The Dalai Lama Heads Towards Arunachal Amidst Protest From China

Amidst increasing diplomatic pressure by China, Tibet’s spiritual and religious leader, His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama, Tenzin Gyatso is all set to visit Arunachal Pradesh this April. The nearly 10 days stay by the biggest leader of Tibetan Buddhism in the world will be his longest sojourn yet in the frontier state. Northeast Today reports.

- Nayanjyoti Medhi

Regarded as the Living Buddha by followers of Tibetan Buddhism, the journey to the Northeast by the Dalai Lama, the present reincarnation of the Buddha, will in some ways trace back the same route the then 23 year old leader took to escape persecution from China.

In March 17, 1959, the Dalai Lama disguised himself as a soldier and slipped through crowds gathered outside the Potala palace in Lhasa, Tibet. Moving South, with an aim to seek asylum in India, he crossed the Himalayas on foot along with a retinue of soldiers and officials. As the Dalai Lama travelled by night, the Chinese army had put down in three days, the revolt in Lhasa. After a two week journey, during which many thought and claimed that he had died, the Dalai Lama reached Tawang in India.

A Time magazine article from 1959 on the Dalai Lama’s escape from Tibet stated, “Last week word came that the Dalai Lama had reached safety in the village of Towang, just across the Indian border. His two-week march to the frontier, it was said, had been screened from Red planes by mist and low clouds conjured up by the prayers of Buddhist holy men.”

It is quite evident that the state holds a special place in the heart of the Dalai Lama. On October 9, last year, Arunachal Pradesh Chief Minister Pema Khandu, invited the spiritual leader for a visit during a meeting in New Delhi.