Gyatsho Tshering (1936 in

Sikkim Sikkim (; ) is a state in Northeastern India. It borders the Tibet Autonomous Region of China in the north and northeast, Bhutan in the east, Province No. 1 of Nepal in the west and West Bengal in the south. Sikkim is also close to the Siligur ...

– 25 June 2009 in

Minneapolis Minneapolis () is the largest city in Minnesota, United States, and the county seat of Hennepin County. The city is abundant in water, with thirteen lakes, wetlands, the Mississippi River, creeks and waterfalls. Minneapolis has its origins ...

), also spelled Gyatso Tsering, was

Tibet Tibet (; ''Böd''; ) is a region in East Asia, covering much of the Tibetan Plateau and spanning about . It is the traditional homeland of the Tibetan people. Also resident on the plateau are some other ethnic groups such as Monpa people, ...

an scholar of Indian nationality. Bhuchung K. Tsering
Obituary: Gyatsho Tshering, Eminent Scholar of Tibetan Studies
, Phayul.com, 29 June 2009 He was the former director of the

Library of Tibetan Works and Archives The Library of Tibetan Works and Archives (LTWA) is a Tibetan library in Dharamshala, India. The library was founded by Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama on 11 June 1970, and is considered one of the most important libraries and institutions of ...

Biography

Tshering was born in Sikkim of Lobsang Lama and Nyima Dolma and completed his studies at the

University of Calcutta The University of Calcutta (informally known as Calcutta University; CU) is a Public university, public collegiate university, collegiate State university (India), state university in India, located in Kolkata, West Bengal, India. Considered ...

. He then worked at the Ministry of External Affairs and the

Ministry of Home Affairs An interior ministry (sometimes called a ministry of internal affairs or ministry of home affairs) is a government department that is responsible for internal affairs. Lists of current ministries of internal affairs Named "ministry" * Ministry ...

of the

Government of India The Government of India (ISO: ; often abbreviated as GoI), known as the Union Government or Central Government but often simply as the Centre, is the national government of the Republic of India, a federal democracy located in South Asia, c ...

, and worked at the Indian Consulate-General in Lhasa and at the

Government of Sikkim The Government of Sikkim also known as the State Government of Sikkim is the subnational government of the Indian state of Sikkim and its 6 districts, created by the National Constitution as the legislative, executive and judicial authority to ...

. After his studies, he planned to become director of the

Namgyal Institute of Tibetology Namgyal Institute of Tibetology (NIT) is a Tibet museum in Gangtok, Sikkim, India, named after the 11th Chogyal of Sikkim, Sir Tashi Namgyal. The institute employs researchers and one of its new research programs is a project which seeks to d ...

and was sent for training at the Consulate of India in Lhasa, where he hold a position in 1955 until its closure during the

Sino-Indian War The Sino-Indian War took place between China and India from October to November 1962, as a major flare-up of the Sino-Indian border dispute. There had been a series of violent border skirmishes between the two countries after the 1959 Tib ...

in 1962. He remembers that between 1955 and 1959, some of the work at the consulate was to gather information on the activities of the Chinese army, and was therefore aware of the tension in March 1959. On the evening of 17 March, the atmosphere was particularly tense, and he spent the night with his colleagues at the consulate where he could not sleep. At 2 am, the shelling began, he knew that the

14th Dalai Lama The 14th Dalai Lama (spiritual name Jetsun Jamphel Ngawang Lobsang Yeshe Tenzin Gyatso, known as Tenzin Gyatso (Tibetan: བསྟན་འཛིན་རྒྱ་མཚོ་, Wylie: ''bsTan-'dzin rgya-mtsho''); né Lhamo Thondup), known as ...

left the

Norbulingka Norbulingka ( bo, ནོར་བུ་གླིང་ཀ་; Wylie: ''Nor-bu-gling-ka''; ; literally "Jeweled Park") is a palace and surrounding park in Lhasa, Tibet, built from 1755.Tibet (1986), p.71 It served as the traditional summer resid ...

, but kept it secret. He decided to go out to see what happens, and found the streets full of Chinese soldiers, shouting and firing at close range. There were masses of corpses. The artillery fired at

Potala The Potala Palace is a ''dzong'' fortress in Lhasa, Tibet. It was the winter palace of the Dalai Lamas from 1649 to 1959, has been a museum since then, and a World Heritage Site since 1994. The palace is named after Mount Potalaka, the mythica ...

, the bombing lasted 2 hours, after which the monks got out from the Potala, providing easy targets for Chinese military guns. He also saw two women and a man walking on the road, white scarves at hands as a sign of peace. They were mown down by 4 or 5 shots. In a monastery near the Potala, he saw Chinese soldiers looking for weapons, threatening thirty Tibetans who raised their hands, who were finally shot He joined the

Central Tibetan Administration The Central Tibetan Administration (, , ), often referred to as the Tibetan Government-in-Exile, is a non-profit political organization based in Dharamshala, India. Its organization is modeled after an elective parliamentary government, compo ...

in 1963 and worked in various departments until his retirement in the late 1990s. He worked for publishing and translation services in 1965. In 1966, he was transferred to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and in 1967 to the Department of Religion and Culture. During this period, he was a member of the entourage of the 14th Dalai Lama during his first trip to Japan and Thailand. Subsequently, he was promoted Secretary of the Ministry and later Deputy Minister. In 1972, he became the Acting Director of the Library of Tibetan Works and Archives newly created until the appointment of Prof.

Thupten Jigme Norbu Thubten Jigme Norbu () (August 16, 1922 – September 5, 2008), recognised as the Taktser Rinpoche, was a Tibetan lama, writer, civil rights activist and professor of Tibetan studies and was the eldest brother of the 14th Dalai Lama, Tenzin Gy ...

as director in June this same year. He was appointed by the Dalai Lama as the new director of the Library of Tibetan Works and Archives in 1974 and held that position from 1 March until his retirement April 1998. In 1999, he joined his wife, Namgyal Dolma, to the United States and they settled in Minneapolis. Tshering's most significant contribution is the development of the

as pre-eminent center for Tibetan studies at international level. Tshering died in 2009. He is survived by his wife Namgyal Dolma and his daughter Yiga Lhamo.

Tributes

American singer-songwriter Larry Long wrote the song "Tibet" in Tshering's honor., LarryLongTroubadour, 6 January 2012

Some of his publications

Books

* ''The Tibetan Cathedral, Thekchen Chholing, Dharamsala, Himachal Pradesh: A Souvenir'', Ed. Tibetan Cultural Printing Press, 1970 * ''The Guru Puja and The Hundred Deities of the Land of Joy'', Dharamsala, Library of Tibetan Works and Archives, 1995

Preface

* ''Vivre la méditation au quotidien'', Dalaï-Lama ; trad. de l'anglais par Pema Dorje et Marie-Pierre d'Haillecourt ; assistés pour la version définitive par M.-T. Guettab ; Paris : Éd. Dewatshang, 1995

Translations

* Yeshi Donden, 'Tibetan Medicine: A Brief History, translated by Gyatsho Tshering', The Tibet Society Bulletin, 5 (1972): pp. 7–24.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Tshering, Gyatsho 1936 births Writers from Sikkim 2009 deaths University of Calcutta alumni Tibetologists Indian people of Tibetan descent Tibetan–English translators Writers from Minneapolis 20th-century Indian translators Indian religious writers Indian social sciences writers 20th-century Indian biographers