Research Department

Our roots are firmly grounded in the soil of Bhutan. But a history unwritten is a history lost in time. We owe our fate partly to this omission of not consciously developing a written history of our own. Too much of our blood and sweat was invested in Bhutan’s development and nation-building without appropriate recognition. As a community we were instead maligned, ostracized and persecuted. Through an effective information hegemony, the persecuting government has generated a ‘national truth regime’ based on which it has successfully de-historicized our belonging to Bhutan. A revival of knowledge, a true rediscovery of our roots, history, culture and politics should be our natural response. The distortion of our history must be unveiled and a new narrative reflecting the perspective of the silenced must be presented and preserved. A critical appreciation of the Bhutan’s national policies and the circumstances leading to our expulsion is our core research objective.

We are an aspiring research organization that wants to engage seriously in Bhutanese studies, research, information and knowledge dissemination. Our research activities will be rooted in our collective experiences as a community and will focus on uncharted research terrains. Our work will endeavor to make an effective case for evicted Bhutanese community, which deserves to be heard, studied, analyzed and understood. We would do so by collecting relevant documents, capturing our unique personal experiences and untold stories in print, electronic media and in videos. By doing so, we hope to capture and record the diverse experiences we went through as a community singled out for persecution and expulsion. We will record the experiences of several activists who went through political incarceration, forced detention and torture in Bhutan. We will record the pains, perspectives and experiences we went through as exiles in Nepal and India. We will also capture the success stories of our community members living in the Diaspora. They will be housed in a physical archive. By preserving these stories in one singular reservoir we hope to preserve our history for posterity. Involving the next generation of our youngsters will ensure continuity.

The BRAIN’s research agenda is set by its Research Department headed by the Research Director. Our researchers shall be pooled from a diversity of thought, experience and personal background. As we do not have full-time researchers currently, our research is being undertaken by Bhutanese scholars and intellectuals on a voluntary basis. We look forward to receiving a constructive response from the Bhutanese American community at large, whose history this research undertaking endeavors to present and preserve.