Kalsangaolma, 59, runs a small stall in the Tibetan Refugees Cloths Market, in Hyderabad. The only Tibetan in the market, she is considered the leader, almost like a mother, to the vendors who hail from across India.
Sipping a small bowl of soup, she is happy to have what she does. When she was just two years old, she had fled Tibet in 1959 along with the Dalai Lama and 80,000 other refugees. Since then, the Indian government has helped them settle in India.
“I started this business after taking a loan of Rs. 20,000, which later grew into one lakh. We sell winter clothes, sourced from Maharashtra,” she says. A variety of winter clothing, from earmuffs to sweaters and monkey caps form the wares of the stall.
The Tibetan community in India is spread across various districts, earmarked as exile settlements by the government. Today, they number under 100,000, with the Dalai Lama as their leader.
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