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No birthday wishes for Dalai Lama from PM Narendra Modi, President Ram Nath Kovind

Last Updated 06 July 2020, 17:11 IST

President Ram Nath Kovind and Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday cautiously avoided greeting Dalai Lama publicly on his 85th birthday, but the heads of the local governments of India’s territories coveted by China did wish the octogenarian monk, whom the communist country calls a separatist.

Even as China’s aggression along its disputed boundary with India resulted in a military stand-off in eastern Ladakh and took the relations between the two nations to a new low, the Modi government in New Delhi did not go for a drastic change in its approach on Dalai Lama, contrary to speculation and suggestions on social media.

Neither the President nor the prime minister on Monday publicly greeted the global icon of non-violent resistance against Chinese People’s Liberation Army’s 1950-51 occupation of Tibet.

A source told the DH that New Delhi wanted its response to China’s aggression along the LAC with India to be “measured and calibrated”, instead of going for drastic change. Public greetings to Dalai Lama from Rashtrapati Bhavan and Prime Minister’s office would have could have put in peril the efforts to resolve the stand-off.

China in the past strongly reacted to official engagement between Dalai Lama, who was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989, and the leadership of India.

But R K Mathur, the Lieutenant Governor of Ladakh, used his official account on Twitter to greet the Dalai Lama on Monday. So did Chief Minister of Arunachal Pradesh Pema Khandu.

“This day marks the 85th birth anniversary of His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama @DalaiLama. I pray for his good health and #longevity. In these difficult times, his spiritual leadership gives strength,” tweeted Mathur.

“A very warm birthday wishes to His Holiness the 14th #DalaiLama. On this special auspicious day of your 85th birthday, me and my family joins millions of followers across the globe, to rejoice and offer our prayers for your excellent health, happiness and long life,” Khandu posted on Twitter.

China claims nearly 90,000 sqkms of areas in Arunachal Pradesh of India and nearly 2000 sqkms in Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand.

The communist country illegally occupied about 38,000 sqkms of India’s territory in Aksai Chin in the east of Ladakh. Pakistan also illegally ceded 5180 sqkms of India’s territory to China in 1963.

Himachal Pradesh Governor Bandaru Dattatraya and Chief Minister Jai Ram Thakur too extended greetings to the Dalai Lama.

The Buddhist monk has been living in exile in Dharamshala in Himachal Pradesh. Union Ministers Ram Vilas Paswan and Kiren Rijiju too took to Twitter to greet him. So did Ram Madhav, national general secretary of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, and United States’ envoy to India, Ken Juster.

Dalai Lama has been living in India ever since he fled the Potala Palace in Lhasa in March, 1959, to escape the Chinese PLA, which had by then occupied Tibet.

But just two months before Modi had an “informal summit” with Chinese President Xi Jinping at Wuhan in central China on April 27 and 28, 2018, the cabinet secretariat issued an advisory in New Delhi asking “senior leaders” and “government functionaries” in the states as well as at the Centre to stay away from events attended by Dalai Lama.

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(Published 06 July 2020, 16:59 IST)

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