpong India, where she went to missionary school run by the Sisters of St. Joseph’s of Cluny. She has a Bachelor of Arts degree in English from the Tribhuvan University of Kathmandu. Married in 1995 to German, she lives with her husband in Germany.