Rumors that Chinese officials intended to seize the 14th Dalai Lama triggered a mass gathering of Tibetans around his summer palace, Norbulingka. The standoff escalated over the following days into open revolt against Chinese rule, crushed by the People's Liberation Army by late March. The Dalai Lama fled to India, where he established a government in exile that endures today.
For nearly a decade, tension had simmered between Tibetans and the Chinese Communist authorities who had occupied the region since 1950. On March 10, 1959, word spread through Lhasa that the Dalai Lama had been invited to a theatrical performance at the Chinese military headquarters without his usual bodyguard escort, a break from protocol that many Tibetans read as a prelude to kidnapping.
By morning, an estimated 30,000 Tibetans had surrounded Norbulingka, the Dalai Lama's summer palace, forming a human shield and refusing to disperse. Women, monks, and farmers alike joined the crowd, chanting for Chinese withdrawal and Tibetan independence. The Dalai Lama, then only 23, found himself caught between the fury of his own people and the threat of Chinese retaliation.
The standoff hardened into the Tibetan uprising, which the People's Liberation Army suppressed with artillery and mass arrests by March 20-23, killing an estimated 10,000 to 15,000 people in Lhasa alone. On March 17, the Dalai Lama slipped out of the city disguised as a soldier and began a perilous two-week trek across the Himalayas to India. March 10 is now commemorated annually as Tibetan Uprising Day by exile communities worldwide.
Key people: 14th Dalai Lama