Chances of Dalai Lama returning to Tibet are slim unless he changed his stance about Independence for Tibet and Taiwan, a senior Tibetan official told China Daily.
Claiming that Tibet was an inalienable part of Chinese territory since times ancient, Qiangba Puncog, government chairman of Tibet told China’s largest English newspaper that the Dalai Lama’s government in exile functioning from India, will never get recognition.
Chairman of the Tibetan government even leveled charges that the Dalai Lama in the last 48 years, after he fled from the country, had not done anything beneficial for the people of Tibet.
The central government of China was open to talks with representative of Dalai Lama but the pursuit of independence or even a higher degree of autonomy for a greater Tibet was not acceptable in any form, the daily reported.
China forcefully occupied Tibet between 1950-1951 forcing the Dalai Lama, then only 16 years old, to flee and seek refuge in India.
Tibet is witnessing economic growth and influx of migrants from others parts of the country. Ever since the Qinghai-Tibet railway started operations in July 2006, the high altitude region has better connectivity which has boosted both tourism and trade. Tibet was practically inaccessible in the first half of the last century. The government agencies claim that there was no adverse environmental impact observed ever since the train to Tibet began operations.
The ‘Free Tibet’ cause being led by the Dalai Lama from Dharamsala, headquarters of the Tibetan government in Exile in north India, has been a long and lonely one that has borne no fruit. As the spiritual and political head of the Tibetan people in exile, the Dalai Lama has advocated a non-violence path for attaining self-rule in Tibet. The long struggle against the Chinese occupation of Tibet has even conferred the Nobel peace prize on the Dalai Lama.
