Tangtse
or Drangtse
() is a village in the Leh district of Ladakh, India. It is located in the Durbuk tehsil. Traditionally, it was regarded as the border between the Nubra region to the north and the Pangong region to the south. It was a key halting place on the trade route between Turkestan and Tibet. It was also a site of wars between Ladakh and Tibet.
During the Jammu and Kashmir princely rule, Tangtse was the headquarters of an ilaqa (subdistrict), whose territory included the Pangong Lake area, the Chang Chenmo Valley and the Aksai Chin plateau. Tangtse was also a key halting place on the Chang Chenmo route to Turkestan, via the Chang Chenmo Valley and Aksai Chin, which the British tried to promote for a few decades.
Tangtse is one of the 26 constituencies of the Ladakh Autonomous Hill Development Council of the Leh district. Following the 2020 election, the Councillor for Tangste is Tashi Namgyal Yakzee, who is also in the Executive Council.
Geography
Tangtse is located at the intersection of two major strands of the Karakoram fault system, called the Tangtse fault and the Pangong fault. The two faults sandwich the Pangong Range, at the northern periphery of which lies the village of Tangtse.
The Tangtse fault is home to the Lung or Long valley, divided into three sections: Long Kongma, Long Parma and Long Yogma (the upper, middle and lower sections). In modern maps, the entire valley is labelled as Loi Yogma without any division into sections. The Tangtse River (or Lung Chu) flows through the valley, draining the western slopes of the Pangong Range as well as the eastern slopes of the Ladakh Range. It flows past Tangtse to join the Shyok River near Durbuk.
The Pangong fault was once home to a "Pangong River" which flowed through its valley during the pleistocene. But the river has been dammed by tectonic activity and has turned into the present Pangong Lake. The valley of the erstwhile effluent of the lake now houses the Mughlib stream, which joins the Tangtse River near the village of Tangtse. Even though the Ladakhis had no knowledge of the erstwhile "Pangong River" (it having predated the birth of humanity), they preserve a myth that the waters flowing into the Mughlib stream, from a "scanty spring at Wangtong", represent the filtered waters of the Pangong Lake. The Ladakhis thus regard the Tangtse village lying at the northwestern end of the Pangong Lake.
Trade routes
From Tangtse, one is able to travel to Rudok and Gartok in Tibet via a number of routes, while Tangtse is also close to the Central Asian caravan route via Durbuk and the Karakoram Pass. According to Moravian Tibetologist F. A. Peter, there is evidence of the route having been used for centuries between Turkestan and Tibet. Historian Janet Rizvi has also acknowledged that the trade route between Turkestan and Tibet passed through Ladakh.
History
Tangtse lies at the border between the Nubra region (traditionally called Dumra) and the Pangong region. It played a key role in the two wars between the Ladakhis and Tibetans, the Tibet–Ladakh–Mughal War (1679–1684) and the Dogra–Tibetan War (1841–1842).
Tibet-Ladakh-Mughal War
In 1679, the Tibetan forces under the command of Galdan Chhewang fought an advance guard of Ladakhi forces in Guge (West Tibet). After defeating them, they invaded Ladakh itself. The route taken by the Tibetans is believed to have been via Rudok, Chushul and the Lung Chu valley. The Ladakhis joined the battle at Lung-Khung (Long Kongma) and repulsed the attack.
The following year, Tibet sent formidable reinforcements (estimated at 5,000 troops along with several seasoned commanders) and the Tibetans returned. A battle was fought at the "foot of the Chang La pass", which would again indicate the valley between Durbuk and Tangtse. Cunnigham gives the location of the final battle as Balaskya and Petech as dPal-rgyas. The Ladakhis were roundly defeated and withdrew to the fort of Basgo in northern Ladakh. After a three-year siege, they requested assistance from the Mughal forces in Kashmir, who fought off the Tibetans and chased them to the Pangong area.
Rudok and Guge, which were previously under the control of Ladakh, slipped out of Ladakhi hands. In 1684, they agreed to respect the new borders in a Treaty of Tingmosgang.