Keeping the Lamas Cool

"To hold Tibet firmly," goes an old Tibetan saying, "the conqueror must win Potala's top floor." Potala is the 500-ft.-high, 1,400-room Lhasa stronghold of the Dalai Lama, Tibet's powerful temporal ruler, and the top floor is the Lama's private residence. Since Red China "liberated" Tibet in 1951, hundreds of Chinese officials have been popping in and out of Potala's top floor, wooing the 21-year-old Dalai Lama with flattery and gifts (among them: ten autos, a direct phone to Peking), and isolating him from his own countrymen. But despite his occasional public concurrences in their party line, they still do not trust him, remembering his flight to India when Red China marched into Tibet. The 18-year-old Panchen Lama, Tibet's spiritual ruler, is more acquiescent, and the Red Chinese have tried to bolster his status at the expense of the Dalai Lama.

India's Prime Minister Nehru recently invited both Lamas to visit New Delhi in May to help celebrate the 2,500th anniversary of Buddha's birth. Last week Nehru ruefully announced that the Lamas could not come. "India in May," Red China had replied, "will be too hot for the Dalai and Panchen Lamas." Besides, the two young rulers were "busy implementing Tibet's constitutional reforms." The Chinese indicated, however, that the Lamas would shortly be allowed to make a trip to cool, cool Moscow, where requests for help can safely be disregarded.

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