By Dawa Dolma
Prior to Hu Jintao visit in New Delhi, I participated in a protest organized by Regional Tibetan Youth Congress as a student in 2012. It was when we were gathered at JantarMantar, a person doused in flame shouting ‘Free Tibet’ ran towards the aisle and flipped down.
A group of people tried to extinguished the fire to save Pawo (Martyr) Jamphel Yeshi’s life. We were frozen, sobbed heavily, and chanted mantra of compassion ‘Om Mani Padme Hum’ for inadvertently witnessing a brave act. Protestors were agitated and rallied a massive protest led to house arrest of Tibetan Youth Hostel, Tibetan Settlement, and Tibetan commercial hub across Delhi.
The next day we learnt the demise of Pawo Jamphel Yeshi la. Tibetans across the world mourned for him, just like we grieved for 155 self-immolators inside Tibet. Most of them belong to a town called Ngaba situated in Sichuan province of China. As mention on the front page of newspapers around the world “Ngaba is the undisputed world capital of self-immolation. Recently Barbara Demick, a prominent journalistpublished her latest book called Eat the Buddha, Life and Death in a Tibetan Town. Itis a collection of oral history from different walks of life and examine why this particular town has the greatest number of self-immolators?
Ngaba, a well-to-do town in terms of economy, infrastructure, and living standard provided by Chinese Communist Party. “I have everything I might possibly want in life, but my freedom” says a Tibetan business man. The government provide the best service through policing. And freedom is nowhere to be seen among ethnic and religious minorities groups like Tibetan, Uighurs, Inner Mongolian, and Falun Gong practitioners. Those who burned themselves were motivated by their sense of powerlessness, injustice, inequality, and no freedom.
Unlike Mohammed Bouazizi incident which led to Arab Spring movement, self-immolations in Tibet unfortunately couldn’t spark a national movement. Because CCP is known for its advanced technological surveillance, the closed-circuit cameras, biometric tracking of the population are maintained orderly and ubiquitously.
There is saying in Tibetan “When there is a fire in Lhasa, the smoke rises in Ngaba.” The town is known for political resistance primarily because Ngaba was the first place where Tibetans encountered the Chinese Communists in the 1930s. Later the local’s revolutionary tried to get rid of Red Army in 1950s. The Ngaba self-immolators were influenced by family tradition to stand up to the CCP rule, dissent to injustice run into their blood. The historical account of Ngaba is disturbing, heartbreaking, necessary that everyone should know.
About the author: Dawa Dolma is a freelance journalist and independent researcher based in LehLadakh, India.
