By Kalsang Rinchen
Dharamsala, February 15 – While children of their age are on vacation from December to March for winter break, two students of Tibetan Children’s village, Suja, are taking an unusual break, pedaling across north India to raise awareness about the issue of language rights in Tibet.
Tselho Gyal and Tsering Dorjee completed their class ten in December last year, and planned a cycling trip covering major cities in north India informing the Indian public about the plight of the Tibetan people inside Tibet and the language persecution in Tibet.
Gyal and Dorjee fled Tibet in 2000 like other Tibetan refugees to get education in India and blessings of His Holiness the Dalai Lama.
The duo’s pledge to carry out the campaign for language rights in Tibet was fuelled by protests in Amdo by Tibetans last year over a Chinese government policy to replace Tibetan by Chinese as the medium of instruction in schools. “Once the Tibetan language is exterminated, Tibet will almost lose its cultural identity.”
“We decided to organize an awareness campaign to highlight this issue as well as show our support to the students in Tibet for their attempt to urge the Government of China to respect their right to the freedom of language and culture which is enshrined in the Constitution of China as well as various International Laws,” they say in the literature they distribute along their journey.
“At a time when the Tibetan people are struggling to preserve their culture; not keeping Tibetan as the medium of school education could ensure the demise of Tibetan culture because one’s mother tongue is what gives both unity and identity to culture,” they believe.
The duo presented their plans before Tibetan NGOs in Dharamsala and received financial and logistical support for their campaign. Students for Free Tibet provided them with the bikes. TYC helped them with the preparation of the campaign literature in Hindi for distribution, all costs relating to reproduction and distribution of literatures and planning their itinerary and coordinating with RTYC located areas.
They have been on the road for 15 days since their cycle rally for language rights in Tibet was flagged off from the Tibetan camp in Majnu ka Tilla on January 30, coinciding with the death anniversary of Mahatma Ghandhi. They are expected to arrive in Dharamsala on 10 March to coincide with the 52nd Tibetan National Uprising Day.
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The two spoke about their campaign and objectives to local Tibetans and Indian public in Delhi, Panipat Muzafarnagar, Haridwar, Rajpur, Dekyiling, Clement Town, Selakui, Paonta Sahib, Nahan, Ambala and Chandigarh.
The local Tibetan public, members of the regional assemblies of Tibetan people’s deputies and local chapters of the Tibetan Youth Congress and Tibetan Women’s Association received the two students and accorded them reception, and arranged meetings with the local public.
