Himalayan earthquakes

Hardcore Tibetan Communist Raidi with Chinese Panchen Lama

Once upon a time, Raidi was a powerful Tibetan Communist cadre. He was the leader of the Nagchu clique, ruling over the Tibetan plateau.
Now, he is honorifically titled, vice chairman of the 10th Standing Committee of China's National People's Congress, but he is very old.
Nonetheless, he recently sent a letter to the Tibet Autonomous Region’s government to “express his sympathies for the victims of the recent earthquake, offer his condolences to the relatives of those injured or killed, and pay his respects to the relief workers.”
Raidi explains to his comrades in the Communist administration that Tibet being located in “an alpine area, the mountains are high, valleys are deep, and the geology is complex”.
Relief work is therefore very difficult: “In such a serious disaster, it is really not easy to have achieved such results in the phased earthquake relief efforts."
Nothing wrong. Raidi then speaks of the massive 8.6-magnitude earthquake on August 15, 1950, whose epicenter was located in Metok County (Dzong) and Zayul Dzong.
Raidi recalled that he was 12 years old at that time: “At the quake’s epicenter, there were landslides from the mountains and the ground opened up, and the Yarlung Tsangpo (Siang/Brahmaputra) was divided into four parts. Some villages were thrown on the opposite of the river and houses collapsed. Even places that were far from the epicenter, like Lhasa, Chamdo, and Nagchu, were also greatly affected. According to incomplete statistics from the time, more than 2,000 people were killed, countless people went missing, and the disaster area was covered in ruins.”
Now comes the ideological part of the letter: “Tibet was still ruled by the old Tibetan government. Led by the 14th Dalai Lama, not only did the government not care about the lives of common people, but they also increased several taxes.”
Raidi’s conclusion is: "There is a sharp contrast between the earthquake relief in Old Tibet and in New China. …this shows that only under the leadership of the CPC, in a socialist society can the Tibetan people have the confidence, courage, and ability to overcome any disaster and rebuild their homeland. Thus Tibet, especially those areas affected by the recent earthquake, will achieve leapfrog development and long-term stability.”
There is no doubt that the infrastructure is very different today from what it was in 1950. In Nepal too, it is far easier to bring food, supplies, warm cloths to those affected by the tragedy. In 1950, Lhasa, without speaking of Metok or Zayul, located north of the McMahon Line, had never an ‘iron birds’, helicopters or planes.
But to compare the rescue operations during the recent tragedy and the ones, 65 years ago is unbecoming of a former senior Communist cadre. Mr. Raidi should have kept quiet. He probably does not realize that the progress in infrastructure, roads, airfields, transportation have been planetary and due to the Communist Party only.
By the way, the Chinese Panchen Lama (also a Nagchu native) has personally donated 200,000 yuan（32,300 US dollars), for the quake-affected areas, “to show his sympathy for the needy people.”
I am wondering how, under a Communist dispensation, Lamas can become rich, like their predecessors in Old Tibet.
How do they get richly-endowed labrangs (estates) like in the past?
Buddha too must be wondering: is what I thought my monks.

The 1950 Earthquake
To give an idea of the devastating 1950 Earthquake, known in India as the ‘Assam Earthquake’, I post the report of the famous British botanist Kingdon-Ward.

THE EARTHQUAKE 
(AUGUST 15, 1950) 

By F. KINGDON-WARD

A vividly-written account of an unforgettable experience.
The Author is a well-known Himalayan explorer, and describes how, while camping near the Tibetan frontier, he and his wife narrowly escaped with their lives from the havoc wrought by one of the most violent earthquakes on record.

Finishing an entry in my diary, I shut it and lay back in the deck chair near the entrance to our tent. On the camp table beside me the hurricane-lamp burnt dimly; my wife was already in her cot, half asleep. I told myself I must soon put out the light and turn in; we were due to start off again early the following morning, and a good night’s rest was essential. First of all, however, I wanted to lie back and relax for ten minutes, enjoying the comparatively cool night air. The date was August 15th, 1950, the time about 8 p.m. and the place the wilds of Upper Assam.
Everything seemed very quiet. Now and then a dog barked in the village of Rima, away behind us, and I could just detect the muffled echo of the river as it entered a narrow part of the deep gorge. Occasionally an owl shrieked somewhere close by.
Suddenly, as I reclined there in a semi-doze, the chair on which I sat, the table, and finally the tent itself began to shiver. Aroused, my wife sat up in her cot. A split second later the whole valley appeared to be convulsed, and the air was filled with a loud roaring. Involuntarily I sprang to my feet.
“What on earth’s that?” I asked, startled, and thrust my head out between the tent-flaps.
The high mountains were silhouetted against a riband of clear, star-flecked sky, but their outlines, instead of being sharp and hard, were strangely fuzzy. Meanwhile noise continued, becoming louder even as I stared about me in bewilderment. Then the dread truth dawned on both of us but it was my wife who put it into words.
An earthquake the cried, now thoroughly awake and forth with leaped from her bed. “Outside –quick!”
I seized the lantern, with some vague idea of a fire risk, and together we rushed out into the most awful pandemonium. The turmoil was terrifying. Mingled with the dreadful sound of the tearing and shearing of the earth’s crust came the roar of mountains that were apparently tumbling downing every direction. It appeared as though the very arch of heaven was falling.
Directly we left the tent a violent tremor threw us to the ground, and we felt the earth beneath us bucking and heaving madly. Every moment I expected it to split open and precipitate us into some yawning figure. Great rocks were crashing from the mountainsides; dust rose like the smoke of some vast conflagration, blotting out the stars. Meanwhile a rain of gigantic hammer-blows thundered on the ground below; it seemed that it must soon be pulverized into fragments.
Too frightened to move, we lay where we had fallen, with the familiar world around us breaking up bodily. For quite five minutes—minutes as long as years—mountains and valleys shook, shivered, and trembled to the accompaniment of ear-splitting sounds of destruction. It is impossible to convey an adequate idea of our sensations or the impression of overmastering terror and utter helplessness in the face of stupendous disaster.
At last, however, the earth-tremors began to die away. Then, quite suddenly, there came a series of five explosions high in the sky; they followed one another, loud and distinct, at equal intervals of a few seconds. The detonations reminded me of anti-aircraft shells bursting round enemy planes, but their effect was very different. Abruptly the shaking of the ground ceased, the last boulders rumbled down the mountains, the splintering trees stood firm. Even the river—which had roared like a wild beast in pain throughout the cataclysm—became quieter. There could be no doubt the earthquake was over.
What caused that extraordinary “gunfire” is a complete mystery. The explosions were heard on the plains of Assam, two hundred miles away, where the soft earth “wobbled like a jelly” during the worst phases of the quake.
We rose slowly to our feet, thanked to be alive and unhurt, but not yet quite sure that we were. Had we passed through some terrible nightmare, or had it all really happened? It seemed hard to believe it was an actual experience—but there was the dust which filled the air and now began to settle, silently and impalpably. It was in our eyes, our ears, our mouths; already it was lining our lungs and forming a grey film on our faces. For days thereafter we were eating dust as well as breathing it!
The quake was mercifully over, but its dread aftermath was only just beginning. From the village came no sound of barking dogs, no shouting of men. Had all those poor souls been killed? Fortunately, this was not the case, for presently there strolled into our camp the familiar figure of a villager of our acquaintance—and he had a broad grin on his face! I envied his stolidity, in the midst of this tremendous calamity he still contrived to remain cheerful! The sight of that simple Hillman put new life and confidence into us, and especially into our two Sherpa boys, who had been badly frightened.
Our friend told us that the village had been badly damaged, despite the fact that the houses—massively built of logs resting on solid stone foundations—were only one storey high. By great good luck, however, nobody had been killed.
“Let’s have some tea,” suggested my wife; there was no thought of going back to bed again after such an awakening. The wood fire was still burning, and we re-lit the lanterns. The stream from which we drew our water was only a dozen yards from the cook-house and boys’ tent, and one of the Sherpas took the kettle and went off. Next moment he gave a shout of dismay, and we all rushed towards him to see what had happened. The brook, which two hours previously had flowed swiftly along its bed, was now nothing but a trickle. Even as we watched it grew smaller and smaller.
    “Quick!” I shouted. “Bring buckets, saucepans—anything!”
We filled a couple of kettles and a pail, but only with difficulty, for the trickle soon died away to a mere thread and, finally, intermittent drops. Our water supply had vanished, and there was nothing we could do about it!
    We sat around sipping tea and talking for an hour. We still felt slightly dazed; it seemed incredible that these mighty mountains, rising ten or twelve thousand feet above our heads—the village in the gorge was itself 5000 feet above sea-level—should have been in the grip of a force which shook them as a terrier shakes a rat. The previous day they had looked as solid and immovable as the Rock of Gibraltar; now they were riven and shattered, their rocky slopes disintegrating like sand-dunes in a breeze.
Inside our tent, curiously enough, everything appeared exactly as it had done before the quake. Nothing was broken, nothing disarranged, even the aluminium tent-poles had not Shifted! The knoll on which our little camp was pitched had withstood the terrific shaking and battering unharmed, moreover-very fortunately for us—it had not been in the line of descent of the falling rocks. Thousands of huge boulders, dislodged from the mountainsides by the violent tremors, had leaped, bounced, and rolled down the steep slopes, snapping off stout trees like match-sticks. Any one of these flying masses could have demolished our tents and swept them away, leaving nothing but rags and shattered corpses to mark the site. Yet we had emerged scatheless!
Though the disturbance was over, there was as yet no reassuring restfulness about our surroundings. Those adjustments of the earth’s crust which inevitably follow a severe earthquake-especially in regions so notoriously unstable as the mountains on the Assam frontier—had still to come. We were blissfully unaware of the fact at the moment, but these minor movements were destined to continue for months! In our state of nervous tension, in the dust and darkness of that night of terror, it was enough for us that, practically every half-hour, the tortured ground gave a convulsive shudder. Each of these tremors—some of hall a minute’s duration—was accompanied by a roaring sound, like a great wind, and by fresh rock-falls close at hand, either on the opposite side of the big Lohit River or on our own bank, close to the village and camp.
Not knowing the ways of major earthquakes—indeed, we were ignorant as yet that it was a major earthquake—we feared a repetition of the major shock, and before venturing to lie down on our beds again we made careful preparations for a rapid get-out if necessary. There was no sleep for any of us during the remainder of the night, although I believe I dozed off once or twice for half an hour.
Meanwhile, in England, California, South Africa, and almost every modern city in the world, seismographs had been registering the greatest upheaval of the earth’s crust since these delicate instruments were invented. As a matter of fact, seismographs thousands of miles distant had been thrown off balance; they either ceased to record or the tremendous oscillations extended beyond the limits of the graph paper. Within a few hours scientists were hard at work trying to decide in what part of the globe this terrific cataclysm had occurred, and later the newspapers announced that there had been an earthquake of great intensity somewhere in north-east India. Not for several days was the real magnitude of the disaster realized.
Its “epicenter,” according to American physicists, was in the south-eastern corner of Tibet, about twenty-five miles from the frontier with Assam. The ‘quake shook the whole of Upper Assam, two hundred miles away, and must also have done the same with a large area in Tibet, but as this region is almost uninhabited no record of what happened there has come to hand.
Dawn arrived at last, and we got up and looked outside once more. Things appeared more or less normal. A bird was singing sweetly; in a nearby field a small boy was shouting to scare birds off the ripening crops. Presently, from the village, there emerged a file of old women and young girls plodding out to work, as they had done every morning for months. We felt very thankful; evidently the world was nor completely topsy-turvy!
Nevertheless, the sun rose on a scene very different from that on which it had set the previous evening. The flanks of the mountains were mutilated and torn asunder, the wounds gleaming white as snow against the prevailing green of summer. The broad terraces that led step by step down to the river—many of them cultivated—were now corrugated and fissured with deep cracks, sometimes raised, sometimes downwards. The high river-bank itself had slipped in a hundred places, piling up mounds of gravel. The village, in its bower of trees, appeared to be in ruins. It was true that the stout main timbers of the twelve or fifteen log houses still held firm, but every roof had gone, and flimsier erections lay flat. Many of the hapless cattle and pigs, shut up in pens that had collapsed, lay dead or dying—a sad loss to their owners. The monastery building lay on its side, hurried clean off its foundations, and a bottle-shaped chorten (religious memorial) had been stripped to its core.
The most amazing sight of all, perhaps, was the Lohit River, now a wildly-tossing sea of liquid mud which had suddenly risen several feet. On its turbulent bosom it carried innumerable great tree-trunks, plunging and tossing amidst huge waves, dancing madly in the swirling eddies, and rushing headlong through the gorge. Literally millions of big trees must have been uprooted or smashed; they passed in endless procession. The stench of the mud was horrible.
No less wonderful, though on a smaller scale was the spectacle presented by the minor tributary which swept swiftly down from the Burma border to join the Lohit at Rima. The previous afternoon it had been crystal-clear; carefully choosing the right place, one could easily have waded across it. Now, like the Lohit, it was just liquid mud—the colour of coffee—laced with froth, and considerably deeper. Three mills housed to timber cabins along its bank in ruins the primitive cantilever bridge that spanned it was in grave danger of collapse and shaking like a leaf. I shouldn’t have cared to essay a crossing.
We learned later that on the plains of Assam, two or three hundred miles from where we were, the earth had swayed sickeningly and sagged in many places. Over a wide area several buildings had fallen, railway lines had snapped, bridges had been shattered, and roads had sunk. On the whole, however, direct damage had been comparatively slight. But the damage had been comparatively slight. But the floods resulting from the damming of rivers far away back in the mountains, long after the earthquake was over, eventually caused the death of hundreds of people by drowning.
So much for external matters; I will now return to our own position. Once it was fully light we were able to get a better idea of the havoc the ‘quake had wrought, but we still had no idea of its extent and intensity. As the sun rose over the mountain ridge the air began to heat up, and the usual daily wind swept through the river gorge. Loosened rocks started to fall again, and soon the shaken mountains were disgorging avalanches of gravel and boulders, which swept down their slopes to the accompaniment to rise from these rock slides, spread far and wide by the wind until the sun was veiled and the mountains across the river, only a mile away, appeared dimly outlined through the choking fog.
Meanwhile, every hour or so, there was a terrifying subterranean rumble, after which the ground shook for several seconds. These earth-tremors felt—and sounded—exactly as though an enourmous train were rushing through a tunnel just beneath our feet.
You will already have gathered that when all this happened my wife and I were far away from anything representing civilization. It was three weeks before we were able to cross the flooded river and start our difficult homeward journey. This was because the rope bridge across the impassable Lohit had been destroyed and—with the stream in gigantic flood—it proved impossible to replace it. Even then it was nearly three months, after a series of adventures, before we succeeded in getting out of the mountains and safely back to the plains. Here we discovered that our friends had been exceedingly anxious as to our fate; even the Home newspapers had indulged in speculation as to what had happened to us. We learned also, for the first time, that we had been at the very heart of one of the greatest earthquakes on record—and, luckily, survived uninjured to tell our story!
From the strictly scientific point of view, however, all that occurred was the sudden collapse of a relatively small block of the earth’s crust a few miles down. Possibly the fracture was several miles long, and one half of it slipped downwards, thus creating a geological “fault.” On the other hand, the roof of some vast subterranean cavern may have given way, thereby jarring the upper crust. Nobody knows for certain; it is just a matter of theory. At all events, whatever its cause, the displacement produced the awe-inspiring phenomenon I have endeavoured to describe, and which my wife and I will never forget.

Why the Dalai Lama Matters

Prof Thurman is no more. We are republishing his interview for Rediff.cocm 

 

Professor Robert Thurman is a well-known figure in the United States. Not only because a few years ago, he was nominated as one of the 25 most influential Americans by Time magazine, but also for being a senior scholar at Columbia University, one of the Dalai Lama's oldest supporters and Hollywood beauty Uma Thurman's father.

He speaks to Claude Arpi about as diverse subjects as his years when he was a monk in north India in the 1960s, his relations with the Dalai Lama (Thurman's latest best-seller is entitled Why the Dalai Lama Matters), but also of 'capitalist' China, the Buddhist wave in the West, his idea of a Second Renaissance, his work for preserving Indian sastras at Columbia University, the Barack Obama-Dalai Lama encounter and his vision for the future of the planet.
My interview with Prof. Robert Thurman of Columbia University is posted in Rediff.com. Click here to read...

 

Tibet Archives Project

Archives Project

I am happy to inform you that the project of cataloguing and indexing some 1,500 archival files from the National Archives of India, The Prime Ministers' Museum and Library (PMML, formerly known as the Nehru Memorial Museum and Library or NMML) and other State Archives has been completed. This represents a corpus of historical documents collected over the last 25/30 years.
A young Tibetan research scholar, Tenzin Dekyong, daughter of the great scholar (and friend) Thubten Samphel, former secretary of the Department of Information and International Relations of the Central Tibetan Administration, Dharamsala and first director of the Tibetan Policy Institute, has worked hard for more than two months on the project as Research Assistant.
The documents are hosted at the Pavilion of Tibetan Culture, Auroville.
A database will be released shortly, and these files will be accessible on demand for interested scholars.
I am grateful to my colleagues at the Pavilion for their constant support.

 

 

 

PLA: An Army without Generals?

China is a strange country; it has the most sophisticated war gadgets, the largest number of ships and the latest technology for rockets and space warfare, but it has less and less generals. Who is going to lead the troops in case of a conflict? It is a valid question.
In meantime, all sorts of rumours are floating around, mostly fake news, though indicating the present climate in the People’s Liberation Army (PLA).
Wanjun Xie, the New York based chairman of China Democracy Party, an active student during the Tiananmen Square events in 1989, recently wrote: “It is reported that the announcement stating that Xi Jinping is no longer the Chairman of the Central Military Commission (CMC), has been issued to all military units at the brigade level and above throughout the entire army.”
A few days later, on September 17, Chairman Xi was seen in Beijing, when he met with representatives from various groups involved in organizing the commemorations marking the 80th anniversary of the victory against the ‘Japanese Aggression’.
But let’s go back a few weeks earlier. 
On August 20, Xi Jinping, the Secretary of the Communist Party of China and CMC Chairman landed at Lhasa Gongkar airport to celebrate sixty years of the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR). China watchers examined the composition of the large delegation accompanying Xi from Beijing to decipher the visit.
Xi was accompanied by Wang Huning, No 4 in the Party, Cai Qi, No 5 and director of the General Office of the Central Committee, Li Ganjie, head of the United Front Work Department …and Gen Zhang Shengmin, one of three remaining uniformed CMC members.
Gen Zhang Youxia, the CMC vice-chairman did not turn up probably because he and Xi have lately not seen eye to eye. One can assume that it is the difference of perceptions between the two leaders which has fuelled most of the recent wild rumours.
But there was more to be decoded. Lt Gen Wang Haijiang who since August 2021 has been commanding the Western Theatre Command opposite India, was missing in action. Earlier Wang had a long career in Tibet. Has he been purged? Also missing was Lt Gen Wang Kai, the commander of the Tibet Military District (TMD); only the TMD’s Political Commissar Lt Gen Yuan Honggang was seen with Xi. 
These absences are intriguing.
Another surprise for the watchers, during the Gala reception in the evening, Gen Zhao Zongqi, the artisan of the Doklam confrontation (2017) and the Eastern Ladakh Chinese intrusions in 2020, was posturing, seated in full uniform in the row behind the top leader. Gen Zhao retired from the PLA in December 2020; he was then serving as Commander of the Western Theatre Command. In the past Gen Zhao created havoc in Sino-Indian relations. So, why was he invited? Probably to show India that the border issue is far from being settled, despite the recent high-level meetings.
A friend, closing following the developments in China, told me: “Don’t worry, we will get more information on the absentee generals on September 3 during the grand parade.
It was not to be the case.
The South China Morning Post (SCMP) published a piece entitled: “Why were China’s generals missing in action during the Victory Day parade?”
The Hong Kong publication explained: “When China held its first Victory Day military parade in 2015, more than 50 generals joined troops to march down Changan Avenue in central Beijing. The generals of all stripes led dozens of formations past the Tiananmen rostrum, saluting President Xi Jinping as the official announcer read out each commander’s name.”
Four years later, the same practice was followed: “The generals were also out in force for the National Day parade in 2019, giving observers a rare opportunity to see the PLA’s new generation of rising stars,” the SCMP added: “[such] events were also a valuable chance to learn who was in charge of each unit.” 
Though 89 generals (including four full generals, two lieutenant generals, and 83 major generals) leading 59 formations were announced for the September parade, none appeared on September 3. 
Only senior colonels (brigadier equivalent) and colonels walked or rode a vehicle on the Tiananmen Square without their names being announced.
The SCMP quotes a Chinese political scientist: “It could be that too many major generals are suspected of having ties to senior generals under investigation, and Beijing may be hesitant to let major generals lead the parade.”
Two weeks after the impressive parade (though without generals), the Chinese Defense Minister Dong Jun spoke of China’s efforts to safeguard world peace at the 12th Beijing Xiangshan Forum. From September 17 to 19, under the theme "Upholding International Order and Promoting Peaceful Development," the forum brought together some 1,800 official representatives.
Dong pleaded for peace; he asserted: “The Chinese military stands ready to work with all parties to defend sovereign equality, uphold the post-war international order, bolster multilateralism, protect common interests, and jointly advance reforms to improve the global governance system.”
At the end Dong issued a veiled threat: “The Chinese People's Liberation Army stands ready to defeat any secessionist plot of Taiwan separatist forces, and will foil any military interference from external forces.”
But this does not explain where the generals are, and more importantly, if China can fight battles, in Taiwan or elsewhere, with revolving generals, who have a constant sword hanging over their heads.
Earlier this year, Joel Wuthnow, a senior research fellow in the Institute for National Strategic Studies at the US National Defense University wrote an essay Can Xi Jinping Control the PLA? for the publication China Leadership Monitor.
While presuming that Xi Jinping is in control of the PLA, he noted: “Recent purges of senior Chinese military officers have renewed the question of how firmly in charge of the People’s Liberation Army is Xi Jinping.” Wuthnow’ conclusions were: “[Xi] has largely preserved a tradition of PLA autonomy relative to the party leadership, both to consolidate his own power …and to focus on its warfighting missions. …the scope of the dismissals has remained narrow.” 
They may be relatively narrow, but they are significant; indeed, can an Army fight with a constant sword above the heads of its senior officers? Will the energy and time of the generals be spent to preserve their future (and their heads) or can they seriously do war preparation planning. The answer seems obvious that they can’t.

The Girls from Tawang

Thingbu villagers

On June 21, Arunachal Pradesh Chief Minister Pema Khandu wrote on X (former Twitter): “Now that Mago–Chuna, nestled near the LAC, is connected by road, you no longer walk out of necessity. You walk to soak in the silence, to breathe the mountain air, and to witness the untouched beauty of the land.”
During his visit, Khandu held detailed discussions with officials and stakeholders to promote sustainable spiritual, cultural, and eco-tourism in the remote Mago–Chuna region of Tawang district.
A joint collaboration between the district authorities, the Indian Army (the ITBP) and the local authorities will help developing the Mago–Chuna region into “a global tourism destination while preserving its fragile Himalayan ecosystem and cultural sanctity.”

This remote area has a historical background.
In 1975, a serious and uncalled-for incident took place, forcing the official spokesman of the Ministry of External Affairs to make a statement: “On the October 20, 1975, an Indian patrol party consisting of one NCO and four men, while on a routine patrol along India’s northern border, were ambushed by a Chinese party of about 40 persons. The ambush was well within Indian territory and in an area which has been regularly patrolled by us for many years and where no previous incident had taken place. Following this incident, four men were missing.”
While visiting the spot, I was told that the bodies of the four soldiers, all of Nepali origin and all called Chhetri, were repatriated a few days later, after the Chinese side informed the Indian post of the incident. A memorial has now been built at an altitude of 17,000 ft, just below the Tulung-la pass marking the LAC to commemorate the death of the four jawans.

Linked by tarred road
The Mago-Chuna area has only recently been linked by a proper tar road to the rest of a district, which saw the brunt of the first military operations with China in October and November 1962. 
The villages of Thingbu and Mago are today easily reachable and slowly getting integrated into the country’s mainstream, partly due to the Vibrant Village Program (455 such villages in Arunachal Pradesh only) and the close collaboration of the Indian Army which is deeply involved.

Mago Area
Before visiting Thingbu village in early August, I read again the report of Capt Henry Morshead of the Survey of India, probably the first explorer to visit the area with his colleague, Capt Frederick Bailey of the Intelligence. 
Morshead wrote in 1913: “Wedged in between Monyul [Tawang] and the Lopa country is the quaint and isolated little district of Mago. … on our arrival there we found it difficult to get the people to supply transport as the district is seldom visited by officials and they are not accustomed to do so.”
The British surveyor continues to describe the area: “The country is wooded and damp. The houses are of wood and stone with pent roofs of shingles, or, in some cases, of slate. They grow no crops but keep yaks in the upper parts of the valleys; the produce of these animals is exchanged with Monbas and Lopas (Daflas) for cereals and madder dye. …Mago is 11,800 feet in altitude and is under snow in winter. Most of the people live on the hills with their yaks in summer and return to the villages from the end of December to the end of May, during which period the grazing grounds are under deep snow.”
For decades, Morshead’s report was the only record about these remote villages: “The total population is only about two hundred and is, they say, decreasing. The people are quite illiterate. …They let their hair grow long and do not tie it in any way. …The women wear a short skirt of woollen cloth in broad red and blue longitudinal stripes under which they wear knickerbockers. They wear a great deal of jewellery.”

Thingbu village 
The village is located some 15 km from Mago at an altitude of 11,000 ft. the population belongs to the Monpa tribe, like in Tawang; the census said that 58 households live in Thingbu. 
I received a grand reception when I visited Thangbu; all the villagers were keen to see this white-skin person interested in their culture as well as what happened in 1962 during the war with China. 
This was one of the routes used by the Chinese Army to bring reinforcements to Dirang and Bomdila during the second phase of the Sino-Indian War (November 18-20, 1962).
Thingbu is just off the famous ‘Bailey Trail’, the historic route taken by Capts Bailey and Morshead who had been commissioned to survey the Tibet border during 1913. After completing the survey along the Great Bend of the Yarlung Tsangpo River, the two Britishers returned into Indian territory at Tulung-la pass, descending to Mago village, then crossing over Tse La to reach Pota, and from Poshing La down to Thembang before proceeding to Tawang and finally to Tsona Dzong in Tibet. The first part of their journey from Mago is known as the ‘Bailey Trail’. 

Meeting the villagers
During my encounters with the villagers of Thangbu, a couple of elders remembered the events of 1962. They said that the Chinese had not been too aggressive with the villagers. At that time, some villagers had gone grazing in the nearby Yangtse area; they came running back to inform people about the Chinese attack and their imminent arrival in the village. Apparently, the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) troops just wanted guides as they did not know their way towards Dirang and Bomdila. 
Upon hearing the news of the Chinese troops’ arrival, all the young people left the village, leaving behind only older people, unable to serve as guides due to their age.
During the discussion, I learnt something interesting: the Chinese troops were usually sleeping during the day and marching at night. In a few days, several hundreds of soldiers passed on their way to Tse-la pass and Dirang Dzong. After seeing the gorges around Mago, one wonders how they could find a track to progress through this densely afforested area or how they could cross the rapid flow of the Mago chu (river).
The Chinese had very few Tibetans guiding them to their destination. 
The Thingbu villagers recounted that the Chinese were all smoking cigarettes and beedies. After seeing the PLA troops, the Monpas’ conclusion was that the PLA were not good soldiers, “nothing compared to Indian soldiers”, they added.
Contrary to other sectors (Tawang for example), the PLA had no mules or horses, they were carrying their own food (something like tsampa, barley flour) and did not take any food from the villagers. 
This reminded me of The Three Main Rules of Discipline given by Mao Zedong in 1947: “Obey orders in all your actions; Don’t take a single needle or piece of thread from the masses; Turn in everything captured” and The Eight Points for Attention: “Speak politely; Pay fairly for what you buy; Return everything you borrow; Pay for anything you damage; Don’t hit or swear at people; Don’t damage crops; Don’t take liberties with women; Don’t ill treat captives.” 
Though these rules were not followed in other sectors, the PLA soldiers told the Monpa villagers that they were from similar race and had not come to trouble them; they just wanted to kill the Indian Army soldiers.
At the end of the discussion, the older Monpa said that if today Chinese were to come inside India “I will fight and kill them”, prudently adding, “if they are of my age, if they are younger soldiers, I will not be able to fight”. The entire village had a good laugh.

The Girls of Tawang
Continuing in a lighter vein, I told them about the 1913 report of Morshead who wrote: “In Mago there were no officials and if we had tried to put on our act, the people would not have understood what we were doing. …They asked if we knew Tawang.”  “Not yet,” we said, “‘but we are going there.”   “What a place!” they answered. ‘‘So many houses! So many people! And the chang (barley beer)! There is no chang like the chang you get there. And the girls, who sing and dance for you. You haven’t seen girls, till you go to Tawang!” None of them had visited Tawang.
The Thingbu villagers could not stop laughing and the ladies vociferously denied that it was true: “here the girls are fine and chang is tasty, as good as in Tawang.” 
The village is quite prosperous, it owns about 1,000 yaks, however, they greatly appreciate the Vibrant Village Program of the Central Government and the role of the Indian Army in providing a good road, a school, a small dispensary and drinking water. 
They don’t need to dream of Tawang as the paradise on earth anymore.

Mago Village

Tulung la

Jang Village

The Tulung-la Killing

On the way to Tulung la

Prime Minister Narendra Modi will visit China for the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) Summit to be held in Tianjin n August 31 and September 1. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun asserted that the Tianjin Summit will be the largest in scale since the establishment of the SCO.

Beijing already stated that it will seek closer ties with New Delhi, especially after global concerns over the tariffs imposed by US President Donald Trump.
While there is no harm to meet, a question remains: can Delhi fully trust Beijing? The past tends to show that it is difficult.
A recent visit to the remote Mago sector of Tawang district showed me that India should remain cautious.
This area has only recently been linked by a proper tar road to the rest of the district, which saw the brunt of the first military operations with China in October and November 1962. 
The villages of Thingbu and Mago are now easily reachable by road and are integrating fast into the country’s mainstream partly due to the Vibrant Village Program of the Central Government. The close collaboration between the Indian Army and the Central and State governments has also greatly helped.

The Tulung-la Pass
Driving further north on a track, one reaches the McMahon Line marking the border between India and Tibet (Arunachal Pradesh Chief Minister, Pema Khandu rightly insists that his State has a border with Tibet only, not China).
The Tulung-la, the pass between the Tsona Dzong (County) in Tibet and Tawang district is located close to the Gorichen peak, on a watershed between the Tsona Chu (river) in Tibet and the Tawang Chu; the ridge clearly demarcates the border between the two countries.
During the 1914 Simla Convention conference, the British Indian Foreign Secretary Henry McMahon and the Tibetan Prime Minister Lonchen Shatra negotiated a mutual agreeable boundary, mainly based on the watershed principle. McMahon explained: “the boundary line ...follows the crest of the mountain range which runs from peak 21431 through Tulung-la ...To the north of it are people of Tibetan descent, to the south the inhabitants are of Bhutanese and Aka extraction. It is unquestionably the correct boundary.”
In fact, before 1975, the boundary was never disputed, though it was one of the routes used by the Chinese Army to bring reinforcements to Bomdila during the second phase of the Sino-Indian War (November 18-20, 1962).

The 1975 Incident
In 1975, a serious and uncalled-for incident took place forcing the official spokesman of the Ministry of External Affairs to make a statement: “On the October 20, 1975, an Indian patrol party consisting of one NCO and four men, while on a routine patrol along India’s northern border, were ambushed by a Chinese party of about 40 persons. The ambush was well within Indian territory and in an area which has been regularly patrolled by us for many years and where no previous incident had taken place. Following this incident, four men were missing and it was subsequently learnt through diplomatic channels that they had been killed. Their bodies have since been returned.”
While visiting the spot, we were told that the bodies of the four soldiers, all of Nepali origin and all called Chhetri, were repatriated a few days later, after the Chinese side informed the Indian post of the incident. The story also says that the fifth member of the patrol had gone around the corner when the killing took place and fate saved him.
The MEA statement continues: “The Government of India have taken a very serious view of this incident and have lodged a strong protest with the Chinese Government against the unprovoked and unjustified firing on the Indian personnel who were on routine duties within the Indian side of the border and against the deliberate killing of Indian personnel performing their routine duty.”
The question is, why did China deliberately kill these Assam Rifles jawans in this remote undisputed area?
I shall answer this later.

A CIA account
It is interesting to go through a CIA note on the incident; the note is entitled: “Peking restrained in denying Chinese crossed Indian border”. 
The US agency observes: “On 3 November PRC Foreign Ministry spokesman's statement used relatively restrained language in denying charges made in a 1 November statement by the Indian Foreign Ministry spokesman.”
Beijing obviously did not want the matter to be scrutinised further; it was satisfied with the mild protest from Delhi, despite the fact that the incident had clearly taken place on the Indian side of the boundary.
The CIA gives its own explanation: “The Chinese statement avoided the harsh invective against the Indian government and its China policy that have characterized Chinese statements on the border since the 1962 Sino-Indian war. China did not comment on the border incident until after the Indian statement made it public.”
It appears that Beijing waited to see Delhi’s reaction; the note just says: “Indian soldiers crossed into Chinese territory on 20 October despite repeated warnings from ‘Chinese civilian checkpost personnel’ and opened fire on the Chinese side, causing the latter to ‘fire back in self-defense.”
It was obviously a lie. 
A further untruth from Beijing is that the Tulung Pass is located on the eastern Sino-Indian border near Bhutan (which is factually incorrect) and that the Indian troops crossed "the line of actual control of November 7, 1959 ".
There is NO 1959 Line. Moreover, the CIA report notes that it is “a phrase used by Peking in the past to refer to the so-called McMahon line which delineates the eastern part of the Sino-Indian frontier,” the Chinese assertion is absolutely incorrect since till date China has never exchanged maps or given its perceptions of the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in the Eastern Sector of the boundary.
According to the US spy agency: “Peking's statement noted that a Chinese protest on the incident had been delivered to the Indian Embassy in Peking on 22 October, that the Indian Embassy had agreed on the 25th to accept China's offer of the 22nd to collect the bodies of the four dead soldiers, and that an Indian representative at Tulung had accepted the bodies and captured Indian weapons and ammunition from the Chinese side on the 28th and had signed a receipt." This chronology might be correct. 
The issue remains, why this sudden unprovoked on Indian territory?
The order to ‘kill’ the Indian soldiers probably came from a local commander in Tibet who wanted to remind the Indian Army (and government) of the 1962 border conflict. The incident took place on October 20, the exact day the war had started on the Namkha chu river 13 years earlier. Any China watcher knows that there are no coincidences with China.
While visiting the Chhetri Memorial built on the site of the incident, I realised that this was the objective of the PLA’s uncalled for shooting, a strong reminder to India that Beijing could strike anywhere, at any time. 
The CIA reports does not make the connection between 1962 and 1975, but notes:“Though accusing the Indian side of spreading ‘slander’ about the clash, the Chinese statement was far milder than China's last official protest over an armed border clash, in 1967. At that time a series of Chinese Foreign Ministry statements in September and October had scathingly labeled the Indian ‘aggressors’, denounced the ‘reactionary Indian government’ for its alleged hypocrisy in calling for a peaceful border settlement and normalization of relations with China, and accused New Delhi of working closely with the United States and the USSR to foster anti-China opinion in the world.”
It was clearly to show India that the Chinese Army were the masters of the Himalaya and that the 1967 clash in Sikkim would be avenged.
For the CIA: “this current statement concluded by giving unusual emphasis to Peking's repeated measures to maintain the border status quo, avoid armed conflict, and ‘preserve peace’ pending a final settlement of the frontier issue.”
Prime Minister Modi will hear similar arguments in Shanghai at the end of the month.
Interestingly, on November 1, 1975, TASS news agency reposted the reports of the Indian protest. Two days later, TASS carried Indian a press comment condemning the Chinese action as an affront to India's expressed desire for normal Sino-Chinese relations; it remarked that it was the latest evidence of "the great power, hegemonistic policy of the Chinese leaders in South Asia”. 
The same day, Moscow Radio spoke of China’s “interference in the Kashmir and Sikkim issue and support for subversion and insurrection in northeastern India.” Interesting in today’s context.
The fact that the Indian Army has built a memorial for the four Assam Rifle soldiers who lost their lives at 17,000 ft is praiseworthy. One can only hope that in the near future, more Indians will visit the spot.
It remains that the Indian negotiators in Shanghai or elsewhere should not be taken in by China.

Mago Village

Mago chu (river)

Cave

Thingbu Village in Mago Circle

On the way to Tulung la

War Memorial & the pass behind

Celebrating the Partition of Tibet

On August 20, at noon, Chinese President Xi Jinping, also General Secretary of the Communist Party of China and Chairman of the Central Military Commission, landed at Lhasa Gongkar airport. 
His fourth visit to Tibet was to celebrate sixty years of the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR).

But what is the TAR?
In 1965, a Tibet Autonomous Region was established to ‘administrate’ Central and Westen Tibet. The area corresponded to the former Ü-Tsang Province and some parts of western Kham. It was a tragedy for the Tibetans because it meant the Partition of Tibet. 
Traditional, ethnic, linguistic Tibet was composed of three provinces Ü-Tsang, Kham and Amdo. Suddenly Tibet was divided in five parts, TAR was one of them, and the remaining parts were amalgamated to the Chinese provinces of Qinghai, Gansu, Sichuan and Yunnan.
Tibet was dismembered. It has always been one of the Dalai Lama’s demands to reunite the five parts of Tibet into one administrative and political entity.
Further, the autonomy promised in the name itself was never given; for the past 60 years the First Secretary of the TAR Communist Party, is not a Tibetan, but a Han. There are very few ethnic Tibetans in the higher echelons of the Party, as we could see in the videos of Xi Jinping’s recent visit.

The Delegation
Xi was accompanied by a large delegation from Beijing.
The Xinhua release observed that Xi was looking at “the long-term stability and high-quality development of Tibet in the new era and the construction of a socialist modern Tibet.”
Xi was greeted by “a cheering crowd when he stepped out of the cabin and waved to the people. Dressed in festive attire, people from different ethnic groups waved red flags and flower bouquets, dancing to joyful rhythms.” 
It looked more a North-Korea type of reception with everyone clapping at unison. Did the Tibetans ‘crowds’ have the choice to not participate? Probably not.
During the following day, the ‘clapping’ continued wherever Xi went. 
During such visits, it is always important to look at the composition of the ‘Central’ delegation; it is the best way to decipher the visit. 
Xi was accompanied by Wang Huning, No 4 in the Party, chairman of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference and member of the Politburo’s Standing Committee. Wang’s colleague, Cai Qi, No 5 in the Partry and director of the General Office of the Central Committee who often accompanies Xi in his tours, was present.
Three other members of the Politburo came to Lhasa: Li Ganjie, head of the United Front Work Department along with He Lifeng and Zhang Guoqing; also present was the powerful Minister of Public Security Wang Xiaohong and Gen Zhang Shengmin, a member of the Central Military Commission who replaced the CMC’s strong man Gen Zhang Youxia, who had accompanied Xi in 2021. Why Gen Zhang did not come is probably because Xi and Zhang have lately not seen eye to eye. 
More importantly and hardly noticed was the presence of Hu Chunhua, a former Party Secretary in Tibet who was at one time Xi’s heir apparent. After being apparently disgraced, he seems to be back in favour; his eventual return needs to be followed closely. Incidentally, Hu is one of the very few Han leaders who can speak Tibetan.
Apart from Gen Zhang Youxia, Gen Wang Haijiang who since August 2021 has been commanding the Western Theatre Command opposite India, was missing in action. Earlier Wang had a long career in Tibet. Has he been purged? Everything is possible in China today. Also missing, Lt Gen Wang Kai, the commander of the Tibet Military District; only the TMD’s Political Commissar Lt Gen Yuan Honggang was seen around. 
These absences are intriguing.

The Fourth Visit
It was Xi’s fourth visit to the Roof of the World. 
In June 1998, then deputy secretary of the Fujian Provincial Party Committee, he came to Tibet for the first time to take back a first batch of Tibet Aid cadres in Fujian and bring a second batch. 
In 2011, Xi Jinping, then Vice-President, led a delegation from the Central Committee to attend the celebration of the 60th anniversary of the so-called Peaceful Liberation of Tibet. He then said “the ecological protection of Tibet is an important issue, and it is necessary to protect Tibet's blue sky.”
His next visit was in 2021. From July 21 to 23, the General Secretary was in Tibet “to congratulate the 70th anniversary of the peaceful liberation of Tibet and visit and comfort the cadres and masses of all ethnic groups in Tibet.”
He also visited Nyingchi Prefecture, near the Indian border where he inspected the ecological environment protection of the Yarlung Tsangpo River and the Nyang River basin. Later, he travelled by train to Lhasa.

The Program
President Xi met six representative groups: people of ethnic groups and ‘all walks of life living in Lhasa’; then cadres who are posted in Tibet; next were judicial workers and police officers, followed by ‘grassroots role models’ and ‘patriotic members of the religious circles’, finally, he had a photo session with military officers ranked colonel and above.
During all these sessions, Xi looked tired, sometime haggard (while the other leaders visited the six Cities/Prefectures outside Lhasa, Xi remained in the capital to rest).  
During his meeting with the religious leaders, Xi had a brief encounter (not more than 5 seconds) with Gyaltsen Norbu, the Chinese selected Panchen Lama. It was the only time that the latter was seen during the visit, which probably means that Norbu will not play an important role in the selection of the next Dalai Lama as he was not given any prominent role during the visit. 
Wang Huning and Cai Qi attended all the meetings.

The Work Report
Xi was invited to listen to the work report of the TAR government.
During his interaction, Xi stressed that “Tibet should fully implement the party's strategy of governing Tibet in the new era, adhere to the general tone of steady progress, implement the new development concept in a complete and accurate manner, solidly promote high-quality development, continue to grasp the four major events of stability, development, ecology and strong edge, and strive to build a socialist modern new Tibet that is prosperous, civilized, harmonious and beautiful.”
The usual  jargon. Do the Tibetans really believe this? It is doubtful but do they have a choice?
The Chinese President then made a summary of the Party’s successes for 60 years: “its economic and social development has achieved remarkable progress, leading to profound changes in the plateau region.” It cannot be denied that materially Tibet has changed.
Xi explained Beijing’s policies: “Governing Tibet, ensuring its stability and promoting its prosperity must begin with maintaining political and social stability, ethnic unity and amity among different religions, calling for further advancing the building of a community for the Chinese nation,” Xi asserted. Stability is a recurrent issue in Xi’s discourse.
Xi then emphasized the need to guide “Tibetan Buddhism in adapting itself to socialist society.” He did not use the usual term of ‘sinisation’ of Tibetan Buddhism, but the result will be the same, erasing all traces of Indian influence on the propagation of Buddhism in Tibet.
He also asserted that Tibet (now called ‘Xizang’ by the Chinese government) “needs to develop competitive plateau industries based on local conditions, with a particular focus on industries of agriculture and animal husbandry with local features, as well as the clean energy sector.” This is being done on a large scale, completely changing the landscape of the Roof of the World and worse, changing the demography of the plateau by bringing lakhs of migrants from China.
Finally, he mentioned the construction of a series of hydropower plants on the Yarlung Tsangpo/Brahmaputra which cause deep anxiety in India: “major projects such as the hydropower project in the lower reaches of the Yarlung Tsangpo River and the Sichuan-Xizang Railway project in a vigorous, orderly and effective manner.”
He spoke of the promotion of ecological conservation: “to make coordinated efforts to cut carbon emissions, reduce pollution, expand green development, and pursue economic growth, so as to protect the roof of the world and the water tower of Asia."
It does not make practical sense. One can’t destroy and protect the environment at the same time.

The Return of Zhao Zongqi
During the Gala reception in the evening, India was in for a surprise: Gen Zhao Zongqi, the artisan of the Doklam confrontation (2017) and the Eastern Ladakh Chinese intrusions in 2020, was posturing, seated in full uniform in the row behind the top leader. Gen Zhao has retired in December 2020 as Commander of the Western Theatre Command after spending two decades posted in Tibet; after taking the command of this sensitive area facing India, he created havoc in the Sino-Indian relations by trying to occupy five places in Ladakh. So, why was he invited? 
Probably to show India, that the border issue is far from being settled, despite the recent meeting of the Special Representatives in Delhi.
This visit (the shortest of Xi’s four visits) is ominous for the Tibetans as well; gaining any type of autonomy in the present circumstances is utopic.
And the question remains: are the Tibetans allowed to not clap?

 

Gen Zhang Shengmin member CMC in Lhoka

Wang Huning at Tashi Lhunpo Monastery with Chinese Panchen Lama

Stage managed reception for Xi Jinping in Lhasa Airport

 

Finding the Future Dalai Lama: The Role of the Ganden Phodrang Trust

 My interview Finding the Future Dalai Lama: The Role of the Ganden Phodrang Trust is on YouTube

In this compelling interview with Ishan Dhar, eminent historian and Tibetologist, Mr Claude Arpi—currently a Distinguished Fellow at the Centre of Excellence for Himalayan Studies, Shiv Nadar University—delves into the complex dynamics of the forthcoming succession of His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama. He offers insights into the role of the Ganden Phodrang Trust, its composition, and the potential challenges it may encounter in navigating this critical transition.

 

 

Dalai Lama@90

My article Dalai Lama@90 appeared in The Times of India

 The Tibetan spiritual leader’s succession could see nasty exchanges between India and China. That’s why Dalai should quickly provide details about the process of finding his successor

Here is the link...

The Dalai Lama is 90 years old.
What an incredible destiny for Lhamo Dhondrub, a boy born in Taktser, in a remote hamlet of Amdo province in north-eastern Tibet; at the age of four Tenzin Gyatso was recognized as the reincarnation of the Thirteenth Dalai Lama and for the Tibetans, the incarnation of Avalokiteshvara, the Bodhisattva of Compassion.
The world is in turmoil today; time seems to have accelerated and violence has reached every corner of the planet. In the midst of all this, the Dalai Lama continues to preach love and compassion to other human fellows. 
He was hardly 15-years when the Chinese People’s Liberation Army walked unhindered onto the Tibetan soil. A new ideology, less compassionate than the Buddha Dharma which had come from India 12 centuries earlier, had according to Mao, ‘liberated’ the Land of Snows. A few months later, the young Dalai Lama was officially enthroned as the spiritual and temporal head of the Tibetan State. 
In March 1959, following a mass uprising in Lhasa, the Dalai Lama had to flee his motherland and take refuge in India where he still lives in Dharamsala, Himachal Pradesh. 
Apart from possessing an extraordinary charisma, why does the Dalai Lama matter so much in today’s world?
I had the good luck (or good karma) to meet him over the years. First in July 1972 in Dharamsala: after this first encounter, I began to understand something that I had not so far realized: the poor Tibetan refugees and their leader had a different set of values than westerners have. 
In seeing this ‘simple monk’, as he prefers to call himself, I saw that inner strength and the power of compassion are qualities which are practically unknown today in the world, but he embodies a wisdom which was part of the spiritual and cultural heritage of a nation that had spent most of its time looking ‘within’.
Though the Dalai Lama reached India in 1959, the world’s interest in Tibet began in the 1970s only, when the Tibetan leader started travelling abroad.
In May 2011, he took a radical decision: he relinquished his secular power, offering it to the people of Tibet, who thereafter started electing their own ‘political’ leader. Today, a Sikyiong or President runs the Tibetan administration from Dharamsala.
On September 24, 2011, the Dalai Lama released a long statement about his succession, he mentioned two options: a traditional reincarnation (leaving written instructions on how to find the reincarnation) or an ‘emanation’, which would mean the transfer of his consciousness and knowledge into a selected young boy (or girl). 
In the same message, the Tibetan leader wrote that at the age of 90, he would re-evaluate whether the institution of the Dalai Lama should continue or not.
It is what he did on July 2, when he reaffirmed that the Institution was there to stay. A few months ago, in a book Voice for the Voiceless, the Tibetan leader had clarified: “Since the purpose of a reincarnation is to carry on the work of the predecessor, the new Dalai Lama will be born in the free world (outside China).”
It was certainly a shock for Beijing who expects to control the succession process …and the next Dalai Lama.
The recent statement is however does not give details about the succession of the Dalai Lama. In 2011, he had mentioned two possibilities; today he seems to have opted for the traditional reincarnation which often means a gap of 20 years or so before the new Dalai Lama is able to lead his people. 
The possibility of an emanation seems to have been dropped; it would have cut the time gap (till the Dalai Lama reaches majority) which can be used by China to interfere during the regency. 
This period has often been used in the past by China to intervene in Tibet’s religious affairs. Many Tibet watchers believe that this gap is too dicey; Buddhism should adapt to the modern world and a new system of succession should be devised, but ultimately, it remains the choice of the Dalai Lama alone.
Beijing was quick to react to the July 2 statement; China’s Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning told the press: “The Dalai Lama’s reincarnation must follow the principles of domestic recognition and approval by the central government, in line with religious traditions and laws.” 
It is ironic that an atheist State which believes that “Religion is Poison” can be so affirmative on an esoteric issue like soul migration. 
When Minority Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju asserted that the decision would only be taken by the established institution and the Dalai Lama himself, and “nobody else”, Beijing started threatening.
The Ministry of External Affairs then clarified that it “does not take any position or speak on matters concerning beliefs and practices of faith and religion.” Later, the Indian Prime Minister wrote from Argentina: “I join 1.4 billion Indians in extending our warmest wishes to His Holiness the Dalai Lama on his 90th birthday.”
Beijing will certainly not leave it at that, exchanges may soon become nastier and could end with two Dalai Lamas? But what legitimacy would the Communist one have? 
The point remains that a world in turmoil needs a Dalai Lama; we can only pray for a smooth succession and hope that Dharamsala will provide more details on the process in the coming months.