by Shishir Gupta

DHARAMSALA, Dec 7: The district administration and the Tibetan Government-in-exile have chalked out a Rs 4 crore security plan to deal with the possibility of a threat to the Dalai Lama's life.

The plan comes in the wake of the arrest of three alleged Chinese spies. The plan makes it mandatory for all Tibetan youth, about 18 years of age, to get registered with the authorities.

The security plan, discussed and agreed upon at a high-level meeting held at Mcleodganj, envisages a bullet-proof Mercedes car for Dalai Lama. The Indian Government will bear the expenses.

Further security measures will include X-ray baggage scanner, metal detectors on doors, a proper boundary wall, and arrangements for adequately illuminating the entire palace complex of the Tibetan religious and temporal hand.

While the Dharamsala Superintendent of Police, Mr RK Sing, refused to comment on the meeting, sources said that, as of now, all Tibetans who entered the country after 1975 will not be allowed to work inside the palace. Special passes of different security levels, will be issued to the place staff shortly, and extra force will be deployed in the area.

The personal drivers of the Dalai Lama have already been sent for a three week course in defensive driving, at the NSG training camp at Maneswar in Haryana.

Taking the espionage case seriously, the authorities have decided to upgrade the intelligence network in the district, and Establishment 22, a special frontier force (SFF) unit of Tibetans, has been placed on alert.

Three Tibetans, including a girl, were arrested under the Foreigner Act on November 21 by the local police, on charges of spying for China.

Though the police and Tibetan officials are tight lipped after China's protest to New Delhi for blowing up the entire incident in the media, interrogation reports have confirmed that Tsering Sampen, 25, and Phuntsok, 26, were indeed involved in espionage.

The girl, Lhame Chhungta (19) is believed to be innocent. The officials, however, have ruled out any attempt on the part of either of them to assassinate the Dalai Lama.

Copies of the interrogation reports have been forwarded to the South Block and the Cabinet Secretariat. These state that of the three, Samten was being groomed by Chinese authorities for "bigger assignments". Samten had been taken to Beijing for briefing, before he crossed over with others to India last December.

The duo had served in the Chinese army and were familiar with weapons. Their aim in Dharamsala was to monitor the functioning of educational institutions, and to ascertain whether the Tibetan-Government-in-exile was using them to indoctrinate the youth with anti-Chinese ideas.

Tsering Samten told his interrogates that two of his army colleagues, Archmu and Lokhang, had been dispatched to Switzerland last year on a similar mission.

However, officials in the know discount this.

Samten confessed that he was sent to India by a senior Wuchin army official of Hri-Tang rank. He was also informed that some of his colleagues had infiltrated Establishment 22. The SFF, which is based in Chakrata near Dehradun, comes directly under the Cabinet Secretariat.

The three accused were produced in a local court on December 4, and were remanded to judicial custody until December 15.