65 years ago, Dalai Lama had entered India

New Delhi, March 30

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Sixty-five years ago, on March 31, 1959, the Dalai Lama entered Tawang in Arunachal Pradesh to seek refuge in India in the wake of unrest in the Tibetan capital of Lhasa. He had fled Lhasa on March 17 that year.

A battalion of 5 Assam Rifles tasked at the frontier post of Chuthangmu in the Kameng Division escorted the arriving entourage. At Chuthangmu, the Dalai Lama’s bodyguards surrendered their arms to the Indian authorities. The Assam Rifles thereafter escorted 12,000 refugees through the Kameng Frontier Division. The Dalai Lama presented his personal weapons to the Assam Rifles. These weapons are displayed at the Assam Rifles Museum in Shillong as mementoes. During a visit to Guwahati in April 2017, the Dalai Lama had met Havildar Naren Chandra Das (retd) of 5 Assam Rifles, who had escorted him in 1959.