Dalai Lama To Begin Talks On Future

Press, Volume XCVIII, Issue 28869, 14 April 1959, Page 15

Dalai Lama To Begin Talks On Future

(K.Z. Press Association—Copyright) (Rec. 9.30 p.m.) TEZPUR (India), April 13. The Dalai Lama, after resting from his journey to Bomdila by mountain pony, will today start his talks with the Indian Government’s envoy, Mr P. N. Menon, about his future in India, according to the British United Press. They were expected to discuss plans for the Dalai Lama’s departure from Bomdila and where he would go during his asylum in India. Mr Menon, a former Indian Consul-General in Lhasa, was an old friend of the Dalai Lama, and was expected to assure him that the granting of political asylum would prove no embarrassment to India—as long as he said and did nothing of even a remotely political nature.

The Dalai Lama probably would not complete the next stage of his journey into Assam until Wednesday evening or Thursday. According to unconfirmed press reports in New Delhi, the Karampa Lama had sought political • asylum in Eastern Bhutan, the agency said. He was one of the highest lamas of Tibet, and one of 18 persons declared traitors by the Chinese. Reports reaching Kalimpong said Lhasa, the Tibetan capital, had been completely cut off from southern Tibet by the Tibetan rebels who had cut roads and blown-up at least seven important bridges. Radio Peking claimed today north Tibetan herdsmen had asked the Chinese Army to put down the rebellion and “revenge” them for “bloody atrocities committed by the anti-Communist rebels.” The broadcast said the herdsmen sent a joint telegram making the request to the Tibet Working Committee of the Chinese Communist Party and to the Tibet Military Area Command.

The herdsmen, the radio claimed, had been holding meetings for several days “indignantly condemning” the rebels.