Bowing to the Inevitable

(By Lhendup Bhutia, August 07, 2008)

The Chinese may be defying the weather gods by shooting rockets into
the air to clear up the skies; spending millions so that every
signboard and restaurant menu reads in English; and officially asking
its citizens to not pick their noses in an attempt to ensure that the
Beijing Olympics a success.

But as people from all over the world wait in excitement for the Games
to open on August 8, to feast their eyes on what China has promised to
be the most magnificent opening the Olympics has ever seen, there is
one community that is not revelling in the action - the Tibetans.

Theirs is the discordant voice, which they say, few are paying heed
to. The scenario is no different in Mumbai. "We are not against the
Olympics, but against China's right to hold such an event," says Eden
Bhutia, a Tibetan studying in St Xavier's College. "The Olympic Games
celebrate the spirit of humanity, and everyone knows of the Chinese
regime's gross human rights violations." Disillusionment, anger and
bewilderment are some of the sentiments that come across. But many are
glad that they at least got the chance to grab the attention of the
world.

"Unfortunate as the March uprising this year at Lhasa was, it was able
to show the world how everything is not all right in China," says
Sethu Das, founder of Friends of Tibet, a support group, which is
sympathetic to the plight of Tibetans all over.

"The important aspect is that such a large uprising took place within
Chinese-occupied Tibet and not elsewhere in the world and thus China's
usual accusation of people outside Tibet fermenting trouble falls
flat," he says.

However, after the intensive media coverage received during the
Olympic torch run across different nations, everything now seems to
have come to a standstill. The Games are just a few days away, but the
protests have died down. "The fault for this lack of action lies among
the Tibetans and their various organisations residing in India and
abroad," says Das. "After the lead taken by their brethren in Tibet,
they should have done more to highlight the issue."

Kesang Bhutia, a college student, looks visibly shaken when asked why
Tibetans have failed to let people know what a grave injustice has
been done to their community. After thinking silently, he asks, "What
could I and people like me have done?" As a young boy living in a
Tibetan settlement in the North-East of India, he took part in various
demonstrations, but he looks helpless as he sums up the predicament of
Tibetans all over the world. "I am expected to study and take care of
my family. I'm alone in a foreign land. What can I do?"

In Das's opinion, this sudden silence after a spate of protests is
eerie. "You never know what can happen or what is being planned by the
various groups in China," he says.

Come August 8th, as people wait with bated breath for the Games to
begin, the people of Tibet, many of whom have not been to their
homeland, will have one question on their minds: How will they keep
the promise they made decades ago of returning to their homeland?