In Lhasa, Tibet-Bollywood Rules

[Guest guest]

July 26, 2004

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In this holy city, Shah Rukh and Aishwarya rule

Monday July 26 2004 00:00 IST

LHASA: Look as hard as you like in Lhasa, but you won't find a photo

or even a remote likeness of the 14th Dalai Lama, Tibetan Buddhism's

most important leader. Instead, in the heart of the holy city, in

the `parikrama' of the Jokhang monastery called the Barkhor, there

are posters of Shahrukh Khan, Aishwarya Rai, Rani Mukherjee and even

an unknown Indian actress called Divya.

 

Clearly, what New Delhi hasn't been able to do for the last 45 years

``since the Dalai Lama fled his mother country and escaped to live

in Dharamsala, India'' Bollywood has succeeded in doing.

 

Aishwarya in all her `Devdas' finery and Shahrukh in vaguely

mismatched clothes and his inimitably raised half-eyebrow sell for 5

yuan each. That's about Rs 25 and it's not cheap. Shopkeepers say

they sell like hotcakes.

 

Barkhor music stalls belt out Punjabi rock all over the place, but

softly. Tibetans are mostly a gently, soft-spoken people and the

invisible, but all-powerful long arm of the Chinese Communist Party

is never very far. So, by the time evening arrives, little dinner

stalls pull down a cloth curtain and in the privacy of the interior

offer `thugpa' and entertainment for a price.

 

>From one such stall on Saturday evening emerged the strains of the

song, `You are my Sonia'. You lift the curtain out of sheer

curiosity. On the television in front, a video of a girl _ she could

be Tibetan or Chinese _ dressed in a red sari and loads of gold

jewellery is happily dancing along with a boy. He too could be

Tibetan or Chinese.

 

Possibly, when you live in a spectacularly beautiful land, when the

word Tibet conjures up a lingering mysteriousness that cannot be

explained away by numerical exactnesses such as the `Three

Represents' or the `Four Modernisations' that other races might be

more comfortable with, then it's a small price to pay for normalcy.

 

`Indu', the word for India in both Tibetan and Chinese, is an

instantly recognised commodity whether you're in Beijing or Lhasa.

But that's as much true for the highly popular Mysore sandal soap

illegally imported via Nepal as for the Sakya Muni, the Buddha

himself, who every Tibetan knows lived in India.

 

Problem is, the Dalai Lama, the incarnation of the `avalokiteshwara'

who is in turn the incarnation of the Buddha, also lives in India.

Depends who you speak to in Tibet, India is either the mother

source, from where the Padmasambhava brought Buddhism in the 7-8th

century and transformed Tibet. This school of thought is also

quietly grateful that India has given refuge to the Dalai Lama and

thousands of Tibetans over the years and doesn't put pressure on

them to leave.

 

As the woman selling Aishwarya Rai/Shahrukh Khan posters said, ``If

every Tibetan had a passport, they would escape to India where the

Dalai Lama lives, and not come back here.''

 

Or then there's the other school of thought which believes that the

Dalai Lama is not only a spiritual figure, but through his ``split

activities'' wants to split Tibet from China and make it

independent. Because India is giving him and all those escapees from

Tibet refuge ``instead of sending them back across the border as

Nepal often does,'' it must mean that New Delhi has never fully

given up its ``special claims'' on a region with which it has

ancient, historical links and political ties until 1954.

 

Certainly though, as visiting Indian journalists have discovered in

every nook and cranny, the idea that Tibet can somehow ``be

different'' as it once was, perhaps even till 1954, is quite dead.

This is a new nation and it shows in all matters of omission and

commission. Right from the enormous square in front of the Potala

palace done up in Socialist Realism style to education in Chinese

and Tibetan to the absolute control that the Communist Party of

China (CPC) enjoys in every sphere of life.

 

Certainly, too, as many Tibetans old enough to remember also aver,

``liberation'' in 1951 also brought an end to the often oppressive,

feudal system that was a sign of pre-1951 times. On the other hand,

the distinctive religious and cultural lifestyle of the Tibetan

Buddhists is also a thing of the past.

 

The Tibetans, meanwhile, defend themselves with their silences. The

CPC has ordered, for example, that keeping the photo or even a

remote likeness of the 14th Dalai Lama, Tenzin Gyatso, who lives in

India, is illegal. The fear with which Tibetans, who revere their

Dalai Lama, follow the Chinese prescription is palpable.

 

But it's quite a regular sight to see Tibetans prostrating

themselves in front of the Potala palace, the home of the Dalai

Lamas. Clearly, even after 45 years, Tibetan Buddhism's most

important leader, lives on in the hearts and minds of these people.