【英语生活】班禅喇嘛过着“正常生活” Panchen Lama is healthy, says China after 20 years of silence

The Panchen Lama, who vanished 20 years ago at the age of six after being chosen by the Dalai Lama as the next-highest figure in Tibetan Buddhism, is “growing up healthily and does not wish to be disturbed”, a Chinese government official who serves as a liaison to the Tibetans said yesterday.

Gendun Choekyi Nyima was taken into custody in 1995 by Chinese authorities after Tibetan religious leaders recognised him as the latest reincarnation of the Panchen Lama. He has not been seen in public since. Norbu Dunzhub, a member of the Tibet Autonomous Region’s United Front Work Department, told reporters he was “living a normal life” but did not specify where.

The Panchen and Dalai Lamas have historically vied with each other for religious and political power in Tibet. Control over the arcane procedure for choosing their reincarnations is a key to political legitimacy on the strategic and ethnically distinct Tibetan plateau, location of the headwaters of most of China’s largest rivers.

The struggle over the Panchen Lama’s reincarnation is viewed as a prelude to the much bigger battle over who will control that of the Dalai Lama’s, now 80, given the stature he has in Tibetan and international communities. He has said he might rule out reincarnation to prevent Beijing from usurping the process.

In 1995 Chinese-appointed authorities chose a different boy, Gyaincain Norbu, as the Panchen Lama, on the grounds that a ceremony dating from the Qing dynasty gives the officially atheist Chinese state the right to select reincarnations of Tibetan religious leaders. That young man, now 25, was raised in Beijing and has appeared occasionally in public, including delivering a speech in English in 2009 at a World Buddhist Conference organised in the eastern city of Wuxi.

When the Chinese Communist party took power in mainland China in 1949, both the Panchen and the Dalai Lamas were teenagers. The Dalai Lama fled over the Himalayas in 1959 after the People’s Liberation Army took control of Tibet following an uprising against forced collectivisation and land reform during the Great Leap Forward.

The previous Panchen Lama was imprisoned in 1962 for “organising a rebellion” after writing a report criticising the starvation of Tibetans due to collectivisation and disastrous crop policies during the Great Leap Forward. He was released in the 1980s and died in Tibet in 1989.

A rail connection to the Tibetan capital Lhasa completed in 2006 has accelerated Chinese state-backed investment in the region, particularly in mining and hydropower projects, bottled water and tourism. A white paper released yesterday said all officially recognised villages in the region gained access to electricity by the end of 2012.

负责与藏人联络的一名中国官员昨日表示，20年前在6岁时被达赖喇嘛(Dalai Lama)选为藏传佛教二号人物后失踪的班禅喇嘛正在“健康成长，他不希望受到任何的干扰”。

1995年，更登确吉尼玛(Gendun Choekyi Nyima)被多名西藏宗教领袖认定为班禅喇嘛(Panchen Lama)转世后遭中国当局扣押。此后他从未在公开场合露面。西藏自治区党委统战部部务会成员罗布顿珠(Norbu Dunzhub)告诉记者，更登确吉尼玛过着“正常的生活”，但没有说明他的下落。

班禅喇嘛和达赖喇嘛历来相互争夺西藏的宗教和政治权力。控制选择其转世灵童的神秘仪式，是在西藏拥有政治合法性的一个关键。西藏高原地处中国大多数最大江河的源头，具有独特的战略意义，同时藏人是一个有鲜明特色的民族。

鉴于达赖喇嘛在藏人乃至国际社会的声望，有关班禅喇嘛转世灵童的波折被视为一场重大得多的斗争的序曲——谁将控制现年80岁的达赖喇嘛的转世？达赖喇嘛已经表示，他可能选择不转世，以防北京方面控制这个流程。

1995年，由中国中央政府任命的西藏当局依照一个源自清朝的仪式，选择了一位名为坚赞诺布(Gyaincain Norbu)的男孩为班禅喇嘛的转世。该仪式使号称无神论的中国政府获得了选择西藏宗教领导人转世的权力。这位现年25岁的男青年在北京抚养长大，偶尔在公共场合出现，2009年他曾在华东城市无锡举行的世界佛教大会(World Buddhist Conference)上用英语发表讲话。

1949年，当中共在中国内地夺取权力时，班禅喇嘛和达赖喇嘛都还是十几岁的少年。在解放军控制西藏后的1959年，在一场反对大跃进期间强制性集体化和土改的暴动之后，达赖喇嘛翻越喜马拉雅山出逃。

1962年，由于写报告批评大跃进期间的集体化政策及灾难性的农业政策导致藏人饥荒，班禅喇嘛因“组织叛乱”入狱。他于上世纪80年代被释放，1989年在西藏逝世。

2006年完工的通往西藏首府拉萨的铁路线，加快了国家支持的对该地区的投资，尤其是在采矿和水力发电项目、瓶装水和旅游业等领域。昨天发布的一份白皮书表示，到2012年底，西藏所有“行政村”都已通电。

译者/何黎