Non-violence works as a strategy only when it can mobilise people. Gandhi lived among the people he mobilised. The British were numerically minuscule vis-à-vis Indians in the country and Indians were never seen as part of British national identity. Demographically, the parallel does not hold in the case of China and Tibet. The Tibetans are part of Chinese nationalism. The Dalai Lama’s exile offers him no means to influence the majority of Tibetans living inside Tibet except through his own symbolism.

Diasporic Tibetans know that this symbolism imposes its own limitations on the options available to them to shape their political present. They cannot wait until the XIVth Dalai Lama’s demise to think of an alternative future (for there is someone else waiting for him to go away too). If they so decide after democratic discussions, they relieve him of the burden of leading Tibetans politically. He can provide moral and spiritual guidance to those who look up to him. Maybe he can then convince China to let him go to Tibet.

A dynamic and radicalised exile leadership without the Dalai Lama will provide greater clarity but will it be able to overcome four main obstacles? One, intolerance of their activities by India and Nepal. Two, drying up of sympathy and attention given to Tibetans in the west. Three, divisions among Tibetans on various issues. Four, China’s overwhelming authority.

And what if ‘Free Tibet’ for many inside China’s Tibet means something very different from their diasporic counterparts? What if most Tibetans inside Tibet have neither the appetite nor the desire to really free Tibet from China? What if they are reconciled to being part of China so long as religious freedom is allowed? So long as they get to worship the Dalai Lama!

... contd.