(TibetanReview.net, Oct19’26) – China has jailed a former abbot of a major Tibetan Buddhist monastery in Machen (Chinese: Main) County of Golog (Guoluo) Prefecture, Qinghai province, for five years after arresting him for possessing photos and audio-visual materials on Tibet’s exiled spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, in his monastic residence during a police raid in Aug 2026, said the Tibetan language tibettimes.net Oct 17, citing an informed source. This was stated to have followed his second arrest.
The Central Tibetan Administration (Tibet.net) said Oct 19 that the senior Tibetan Buddhist master was stated to have been jailed for performing long-life prayers for the Dalai Lama.
On Aug 5, during the monks’ summer retreat, the county police put up a Chinese-text notice on the door of the residence of Ragya Monastery’s former abbot Lobsang Tenpa (usually known as Tenpa Gyatso), warning that no one should enter it. At that time, no one knew what had happened to the former abbot.
The report cited the source as saying it was later learnt that Chinese police had searched his residence and seized several photos of the Dalai Lama and of the monastery’s patron-head Kyabje Shingsa Rinpoche, as well as a thumb drive containing speeches and images of the exile Tibetan spiritual leader.
It has also been learnt that the former abbot was initially held in a prison in Golog County. However, after being tried in secret on or around Oct 5 and given a five-year jail sentence, he was said to be incarcerated in the provincial prison in the provincial capital Ziling (Xining), which was previously best known as a brickworks factory.
There is no information whether his family was notified about his arrest or trial, or whether he was represented by a lawyer of his choice, or, indeed, what he was charged with or tried for.
The source has also revealed that earlier, in May 2025, the county police took preventive measures against him, intimidated him with prolonged interrogations over many days, and held him in detention for several months before eventually releasing him. The reason for that was that for the purpose of His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s upcoming 90th birthday celebrations, the former abbot had called on the Tibetan public to offer prayers, taught them mantras to be recited, and rewarded those who had accumulated the most numbers of recitations with citations containing quotations of His Holiness the Dalai Lama.
Khensur Lobsang Tenpa was the 54th abbot of Ragya Monastery. Born in 1965 in the Hashiha Village, one of the cluster of four villages of the Tsangki Tso community. He joined Ragya Monastery in 1983 and assumed the post of its abbot for a five-year term in 2000, at the age of 35.
The source has said that because of severe restrictions being implemented in the local areas, no further information about the former abbot’s case could be obtained.
Founded in 1769 on the north bank of the Machu river (Yellow River) at the foot of a mountain, Ragya Monastery is one of the most famous Gelug centre along the upper Yellow River and features a large architectural complex including a Great Sutra Hall, Tantric institutes, a medical college, and stupa halls.