News and Views on Tibet

Dalai Lama arrives in Gaya

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Gaya, January 7 – Amidst tight security, Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama arrived here today to participate in a nine-day long Buddhist festival, Kalchakra Puja.

The Dalai Lama will inaugurate the festival tomorrow in which the 17th Karmapa Lama, Urgen Trinley Dorjee, will also take part.

Official sources said security of the two spiritual leaders has been tightened in view of terrorist threats from Nepal’s Maoist rebels. The sacred Mahabodi temple, venue of the puja, has also been cordoned off, they said.

The Kalchakra Puja is one of the most sacred rituals of Buddhism’s Mahayana sect. Over 80,000 devotees from India and abroad have already here arrived for the ceremony.

Altogether 120 police officers, including DSPs, 165 armed policemen, 275 constables and 42 women constables, besides a platoon of mounted police and a sniffer dog squad have been pressed into service, the sources said.

Police Superintendent Ravindran Shankaran, said night vision devices, metal detectors and wireless sets were also being used.

Meanwhile, a controversy erupted over a reported affair between a Tibetan security guard and a Chinese woman who were interrogated by police and later let off.

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