Sources in Tibet report the death on 31 July 2004 of Dondrub Gyal, former Party Secretary of Tsolho prefecture (More commonly referred to as Chabcha, in Chinese: Hainan) in Qinghai. Aged 64, Dondrub Gyal suffered from stomach cancer and was being treated in a hospital in Shanghai. Closely associated with the late 10th Panchen Lama and his policies on education and the use of Tibetan language, Dondrub Gyal was instrumental in boosting the use of Tibetan language in government and educational institutions in Tsolho, a prefecture known for its thriving literary community. After a period where Chinese policies in Tibet allowed Tibetan language and culture to play a more prominent role in education and government, these policies were reversed after the death of the 10th Panchen Lama in 1989. Dondrub Gyal, throughout the 1990s encountered increased opposition to the language policies he tried to implement in Chabcha.
Before he became Party Secretary of Chabcha county in 1983, Dondrub Gyal had already been head of Sumdo Commune, vice chairman of the revolutionary committee of Mangra shang (1975), head of Guinan county education department (1978-1979) and junior head of Guinan county. A contemporary of Dondrub Gyal who worked in the education department when Dondrub Gyal was junior head of Guinan county recalls: “He was very powerful in our county at that time although he was only vice chairman and he could do anything he wanted. He was very skilful in being a leader. He would seriously scold youngsters who wore flared trousers and who kept their hair in a mess.”
Among the achievements Dondrub Gyal is credited for during this time was the establishment of the Chabcha Tibetan Middle School, which was later renamed the “Chabcha Minorities Middle School”. In typical fashion, he raised funds from the province to be used for extensive digging work needed in the construction of the school, but instead of spending that money on labourers he got the teachers and students to do this work outside school hours and used the funds to help the teachers and students. His colleagues remember how he would personally visit the site in the mornings to oversee the work.
Between 1986 and 1992, Dondrub Gyal was respectively Junior Party Secretary, Chairman and Party Secretary of Tsolho prefecture. Local government employees remember this period as a minor renaissance of Tibetan language and culture. “He made the Tibetan language the most important language in the prefecture. … People thought that as a Party member, he didn’t believe in Buddhism but then he helped renovate or helped fund the renovation of many local monasteries. Usually he wouldn’t prostrate in front of each and every Lama and, if needed, he would tick off Lamas like he would anyone else,” said one.
Among local leaders, Dondrub Gyal was not always uncontroversial, but generally he was respected as hardworking and outspoken. At one meeting, he spoke out against the many arguments that took place between various leaders, which, he believed, prevented them from ever making any decisions. He was also skilful in obtaining funds through his connections with high officials both in the province and at the centre. The late Panchen Lama is reported to have told Dondrub Gyal not to donate so much goat meat to him; that too many people offered him much more meat than he could ever consume. The Panchen Lama is said to have told Dondrub Gyal to give donations to Tashi Wangchug instead, because he was working very hard at the centre at the time in support of the use of Tibetan language in the government in the Tibetan autonomous areas of Qinghai. The Panchen Lama is said to have added, “Please implement what Ngapo Ngawang Jigme and me have been working on so much; the implementation of the use of Tibetan in Tibetan areas.” Whatever the accuracy of such recollections, they give an idea of the significance these figureheads continue to play in the minds of people, and the personal connections of local leaders with someone like the Panchen Lama can help develop their almost mythical status, particularly after death.
After a visit to Chabcha in 1988 by the Panchen Lama, and with his backing, Dondrub Gyal established the magazine ‘Riwo Nyida’ [Mountain of the Sun and the Moon], which allowed him to send three Tibetans from Chabcha to Beijing for training. The editor in 1992 recalls: “This magazine dealt with achievements in the field of Tibetan language in Qinghai. It covered a variety of subjects. … This magazine was aimed at discussing the potential of the use of written and spoken Tibetan language and how people’s regard for it can be enhanced. However, we didn’t feel we were able to accomplish our goals. Most people don’t know anything about these issues. For example, I personally wrote an article that really dealt with the issue, it was about the need to make Tibetan more relevant in the school curriculum. The article however was not allowed to be published. In this way, the magazine ended up becoming a poetry magazine.”
The editor went to the Qinghai Publishing House where they showed him what was and what wasn’t allowed in publishing. “They said explicitly, “If you violate these rules, then you know what will happen. We have confidence in you. You are a party member.” You had to praise the party and you were not allowed to talk about the relevant Tibet issues. An article had to reflect the views of the policies of the Communist Party at that moment. We had to be the best mouthpiece for the best of the Party’s policies… And we had to oppose the ‘Dalai Clique'”
Dondrub Gyal implemented the Panchen Lama’s language policies vigorously. He increased the numbers of ethnic Tibetans working for the government and introduced for the first time Tibetan language secretarial job placements for Tibetan university graduates. When he was party secretary he also added Tibetan to office signboards and letter headings. Officials who worked with Dondrub Gyal recall that it became standard procedure to write applications in both Tibetan and Chinese and that he even left his mark in the construction of new buildings in the prefecture, which had to become more Tibetan in style. Another product of his tenure was the establishment of the Chabcha Literary Society.
Both Dondrub Gyal’s policies and his work style received criticism from local leaders. His initiatives to bring together able and capable people to work on certain projects, and his project to employ educated elderly people, such as former monks from various areas, in educational positions in Chabcha, were subject to jealousy and accusations of nepotism. Many local leaders were particularly unhappy about his drive to teach not only Chinese officials the Tibetan language, but also the many ethnic Tibetan leaders in Chabcha who had a very poor level of written Tibetan. Fines were imposed on those officials who didn’t pass examinations and it is alleged that certain officials were denied promotion because of their failure in exams.
A former official from the education department in Chabcha recalls: “Dondrub Gyal’s biggest frustration was that China’s policies on minorities’ autonomous areas were not properly implemented. This is a problem not only faced by Dondrub Gyal but by all government leaders who are devoted to their nationality”.
Dondrub Gyal’s downfall came in 1992 when he was accused of embezzlement, which landed his son, his son-in-law and himself temporarily in detention. He was acquitted because of a lack of evidence, but was demoted from his post as party secretary of the prefecture and, after having been recalled to Party School in Beijing for one year, he was given the post of vice chairman in the province-level department of animal husbandry. This was a position that is technically higher than that of party secretary of a prefecture, but seen by the people as a demotion because of its lack of any real power.
Dondrub Gyal had first-hand experience of the lives of Qinghai’s many livestock raising families. For most of his career, he served the government in areas where there was a strong presence of nomads. A former colleague recalls that as a prefecture leader he mediated many times in disputes among nomads over access to grasslands. At an earlier stage in his career, when he was head of Sumdo township, Dondrub Gyal had earned himself respect because of his achievements in bringing irrigation techniques from China to the pastures of the township. In his position in the province’s animal husbandry ministry, he familiarised himself with the livelihoods of the common people in Yushu and Golog prectures and secured funds for the construction of schools and hospitals. He also visited Tsonub, Tsojang and Tsolho prefectures and helped tackle multiple taxes on meat and wool. Dondrub Gyal argued that a China that had changed to a market economy could not continue to tax people doubly on both meat and wool.
Tenzin Gonpo, who used to work in the Guinan education department under Dondrub Gyal, remembers him as: “A man of quality, from the many Tibetan officials working in Tibet I know, Dondrub Gyal was the only one who could actually work with the Chinese officials and was a match for them. At a time when most Tibetan officials gave speeches solely in Chinese, he would stand up and speak in both Tibetan as well as Chinese”.
A former colleague summarises his impression of Dondrub Gyal as a leader in Chabcha: “It was something very strange about Dondrub Gyal that, although he hardly had any educational background, he was very skilful in rallying people and resources in such a way that he achieved his goals. In his case it is one thing to initiate something, but it is another thing for the people who have the task to implement it, to really make it a success. Of course first and foremost, he was a Tibetan, and that was his starting point”.
