The British sent personnel into Tibet to explore the source of the Brahmaputra River, but failed on the way
270 years ago, India became a British colony. Located in the northeastern part of China's southern Tibetan region, that is, Assam, it has a very important strategic position. The British were anxious to find out if the Brahmaputra River was of the same origin as the Brahmaputra River in our country.
As a result, they secretly trained a group of professional explorers and sneaked into Tibetan areas many times to carry out surveying and mapping work. Among the most famous are four people: Nain Singh Rawat, Lara, Nim Singh and Kintup.
This article is the first in a series of articles in which we will focus on Nain Singh Rawat.
The Brahmaputra River, which traverses Tibetan areas of China, northeastern India, and eventually flows into Bangladesh.
In 1824, the British set up a consulate in Assam and sent commissioners to explore the rivers in this area. Later, they discovered an important fact: the Brahmaputra and Brahmaputra rivers are actually the same river, only with different names in different places.
The British considered this discovery very important for their territorial expansion and territorial security.
After the British colonized India, European geographers were eager to understand how the Brahmaputra River emptied into the Indian Ocean, fearing that if the Brahmaputra and Brahmaputra rivers were the same river, the upper Tibetan areas could take advantage of the topography and water to flow downstream, posing a threat to Assam.
There was a time when there was a debate about whether two rivers were the same river. According to one view, the easternmost part of the Brahmaputra River joins the Nu River and flows into the sea along the Irrawaddy River in Myanmar. Another view is that the Brahmaputra River changes direction at its easternmost point, crossing the mountains and valleys of southern Tibet, flowing through the Brahmaputra River in India and finally crossing Bangladesh into the sea.
Please look at the two routes of the Brahmaputra River into the Indian Ocean, the new text is as follows: Come, follow me to see the two routes of the Brahmaputra River into the Indian Ocean, which one do you support more?
In 1765, the British colonists boldly speculated that the Brahmaputra and Brahmaputra rivers were the same river. To test this hypothesis, Indian Surveyor James Rennell explored Assam upstream along the Brahmaputra River.
He drew on the accounts of early missionaries to Tibet, information provided by people living along the banks of the Brahmaputra River, and information about the course of the Irrawaddy River.
Although no one has ever been able to follow the Brahmaputra River in Assam along the Brahmaputra River, Rennell still believes in his own reasoning. Although Rennell's views are accepted by many, there is still disagreement as to which channel the Brahmaputra River enters the Brahmaputra River through which exactly.
In 1826, Lieutenant Wilcox, a military surveyor in Tibet, was commissioned to explore the source of the Brahmaputra River, and he went up the lower reaches of the Brahmaputra River, and met tribes living on both sides of the river in southern Tibet (known as the Xianghe Siang River in India and the Dihang River).
In the same year, he also penetrated deep into the Mishmi region along the Lohit River, a tributary of the Brahmaputra River. In 1827, he reached the western tributary of the Irrawaddy River. Through these expeditions, Wilcox came to the conclusion that the Brahmaputra River flows downstream into the Brahmaputra River, known as the Dihang River in India.
In 1837, while on a mission in Bhutan, Assam's western neighbor, Captain Robert Pemberton heard from Tibetans familiar with the Brahmaputra and Brahmaputra rivers that the two rivers were actually the same river.
03 India's outbound exploration, the British colonists struggled to find a suitable candidate to no avail. It wasn't until the 1870s that the Survey Bureau of India decided to try to solve the mystery, and they needed to find direct evidence outside of British-occupied India.
To do this, they work hard to find"Aboriginal of the Indian state of Assam", and train them to spy secretly"The part of the Brahmaputra River in Tibet that has not yet been actually surveyed on site"。
However, the Assam region** is struggling to find suitable candidates, what is the reason for this?
There are two unavoidable problems in the exploration of southern Tibet. First of all, the harsh natural environment makes it extremely difficult to explore. The lower elevations are covered with tropical plants, such as dense bamboo forests and meadows up to 6 meters high, where only elephants or buffalo can walk.
At higher altitudes, tall trees are closely aligned, and various plants climb on their trunks. These environments place extremely high demands on expedition teams.
Secondly, the southern Tibetan region is inhabited by several tribal groups that are not friendly to each other and are even wary of strangers. Although there are sometimes ** between them, only under specific arrangements will the other party's people be allowed to enter their own territory.
Even the British colonists struggled to recruit people willing to participate in the expedition. Although the British had tried to recruit the natives of Assam for training, they were reluctant to participate at the beginning of the expedition.
The British reluctantly stated that they could not find someone they could trust and be able to cross the border some distance. Therefore, these two objective reasons make the exploration of southern Tibet full of challenges.
04 The first protagonist appears, but suffers a setback halfway. The British turned to the experienced Nain Singh Rawat, but his knowledge of the Brahmaputra was limited.
Nain Singh Rawat, in 1873, was ordered by the British official Captain Trotter to go to Lhasa. Its main task was to participate in the tributary mission from Lhasa to Beijing every three years.
If this is not possible, he will have to travel down the Brahmaputra River in an attempt to return to Assam, India. This was his third secret investigation into Tibet, starting in Ladakh in western Tibet.
Although he arrived in Lhasa, he was unsuccessful in joining the tribute. So, he began to carry out the exploration mission of the Brahmaputra River. By the end of 1874, he had managed to reach Chetang (near present-day Shannan City), the lowest point of the Brahmaputra River as measured by any Indian explorer at the time.
According to Nain Singh Rawat, the Brahmaputra River can still be seen 48 kilometres downstream of Chetang. Local residents believe that the Brahmaputra River flows into the Brahmaputra River in Assam.
In Chetang, Nain Singh Rawat's secret survey activities were discovered and forced to leave. Due to lack of funds, he had to choose to travel south from Chetang to return to Assam in India via the Tawang region of southern Tibet.
On March 1, 1875, he arrived in Calcutta 10 days later.
Nain Singh Rawat, an explorer, began his professional training as a British colonist as early as 1865. He spent two years learning surveying techniques and conducting secret investigations through some technical means.
For example, he hid the mercury used for the thermometer at the bottom of the bowl, the paper slip in the prayer wheel, and the measuring device in the suitcase. He also used a rosary with only 100 beads to count steps, maintaining a precise stride of 33 inches per step.
In 1865, he embarked on his first expedition to Tibet, arriving in Lhasa and surveying boiling water and celestial observations. In the next issue, we will continue to tell the story of Nain Singh Rawat, who surveyed the Brahmaputra River in the Chetang section and became the first Indian and British to reach the river, although he did not complete the task of confirming that "the two rivers belong to the same river".
Stay tuned for the next issue: Indians are at the behest of the British, spying on China's Brahmaputra River several times for more than 200 years! (bis).