Jonang Monastery

The Jonang Monastery is situated in Sanjauli, east of the hill city of Shimla in the northern Indian state of Himachal Pradesh.
The monastery at Sanjauli, Shimla was originally founded in 1963
The monastery has a temple, a meditation house and a hostel.
There are 120 monks in the Jonang Monastery, including monks from Mongolia, Tibet and various regions of India.

Our current situation - and plans for the future

Constructed in 1963, the buildings of monks' quarters, dispensary, kitchen, library and classrooms are now more than forty years old. They have already started cracking from various sides - indicating that they are in urgent need of renovation. Though we have been able to build a new meditation hall with the financial help of a generous individual, due to an ever increasing number of students, the present assembly hall has become too small to accommodate all the students. As a result, we have to hold exams and debate sessions outside the hall, due to which we face extreme difficulty and problems during rainy and hot sunny days.
The library holds a set of Kagyur and Tengyur - rare texts of the Six Yogas of the Kalachakra, the collected works of Kunkhen and Jetsun Taranatha and more than 500 volumes of literary works of many Tibetan scholars. We are making continuous effort to acquire as many rare texts, books and manuscripts as possible in the future. We therefore face acute problems of space with our present library.

As we have only two classrooms at present, we face shortage of classrooms - so we are compelled to hold classes in monks' rooms. Because of its small size, one classroom has been used for arranging meals and other purpose.

The present dispensary is quite small as compared to the strength of students of this monastery, and moreover, its roof has cracks and is unable to resist rains during the rainy season. Currently, more than four monks have to share one bedroom, thereby endangering their health and hygiene as there is great risk of spreading contagious disease, such as skin disease, to one another.
As most of the rooms on the upper floor have poor roofs, they cannot resist rains. As a result the lower rooms remain wet and damp.
The kitchen, being very small and congested, the cooks and helpers cannot work freely to prepare meals for more than 120 people, and there is no dry space in the kitchen to keep vegetables separately.

Although we continuously receive requests, from many enthusiastic young children from both in and outside Tibet, to give them admission, owing to insufficient rooms and lack of other facilities we have been forced to refuse them to their great disappointment.
Given the growing number of students every year, the present two small classrooms, toilets and bathrooms and other buildings that are in extremely poor condition have become unsuitable for use. The drainage and electricity lines have broken badly.
In short, established over 41 years ago, the present small building of the Jonang monastery is in severe condition. The need was felt for construction of a new building, with larger capacity. The deteriorating buildings have lead us to plan the construction of new buildings with better facilities and spacious rooms. Nevertheless, to fulfill such a big project we need funds. We therefore extend our heartfelt appeal to any generous individual or aid agency to make a donation or provide support for any specific part of this project. Given our urgency, we endeavor to complete this project as soon as possible.