Projects

Below is a list of active and proposed projects initiated by Geshe Yonten and Save Zanskar.

Education Program

Save Zanskar currently supports (food, accommodation, tuition, clothing)  the eduction of 20 children from Zanskar. Geshe Yonten has plans to expand the education program to include more children.

Save Zanskar has plans to build 2 residential hostels, one in Zanskar and one in Jammu in the Kashmir region. Fulfillment of this goal will provide a living space for up to 100 children in Zanskar and Jammu while they are attending school. This ‘boarding school’ environment would allow them to attend the government school during the day, and receive evening classes about their traditional culture and Buddhist values – enabling them to learn both their local language, and Tibetan. They would be close enough to their parents to return home for their school holidays.

Expanding Health Care in Zanskar

Zanskar Eye Care Program

Eye doctors from Austria will visit Zanskar in the summer of 2011 to examine people’s eyes and provide them with over 500 sets of eyeglasses free of charge. This program will also be providing walking sticks and wheelchairs to those in serious need.

Health Clinics

Currently Zanskar has only very poorly equipped medical clinics, which are not even able to offer beds to the sick and injured. Save Zanskar would like to be able to provide these clinics with better equipment and improve the facilities so that the people of the region are able to receive necessary treatments. Currently, the closest medical facility for advanced treatment and surgery is in Leh, a two-day bus ride away in the summer and only accessible by helicopter in the winter.

Green Projects

Zanskar Water Project

Clean water sources and rain in Zanskar are extremely limited therefore creating a constant water shortage. With modern development giving rise to tourism and business, water has become even more scarce. Save Zanskar would like to fund a water project that will help over 20,000 families have access to a more plentiful and clean water supply on the other side of the Tongdey Pass from Zanskar.