02-01-2006, 01:37 PM
Shekhar Gupta Interview with Dalai Lama
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->SG: I read in your biography that when you first came to India in 1956, you had several meetings with Jawaharlal Nehru. Do you remember something about those meetings?
HHDL:<b> It's very interesting: the main person who advised me to return, in 1956 and '57 was Pandit Nehru.</b>
SG: He said, go back to Tibet?
HHDL: <b>Yes. Once he came to see me with a copy of a seventeen-point programme. He personally read it out to me and he told me that it should be the basis on which I should carry on the struggle to preserve our culture.</b> He gave me every encouragement to struggle within Tibet. Then in '59, things became out of control and there was no other way but to leave. But he showed me a special interest and concern because I had listened to his advice to return-the situation had become such a disaster that he felt a moral responsibility to help. In the early 1960s, he really helped a lot-and on some occasions, <b>I also got a scolding from him. He lost his temper (laughs).
</b><!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
This is the seventeen point program signed by the
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->SG: Over what?
HHDL: Once, we were in Mussoorie, I think it was our first meeting after I escaped.<b> I had a long talk with him about what had happened since I returned from India in '57. Then I requested him for help to stop the bloodshed and the suffering and also told him that we were trying to re-establish the Tibetan government in southern Tibet. That was when he lost his temper. He banged on the chair and said it was impossible.</b> He found a contradiction between the two. But later, in '59, <b>when we decided to raise the Tibetan issue at the UN, Pandit Nehru was opposed to it.</b> When I went to meet him, I was quite apprehensive of what he might say. But he was completely normal.<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
So Taking Tibet to the UN was completely out of the question. But Kashmir, where India was winning, needed to be settled by the UN.
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->SG: You've seen all generations of India's leaders. There's a fascinating account of <b>Nehru's meeting with Dwight Eisenhower, where he tells Eisenhower not to be so angry with China, </b>he says: <b>âGive Communism time, it will ultimately sort itself out.' </b>Countered to that is the Chinese view: âPostpone every problem, leave it to a wiser generation.' Now Nehru's generation, Indira Gandhi's generation could not solve the India Pakistan problem. Do you think the leaders of today's generation have it in them to solve it?
I think the overall picture has changed greatly from the early '60s to the 21st century. I think, world-wide, the concept is coming in of non-violence, of neighbourliness.<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->SG: I read in your biography that when you first came to India in 1956, you had several meetings with Jawaharlal Nehru. Do you remember something about those meetings?
HHDL:<b> It's very interesting: the main person who advised me to return, in 1956 and '57 was Pandit Nehru.</b>
SG: He said, go back to Tibet?
HHDL: <b>Yes. Once he came to see me with a copy of a seventeen-point programme. He personally read it out to me and he told me that it should be the basis on which I should carry on the struggle to preserve our culture.</b> He gave me every encouragement to struggle within Tibet. Then in '59, things became out of control and there was no other way but to leave. But he showed me a special interest and concern because I had listened to his advice to return-the situation had become such a disaster that he felt a moral responsibility to help. In the early 1960s, he really helped a lot-and on some occasions, <b>I also got a scolding from him. He lost his temper (laughs).
</b><!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
This is the seventeen point program signed by the
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->SG: Over what?
HHDL: Once, we were in Mussoorie, I think it was our first meeting after I escaped.<b> I had a long talk with him about what had happened since I returned from India in '57. Then I requested him for help to stop the bloodshed and the suffering and also told him that we were trying to re-establish the Tibetan government in southern Tibet. That was when he lost his temper. He banged on the chair and said it was impossible.</b> He found a contradiction between the two. But later, in '59, <b>when we decided to raise the Tibetan issue at the UN, Pandit Nehru was opposed to it.</b> When I went to meet him, I was quite apprehensive of what he might say. But he was completely normal.<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
So Taking Tibet to the UN was completely out of the question. But Kashmir, where India was winning, needed to be settled by the UN.
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->SG: You've seen all generations of India's leaders. There's a fascinating account of <b>Nehru's meeting with Dwight Eisenhower, where he tells Eisenhower not to be so angry with China, </b>he says: <b>âGive Communism time, it will ultimately sort itself out.' </b>Countered to that is the Chinese view: âPostpone every problem, leave it to a wiser generation.' Now Nehru's generation, Indira Gandhi's generation could not solve the India Pakistan problem. Do you think the leaders of today's generation have it in them to solve it?
I think the overall picture has changed greatly from the early '60s to the 21st century. I think, world-wide, the concept is coming in of non-violence, of neighbourliness.<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->