Zhemgang District (

Dzongkha Dzongkha (; ) is a Sino-Tibetan language that is the official and national language of Bhutan. It is written using the Tibetan script. The word means "the language of the fortress", from ' "fortress" and ' "language". , Dzongkha had 171,080 ...

: གཞམས་སྒང་རྫོང་ཁག་; Wylie transliteration: ''Gzhams-sgang rdzong-khag''; previously "Shemgang"), is one of the 20

dzongkhag The Kingdom of Bhutan is divided into 20 districts (Dzongkha: ). Bhutan is located between the Tibet Autonomous Region of China and India on the eastern slopes of the Himalayas in South Asia. are the primary subdivisions of Bhutan. They ...

s (districts) comprising

Bhutan Bhutan (; dz, འབྲུག་ཡུལ་, Druk Yul ), officially the Kingdom of Bhutan,), is a landlocked country in South Asia. It is situated in the Eastern Himalayas, between China in the north and India in the south. A mountai ...

. It is bordered by Sarpang, Trongsa, Bumthang,

Mongar Mongar (Dzongkha: མོང་སྒར) is a town and the seat of Mongar District in eastern Bhutan. it had a population of 3502. Mongar is on the road from Thimphu to Trashigang. It is one of the oldest educational hubs of the country. It ha ...

and

Pemagatshel District Pemagatshel is one of the 20 districts of Bhutan. Language Native speak Tshangla (Sharchopkha), an East Bodish language that is the ''lingua franca'' of eastern Bhutan. Population Pemagatshel district, as of 2005, had a population of 13,864 ...

s, and borders

Assam Assam (; ) is a state in northeastern India, south of the eastern Himalayas along the Brahmaputra and Barak River valleys. Assam covers an area of . The state is bordered by Bhutan and Arunachal Pradesh to the north; Nagaland and Manipur ...

India India, officially the Republic of India ( Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the ...

to the south. The administrative center of the district is Zhemgang.

Languages

The dominant language in Zhemgang is

Khengkha The Khengkha language (Dzongkha ྨཕགལཔམཕ), or Kheng, is an East Bodish language spoken by ~40,000 native speakers worldwide, in the Zhemgang, Trongsa, and Mongar districts of south–central Bhutan. Classification Khengkha is a ...

. Historically, Khengkha and its speakers have had close contact with speakers of Kurtöpkha, Nupbikha, and Bumthangkha to the north, to the extent that they may be considered part of a wider collection of "Bumthang languages." The term Ngalop may subsume several related linguistic and cultural groups, such as the Kheng people and speakers of Bumthang language. S.R. Chakravarty asserts that Kheng are one of the earliest inhabitants that language spread upwards from Kheng into Bumthang and Kurtöp. By all accounts the Kheng are more closely related to the people of central Bhutan than they are to their neighbors in eastern Bhutan, who are primarily Sharchops. The Kheng still retain special trade relations with the Bumthang, including providing winter pasture rights for Bumthang yaks. SIL International estimates there are 50,000 Kheng speakers.

Security issues

Starting in the 1990s, the United Liberation Front of Assam maintained guerrilla bases in the forests of southern Zhemgang from which they would launch attacks on targets in India and then return across the border. In late 2003 the King of Bhutan,

Jigme Singye Wangchuck Jigme Singye Wangchuck ( dz, འཇིགས་མེད་སེང་གེ་དབང་ཕྱུག་, ; born 11 November 1955) is a member of the House of Wangchuck who was the king of Bhutan (Druk Gyalpo) from 1972 until his abdicati ...

led a military operation which largely swept the guerrillas out of the region. Because of the risk of attack, foreign tourists were not allowed to visit Zhemgang in the past.

Administrative divisions

Zhemgang Districts comprises eight village blocks (or '' gewogs''): *

Bardho Gewog Bardo Gewog (Dzongkha: བར་རྡོ་) is a gewog (village block) of Zhemgang District, Bhutan Bhutan (; dz, འབྲུག་ཡུལ་, Druk Yul ), officially the Kingdom of Bhutan,), is a landlocked country in South Asia. It ...

Bjoka Gewog Bjoka Gewog (Dzongkha: འབྱོག་ཀ་) is a gewog (village block) of Zhemgang District, Bhutan. Bjoka Gewog is also a part of Panbang Dungkhag (sub-district), along with Goshing, Ngangla, and Phangkhar Gewog Phangkhar Gewog (Dzongkha: ...

* Goshing Gewog *

Nangkor Gewog Nangkor Gewog (Dzongkha Dzongkha (; ) is a Sino-Tibetan language that is the official and national language of Bhutan. It is written using the Tibetan script. The word means "the language of the fortress", from ' "fortress" and ' "language". ...

Ngangla Gewog Ngangla Gewog (Dzongkha: ངང་ལ་) is a gewog (village block) of Zhemgang District, Bhutan, bordering India. Ngangla Gewog is also a part of Panbang Dungkhag (sub-district), along with Goshing, Bjoka, and Phangkhar Gewog Phangkhar Gewog ...

Phangkhar Gewog Phangkhar Gewog (Dzongkha: ཕང་མཁར་) is a gewog (village block) of Zhemgang District, Bhutan. Phangkhar Gewog is also a part of Panbang Dungkhag A dungkhag ( dz, དྲུང་ཁག་ ''drungkhak'') is a sub-district of a dzongk ...

Shingkhar Gewog Shingkhar Gewog (Dzongkha: ཤིང་མཁར་) is a gewog (village block) of Zhemgang District, Bhutan Bhutan (; dz, འབྲུག་ཡུལ་, Druk Yul ), officially the Kingdom of Bhutan,), is a landlocked country in South ...

* Trong Gewog

Environment

Most of Zhemgang District is part of the protected areas of Bhutan. Zhemgang's environmentally protected areas include Jigme Singye Wangchuck National Park (the ''gewog'' of

Trong Terong ( Jawi: تروڠ; zh, 直弄) is a mukim in Larut, Matang and Selama District, Perak, Malaysia Malaysia ( ; ) is a country in Southeast Asia. The federation, federal constitutional monarchy consists of States and federal territo ...

) and Royal Manas National Park (the ''gewogs'' of Ngangla, Pangkhar and

), which occupy much of the west. These parks connect to Phrumsengla National Park in the north (the ''gewogs'' of Nangkor and Shingkhar) via a biological corridor that bisects Zhemgang.

References

External links

Zhemgang Dzongkhag official website
Districts of Bhutan {{Bhutan-geo-stub