(TibetanReview.net, Apr04’25) – Amid rumours whether a prominent Tibetan Buddhist leader in Golog (Chinese: Guoluo) prefecture of Qinghai province who went missing eight months ago had been arrested, Chinese authorities have informed monks of his monastery on Apr 2 that he had died, reported rfa.org and the Tibetan language tibettimes.net Apr 2. The disappearance of the religious leader, Tulku Hungkar Dorje, reportedly followed his works and remarks directed at the preservation of Tibetan language and culture and the Chinese-government appointed 11th Panchen Lama’s visit to his area last year.
Tulku Hungkar Dorje, 56, the 10th abbot of Lung-ngon Monastery in the prefecture’s Gade (Gande) County, was well known as a philanthropist, educator and religious teacher, besides being an author. He went missing on Jul 21, 2024 amid suspicion that Chinese police had taken him away. In Aug 24, the authorities announced that the lama had disappeared, according to the tibettimes.net report.
Chinese officials on Apr 2 summoned seven monks from the Lung-ngon Monastery and informed them about Tulku Hungkar Dorje’s death. They were stated to have been made to sign an official document confirming that he had died.
The officials have provided no information on the time and place or circumstance of his death, the rfa.org report cited its local Tibetan sources as saying, speaking on condition of anonymity for safety reasons. There is also no information on the lama’s whereabouts during the past eight months, or what had become of his remains.
Local Tibetans were stated to have expressed anguish on social media platforms over the news of the lama’s death. “As learned leaders depart like this, one after another, we are left behind like a flock of sheep without a shepherd,” one Tibetan netizen was stated to have written, apparently referring to a number of other similar deaths of such people.
Chinese officials are stated to have imposed strict restrictions on the monks of the monastery and local Tibetans, forbidding any public discussions about the lama’s disappearance and prohibiting the sharing of his teachings in audio or video formats.
Tulku Hungkar Dorje’s popularity for his works in philanthropy, as well as in Tibetan language and culture, had put him in direct conflict with President Xi Jinping’s campaign to Sinicize the Tibetan regions.
He was stated to have founded the first Buddhist nunnery in Golog’s history in 2005 and also established several schools and vocational centres, including the Hungkar Dorje Ethnic Vocational High School and the Mayul Centre of Studies, to provide free education to Tibetan children from local nomadic families.
Most of these schools were stated to have been shut shortly after his disappearance, with one having been shut down much earlier, in 2021.
The schools were stated to have taught children Tibetan history and language, Chinese and English languages, mathematics and moral education. Vocational training in Thangka painting, Tibetan medicine, tailoring and carpet weaving were also reportedly offered.
Besides, the Gesar Shenpen Foundation, set up by him 2004, was stated to have run a number of welfare programmes, including free distribution of food, clothes, and medicine to thousands of local Tibetan people, including monks, nuns, and the elderly.
Tulku Hungkar Dorje was suspected to have been taken away and possibly put to death by the authorities for these efforts as well as for his perceived failure to extend a proper reception to the Chinese government installed 11th Panchen Lama Gyaincain Norbu during the latter’s visit to Golog last year, said the tibettimes.net report.
Tulku Hungkar Dorje was also stated to have written several books, including “Tangkas in Golog: The Tangka Album of Lung Ngon Monastery” and “The Melodious Sound of the Laughter of the Vidyadharas of the Three Lineages.”