Although officially atheist, the Chinese government recognized him as the 11th Panchen Lama in a drive to win the hearts and minds of Tibetans, after rejecting the 6-year-old boy that was chosen by the Dalai Lama who fled into exile in India in 1959 after an abortive uprising against Chinese forces. About 40 monks from Zhaxi Lhunbo Lamasery in Xigaze in Tibet and Labrang Lamasery in northwest China’s Gansu Province are engaged in the closed-door worship of Yidam, the Kalachakra deity, it said.
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While whereabouts of Nyima were not known, a Tibetan official said in September previous year that he is receiving education, and living normally. The official Xinhua news agency said that an estimated 50,000 people will attend the “auspicious event” at the New Palace of the Panchen Lama, near the Zhaxi Lhunbo Lamasery at Xigaze in Tibet.
It was Gyaltsen Norbu, the 11th Panchen Lama, who presided over the Kalachakra in Tibet on Thursday, July 21.
The Panchen Lama was gradually exposed by Beijing to the public with the hope that he will get the same respect as the Dalai Lama.
The London-based Free Tibet group says government workers began removing residential buildings and evicting residents Thursday morning.
The BBC reports that authorities have not made a formal comment on the demolition, Free Tibet Director Eleanor Byrne-Rosengren argued that overcrowding is not the real issue.
A pro Tibetan activist lights candles as others shout slogans while taking part in a protest in New Delhi, 25 April 2007, against the ongoing alledged detention by Chinese authorities of Gendun Cheokyi Nyima (The Panchen Lama). Let’s give a strong message to China that faith can not be imposed upon or controlled by gun.
One of the largest Tibetan Buddhist centres has been bulldozed by the Chinese, threatening the homes of thousands of people in what one human rights group has called a “man-made humanitarian disaster”.
“The work started at 8:00 a.m. on July 20, beginning with those structures that were not already recorded in the government’s record of permitted dwellings”, RFA’s source said.
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“We don’t know how much has already been torn down, as we are not allowed to visit the site”, RFA’s source said. “Because the continued survival of the Larung Gar itself is more important”.
