The Planet needs a Dalai Lama

My article The Planet needs a Dalai Lama appeared in The Week

Here is the link...

In the midst of the present planetary chaos, one man preaches love and compassion to other fellow human beings. This man is Tenzin Gyatso, the Dalai Lama of Tibet, who turns 90 on July 6.
For the last 66 years, he lives as a refugee in India where he is considered the leader of all the Tibetans (including those in the Land of Snow), as well as of nearly one million Indian Buddhists in the Himalayan belt, from Ladakh to Arunachal Pradesh.
Following an uprising in Lhasa on March 10, 1959, the Dalai Lama left Lhasa in the dead of night in dramatic circumstances. A week later, he reached Lhuntse Dzong, a couple of days march from the McMahon Line, the border between India and Tibet, from where he wrote to the Indian Prime Minister, seeking asylum in India.
Four days later, he reached the first Indian post at Chuthangmu, north of Tawang, then part of Kameng Frontier Division of the North East Frontier Agency (NEFA). A letter from Nehru was waiting for him: “We shall be happy to afford the necessary facilities for you, your family and entourage to reside in India. The people of India who hold you in great veneration will no doubt accord their traditional respect to your person.”
Since that day, the Indian Government and people have considered the Dalai Lama an honoured guest in the Land of the Buddha.
Was it a coincidence, but soon after his arrival in India, the Indo-Tibet border became tense? At the end of August 1959, a first serious incident took place at Longju in Subansiri Frontier Division? Several Indian jawans lost their lives. This marks the beginning of protracted dispute between India and China about the northern borders of India; it still continues today, as we have witnessed in Ladakh in May 2020.
For the Eastern sector, there was an agreed map of the border (known as the McMahon Line); it was signed in 1914 between British India and the government of free Tibet in Lhasa. After walking onto the Tibetan plateau in 1950, Beijing not only refused to recognize the 1914 agreement, but it also started to claim the entire NEFA till the foothills in the South, as its territory. 
In October 1962, a war erupted when the People’s Liberation Army marched into the Tawang sector; the very place where the Dalai Lama had entered three years earlier. Was it again a coincidence? The conflict rapidly spread to other areas like Walong in the Lohit Valley and Ladakh. The scar it left on India’s psyche still endures.
For years, the young Dalai Lama lived peacefully in Dharamsala in Himachal Pradesh taking care of the education of the young Tibetans and preserving their culture; it is only in 1973 that the Tibetan leader traveled to Europe for the first time; during the following decades, he would be instrumental in giving a concrete shape to the prophecy of the Great Indian Master, Guru Padmasambha: "When the iron bird flies and horses run on wheels, the dharma will come to the land of the red faces." 
As the Dalai Lama tirelessly traveled over the five continents to spread the Buddha’s message of Love and Compassion, his focus widened and he became a global leader.
A turning point was an address to the US Congressional Human Right's Caucus in Washington in 1987 when he presented his Five Point Peace Plan; the first point was: “I propose that the whole of Tibet, including the eastern provinces of Kham and Amdo, be transformed into a zone of Ahimsa.”
It was an interesting proposal for India as a demilitarized Tibet could have been a solution to the border dispute. But the Tibetans were soon told by Beijing that it was unacceptable to China. 
In the following years, the Tibetan leader continued to travel abroad and to India’s Northern frontiers where he brought a new life to Tibetan Buddhism. 
Interestingly, the Dalai Lama always refers to his faith as “the Nalanda Tradition”, simply because several Indian gurus of the ancient Nalanda University visited Tibet to teach the Buddha Dharma. 
This old relation is especially important at a time when all the contacts between the Indian Himalaya and Tibet have been cut and the Tibetan monasteries in Tibet are subjected to what the Communist party calls the ‘sinization of Tibetan Buddhism’, which in fact aims to obliterate the Indian origin of the Buddha and his Dharma to replace it by the diktats of Karl Marx.
Today, the Dalai Lama’s followers are worried about his succession; what will happen if he departs for The Heavenly Fields? Will a Fifteen Dalai Lama replace him? Who will select him? These are still unanswered questions.
The Dalai Lamas traditionally ‘reincarnate’ in a young boy, who is then groomed to take-over as the next Dalai Lama.
The fact that the Dalai Lama has recently announced that his successor will be from outside China, makes Beijing extremely nervous; the Communist regime fully realizes the importance of controlling the next Dalai Lama. 
Already in February 2023, The Global Times, the mouthpiece of the Communist Party, asserted that religious rituals for the selection of a new lama “have [for centuries] been supervised by the Chinese Central Government”; this is simply not true.
The Global Times also hides the fact that the boy recognized by the Dalai Lama as the Panchen Lama (the second highest hierarch in the Dalai Lama’s Yellow Hat School) was arrested in 1995 and 30 years later, he remains in the custody of the Chinese government somewhere in China. 
India is deeply concerned by the Dalai Lama’s succession as he has nearly one million followers in the Indian Himalaya …and Buddhism is born in India, not in China. It is also a fact that the Tibetan leader’s presence has always been a stabilizing factor for the northern borders. 
Today, in the midst of wars and conflicts, the planet needs a Dalai Lama; we can only pray for a smooth succession.

The Tibet factor in India-China relations

My article The Tibet factor in India-China relations appeared in The Sunday Guardian

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The virus which originated in Wuhan, China and the unexpected attack by the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) on Indian frontiers in Ladakh have forced India to re-look at her relations with China. After ambitious generals in Chengdu’s Western Theater Command sold the idea to Xi to advance the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in Ladakh, the bonhomie between India and China has become past history; in the process, Xi Jinping has destroyed the trust built during the Wuhan Consensus in 2018 and the Chennai Connect in 2019.
Borrowing the words of Beijing’s tacticians, some in India have suggested using ‘ten thousand methods’ to tackle the Middle Kingdom.
Among the different ‘methods’, many speak of a ‘Tibet Card’.
Though the word ‘card’ may not be adequate, one can certainly speak of Tibet Factor in the India-China relations.
Since the beginning of the 20th century, the Tibetan nation had all the attributes of a sovereign State (a government, a language, a script, a flag, a (weak) army, coins, stamps, etc); for centuries, the Land of Snow had unhindered relations with India, first and foremost, in the cultural and spiritual domains (Tibetan Buddhism originates from Nalanda, let us not forget), but also economically with countless ‘silk’ roads across the Himalaya; in other words, there was a deep kinship.
All this came to a sudden end when Mao decided to ‘liberate’ Tibet.
The Great Helmsman was not interested in the civilization aspect, but purely in Tibet’s strategic assets; by invading Tibet, China gained not only a huge landmass, but access to the ‘water tower of Asia’, large mineral resources and a strategic position dominating the subcontinent. The welfare of the Tibetan masses was not the Communists’ concern.
In 1950, by weakness or idealism, the Indian government abandoned Tibet to its own fate …for the sake of world peace.
In a recently-published quadrilogy covering the period between 1947 and 1962, I described this momentous era: India became independent; China did its own revolution, resulting in the arrival of a new regime, more brutal in its approach, especially towards the periphery of the Middle Kingdom. While most of the African and Asian nations were decolonized, Tibet, a de facto independent nation came under the yoke of Communist China.
An unprepared and peaceful Land of Snows became part of the Chinese ‘Motherland’. The events that we are today witnessing in Ladakh have their origin in a series of blunders committed in the 1950s and 1960s.
In India, the tumultuous year 1950 saw the emergence of two factions: one led by Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru and KM Panikkar, his ambassador in Beijing, both obsessed with an imaginary friendship with New China and fixated on the ‘larger implications for World Peace’ for any decision concerning Tibet; the other, which immediately saw the strategic implications for India’s frontiers if Delhi let Tibet down, was led by Sardar Patel, the Deputy Prime Minster, with Sir Girja Shankar Bajpai, the Secretary General of the Ministry of External Affairs and Commonwealth Relations as his main adviser, but also comprised of President Rajendra Prasad, C. Rajagopalachari, KM Munshi and others. They were fed with reports ‘from the ground’ by Harishwar Dayal, the brilliant Political Officer in Sikkim and Sumul Sinha, the Head of the Indian Mission in Lhasa, two sincere and far-sighted civil servants. At that time, India had a full-fledged Mission in Tibet as well as three Trade Agencies in Gyantse, Yatung and Gartok.
The dichotomy between the officers on the ground and the ‘visionaries’ in Delhi continued till October 1962, when China’s massive invasion in NEFA and in Ladakh brought the idealists back on earth.
One can trace the first blunder to December 1949 when India kept quiet after Beijing unilaterally closed down the Indian Consulate in Kashgar, Sinkiang (today Xinjiang).
By taking over Xinjiang, Mao controlled the western borders of the Middle Kingdom, he could access trade with Central Asia and block any possibility of Soviet southward advance; for the first time, he also came in contact with the Indian frontiers, particularly the Aksai Chin area, the object of today’s conflict; a few years later, Beijing built a road across Indian territory linking up Xinjiang with Tibet.
On November 7, 1950, a well-drafted appeal to the UN was sent from Kalimpong (as there were no postal facilities in Lhasa), pointing to the fact that “the Tibetans were racially, culturally and geographically far apart from the Chinese.” It also made a parallel with the situation in the Korean peninsula: “The attention of the world was then riveted on Korea where aggression was being resisted by an international force.” Similar happenings in Tibet were taking place with the world covering its eyes.
Delhi decided to bury the issue in the UN by telling the General Assembly that it would sort out the issue and find a peaceful solution. Interestingly, some years ago, a Canadian scholar, Claudia Johnston studied the issue; the outcome of her research was that the Tibetan Appeal was still a pending matter in the UN …waiting to be reopened.
Another very-little known, but consequential blunder was that Delhi accepted to downgrade its full-fledged Mission in Lhasa to a Consulate General in 1952. It was secretly done without the knowledge of the Indian Parliament. This action, initiated by KM Panikkar, practically brought down Tibet to the level of a province of China; Delhi thought it would please Zhou Enlai, the Chinese Premier; of course, India did not get anything in return.
Two years later, Delhi took the initiative to call a conference to discuss the trade and pilgrimage between Tibet and India.
One of the most immoral parts of what became the Panchsheel Agreement, was that Delhi ignored the existence of the Tibetan Government; Delhi only dealt with the new masters of the Roof of the World, without informing the Dalai Lama’s Administration. Strange for a government so vociferous about the decolonization of Africa or Asia, while Tibet enjoyed what the Indian Prime Minister himself described as an autonomy ‘verging on Independence’.
The “Agreement on Trade and Intercourse between the Tibet region of China and India” was signed on April 29, 1954 in Beijing. The talks would take four months to arrive at a settlement …forgetting the border in the process.
The ‘Panchsheel’ Agreement resulted in the unhindered advance of the Communist ideology and the PLA on the Tibetan plateau.
At the time, many senior Indian politicians and diplomats, educated in ‘modern’ ideas, thought the ‘old Lama hierarchy’ should be swept away and Tibet become a ‘modern’ country; they believed that the Chinese invasion was a chance to make a clean sweep of the old superstitions, beliefs or rituals. What a folly!

A New Tibet Policy
It is easier to commit a blunder than to repair its consequences, however in view of the present situation on the borders, it is necessary to take a first step and re-think what could be a new approach, not only towards Tibet and the Tibetan refugees, but also the entire Himalayan belt.
It would indeed be more advantageous to have a policy for the entire Himalaya, including Tibet, which have shared countless cultural, spiritual, strategic and economic similarities. The first step could be the creation of an Office of Northern Frontiers and Tibetan Affairs under the Prime Minister’s Office.
For the purpose, Delhi should start a dialogue with the Tibetans (for example with the present Dalai Lama’s representative in Delhi, who has a great knowledge in security issues) and the Himalayan States.
Some general principles should dictate the new policy.
First, India should look after her own interests and the security of the people living on the borders; it seems obvious, but it has not always been the case.
Another principle is that India’s policies or actions should not be dictated by what others will think or say, particularly how China will react to a particular decision. This tendency has lasted too long with no tangible gain for the country; for example, the 2018 notice circulated to all ministries/departments ordering that no Indian officials should meet the Dalai Lama had serious counter-productive effects.
It is unfortunate but it is a fact that India faces a country which still believes that power comes from the barrel of a gun; without emulating China, India needs to quietly and forcefully look after her own interests and be straightforward about it; a closer kinship between Delhi and Dharamsala is in the country’s interests.
Whatever over-all policy is adopted by the Government at a later stage, one element is critical: coordination. In view of the individualistic tendencies of the Indian bureaucracy, this is crucial in order to achieve the targeted aim of the policy between the different shareholders (Ministries of External Affairs, Defence; Home Affairs, Education, Culture, intelligence agencies, etc).
Without proper coordination, it will be just one more futile new policy.
The creation of such a Department would be the first step to strengthen the border areas, and use the goodwill of the Tibetans towards India; the rest will follow. But undoing the knots of the past will take time.

China excels in making fakes, but religion is not its cup of tea

Buddha's finger?

My article China excels in making fakes, but religion is not its cup of tea is posted in NitiCentral.com.

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A couple of years ago, a Chinese site mentioned Château Lafitte, one of the most famous vintage Bordeaux wine. The site gave this surprising information: “Château Lafitte Rothschild, a wine estate in France, produces 15,000 to 25,000 cases of wine annually, or about 200,000 bottles. China's annual quota of Lafitte wine imported from France is only 50,000 bottles. However, the annual sale of Lafitte in China exceeds 3 million bottles, meaning 80 to 90 % of Lafitte sold in China is fake.”
The Chinese are well-known for their prowess in retro-engineering; it is obvious that if Chinese engineers are able to duplicate a Russian fighter plane’s engine, there should be no problem to ‘produce’ a Côte de Bordeaux as only the label has to be copied. The fake bottle will serve its purpose: showing-off for the Chinese nouveaux riches.
Around the same time, PCWorld had reported that Chinese authorities had found a number of fake Apple Stores (22 just in the city of Kunming, Yunnan). The Rothschild family, owners of famous vintage since the 19th century, can find consolation in the fact that no Chateau Lafitte stores need to be opened in China for the fake red wine to continue to flow abundantly in the Middle Kingdom.
This story came back to mind while I was reading in The South China Morning Post, an article entitled, “Ancient Buddhist temple in China bogged down by fake monks and debt.”
The Honk Kong papers writes: “A provincial city’s ambitious plans for turning an ancient Buddhist temple near Xian into the world capital of Buddhism and listing it on a stock exchange have stagnated, leaving the temple surrounded by fake monks and sham Buddha statues.”
It quotes the outspoken Guangzhou-based Southern Weekly which says the project around the 1,700-year-old Famen Temple in Shaanxi province ‘went horribly wrong’.
The temple is famed for having the relic of the Buddha’s finger bone. The Southern Weekly’s story does not tell us if, like the Chateau Lafitte labels, the relic is fake; it is however surprising that the Great Son of India’s finger would have found its way to the Middle Kingdom (although in 1955, Zhou Enlai lent a ‘tooth’ of the Buddha to Rangoon, making the Burmese people greatly feel obliged by this noble gesture).
Communist China has always seen Buddhism as a good business opportunity. According to the Southern Weekly, at the Famen temple, “fake monks from Hubei province roam a nearby scenic park that opened in 2009 and that tourists and pilgrims mistake as part of the temple. The impostors get commission for collecting donations to the Shaanxi Famen Charitable Foundation.”
The foundation is apparently a front name for the industrial group which operates the park, Shaanxi Famen Temple Scenic Park Cultural Group.
But business is tough these days, even in China! The company does not collect enough ‘donations’ to make profits. Last year, the public-listed enterprise lost some 50 million US dollars, that’s a lot for a spiritual undertaking.
The South China Morning Post adds: “When the park opened in 2009, it quickly became apparent that the massive project was not the goldmine it had promised to be for the government, and investors disappeared. In search for new capital, its operators set up an organisation, which could collect donations from Buddhist believers and bankroll the company.”
The abbot and monks refused to be used by the company; eventually they sent their resignation, which was refused. The Weekly quotes Zeng Qin, the head of Xian’s Buddhist Association, who said that he had ‘involuntarily’ been selected as head of the foundation. With his colleagues, he had been forced to sign a contract with the enterprise, but the Buddhist monks have now put their foot down and refused to extend their contract. They consider that the project had brought ill-fame to the temple. The monks also refused to take over the project, knowing too well about the debts.
The latest information about the ‘Chinese Buddhist venture’ must be rather worrying for the Lumbini project which is in the process of being taken over by some wealthy and well-connected Chinese businessmen.
Two years back, The Economist mentioned “a bizarre project in Nepal, at Buddha’s birthplace: a Chinese development proposal causes disbelief”.
The weekly magazine pointed out that after stepping down as Prime Minister in 2009, Prachanda, the Nepali Maoist leader regularly met representatives of the ‘Asia Pacific Exchange and Co-operation Foundation’, particularly its head, one Xiao Wunan based in Hong Kong with a doubtful past and many links in the Party.
The Chinese media had reported earlier that the Hong-Kong-based foundation had signed an agreement with UNIDO, the UN’s industrial-development organisation, to invest $3 billion in Lumbini, the birthplace of the Buddha. It wanted to set up a ‘Mecca for Buddhists’ with train links, an international airport, hotels and a Buddhist university.
Many in Delhi were nervous, as Lumbini is located a few kilometers from the Indian border and India can certainly not remain silent if huge infrastructure development is planned by China at her doorstep.
What about the 'famous' Nalanda University of Amartya Sen? The only foreign donor seems to be the Chinese government which pledged 1 million US dollars for the project. Is it not disturbing? The Chinese may be keen to ‘invest’ in spiritual ventures, but does it make the projects, like the wine or the Buddha’s relics genuine?
Chinese are good at many things (infrastructure, along their expansible 'borders' for example), but running Buddhist institutions is not their forte; it is understandable for people who do not believe in religion.
Let us hope that Famen temple’s failure will, for some time, cool the Chinese investors’ fervour; the longer it does, the better for Nepal and India.

At Nalanda, science first met spirituality

Nagarjuna

My article At Nalanda, science first met spirituality appeared in the Edit Page of The Pioneer today.

Today, any project that invokes the traditions of that hallowed ancient university must be based on the principles of the ‘science of the mind’, not on religion or political expediencies

Recently, I had the chance to listen to a long talk by the Dalai Lama. I was surprised as he repeatedly said that there is no such thing as ‘Tibetan Buddhism’, even less ‘Lamaism’. The so-called ‘Tibetan Buddhism’, he said, has entirely been borrowed from India, more precisely from Nalanda.
In recent times, the name of the ancient university has been in the news for the wrong reasons; we heard that a new institution carrying the name of the famed university and ‘mentored’ by Amartya Sen had shifted its operations from Bihar to Delhi. Why? Nobody seems to know. The strange move was, in any case, not explained to the Indian public; the project holders probably considering the masses too stupid to grasp the subtleties of the Nalanda project.
Further, though accusations of financial improprieties have circulated about the grandiose project, they have never really been dispelled. Why should the university be directly run by an already poorly-staffed Union Ministry of External Affairs? Why did the Ministry need to plunge into an educational venture?
But let us forget the politics for now and take a look at the depth and vastness of the philosophical background of the ancient institution. From the fifth century CE to 1193 CE, the Buddhist vihara was one of the greatest centres of higher learning of all times. Nalanda flourished under the patronage of not only Buddhist emperors like Harsha and later the Pala dynasty, but also received the support of the Hindu Gupta rulers. Before it was destroyed by the Turkish hordes of Bakhtiyar Khilji, Nalanda was spread over a large area near the village of Baragaon, 10 km north of Rajgir in Bihar. It hosted scholars, monks and scientists from the world over who flocked to the vihara, the largest knowledge centre of its time.
The Nalanda University library was so large that it is said to have been ablaze for over three months after the invaders set it on fire. It was the secular and spiritual knowledge of India which was ransacked and destroyed. However, by a twist of fate (or good karma), Tibetan monks and lamas along with some abbots of the vihara had transferred Nalanda’s knowledge to cold storage on the Roof of the World where it was preserved.
The great monastic university had come into prominence when learned sages such as Nagarjuna or Arya Deva decided to set up a vihara in Nalanda. The history of Nalanda is known thanks to Chinese pilgrims as well as Taranatha, the great Tibetan historian who lived in the 16th century and wrote the History of Buddhism in India. It is said that Arya Deva once invited Nagarjuna for a discussion on Buddhist philosophy; when the former tried to argue with Nagarjuna, he failed to grasp his reasoning. Arya Deva then understood that he had found his master; Nagarjuna later initiated him into the mysteries of the science of mind.
The Dalai Lama likes to quotes Nagarjuna who never accepted any philosophical concept without testing it. He did not even accept the Buddha’s sayings until he was able to check their veracity, using his profound mind as a tool. He never believed in blind faith. This testing mind is the foundation stone of the Nalanda tradition. The Dalai Lama, who does not hide his admiration for Nagarjuna, also quotes ‘his boss’, the Buddha himself: “My followers should not accept my teachings out of faith and devotion, but after investigation and experimentation.'”
It is surprising that Mr Amartya Sen, the chairman of the Nalanda Mentor Group, does not grasp what has been the hallmark of the Indian mind for millennia. When asked about the omission of the Dalai Lama’s name from the international project, Mr Sen stated that “religious studies could be imparted without involvement of religious leaders.” The Dalai Lama may not need to be involved in the project, but the spirit of Nalanda has to be insufflated in the project. The Dalai Lama explains: “During the eighth century, the Tibetan emperor (Trisong Detsen) invited a great master of Nalanda; his name was Santarakshita. He was a famous, a well-known scholar and master of Nalanda. He went to Tibet and spent the rest of his life there. He introduced Buddhism in Tibet. That is why I consider Tibetan Buddhism is the authentic tradition of Nalanda.”
Mahapandits such as Nagarjuna, Aryadeva, Buddhapalita, Bhavaviveka, Chandrakirti, Shantideva, Shantarakshita, Kamalashila, Asanga, Vasubandhu, Dharmakirti or Atisha wrote extensive commentaries on the Sutra, still used in Tibetan monasteries today. Santarakshita, the Abbot of Nalanda, not only introduced the Buddha dharma to the Land of Snows, but also ordained the first monks. Since then, the lamas of Tibet have faithfully followed their Nalanda teachers.
The ‘Nalanda path’ prevailed in Tibet after a long debate — the famous Samye Debate which was held in Samye monastery between the Chinese and Nalanda schools of Buddhism. The debate took two years (792-794 CE) to reach its conclusion. Hoshang, a Chinese monk, was defeated by Kamalashila, who defended the Indian view. At the end, the Tibetan king issued a proclamation naming the ‘Indian path’ (from Nalanda) as the orthodox faith for Tibet.
Nalanda tradition is not a ‘religion’, it is a ‘science of the mind’. The Dalai Lama once recounted the story of Raja Ramanna, the nuclear physicist, who told him that he was surprised to find the concept of quantum physics and relativity in one of Nagarjuna’s texts. The Dalai Lama said: “The West discovered these concepts at the end of the 19th century or beginning of the 20th century. Some Indian sages like Nagarjuna knew it nearly 2,000 years ago.” Nagarjuna’s concept of Madhyamaka (the Middle Way between extremes) was very much part of the Nalanda curriculum. The Tibetan leader clearly differentiates between this ‘science of mind’ originating from Nalanda, Buddhist philosophy and Buddhist religion: “When we say ‘Buddhist science’, we mean ‘science of the mind’; it is something universal; it is not a religion. Buddhist religion is not universal, it is only for Buddhists.”
The Nalanda project should be based on the ‘science of the mind’, not on religion or political expediencies. Since his retirement, the Dalai Lama has spent most of his time exploring the convergence between science and spirituality. For the past three decades, he has had a dialogue with modern scientists. His Mind & Life Institute based in the US spearheads this research. Its objective is to test if the effects of meditative practices can be corroborated by modern science.
The ‘testing’ process may not be important for the practitioners themselves; the Dalai Lama recounted the story of yogis living in caves who were not at all interested in being covered by electrodes to ‘test’ their siddhis or meditative prowess. He, however, believes that it is important for the rest of humanity to realise that exercises such as yoga or meditation can bring peace of mind and ultimately a better life. He sees it as a gift from India and Tibet to the world.
Research into the confluence of science and spirituality should definitively be included in the curriculum of an institute calling itself ‘Nalanda’. The project’s ‘mentors’ must keep in mind the glorious history of the vihara. This does not seem to be the case today.

A Step Forward or Backward?

Xiao Wunan and the Karmapa

According to the website of the Asia Pacific Exchange and Cooperation Foundation (APECF), a  delegation from this Hong Kong based organistaion "visited India and Nepal upon invitation".
The site said: "During the visit in India, APECF delegation went to Dharamsala and visited the 17th Karmapa, both parties had a pleasant talk about the issue of bilateral religious and cultural exchange."
The APECF webmaster has forgotten to mention that Xiao Wunan, a senior CCP cadre and executive vice-president of APECF also met with the Dalai Lama and Dr Lobsang Sangay, the elected Tibetan leader.
Why to only mention Karmapa?
The Chinese leadership probably wanted to keep the encounter with the Tibetan leaders as informal ans low-key as possible. 
None of the Tibetan websites reported the event which is an important one.
A year ago, I had mentioned on this blog:

The Economist recently reported that China plans to invest $3 billion in Lumbini, the birthplace of the Buddha. The Economist explained: “After Prachanda, the leader of Nepal’s Maoists, stepped down as prime minister in 2009, he several times met representatives of The Asia Pacific Exchange and Co-operation Foundation (APECF). In July Chinese media reported that the Hong-Kong-based foundation—which is widely thought to have China’s backing—had signed an agreement with UNIDO, the UN’s industrial-development organisation, to invest $3 billion in Lumbini.” The objective is to make a ‘Mecca for Buddhists’.The Economist said that the news caused an uproar in Nepal as neither the central government nor the local authorities responsible for Lumbini were consulted. Later the Nepalese government refused to entertain the deal. “If this was an exercise in Chinese ‘soft power; it was a disaster’, The Economist commented.

Xiao Wunan and Nepal Vice-President

Despite the 'uproar', Xiao Wunan stayed a week in Nepal. 
The APECF website says: "From August 14th to 22nd, the Executive Vice Chairman of APECF Mr. Xiao Wunan, the Deputy Secretary General Ms. Gong Tingyu and Ms. Ge Chen, etc and representatives from China Railway 21st Bureau and China Potevio Group visited this area mentioned above, and had extensive exchanges with all parties in the aspect of bilateral and multilateral religious and cultural exchange and the further implementation of Lumbini Recovery Plan, and obtained fruitful results."
The Lumbini project is certainly not shelved as: "During the visit in Nepal, APECF delegation visited Mr. Parmanand Jha, the Vice President of Nepal, Mr. Prachanda, the President of Lumbini Development National Directive Committee, Mr. Posta Bahadur Bogati, the Minister for Culture, Tourism and Civil Aviation, Mr. Hridesh Tripathi, the Minister for Physical Planning, and Mr. Kamal Thapa, the Minister for Telecommunications."
And Mr Xiao wants also to help Nalanda!
Regarding, the re-designation of the Kalon Tripa (Dr Lobsang Sangay) as 'Sikyong’ (political leader), it is doubtful if the new designation is more swallowable to the Chinese, as it has a strong connotation with the Regency. The last regent of Tibet, Taktra Rinpoche was called 'Sikyong'. It would mean that the Chinese are ready to accept a 'political leader' to run the Tibet Affairs after the departure of the Dalai Lama. Probably not.
Anyhow, it is an extremely interesting development. In my book The Negotiations that never were, I have always advocated a direct approach between the Dalai Lama and the Chinese leadership. 
It can only help clarify the suspicions.
It is hopefully a small step forward.
 
A concerned dragon: China’s fresh overture to Tibetans
DNA
Jayadeva Ranade
October 26, 2012
As China prepares to usher in a new leadership at the 18th Party Congress scheduled to open in Beijing on November 8, there is mounting concern in senior echelons of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) at the rising resentment in the ethnic Tibetan minority.
Particularly worrying would have been the self-immolation on October 15, by the grandfather of the 10-year old Beijing-recognised VIIth Gungthang Rinpoche, which highlights the strained relationship between Tibetans and Communist authorities. A new feature is that recently thousands of Tibetans, disregarding heavy armed police presence, assemble at sites of the self-immolations to pray for the deceased and mark the spot.
In a recent apparent bid to ease these tensions, Chinese authorities quietly sent an emissary and contacted Tibetan leaders in Dharamsala. Thinly cloaked as a venture of ‘Asia Pacific Exchange and Cooperation Foundation’ (APECF), a Chinese government-sponsored NGO manned by Chinese Communist Party (CCP) cadres, the initiative seeks to revive plans to consolidate and expand China’s presence in Nepal and ingress India and its border regions, ostensibly by encouraging Buddhist tourism in Lumbini in Nepal. At least one executive director of APECF has links to China’s military establishment.
Xiao Wunan, a senior CCP cadre and executive vice-president of APECF visited India and was received in Dharamsala on August 16 by the Dalai Lama, Lobsang Sangay, then ‘Kalon Tripa’ (prime minister) of the Central Tibetan Administration (CTA) and Ugyen Thinley Dorjee, who is formally approved by the Dalai Lama and Beijing as the XVIIth Gyalwa Karmapa, or head of the Karma Kargyu sect. Xiao Wunan was accompanied byGong Tingyu, a Deputy Secretary General of APECF and Simon Kei Shek Ming, reportedly a journalist of the Hong Kong magazine Yazhou Zhoukan.
During his meeting with the Dalai Lama, Xiao Wunan probably carried a personal message from a senior Chinese leader, possibly Xi Jinping. He could have informed the Dalai Lama that he was welcome to spend his last days in Beijing provided he gave up ‘anti-China’ activities and expressed support for the Communist regime.
Xiao Wunan’s meeting with Lobsang Sangay, elected head of the CTA, is significant. It suggests Beijing may be willing to talk to its representatives. Lobsang Sangay is also ‘known’ to the UFWD for facilitating contacts between Chinese academics and the Dalai Lama. Coincidentally, within a month of the meeting the designation of the Head of the Central Tibetan Administration (CTA) was changed from ‘Kalon Tripa’ (or prime minister) to the less controversial — from Beijing’s perspective —’Sikyong’ (or political leader).
Xiao Wunan’s meeting with Ugyen Thinley Dorjee reportedly ended abruptly when the monk took offence at the tenor of his questions. Xiao Wunan’s photograph with Ugyen Thinley Dorjee is, however, posted on APECF’s website.
Xiao Wunan also visited Nalanda when he met officials of the proposed university and assured financial assistance. In Delhi he met officials in the Ministries of Culture and Tourism. Returning to Kathmandu, Xiao Wunan disingenuously announced that APECF now has the support of the Government of India and would be organising three and four-day package tours for Buddhist pilgrims travelling from Lumbini to India.
Interestingly, Xiao Wunan separated from an official Chinese delegation visiting Kathmandu to visit India. The Chinese delegation included Zou Lanming, vice general manager of the Lanzhou-based China Railway 21st Bureau. Xiao Wunan’s presence could suggest China plans to extend the railway from Xigaze to possibly Lumbini, on the border with India. A month later Xiao Wunan announced that APECF had signed an MoU with UK’s Vertical Theme Park (VTP) Group for a Lumbini Cloud Tower project, with the Nepal Government’s approval.
Nepal’s My Republica on October 11, reported the Nepal Ministry of Culture, Tourism and Civil Aviation’s denial that it was aware of any deal to develop Lumbini as an ‘international peace city’. Prachanda, leader of the Unified Communist Party-Marxist Leninist (UCP-ML), however, continues to be a vice president of APECF.
Meanwhile the CCP’s policy governing Tibetans, of combining economic incentives with intense political persuasion, remains unchanged. In an unusually candid interview to the Party mouthpiece People’s Daily on September 21, 2012, Chen Quanguo, party secretary of the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR), enumerated the economic benefits extended to the people of Tibet. Disclosing measures to ensure ‘social stability’, he listed that 21,804 cadres had been sent to work in 5,451 administrative villages, that the Party had compiled complete sets of files and that 698 police stations had been established. All monasteries and temples now have photographs of the ‘four leaders’ (Mao Zedong, Deng Xiaoping, Jiang Zemin and Hu Jintao), the national flag and a copy each of the People’s Daily and Tibet Daily. A project has also been started to ‘cultivate’ 100 senior monks and ‘guide’ Tibetan Buddhism to ‘adapt itself to socialist society’.

Cruel overlord called China

My article Cruel overlord called China appeared in The Pioneer. Click here to read.

The West is silent over rights violations in Tibet because it hopes China will bail out Eurozone. Meanwhile, Amartya Sen goes to Beijing with a begging bowl.

A similar piece appeared in The Statesman. The title was Two different worlds. Click here to read.

Two separate worlds

We lived in a strange world.
On one side, we have ‘great leaders’ taking ‘vital’ decisions for our future at the G20 Summit in Cannes on the French Riviera, while on the other side ordinary people (known as the ‘common man’ in Indian political parlance) struggle with their miseries and their aspirations. In today’s world, there is no connection between the two.
While the ordinary man cannot really understand the ins and outs of the famous economic ‘crisis’ (except for the fact that the bankers never lose ‘their’ money), the 20 most powerful persons of the planet promise that everything will be solved for our good.
What is this crisis about? For dummies, it can be simplified thus: Europe is broke, the US are deeply indebted, while China is rich and does not know what to do with its Yuans (it is also true of India, but in a much smaller measure).
As a result, Sarkozy and his colleagues have been courting China.
A few thousands kilometers away, Tibetan monks and nuns are immolating themselves. The latest on the list (the eleventh) was Palden Choesang, a 35 years old nun from Kardze Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture. She set herself afire in protest against the Chinese government’s suppression of religious freedom. Before dying near a Buddhist stupa, she shouted, ‘Freedom for Tibet’, ‘Long live H.H the Dalai Lama’ and ‘Let the Dalai Lama return to Tibet’. Immediately after her death, heavy contingents of police arrived and placed further restrictions on the clergy’s practices.
What is the connection between the two events? There is none. For a simple reason: as poor, sinking Europe had to beg from China, the West must remain silent while China is asked to ‘help’ by investing some of its $3.2 trillion in foreign exchange reserves in the bailout fund. But China is not even responsive. Hu told Sarkozy that the European debt problem should be mainly solved by Europe: “We hope that the implementation of the plan will address current difficulties in Europe and boost European economic development”.
It is not difficult to understand why everybody keeps mum about the tragic events happening in Tibet.
This series of self-immolations began on March 16 when Phuntsog, a 21-year old monk of Kirti Monastery set himself on fire in Ngaba. It continued on 15 August with Tsewang Norbu of Tawu Nyatso Monastery. On 17 October, Tenzin Wangmo a 20-year old nun was the first nun to immolate herself.
In the meantime, the Chinese propaganda says that the Tibetans have never been so well off. Xinhua reported: “Low-income families in Tibet whose per capital net income in a year is lower than 1450 yuan could get minimum living funds. …It’s said that Tibet has increased the minimum living fund standard by 4 times since 2007.”
So where is the problem?
The Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy (TCHRD) which follows closely the human right situation in Tibet, gave a rationale for the extreme step taken by these monks and nuns: “Movement is controlled and religious practices are either limited or completely forbidden. Several laws and policies are specifically aimed to control Tibet’s Buddhist institutions.”
TCHRD remarked: “Such acts not only violate the very principles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, but also the Constitution of China. Article 33 of the Chinese constitution provides for the safeguard and protection of Human Rights.”
But who is to tell this to Hu Jintao who could tomorrow be Europe’s ‘savior’?
The Dalai Lama on tour in Japan affirmed: “these incidents of self-immolation are very very sad. The leadership in Beijing should look into the ultimate cause of these tragic incidents. These Tibetans have faced a tremendously desperate situation, otherwise nobody will commit such drastic acts”.
He would like the Chinese leadership to pay serious attention to their minority policies: “Relying on force is counter-productive. Force can never bring unity and stability.”
But Beijing’s leadership is not ready to listen.
The renown dissident and poetess Tsering Woeser recalled on her blog that in 1948, Quang Duc Thich, a Vietnamese monk burnt himself in Saigon. Woeser said that the 67-year-old monk’s last words were, “before closing my eyes and moving towards the vision of the Buddha, I respectfully plead to the [Vietnamese] President to take a mind of compassion towards the people of the nation and implement religious equality …I call the venerables, reverends, members of the sangha and the lay Buddhists to organise in solidarity to make sacrifices to protect Buddhism.” Woeser believes that the same aspirations and feelings pushed Tibetan monks and nuns to set themselves on fire.
Do not conclude prematurely that the Communist regime in Beijing does not like Buddhism. On the contrary, these days Beijing seems to love the philosophy taught by Gautam Buddha.
On October 14, 2011, Nobel Prize Laureate Amartya Sen met Vice Foreign Minister Zhang Zhijun; Sen was heading a delegation of the Nalanda University Mentor Group. According to the Chinese press: “The two sides exchanged opinions on the rebuilding of Nalanda University and China-India cultural and educational exchanges and cooperation …Nalanda University was known in ancient times as Nalanda Temple where Monk Xuanzang of Tang Dynasty fetched Buddhist scriptures.”
The Chinese are said to have pledged 1 billion dollars for the project. It means that Beijing ‘loves’ Buddhism, does it not? So, why the Tibetan monks and nuns continue to immolate themselves?
Unfortunately, today Buddhism is just a propaganda tool in Beijing’s agenda which dreams to spread its ‘soft power’.
The Economist recently reported that China plans to invest $3 billion in Lumbini, the birthplace of the Buddha. The Economist explained: “After Prachanda, the leader of Nepal’s Maoists, stepped down as prime minister in 2009, he several times met representatives of The Asia Pacific Exchange and Co-operation Foundation (APECF). In July Chinese media reported that the Hong-Kong-based foundation—which is widely thought to have China’s backing—had signed an agreement with UNIDO, the UN’s industrial-development organisation, to invest $3 billion in Lumbini.” The objective is to make a ‘Mecca for Buddhists’.
The Economist said that the news caused an uproar in Nepal as neither the central government nor the local authorities responsible for Lumbini were consulted. Later the Nepalese government refused to entertain the deal. “If this was an exercise in Chinese ‘soft power; it was a disaster’, The Economist commented.
Today’s China seems to have a different definition of ‘culture’ or ‘religion’ than the rest of the world.
In an official Chinese publication Outlook Weekly, a Chinese professor of the Party School explained what Beijing means by ‘culture’: “The socialist core value system is the soul rejuvenating the country and the essence of the socialist advanced culture. …The core value of socialism is to liberate mankind. The four basic elements that make up the socialist core value system are the guiding principles of Marxism, the common ideals of socialism with Chinese characteristics, the national spirit and the spirit of the times, and socialist morality.”
One cannot expect the Tibetan monks and nuns who continue to immolate themselves, to understand these doctrinal niceties, they just want to practice the Dharma.
It is all the more indecent that a renowned person like Amartya Sen who pretends to revive the Nalanda Tradition of compassion and openness, not only remains quiet about the immolations, but continues to go begging to Chinese authorities for a purely Indian cultural project.
The world is indeed upside-down.

China and the Nalanda Tradition

Something strange! As I mentioned in an earlier posting, the Nalanda tradition was never followed by the Chinese. Nalanda is mainly associated with China  because of the travelogue of the pilgrim Huanzang (596-664), who visited India in 629 (he came by the route through the Taklamakan desert). 
His fame is due to the extraordinary record of his travels, as well as to Wu Cheng'en's novel Journey to the West, (published around 1570 during the the Ming Dynasty). The novel recounts the imaginary adventures of Huanzang and his companion, the monkey king Sun Wukong.
In Tibet, King Trisong Detsen invited Shantarakshita, the Abbot of Nalanda to teach the Buddha Dharma and ordain the first monks. 
The Great Monk predicted that a dispute would arise between two schools of Buddhism, the Indian (Nalanda) and the Chinese. The issue was sorted out through the famous Samye Debate. After 2 years of intense discussion, the Indian path prevailed and a proclamation was issued by the King stating that the Indian Nalanda path was thereafter the orthodox faith of the Land of Snows.
So why should China give so much money for a tradition in which they never believed? Probably with some ulterior motives? 

China announces donation for Nalanda University
ANI
2011-01-21
Chinese Ambassador to India, Zhang Yan has announced one billion US dollar aid for the reconstruction of Nalanda University.
Yan made the announcement after meeting Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar here on Thursday.
"Nalanda University is under the reconstruction. Chinese government has donated one billion US dollars, to support the reconstruction of the Nalanda University," Yan told reporters.
"I will visit the University and discuss with the chancellor or vice-chancellor, how two sides can cooperate with each other to make this project very successful work," he added.
Yan encouraged cultural exchange between Bihar and China other than showing keen interest in the development of the state's agriculture and industry.
"Chinese side is very interested to develop co-operations with the state in many areas, especially in the agricultural industry as well as in infrastructure. Furthermore, we want to develop country exchanges with the state of Bihar," said Yan.
The Nalanda University Bill, 2010, will help begin a Central university in Nalanda district, on the lines of the ancient university, which was founded during the 5th century A.D and became a centre of learning for students from across South and East Asia.
Singapore, China, India, Japan, had announced a proposed plan to restore and revive the ancient University as Nalanda International University in 2006. (ANI)

The gift that the world needs from India: A Nalanda renaissance

My article on the Nalanda tradition The gift that the world needs from India: A Nalanda renaissance is on Sify.com. Click on title to read.

Mind over matter

The Pioneer has published today my article on Nalanda and Amartya Sen, Mind over Matter. Click here to read.
"The Tibetan Buddhist tradition draws its root texts from the Nalanda masters and describes itself as a ‘science of the mind’. It is ironical, therefore, that an initiative to revive the Great Vihara of northern India should plan not to include its greatest champion — the Dalai Lama".

The Nalanda Tradition excluded from Nalanda

It is perplexing to discover that an Indian Nobel Prize Laureate does not possess the insight to grasp what has been the hallmark of the Indian mind for millennia. I am speaking of Dr. Amartya Sen, the Chairman of the Mentor Group who is trying to revive the ancient Nalanda University. Dr. Sen recently made a statement showing he is out of tune with the spirit of the Indian Ancient Viharas. This is rather worrying for the project. One can always argue that he is just a modern economist and can’t be expected to understand the subtleties of the Ancient Indian Mind.
The facts: when asked about the omission of the Dalai Lama’s name from the international project, Dr Sen stated that “religious studies could be imparted without involvement of religious leaders.”
This is a flabbergasting statement. Does it mean that ‘religious studies’ should be disconnected from the practitioners?
It reminded me of the 1960’s in Europe when the first Buddhist Lamas were engaged as Lecturers in Universities, they were told not interpret Buddhism as an ‘insider’, but remain an ‘outsider’. It is probably what Dr. Sen means when he spoke about the Dalai Lama: “Being religiously active may not be the same as (being) an appropriate person for religious studies.”
These declarations from a supposedly eminent intellectual proves that Dr. Sen has no knowledge of what once made Nalanda University the greatest knowledge center of the entire world.
Does he know why the great viharas of Northern India attracted scholars and students from Korea, Japan, China, Tibet, Indonesia, Persia or Greece, at least till the day it was looted by Bakhtiyar Khalji’s Muslim troops in 1193?
Simply because the teachers, the gurus, the pandits taught what they had practiced and experienced.
It is during the 8th century that Trisong Detsen, the great Tibetan King invited Shantarakshita, the Abbot of Nalanda to introduce the Dharma to Land of Snows and ordain the first monks. Since then, the Lamas of Tibet have faithfully followed the masters of Nalanda.
During a recent encounter, the Dalai Lama explained: “I always describe Tibetan Buddhism as pure Buddhism from the Nalanda tradition. ...Nalanda had great masters such as Nagarjuna or Arya Asanga. …During the 8th century, the Tibetan Emperor invited Shantarakshita. He was a famous, well-known scholar and master of Nalanda. He went to Tibet and spent the rest of his life there. He introduced Buddhism in Tibet. I myself studied the Nalanda tradition of Buddhism; first I learned by heart and memorized what we call the Root Texts. All these Root Texts have been written by Nalanda masters. …The Tibetan Buddhist tradition is the Nalanda tradition which combines the Sanskrit and the Pali traditions as well Buddhist Tantrayana. Masters like Nagarjuna, Aryadeva and Chandrakirti wrote tantric treatises in Sanskrit.”
After the Muslim invasions, the monasteries of Tibet became the last repositories of the ancient wisdom which had been virtually destroyed in India, its land of origin.
Dr Sen does not seem to understand that the Nalanda tradition is not a ‘religion’, but a ‘science of the mind’. The Dalai Lama recounted the story of Dr. Raja Ramanna, the nuclear physicist, who told him that he was surprised to find the concept of quantum physics and relativity in a text of Nagarjuna. The Dalai Lama continued: “The West discovered these concepts at the end of the 19th century or beginning of the 20th century, when some Indian sages like Nagarjuna knew it nearly 2,000 years ago.” Nagarjuna’s concept of Madhyamaka (the Middle Way between extremes) was very much part of the Nalanda curriculum.
The Dalai Lama likes to speak about his contacts with Western scientists. They started 27 years ago: “We have had some serious discussions. We have been meeting annually; the interest is from both sides. …In Buddhism, there is a lot of explanation about the mind, many categories of mind. Therefore Buddhism should be considered as ‘science of mind’.”
The Tibetan leader clearly differentiates between this ‘science of mind’ originating from Nalanda, Buddhist philosophy (like Buddhist relativity of things, he explains) and Buddhist religion. He said: “When I contact modern scientists, I don’t put them in contact with Buddhist religion, but with Buddhist science and to some extent to Buddhist philosophy.” And he adds: “It is important to understand that when we say ‘Buddhist science’, we mean science of the mind; it is something universal; it is not a religion. Buddhist religion is not universal, it is only for Buddhists.”
The Nalanda project should be based on the ‘science of the mind’, not on Buddhist religion.
Unfortunately one has the feeling that Dr. Amartya Sen would like to recreate a new Shantiniketan, an academic institution without its original Spirit. How to lay the foundations of Nalanda International University without the Spirit of Nalanda?
Some analysts tell me, “You are wrong, it is not a question of religion or science, but of politics, Sen is a politician and has to take care of Chinese susceptibilities. China wants to participate and does not want to hear about the Dalai Lama”.
This is terribly ironic. Dr. Sen is probably unaware of it, but the Chinese fought hard to impose their own system of Buddhism in Tibet, but finally it is the Nalanda Path which prevailed.
The decision was taken after a long debate, the famous Samye Debate which was held in Samye (Central Tibet) between the Chinese and Nalanda schools of Buddhism. Shantarakshita before dying had predicted that a dispute would arise between the two schools of Buddhism that had started spreading in Tibet.
The first one — the Chinese school, influenced by Taoism — was of the opinion that enlightenment was an instantaneous revelation or realization. This system of thought had spread throughout China.
The second school, taught by the Indian Pandits of Nalanda, known as the ‘gradual school’ — asserted that enlightenment was a gradual process, not an ‘instant one’, but requiring long study, practice and analysis.
The Samye Debate took two years (792–794 ce) to reach its conclusion. Hoshang, a Chinese monk, representing the ‘instant school’ was defeated by Kamalashila who defended the Indian view. At the end of the debate, the king issued a proclamation naming the Indian Path (from Nalanda) as the orthodox faith for Tibet.
Today, the Marxist rulers in Tibet seem to have forgotten these details; they want to participate in rebuilding the Great Vihara. Fine, but it is nonetheless strange that the main living proponent of the Nalanda tradition is kept out of the project. I am sure that the Dalai Lama does not mind, but it would certainly have been a blessing for the project to have him as a mentor (or Chancellor), like Shantarakshita had done for Tibet.
It is clear that it is the Spirit of appeasement and not of the Spirit of Nalanda which will prevail in South Block today. Very sad.