Gewog: People of Brekha and Bephu, Trashigang want to separate from Khaling because the gewog centre is too far from the villages.

Two villages are located more than 40 kilometres from Khaling.

Brekha and Bephu could be merged and created a separate gewog, said the villagers.

Brekha Tshogpa Sonam Choden said that travelling to the gewog centre is a problem for the people of the two villages because of distance.

“Merging Brekha and Bephu to create a separate gewog would solve lot of the problems that the people face,” said Sonam Choden.

Brekha has 75 households and Bephu 73.

A number of households under Thrimshing gewog that belonged to Khaling before the 2007 boundary delimitation are also lobbying for the same. They want a separate gewog.

Bephu Tshogpa Thinley said with gewog centre located far away it becomes very expensive to travel to the centre. For instance, to go to the gewog centre to pay the land tax, which is normally less than Nu 50, villagers have to spend five times more for the journey to and from.

“Office of forestry sector, agriculture and livestock are all in Khaling. Travelling is a huge problem and not a single household owns a vehicle in Bephu,” Tshogpa Thinley.

Trashigang Dzongdag Lungten Dorji said that creation of a new gewog will not be necessary with road connectivity improving and added that the focus rather should be on reducing the number of gewogs.

“We will discuss with the gewog administration,” said Lungten Dorji. “Before the delimitation exercise in 2007, we asked villagers of Bephu and Brekha to come under Thrimshing which would have been convenient for both. They did not agree.”

Thinley said one can reach from Bephu to Thrimshing in about 10 minutes which means service delivery would be quicker.

Delimitation has also caused similar problems for people of Khaling and Thrimshing. For instance, people of Thrimshing have to travel all the way to Khaling where parts of their land are.

“There are a lot of factors government should look into before the next delimitation exercise is carried out to prevent such problems,” said Lungten Dorji.

Tshering Wangdi, Trashigang

Advertisement