Tibetan spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, arrived in Tawang in Arunachal Pradesh today on a four-day visit. The 74-year-old Tibetan monk, who flew in from Guwahati by helicopter, was received by Arunachal Chief Minister Dorjee Khandu and his cabinet colleagues. The Dalai Lama, who will be staying in the 300-year-old Tawang Monastery, will hold religious discourses for the Buddhist community. He will deliver religious discourses in Tawang, Dirang, Bomdila and Itanagar. Besides, the religious leader will also inaugurate a library and a state-of-the-art hospital in Tawang.The visit coincides with 50 years of his arrival in Tawang in 1959 after a failed uprising against China in Tibet.

Nestled among the snow-capped mountains and perched at a height of 10,000 feet, Tawang has been spruced up for the visit of the Dalai Lama with colourful posters carrying his pictures and Tibetan and Indian flags flying everywhere.

A security blanket has been thrown over the town, close to the borders with China and Myanmar, with the administration making all efforts to ensure a peaceful stay for the Tibetan leader whose visit has been criticised by China ., Dalai Lama was taken in a procession from the entrance to duakkan that was attended by 700 Buddhist monks. Accompanied by Kandu and another spiritual leader P G Rinpcohe, the Dalai Lama went into to the duakkan to offer prayers.
Tawang, the 400-year old and the second largest Tibetan monastery in India, holds personal history for the Dalai Lama.
When he fled Tibet in 1959 following a failed uprising against Chinese rule, he entered India through Arunachal Pradesh and took refuge in Tawang.
He has also visited the town in 1983, 1997 and 2003. He paid two visits to the state in 2003 and during one of them he had skipped Tawang to visit the western side of the state dominated by the followers of the Mahayana sect of Buddhism.