NEW DELHI, October 6, (Reuter) - Tibetan monks staged a protest demonstration near the Chinese Embassy in New Delhi Friday against what they said was Beijing's illegal detention of a boy they believe to be their second highest spiritual leader.

About 20 monks demanded in a memorandum to Prime Minister P.V. Narasimha Rao and Beijing that six-year-old Tenzin Gedun Choekyi Nyima be freed and enthroned. Beijing denies it is holding the boy.

The protesters, who went on a day's hunger strike, are part of a large community of Tibetans living in exile in India with their spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, a Nobel peace prize winner.

The Dalai Lama, who fled to India in 1959 after a failed uprising against Chinese rule, gave the boy his stamp of approval in May after a search team in China used ancient rites to recognize the boy as the incarnation of the previous Panchen Lama.

The 10th Panchen Lama died in 1989, sparking the mystical search for the child to whom his spirit had migrated.

In their statement, the monks accused Beijing of violating human rights in Tibet by blocking the practice of religion.

"His Holiness the Panchen Lama's status as a luminary of the Tibetan people should be restored and (he should be) allowed to get necessary religious education and training," the statement read.

"We demand that the Chinese government should release the Panchen Lama from their detention immediately and extend all necessary cooperation to His Holiness the Dalai Lama to enthrone him at his traditional seat," it said.

Beijing has denied holding the boy and has attacked the Dalai Lama's announcement of the choice, branding it illegal and saying the exiled god-king's recognition was void because not all procedures in the search had been completed.

China maintains it has final say over the recognition of senior lamas under terms of 1792 Qing dynasty agreement.