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Karmapa ‘granted’ refugee status
Tribune News Service

DHARAMSALA, Feb 2 — The 17th Karmapa, Ogyen Trinley Dorjee’s ordeal of being labelled as an illegal immigrant in India has finally come to an end, with the Indian Government reportedly granting him refugee status and lifting all restrictions imposed on his free movement.

According to sources, the Indian authorities have conveyed their decision to the exiled Tibetan government that the head of the Karma Kagyu sect of Tibetan Buddhism would now be free to undertake pilgrimage to various monasteries and other Buddhist religious shrines. During his one-year stay in India, the Karmapa was not granted permission to visit any monastery, not even within Kangra district. The repeated pleas by the Tibetan government to allow the Karmapa to be shifted to the Sherabling Monastery at Bhattu near Baijnath were also turned down.

It was on January 5 last year, that the Karmapa, had made a sudden appearance in McLeodganj, the headquarters of the Tibetan Government-in-exile, taking the world by surprise as he gave a slip to the Chinese securitymen guarding him. Even after one year of his stay here, the Indian Government had been delaying a decision on granting him political asylum or simply allowing him refugee status like any other ordinary Tibetan entering India.

Aides close to the Karmapa revealed that the Tibetan Minister for Religion and Culture Mr Tashi Wangdi, had conveyed to them that the Indian Government had decided to lift all restrictions on the movement of the Karmapa.

The Tibetan spiritual leader, Dalai Lama, had personally requested the Indian Prime Minister, to grant permission to the Karmapa, to stay in India. He had also personally met the Home Minister, Mr L.K. Advani, in New Delhi. The Dalai Lama returned from Delhi yesterday, after a visiting the Kumbh mela at Allahabad.

During the Karmapa’s one-year stay here in Dharamsala, officials from the Ministry of External Affairs and the Intelligence Bureau, made several trips here, to have first hand information about the reasons that compelled Karmapa to flee Tibet and how he managed to undertake this arduous journey from the Tibetan capital, Lhasa to the headquarter of the Tibetan Government-in-exile.