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Bhutan Theocratic Government, 1616-1907
Consolidation and Defeat of Tibetan Invasions, 1616-51
In the seventeenth century, a theocratic government
independent
of Tibetan political influence was established, and
premodern
Bhutan emerged. The theocratic government was founded by
an
expatriate Drukpa monk, Ngawang Namgyal, who arrived in
Bhutan in
1616 seeking freedom from the domination of the Gelugpa
subsect led
by the Dalai Lama (Ocean Lama) in Lhasa. After a series of
victories over rival subsect leaders and Tibetan invaders,
Ngawang
Namgyal took the title shabdrung (At Whose Feet One
Submits,
or, in many Western sources, dharma raja), becoming
the
temporal and spiritual leader of Bhutan. Considered the
first great
historical figure of Bhutan, he united the leaders of
powerful
Bhutanese families in a land called Drukyul. He
promulgated a code
of law and built a network of impregnable dzong, a
system
that helped bring local lords under centralized control
and
strengthened the country against Tibetan invasions. Many
dzong were extant in the late twentieth century.
Tibetan armies invaded Bhutan around 1629, in 1631, and
again
in 1639, hoping to throttle Ngawang Namgyal's popularity
before it
spread too far. The invasions were thwarted, and the
Drukpa subsect
developed a strong presence in western and central Bhutan,
leaving
Ngawang Namgyal supreme. In recognition of the power he
accrued,
goodwill missions were sent to Bhutan from Cooch Behar in
the Duars
(present-day northeastern West Bengal), Nepal to the west,
and
Ladakh in western Tibet. The ruler of Ladakh even gave a
number of
villages in his kingdom to Ngawang Namgyal. During the
first war
with Tibet, two Portuguese Jesuits--the first recorded
Europeans to
visit--passed through Bhutan on their way to Tibet. They
met with
Ngawang Namgyal, presented him with firearms, gunpowder,
and a
telescope, and offered him their services in the war
against Tibet,
but the shabdrung declined the offer.
Bhutan's troubles were not over, however. In 1643 a
joint
Mongol-Tibetan force sought to destroy Nyingmapa refugees
who had
fled to Bhutan, Sikkim, and Nepal. The Mongols had seized
control
of religious and civil power in Tibet in the 1630s and
established
Gelugpa as the state religion. Bhutanese rivals of Ngawang
Namgyal
encouraged the Mongol intrusion, but the Mongol force was
easily
defeated in the humid lowlands of southern Bhutan. Another
Tibetan
invasion in 1647 also failed.
During Ngawang Namgyal's rule, administration comprised
a state
monastic body with an elected head, the Je Khenpo (lord
abbot), and
a theocratic civil government headed by the druk
desi
(regent of Bhutan, also known as deb raja in
Western
sources). The druk desi was either a monk or a
member of the
laity--by the nineteenth century, usually the latter; he
was
elected for a three-year term, initially by a monastic
council and
later by the State Council (Lhengye Tshokdu). The State
Council was
a central administrative organ that included regional
rulers, the
shabdrung's chamberlains, and the druk desi.
In time,
the druk desi came under the political control of
the State
Council's most powerful faction of regional
administrators. The
shabdrung was the head of state and the ultimate
authority
in religious and civil matters. The seat of government was
at
Thimphu, the site of a thirteenth-century dzong, in
the
spring, summer, and fall. The winter capital was at
Punakha, a
dzong established northeast of Thimphu in 1527. The
kingdom
was divided into three regions (east, central, and west),
each with
an appointed ponlop, or governor, holding a seat in
a major
dzong. Districts were headed by dzongpon, or
district
officers, who had their headquarters in lesser
dzong. The
ponlop were combination tax collectors, judges,
military
commanders, and procurement agents for the central
government.
Their major revenues came from the trade between Tibet and
India
and from land taxes.
Ngawang Namgyal's regime was bound by a legal code
called the
Tsa Yig, which described the spiritual and civil regime
and
provided laws for government administration and for social
and
moral conduct. The duties and virtues inherent in the
Buddhist
dharma (religious law) played a large role in the new
legal code,
which remained in force until the 1960s.
Data as of September 1991
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