This book offers the first comprehensive study of Sarat Chandra Das (1849&1917), the Bengali explorer and scholar whose journeys to Tibet and scholarly contributions transformed the religious and intellectual landscape of colonial Bengal. Tracing Das&s expeditions, his recovery of Sanskrit Buddhist texts, and the founding of the Buddhist Text Society of India, the book reveals how Tibet was reimagined as a sacred geography-central to the revival of Buddhism and the construction of new nationalist histories in early twentieth-century Bengal. By centering the theme of native agency and highlighting Das&s collaborations with Tibetan and Sikkimese interlocutors, the book challenges dominant narratives of colonial knowledge-making. It shows how Buddhism, textual and visual discourses, and trans-Himalayan networks were mobilized in service of both historical recovery and regional self-fashioning of Bengal&s past. Rich in historical detail and interpretive insight, the book significantly contributes to Buddhist studies, Tibetology, and South Asian intellectual history.