Karmapa probe is on: Chidambaram
Home minister P. Chidambaram on Monday said that investigation is going on into the alleged Chinese linkages of Karmapa Ugyen Trinley Dorje . However, he said that the government was yet to draw any conclusion on the issue as the probe was still on. Mr Chidambaram said various government agencies were investigating into the recovery of `7.5 crore from the offices of a trust backed by Karmapa in Himachal Pradesh. “I have been briefed but I am not prepared to draw any conclusion at this stage. And since I did not draw any conclusion, I can’t share anything with you either,” he said when asked about the reports of Chinese link to the cash haul. Meanwhile, defence minister A.K. Antony said that the government is taking the issue seriously and the matter is under investigation. The agencies are trying to find out the truth, he said.
Central agencies are probing whether the large cash haul of Chinese currency recovered from a Buddhist monastery linked to Karmapa was deliberately not converted into Indian rupees so that it could be ‘’re-routed’’ to the monasteries in China.
A senior government official said that investigating agencies are probing the ‘’source’’ of the Chinese currency by ascertaining the number of Chinese visitors to the monastery.
“It is being examined whether a proper record of all donations had been maintained or not,” the official said. Further, the agencies are suspicious that Karmapa and his aides was re-routing the foreign currency they received into the monasteries in China.
“The money was not converted into Indian currency and deposited in a bank,” an official noted.
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Monk not a Chinese spy: Beijing
Beijing, Jan. 31: Beijing has said that speculation over Ugyen Trinley Dorje, the 17th Karmapa of the Karma Kagyu sect, being a Chinese spy “shows that India is keeping its mistrustful attitude toward China”, an official said. A Chinese official denied reports that the Karmapa was part of a Chinese plan to control monasteries along the Sino-Indian border. Xu Zhitao, an official at the united front work department of the CPC central committee, told the Global Times Sunday that “the speculation by India’s media shows that India is keeping its mistrustful attitude toward China”.
—IANS
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