By Tenzin Nyidon
DHARAMSHALA, Dec 22: The parliament secretariat of the Tibetan Parliament in Exile in an official circular on Thursday announced that the remainder of the sixth session of the 17th Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile (TPiE) has been rescheduled later in March 2024. Originally slated to reconvene for the pending agenda of the general session between December 25 and 29, the session will now convene from March 13 to 16, 2024.
The session’s postponement is due to the unavailability of the required quorum needed to officially convene the session. The announcement stated that 16 Parliamentarians have taken a leave of absence, leading to the lack of necessary numbers to convene the house.
Last month, a group of MPs in a signed letter urged the parliamentary secretariat to convene the remainder of the sixth session before and in conjunction with the seventh session, citing additional expenses related to travel and conveyance for lawmakers, some of whom travel from overseas. A member of the TPiE’s standing committee citing official document told Phayul that the expenses for lodging, conveyance and travel, as well as other expenses stacks up to over 20 lakhs for a typical 10 day session for the lawmakers.
In accordance with Article 49 (ii) of the Charter of Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile, “In case a meeting of the Tibetan Parliament had to be adjourned for more than seven days due to the absence of the requisite quorum for the purpose, the Speaker and the Deputy Speaker shall together take a decision to the adjourn the meeting,” the announcement further read.
The sixth session of the 17th Parliament was adjourned on the fourth day of the parliamentary session and a significant portion of the agendas tabled for the general session remained incomplete.
The 17th TPiE was unable to convene the general session of this year due to the absence of the requisite quorum needed for the session to constitute, following a walk out by some members of the parliament.
In a separate official circular by the Parliamentary Secretariat on Thursday announced that the seventh session of the 17th Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile initially planned to take place from March 14 to March 30, 2024, has been rescheduled. The new dates for the session are from March 18 to March 30, 2024, spanning 10 days and will be held in the Parliamentary Hall, adding that all members of the parliament must report to the Secretariat on March 17.
The prolonged deadlock within the parliament has resulted in a growing public perception that the elected Members of Parliament (MPs) are unable to effectively carry out their duties. This situation has led to increased division and is seen as a failure on the part of the lawmakers to fulfil their responsibilities.
Please fulfill your duty bei remaining on the agenda. Be a good example for our younger generations through dedication, discipline, respectfulness, dignity and unity with real love and compassion at least among ourselves.
Remember where you were and who brought you up to the present stages. Remember your parents who could not bring you up and educate in your young ages. Remember the dedicated members of the sixties and seventies with very poor resources, who worked hard under His Holiness the Dalai Lama‘s guidance and vision.
I can tell you, many young children are quite fed up with your squabble in the parliament and the many fake or silly assertions in the media and in our society. They lose interest for the Tibetan issue, because they find us only fighting among ourselves for silly or no reasonable matters. They want to be Tibetans and they are not interested in this unreasonable fanatic regionalism and so on. We are Tibetans at first and our country is བོད་གངས་ཅན་གྱི་ལྗོངས། Remember please, united we stand and divided we fall.
I had the opportunity to work and be with members of old government members from Tibet in early seventies in Delhi amd Dharamsala. They told me that without his Holiness‘s sacrifices for Tibet, Tibetans and Tibetan religion and culture, we are not in any country where we could live in safety and prosperity as we are now. Without His Holiness, we are now in Tibet under the communist Chinese dictatorship, if we are at all alive. I have wrote some time back how India ordered the Tibetans who were already in India to back to Tibet in early 1959. India put this order down as soon as His Holiness put his feet on the Indian soil.
Not only that, His Holiness organized at first an exile government to look after the Tibetans who could come to India after him and also of course to fight back our country from the communist China. In the mean time he founded schools for the children, settlements for the grown up people and monasteries for the monks and later high education institutions. He visited other countries and waked interest in Buddhism in theses countries and sent religious teachers to these countries, which brought benefits for the both sides. Many people are not aware or forget the kindness and far sighted vision of our His Holiness the Dalai Lama.
We have to remember that we have no political parties which of course makes no sense at the moment. So it was a wise decision to elect members of the parliament from the people of three main regions and from all schools of the religion from Tibet with the main object that we work unitedly in harmony and dignity. Please think Tibet is our country and we are non other than Tibetans. With this in your mind please fulfill your duty as you have sworn in. This will bring pleasure in your own life and we will all be happy and thankful to you all. བོད་རྒྱལ་ལོ།