The Nobel Peace laureate and Tibetan spiritual leader His Holiness the Dalai Lama called for a violence free 21st century on Monday. His Holiness was invited as the chief guest of the 92nd Annual Meet of Association of Indian Universities at CIHTS in Sarnath and addressed the inaugural address to the three day annual meet.
“Respected brothers and sisters, this is how I prefer to begin because I really feel that if we kept the 7 billion human beings alive today in our hearts as brothers and sisters, many of the problems we face would disappear. Instead we think in terms of ‘us’ and ‘them’, which just leads to trouble. The world is becoming smaller and more interdependent. The global economy has no boundaries. Climate change affects the entire world. Our lives depend on water, and yet it is becoming increasingly scarce. In this new reality we must find new ways to think and act. Violence and war, outdated behaviour, must cease.” the Tibetan spiritual leader His Holiness the Dalai Lama addressed the gathering at the Central Institute for Higher Tibetan Studies (CIHTS) in Sarnath on Monday.
His Holiness as explained that when men fought in the past with swords, spears or obsolete guns it wasn’t so serious, they couldn’t do too much damage, but today there are several thousand nuclear weapons primed for use. He also added that while the 20th century saw great developments in many areas, it also experienced the wrath of violence. Therefore he called for the century to be an era of dialogue.
Geshe Ngawang Samten, Vice-Chancellor of the Central Institute for Higher Tibetan Studies addressed the welcome note at the gathering followed by remarks from Prof Furqan Qamar, Secretary General of AIU, Prof Francisco Marmolejo and Prof PB Sharma, President of AIU during the inaugural ceremony. The event was attended by about 150 Vice Chancellors of Indian Universities, academicians and scholars across the globe are taking part in the annual forum.
Leave a Reply