These horrible murders took place over ten years ago, and in all that time not a shred of evidence has ever been found linking Dorje Shugden practitioners to them. Nonetheless, the Dalai Lama and Office of Tibet continue to repeat this calumny on their website and literature.

Repeating a lie over and over again does not make it the truth. We will not repeat the defamations here: you can check the Dalai Lama’s literature for the ghastly pictures of poor Lobsang Gyatso and the false accusations. We do however need to address the false accusations here, as they are parrotted over and over again by supporters of the ban against Dorje Shugden practice. This is even though they have already been proven unfounded by the Indian police years ago due to no evidence, and it is a lie to say that any “arrest warrants remain pending” as there are no actual suspects.

Any number of possible suspects

In reality, there are any number of possible suspects for the murders but the true culprits have never been found as the Dalai Lama prefers conveniently for his political objectives to keep the blame on Dorje Shugden practitioners. Why? To try and convince the world that they are evil and so his ban on their religious practice is reasonable. The fact is, these practitioners have never committed any violent actions. They are peace-loving Buddhists who follow the non-violence, love and compassion taught to them by Trijang Rinpoche — the Dalai Lama’s own teacher — and other great Buddhist Lamas of Je Tsongkhapa’s tradition.

According to a disciple of Geshe Lobsang Gyatso, as reported in the Austrian Buddhist magazine “Ursache und Wirkung”, July 2006, page 73, before he was killed, Lobsang Gyatso had to face many death threats, but refused any personal security.

Lobsang Gyatso was very outspoken and had many targets, all of them those who disagreed with the Dalai Lama. For example, the Dalai Lama’s own brother had a problem with his renouncing the cause of a Free Tibet. Also, in 1962 the Dalai Lama tried to unite all schools of Tibetan Buddhism under his authority, but this autocratic move was opposed by the Thirteen Tibetan Settlements and the 16th Karmapa. The Dalai Lama has many enemies, and Lobsang Gyatso goaded them all.

Helmut Gassner, an Austrian Buddhist monk who was a translator for the Dalai Lama for seventeen years around this period, spoke about the murders in a talk he gave to the Friedrich-Naumann-Foundation Hamburg, on March 26th 1999 (http://www.wisdombuddhadorjeshugden.org/speechnaumannfoundation.pdf):

“The Director of the Dialectics School was well known for his slanderous writings in which he would drag through the mud anything that veered even slightly from the course established by the government-in-exile: famous masters, the big monastic universities and even the Tibetan guerillas were his targets. In one of his last articles he wrote, “…these people will not cease to criticize the Dalai Lama until blood flows from their bodies…”

Given the character of the assassination and the humiliations the Tibetan guerilla movement had been subjected to in earlier years, one could have assumed that the search for the murderer would eventually also lead to them. But that obviously did not occur; already the next day, Dharamsala’s local newspaper claimed that the murderer would certainly be found among the Dorje Shugden Society in Delhi. Aside from who committed the murders, this gruesome act was exploited to the hilt by the government-in-exile with only one aim in mind: Resorting to all possible means they tried to incriminate the Dorje Shugden Society in Delhi in order to put its leading monks behind Indian bars. For the benefit of the press, the image of a Dorje Shugden sect with bloodthirsty, cultish, terrorist and fundamentalist attributes was successfully established linking it effectively with the traditionally depicted wrathful appearance of the deity while cleverly neglecting to mention that many wrathful Buddhist deities are represented in considerably more terrifying ways.”

Geshe Kelsang Gyatso also made reference to other suspects for the murders in his reply to a 1997 article in Newsweek, where Robert Thurman offensively and ignorantly described Dorje Shugden practitioners as the “Taliban of Buddhism”:

“Robert Thurman is quoted as saying: “I think there’s no doubt that Shugden was behind the killings.” Of course, killing people is very bad, and I utterly condemn these appalling murders, but by reading the letter addressed to HH the Dalai Lama known as the ‘Mongoose Canine Letter’, we can clearly understand that HH the Dalai Lama has many enemies, so why are only Shugden supporters suspected? It is a great pity that Lobsang Gyatso who was a 70-year old Geshe died in the most horrible of circumstances, seemingly because HH the Dalai Lama has many enemies.”

The Shugden Society in New Delhi has always denied any involvement in the murders or threats and after an investigation by the Indian police were found to have no involvement in the murders. [Mike Wilson, 1999, Schisms, murder, and hungry ghosts in Shangra-La - internal conflicts in Tibetan Buddhist sect.] This fact has been ignored by the Tibetan government in Exile, which continues to make the false accusation on its website.

There are therefore many people who might have wanted Lobsang Gyatso dead — all enemies of the Dalai Lama, in fact. The Tibetan Government in Exile (TGIE) have exploited his death to cause problems for Shugden practitioners.

Shred of evidence?

There was only one possible shred of evidence, a supposed “threatening letter” found in Lobsang Gyatso’s office.

According to the Indian police in 1996, there was a “threatening letter to the monk Lobsang Gyatso, and it proves the direct connection of murderers with Shugden”. He also said: “The six murderers have fled to Tibet where they live under protection from China.” The investigation stopped there.

On a Swiss TV program discussing the subject, the TGIE minister Tashi Wangdu exhibited the “evidence” in front of the camera. According to the commentator, this was the death threat letter sent by Dorje Shugden followers to the murder victim as mentioned by the police.

Later, the Tibetan text on the letter was copied and translated by various Tibetan speakers. It contained absolutely no death threat at all. It was simply an impertinent letter containing a challenge to debate the issue so as to settle the differences.

As to where and how the Chinese are supposedly sheltering six murderers in Tibet, there has not been any evidence of this either in ten years. The Dorje Shugden Devotees Charitable and Religious Society, whom apparently supplied the murderers, continue their peaceful work in India to oppose the ban and none of their members have fled anywhere.

See also the Dorje Shugden Devotees Charitable and Religious Society account.

See also Did Dorje Shugden practitioners issue death threats? (including the misinformation spread by Tashi Wangdi) (Editor’s Note: This link appears to have been removed from the mentioned website).

This repeated defamation, with blatantly political objectives, is one of the many reasons Western Shugden Society members everywhere are following the Dalai Lama to ask him to “Stop Lying!”

(Source: http://wisdombuddhadorjeshugden.blogspot.com/2008/06/defamatory-accusations-of-murder.html)