Sikkim’s Lepcha community maps its sacred lands for the first time

The Lepcha people of Sikkim’s Dzongu reserve call themselves the ‘children of the hidden land’ — and their sacred geography includes peaks, lakes and groves that no official map has ever named.

A community mapping project is changing that, recording the sacred sites, their stories and the rules that protect them.

The map is intended as a shield: if a sacred peak is on the map, the argument goes, it cannot be quietly surveyed away.