PM Modi, Dalai Lama to share stage for first time, exiles hope for a meeting

Sandeep Dikshit

New Delhi, April 19

Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the Dalai Lama will address the Global Buddhist Summit to be held here on Thursday and Friday. This would be the first time that the Prime Minister and the Dalai Lama will address the same conference though on different days.

The Dalai Lama left Dharamsala on Wednesday and was received by hundreds of his supporters when he arrived here.

The Prime Minister will address the inaugural session on April 20 while the Dalai Lama is slated to speak on April 21. The two-day Summit is being hosted by the Ministry of Culture in collaboration with the International Buddhist Confederation on the theme “Responses to Contemporary Challenges: Philosophy to Praxis”.

In his nine years as Prime Minister, Modi has spoken to the Dalai Lama only once. On his 86th birthday in July 2021 after the Galwan Valley clash, the PM had called up the Dalai Lama to convey greetings and wish him a long and healthy life. There is now a buzz among Tibetan exiles that for the first time since he became PM, Modi could meet the Dalai Lama at the conference.

Several world leaders have met the Dalai Lama, but PM Modi has not interacted with the revered monk whom Beijing says is a “splittist.’’

India is yet to comment on the US’ Tibetan Policy and Support Act in 2020 which stipulates that only the Dalai Lama should have control over his reincarnation, not complying with China’s laws to impose its sanctioned successor.

Tibetan Administration (CTA) President Penpa Tsering had said in 2021 that PM Modi is likely to meet the Dalai Lama once the Covid situation stabilises. As India tried to resolve the border issue with China, the possibility of a meeting appeared to have been put on the backburner.

The Dalai Lama has met several BJP leaders including former PM Atal Bihari Vajpayee and former Deputy PM L.K. Advani, Presidents Ram Nath Kovind and Pranab Mukherjee, and former PM Manmohan Singh. But most of the interactions were held after they had demitted public office or before they took up weighty Central portfolios.