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Tara Bodong Foundation (Netherlands) is a registered non-profit charity that supports humanitarian projects in Northern India and Nepal. Our mission is to improve the living conditions of local people in the Himalayan regions of India and Nepal, and help them break out of the vicious circle of hardship which often characterises their lives. We do this through (financial and non-financial) donations, capacity building and knowledge transfer. Our main project is the Lumla Bodong Nunnery/Girls’ School, which is a shelter for girls in Lumla, Arunachal Pradesh, NE India. This facility houses and provides supplementary education to poor and orphaned young girls. Lumla is a tiny village that shares a border with Bhutan and Tibet (China).
News
The Impact of a Sponsor
Next summer will mark a significant milestone for the Tara Bodong Foundation. For the first time, six girls from the Lumla Bodong Nunnery/Girls’ School will be graduating from high school. Armed with their high school diploma, they now have choices for the first time in their lives. Those who have the ability, can choose to continue their studies and even go on to university. Others can choose to get a job as a teacher or in an office or government ministry. Others can even choose to become a nun. Regardless of where they choose to go, these six girls will not be following blindly in their parents’ footsteps as child brides or manual labourers. This is the impact of our sponsorship programme. Since 2014, each girl in residence at our Nunnery/Girls’ School in Arunachal Pradesh has been individually sponsored and we are pleased to see our programme bearing fruit, by producing young women with choices and a chance for a better future. Once they graduate, these inspiring young women will go on to improve their local communities for generations to come.
Six girls moving on to what we hope will be a brighter future, means there will be room for six new faces. The mountainous hillsides that surround Lumla are dotted with numerous nomadic families who are desperate for a chance to give their girls a chance at a better life. The Lumla chapter of the Tara Bodong Foundation will now be able to seek out the most deserving cases to fill the empty beds left behind by our graduates. And so the cycle of change continues! We need your help; for just €45 per month you can change a girl’s life, who will then have the potential to change an entire community! Your monthly contribution provides access to lodging, clothes, food, school uniforms, books, and anything else she might need, to help her become self-reliant, contributing members of her community and the world at large.
With recurring donations, you help support Tara Bodong in providing a secure learning environment to these girls in Lumla in which they are given access to a valuable education that changes their lives and futures.
“The aim is to become resourceful women in their own locality - as teachers, social and health care workers and mentors. By being taught in the Bodong Tradition of Buddhism, the girls will help to revitalise their religious and cultural heritage.” (Siri Weirum - co-founder, Tara Bodong). For more information, please email us at or visit
Life in Lumla During the Coronavirus Lockdown
As you read this message, we hope you are well and are practising measures to keep yourself and your family safe and healthy during the Coronavirus outbreak. We, the members of the Tara Bodong Committee, are also staying indoors as much as possible and practising social distancing to try to limit the spread of the disease.
Our daughters at the Lumla Bodong Nunnery/Girls’ School are coping very well with the restrictions that are now in effect throughout India to try to limit the spread of the disease. Like the rest of the country, Lumla and its surrounding villages are in a state of lockdown. Luckily, the girls are now on the six-week annual school summer holiday break. All of them are spending their holidays at the nunnery.
The girls spend most of their days completing chores around the facility, helping to care for the younger ones and playing games with one another of course! In the afternoons, they practice their handicraft skills such as weaving, under the watchful eye of House Mum, Pema Deki and her assistant Tashi Drema. For more information on Monpa traditional crafts, click here.
So far, we are happy to report that there are no indications that any of our girls or staff members has contracted Covid-19. There are also no reports of any symptoms among them. In the meantime, everyone is taking extra precautions to ensure good hygiene, sanitation and social distancing, as instructed by the Indian Government and the WHO.
