China admits it discouraged Tibetans from attending Kalchakra ritual in Bodhgaya

January 8, 2017;

BEIJING: Chinese officials have confirmed that the government was discouraging people in Tibet from visiting India to attend the Buddhist ritual, Kalchakra, which will be attended by the Dalai Lama this month. But they rejected allegations that the Chinese government was forcing Tibetan travellers who are visiting India to return to China.

Earlier, Karma Gelek Yuthok, chairman of the Kalchakra organizing committee, alleged that nearly 7,000 pilgrims from China had gone back to the country because local officials were putting pressure on their relatives back home. Preparations for the ritual, which will be presided over by the Dalai Lama, began at the place where Buddha attained enlightenment, on Wednesday.

A Chinese official said there were still some pilgrims with Chinese passports attending the ceremony in Bodhgaya.

“Therefore, the government by no means threatened them to return, although the government does not encourage them to attend the ritual,” Xu Zhitao, deputy director of the bureau of the Tibet question at the United Front Work Department of the Communist Party of China Central Committee told the Global Times.

Another official said that the Chinese government had told Tibetans to avoid attending the ritual in India because it has a political purpose.

“The number of Tibetans attending the ritual decreased dramatically in recent years after the local governments clarified to local Tibetans that the ritual is about separatism, and also due to tightened border control,” Zhu Weiqun, chairman of the Ethnic and Religious Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, told the paper.

“Considering that the large-scale ritual needs years of preparation, the India-based ceremony frequently degenerates into a political tool,” he said. The ritual is used as an opportunity to meet the Dalai Lama and see him propagate ideas of “hating the Chinese government,” Zhu said.

Last July, the Chinese government encouraged Panchen Lama to organize and preside over a Kalchakra event, the first by the Panchen Lama in 60 years, in Tibet. It was attended by 426,000 pilgrims over four days, the official media said.