Traditionally, Ladakh practised polyandry — one woman married to two men, usually brothers, each holding an equal position within the household: one working outside, one managing things in and around the house. It still happens occasionally in the villages, but among young, educated Ladakhis, a one-on-one relationship is now what's wanted.
Development, tourism included, has pulled many young people away from farming altogether. Plenty of women now stay home while husbands work elsewhere — often in the army. At the Women's Alliance Centre, she works to keep women's traditional skills alive and give them a way to earn from them, teaching those same skills to the next generation before they disappear for good. Most of Leh's older cooperative organisations have already folded.
Tourism's benefits land unevenly by geography. In the city, women profit directly — extra sales, guest houses to run. In the villages, that gain barely registers; women there mostly farm and sell vegetables while husbands take tourism-adjacent work as guides or shopkeepers. The Centre tries to close part of that gap by selling village-made products and running workshops, hoping eventually to open dedicated shops for village goods.
It gives the women an important extra bit of income, but also a greater self-esteem, because this way they can contribute to the household income.
That income matters most, she notes, for women married to soldiers — near-constant absence of a husband means needing the ability to support a household alone. Village life still runs on strong family bonds and mutual support; city life has thinned in that regard, especially during the frantic June-to-August tourist season, when no one has much time for anyone else. Winter brings the old rhythm back.
Cultural pride has followed an interesting arc. A few years back, young Ladakhis were embarrassed by their own culture, stung by disparaging remarks from other parts of India about Ladakhi food and dress. That's reversed, largely thanks to tourists' genuine enthusiasm for local culture — visitors who admire what young Ladakhis were once taught to feel ashamed of.
Education has slipped, and language sits at the heart of the problem: Ladakhi was never taught properly in schools, so most people speak it but very few can write it — a gap she fears could eventually cost the language its written future entirely.
In the early days of tourism, Kashmiri businessmen would trick local people into exchanging their antique family jewellery for new jewellery — then sell the antiques to tourists for a lot of money.
It was a hard lesson, but a lasting one — locals no longer take the trade at face value, and if nothing else, the experience left people more conscious of the value of what they'd inherited. The Centre has had more success on plastic: Leh has banned plastic bags outright since 1998, though garbage bins still sit out too long on the streets before collection, and it's often local guides and helpers, more than tourists themselves, who leave rubbish behind on trekking routes.
“Tourist numbers will go down if Ladakhis do not hold on to their culture,” she says. “That is why everyone wants more tourism — because of its economic benefits. But more buildings are going up, even on farmland, which only makes us more dependent on tourism still.”