By Tenzin Dharpo
DHARAMSHALA, Mar. 9: The Tibetan Parliament in Exile (TPiE) announced Friday that it will convene the 10th session of the parliament from March 15 to 31 with precautionary measures in place in view of the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic.
“Following the Standard operating procedure (SOP) issued by the center and the state government of India, the budget session of the Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile for the fiscal year 2021-2022 will be held for 15 days from 15-31 March. Tibetan Parliamentarians from different states of India and from different countries will attend the session,” the parliamentary secretariat said in a statement last week after Deputy Speaker AcharyaYeshi Phuntsok and Secretary-General Tsewang Ngodup met Rakesh Kumar Prajapati, Deputy Commissioner of Kangra, Himachal Pradesh.
The DC advised adherence of government guidelines during the parliamentary session and assured inspection of the parliament premises if needed, the statement further added.
As part of its precautionary measure, the TPiE will not host any observers or guests to attend the proceedings in the house. The dedicated observer area used to seat guests will instead be utilised to seat MPs to accommodate social distancing in the house. Lawmakers are required to bring Covid-19 test results conducted within the last 72 hours and those with negative results must stay in quarantine for a week.
The Speaker of the TPiE Pema Jungney told VOA that he has also made appeal to the Health Department to conduct tests on all those participating in the session including the MPs and Secretariat staffers before the house begins the session next week.
The 10th and the final session which will over see the budgetary session of the the fiscal year 2021-2022 was postponed on August 17 last year by the house Standing Committee citing growing danger of the Covid-19 pandemic and the inability of the MPs to attend the session due to the travel ban at the time.
Dharamshala where the Tibetan parliament is based saw a large cluster case of more than 150 cases at the Gyuto monastery prompting concern among the residents of the virtual capital of the exile Tibetan diaspora. The incident has also prompted the CTA to do away with its official function and public gathering for the 62nd Anniversary of Tibetan National Uprising Day at Tsuglakhang and instead hold a curtailed event at the Sikyong hall in Gankyi on March 10.
According to the Covid-19 statistics maintained by the CTA, till date Tibetans in India, Nepal and Bhutan recorded 1576 cases; 1480 of them recovered, 55 active cases and 41 fatalities.
Abroad, 213 cases were recorded; 165 of them recovered, 33 active cases and 9 deaths according to CTA date obtained through various Office of Tibet spread across the globe.
The past week, mass COVID-testing drive covered 1805 Tibetans in India and 413 Tibetans including health care workers received the vaccination for the virus, the CTA Covid-19 response committee said.
The Indian Health Ministry has advised continued adherence to precautionary measures such as wearing masks and maintaining social distancing despite dip in infection rates in the country and the rollout of the ambitious inoculation drive for more than 1.3 billion of its citizens.
