By Kate Saunders
Stringent security procedures were in place for the recent visit of the Chinese appointed Panchen Lama, 13 year old Gyaltsen Norbu, to Kumbum (Chinese: Ta’ersi) monastery in Huangzhong (Tib: Kumbum) county, as part of a 11-day tour of Qinghai. According to a Tibetan from the area, many monks quietly left Kumbum prior to the official visit of the boy declared by the Chinese leadership to be the 11th incarnation of the Panchen Lama, who is not recognised by most Tibetans. Those who remained were told by the government that any monk not attending the various ceremonies could be expelled from the monastery. Tibetan students, workers and government officials in nearby Xining were also brought to Kumbum to attend the official ceremonies on 3 August. The visit was of particular political significance as it was the first time that Gyaltsen Norbu has travelled to Kumbum, one of the six great Gelugpa (Yellow Hat) monasteries and traditionally known as a seat of the Panchen Lama. Five years ago, the abbot of Kumbum, Agya Rinpoche, one of the most senior lamas of the Gelugpa tradition who also held a number of official positions, escaped from Tibet as he could not accept the authorities’ plans to bring the controversial Chinese appointed Panchen Lama to his monastery.
Agya Rinpoche, who is now living in California, said: ‘I think the monks at Kumbum do not accept this boy in their hearts as the Panchen Lama, but they have no choice but to attend any ceremony held for him. Many Chinese officials know this, and they would not want to keep Gyaltsen Norbu for too long in the area, they want him back in Beijing where they have full control.‘
The Panchen Lama is one of the most senior figures in the Tibetan Buddhist hierarchy and is of particular significance to the Chinese authorities in political terms as he is traditionally responsible for choosing the reincarnation of the Dalai Lama and playing a major role in his education and upbringing. The boy revered by most Tibetans as the real 11th incarnation of the Panchen Lama, Gyaltsen Choekyi Nyima, was taken into Chinese custody soon after he was recognised by the Dalai Lama in 1995. In answer to a question about Gendun Choekyi Nyima last week, the Chinese Foreign Ministry said: ‘He is not the incarnated soul boy. He’s only an ordinary Chinese child, the same as other children. He is now in a good healthy condition, leading a normal and happy life. He has got a good cultural education. He is a student now and is studying well.’ (Agence France Presse, 5 August). Gendun Choekyi Nyima’s whereabouts are still not known and despite repeated requests from Western governments, Beijing has not allowed any independent observer access to him and his family.
According to the Chinese press, Gyaltsen Norbu concluded an 11-day tour of Qinghai Province, northwest China, the traditional Tibetan area of Amdo, last Wednesday (People’s Daily, 13 August). The newspaper reported that at a farewell party, the boy said he wished for the people of Qinghai ‘to enjoy stable lives, a prosperous economy and unity among the different ethnic minorities and for them to advance on the road to socialism with Chinese characteristics under the leadership of the Communist Party of China’. The statement was in keeping with the authorities’ aim to use religious leaders, whether selected officially or not, for Party political purposes.
A by-lined article describing the visit published in Chinese by Xinhua on 13 August – which was withdrawn by the official news agency five hours after being circulated for reasons that are not stated – reported that on 7 August Gyaltsen Norbu visited Sonam Drolma, mother of the 10th Panchen Lama, in Haidong prefecture, where they had ‘cordial talks’ and where he ‘posed for photographs with the family’. Gyaltsen Norbu also met senior provincial leaders and visited various sites important to the economic development of the region, including a potash fertilizer production workshop, oil refinery and a construction base of the Qinghai-Tibet Autonomous Region railway in Golmud. The same report, which was translated by BBC Monitoring, stated that Gyaltsen Norbu gave blessings at Kumbum to nearly 20,000 Buddhist monks and Buddhist followers of Tibetan, Chinese, Mongolian and other nationalities. This figure could not be confirmed and is likely to be a high estimate of the number of people who attended.
As one of the major centres of the Gelugpa school of Tibetan Buddhism, Kumbum monastery, which is located nearly 30 km south-west of the provincial capital of Xining, has particular historical and religious significance to Tibetans. Former abbot Agya Rinpoche, who was close to the 10th Panchen Lama before the Panchen Lama’s death in 1989, was under particular pressure to support Chinese policies on religion and the Chinese choice of Panchen Lama due to the importance of the monastery and his senior status and official positions as vice-president of the state-run Buddhist Association of China and a representative of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC). He says now: ‘There is a lot of political pressure on high lamas in Tibet today. The monks who are not as senior do not have the same pressure, but they undergo a different type of suffering in terms of what they feel in their hearts and what they are required to accept by the authorities. They don’t have any real choice.’ Agya Rinpoche, who is in his early 50s and recognised as the reincarnation of the father of Tsongkapa, the founder of the Gelugpa school of Tibetan Buddhism, said: ‘The reason I left Tibet was because Chinese officials came to the monastery and said they wanted to set up a big ceremony for the Chinese choice of Panchen Lama. They saw that this would be controversial, so later they changed their minds slightly and said they would hold a different type of ceremony, not specifically one for the Panchen Lama, but that Gyaltsen Norbu and high lamas would be there. This meant that I would have been forced to help the government have its choice of the Panchen Lama accepted by the Tibetan people, which would violate my deepest beliefs. I could not accept this, so I escaped.’
A rumour that government officials paid 10 yuan ($1.2) to monks at Kumbum to prostrate in front of the Chinese choice of Panchen Lama during his visit could not be confirmed, and is more likely to be a reflection of the resentment among Tibetan monks to the authorities’ actions in installing an incarnation they do not recognise, and expecting Tibetans to welcome his visit. The Tibetan source from Amdo said: ‘It is a customary gesture for money or tea to be offered to monks during the visit of an important lama. The fact that monks could have perceived the offering as a bribe and that these rumours have been spread perhaps symbolizes the sentiments of monks in the monastery.
‘From the time of the 10th Panchen Lama visiting Tibetan areas in the early 1980s, the Chinese government should have known that such high profile visits did not need police and army units present in monasteries. Tibetans would come from hundreds of miles to see the Panchen Lama. The invitations and arrangement were all voluntary by Tibetans. Devotion and respect was earned from the religious establishment. It cannot be bought or forced by an atheist regime.’
This is one in a series of independent reports by Kate Saunders commissioned by the Australia Tibet Council, Free Tibet Campaign and the International Campaign for Tibet.
