Dharamsala, July 24 – A Tibetan monk holding the post of disciplinary head (Gekoe) of a Monastery in Bayen County, has been expelled for failure to comply with the “patriotic education” campaign, the Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy (TCHRD) based here said on its website.
Lobsang Tsuiltrim, 36, was expelled after Chinese officials found that none of the 400 monks of Amdo Jaqung monastery turned out for the “patriotic education” campaign on June 27 this year. Officials from the Religious Affairs Bureau of Bayen (Ch: Hualong) Hui County under Tsoshar (Ch: Haidong) Prefecture, Qinghai Province and the County Public Security Bureau (PSB) officials asked Lobsang to assemble the monks of Amdo Jaqung Monastery for the “patriotic education” campaign now euphemistically called the “Legal Education” session, according to the TCHRD.
The officials blamed Lobsang for lack of discipline in the monastery and failure to educate the monks, and sacked him from his position as disciplinary head, “stripped of privileges entitled for religious heads and expelled from the Monastery.” The officials ordered him that he cannot join any other monasteries.
The “patriotic education” campaign which was launched since April 1996 across religious institutions in Tibet, requires monks and nuns to denounce the Dalai Lama, their religious leaders, oppose ‘splittist’ forces, and pledge their allegiance to the communist party.
Several monks have been sent to prisons for defying Chinese government orders under the campaign.
Since the large scale protests across the Tibetan plateau last March, a renewed ‘patriotic education’ campaign with “more severity and intensity” was launched.
“The campaign which was earlier concentrated primarily in the monastic institutions, long considered as the bastions of political dissidence, was launched for government employees, security forces, farmers, nomads, private entrepreneurs and educational institutions. The “legal education” session was launched last year in Drepung Monastery on 11 April 2008 and later carried out in other monastic institutions,” said TCHRD which condemned Lobsang’s explusion and called for an immediate end to patriotic education’ campaign or ‘legal education’.
