Uprising Day: Tibetan women hold march

Tribune News Service

Dharamsala, March 12

Members of the Tibetan women organisations today took out a protest march in Dharamsala to mark the 62nd anniversary of Tibetan Women Uprising Day. They carried Tibetan flags and raised slogans against China while marching from McLeodganj to the Kachehri crossing.

On March 10, 1959, the 14th Dalai Lama was invited to a theatrical performance at the Chinese army headquarters in Lhasa. A day before the event, the Dalai Lama was asked to attend the event unaccompanied by his guards. When this information reached the people, thousands of Tibetans formed a human chain around the Norbulingka palace to protect him. Seven days later, shells of the two mortars fired from a nearby Chinese army camp fell outside the palace’s northern gate and the Dalai Lama was forced to leave that very night. In the early hours of March 20, mortars and gunfire rained down on Tibetans and in the following days, thousands were massacred.

The organisation commemorates the contribution of Tibetan women in the uprising by organising a march every year.