Security breach unfortunate, probe on: MEA
By RAJEEV P.I.
BANGALORE, APRIL 10: Even as the police kept more than a hundred Tibetan students in the city under house arrest, one protester managed to make his point with flourish, turning the combined glare of the national and international media off Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao, if only for a few moments.
While Wen was interacting with top scientists at the ground floor of the imposing main building of the Indian Institute of Science, Tenzing Tsundue, Mumbai-based national general secretary of the Friends of Tibet, poet and freelance scribe, surfaced on the sixth storey, waving a flag and dangling a huge red banner with the legend ‘Free Tibet’. A clutch of red-faced Chinese officials and local policemen with sniffer dogs stood watching as Tenzing, perched precariously on the ramparts, shouted slogans asking China to quit Tibet. Within minutes, security men dashed up and hauled him off. ‘‘This is an unfortunate incident. The miscreant has been promptly apprehended and the Karnataka government is conducting an investigation,’’ an MEA spokesperson said.
The demonstration was Tenzing’s second — he had pulled off a similar routine in Mumbai when Wen’s predecessor Zhu Ronji was at a city hotel.
Police sources said access to the area had been barred, the entire building and the surrounding huge campus thoroughly scanned and cops posted round the clock three days ago. ‘‘He must have sneaked in and hid himself in the cramped space of the steeple at least three days ago. We didn’t find any food there, and he must have been starving,’’ they said.
Additional Commissioner of Police K.V.R. Tagore said Tenzing would be charged for criminal trespass, violating prohibitory orders and attempted suicide, to start with. Senior police sources said a probe would be ordered and ‘‘heads would roll’’ for the security mess-up.
