DESTINATION: INDIA
Polo with the snow tigers in Ladakh STORY AND PHOTOS BYNATHANWHITMONT
In southern Central Asia three powerful, nuclear-armed nations, India, Pakistan and China, stand at odds in a sea of more than 20,000-foot peaks. Between them is a small, ancient kingdom called Ladakh, a place where polo has been played for 500 years. Culturally and geographically akin to Tibet, Ladakh is a moonscape of rock valleys and icy mountains. Buddhist monasteries stand on cliff tops, Muslim mosques rise above the villages and Hindu shrines dot the roadsides. And war stirs on the
borders. Ladakh lies in the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir, which India and Pakistan have fought over for
62 years; a region Bill Clinton once called the most dangerous place on earth. Ladakh also
Stands were packed on game days.
includes the area of Aksai Chin, a region China took in the Sino-Indian war of 1962. The defense of this peaceful, war-
threatened land is in the able hands of the Ladakh Scouts, nicknamed the Snow Tigers, five highly-decorated battalions of the Indian Army, who specialize in high altitude and winter warfare. They also specialize in polo. The Scouts fight not only for Ladakh’s freedom, but to
44 POLO PLAYERS EDITION
preserve its traditional culture as well. Polo came to Ladakh in the 1600s from
Baltistan, an ancient kingdom, now mostly in Pakistan. Some local scholars say polo arrived when Ladakh’s king, Jamyang Namgyal, married the Balti princess Gyal Khatun and polo players came along in her bridal retinue. Others say a massive drought forced the people of Baltistan into Ladakh, and the game came with them.