South Asia and Beyond

China May Have Occupied Tibet But Can Never Control Our Minds: Dalai Lama

Nitin A. Gokhale
June 14, 2020 - 9:56 am
1 minute read

BODH GAYA: The Chinese display of aggression along the LAC in the Ladakh region is ironically channelled through the occupied territory of Tibet! Following the brutal suppression of the Tibetan uprising by China in 1959, Tibetan spiritual leader His Holiness the Dalai Lama has been in India, a constant source of irritation for China that has even sought to determine his successor! The Tibetans will never accept that, he told StratNews Global Editor-in-Chief Nitin A. Gokhale in an exclusive interview recorded in Bodh Gaya in January this year. He also spoke about the future of Tibet, the tussle over reincarnation and what happened when he met Mao Zedong in the 1950s (he almost became a Communist!). Republishing the interview.

Nitin A. Gokhale

Left to himself, Nitin A. Gokhale would rather watch films and sports matches but his day job as a media entrepreneur, communications specialist, analyst and author, leaves him little time to indulge in his primary interests. Gokhale in fact started his career in journalism in 1983 as a sports reporter. Since then he has, in the past 41 years, traversed the entire spectrum across print, broadcast and digital space. One of South Asia's leading strategic analysts, Gokhale has moved on from conventional media to become an independent media entrepreneur running three niche digital platforms—BharatShakti, StratNewsGlobal and Interstellar—besides undertaking consultancy and training workshops in communications for military institutions, corporates and individuals. Now better known for his conflict coverage and strategic analyses, Gokhale has lived and reported from India’s North-east for 23 years between 1983 and 2006, been on the ground at Kargil in the summer of 1999 and also brought us live coverage from Sri Lanka’s Eelam War IV between 2006-2009. An alumni of the Asia-Pacific Centre for Security Studies in Hawaii, Gokhale now writes, lectures and analyses security and strategic matters in Indo-Pacific and travels regularly to US, Europe, Australia, South and South-East Asia to take part in various seminars and conferences. Gokhale is also a popular visiting faculty at India’s Defence Services Staff College, the three war colleges, India's National Defence College, College of Defence Management and the IB’s intelligence school.