Buddhist monks end strike for Bodh Gaya

TheHindu.com

Great Enlightenment monument; enormous Japanese seated Buddha in Buddha Gaya (Bodh[i] Gaya), India with temples from every Buddhist tradition in the world.

A group of Buddhist monks on Thursday [1/14/10] ended their hunger strike for control over Bodh Gaya’s 1,500-year-old Mahabodhi temple, meant to mark where the Buddha attained enlightenment.

“We have ended the hunger strike as the district administration forced us, but we will continue to raise the demand for Buddhist control over the Bodh Gaya temple,” one of the monks Bhante Gayanratan said. The monks began their fast on Jan. 1, 2010 near the office of the temple management committee at Bodh Gaya [effectively controlled by Hindus], where the Buddha attained enlightenment 2,550 years ago.

Under the Bodhi tree, the spot where Siddhartha became a buddha

Another monk, Bhante Budh Saran, said they would not sit silent. “We will launch another non-violent protest against injustice to the Buddhists,” he said. He added that even the National Minority Commission was in favor of Buddhist control over the temple but the state government was delaying the matter due to vested interests.

National Commission for Minorities members H.S. Hanspal and Spaljes Angmano, who visited Bodh Gaya, some 110 km from here, early this month, made it clear that it was against the [Indian] constitution to deny Buddhist control over the temple, he added.

The monks have been demanding amendment to the Mahabodhi Temple Management Act, 1949, under which the Bodh Gaya Temple Management Committee (BGTMC) has four Buddhist and an equal number of Hindu members for a three-year period, with the Gaya district magistrate as its ex-officio chairman.