Journalism of Courage
A recent exhibition of personal archives titled Shadow Circus - A Personal Archive of Tibetan Resistance (1957–1974) brought some memories from the Guerrilla war that was fought from the mid-1950s to 1974 when thousands of Tibetans took up arms against the invading forces of China to the fore; Reconnaissance team in Tibet (Source: PR Handout)
The exhibition also re-evaluated the audiovisual material that filmmakers Ritu Sarin and Tenzing Sonam gathered over the years, including Lhamo Tsering’s personal archives, and presented a re-edited version of their 1998 documentary – The Shadow Circus: The CIA in Tibet – to create a more complete and complex mosaic of the event; Lhamo Tsering with camera (Source: PR Handout)
Camp Hale CIA Training Centre (Source: PR Handout)
Tenzing’s late father Lhamo Tsering was one of the leaders of the Resistance and the key liaison between Tibetan Resistance forces and the CIA. Serving as Chief of Operations, Lhamo Tsering oversaw the activities of the resistance and at the same time, maintained an incredibly detailed archive of photographs, documents, letters and maps; Guerrilla handbook explosives (Source: PR Handout)
The resistance collapsed in 1974 when its last stronghold on the Nepal-Tibet border was shut down by the Nepalese army; Guerrilla handbook still camera. (Source: PR Handout)
Lhamo Tsering, Gyato Wangdu (Source: PR Handout)
The exhibition was on display at Kamaladevi Complex, India International Centre, New Delhi. (Source: PR Handout)
Lhamo Tsering said in an interview shortly before his death, “In my opinion, I don’t see our armed struggle as something that was helpful only at a certain point in our history, something that is finished. I believe we should look at it as one chapter in our continuing struggle for freedom, one that still has some meaning.” (Source: PR Handout)
