His Holiness the Dalai Lama to inaugurate Centre for Tibetan Studies at IGNOU

DHARAMSALA, India: His Holiness the Dalai Lama will inaugurate the Centre for Tibetan Studies at the Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU) on 5 September, an announcement posted on the university's website said.

"The Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU) will host its 24th Convocation on September 5, 2011 welcoming H.H. the Dalai Lama who will inaugurate the Centre for Tibetan Studies in the university. IGNOU will also confer Honoris Causa to the Tibetan leader," it said.

The decision to establish the Centre for Tibetan Studies was first announced in April 2010 by the IGNOU Vice-Chancellor Prof. V.N. Rajasekharan Pillai on the occasion of the 3rd Annual Mother Teresa Memorial Lecture held at IGNOU. His Holiness the Dalai Lama delivered the key Memorial Lecture on 'Mother and Compassion'. INGOU issued a notification on 1 February 2011 for the establishment of the Centre for Tibetan Studies in the School of Social Work of the University. The Centre will help preserve the endangered Tibetan culture in India and Nepal. It will develop and launch B.A./M.A./M.Phil/Ph.D. programmes of study on Tibetan studies, Buddhist Philosophy and Theology. The degrees will be issued jointly by IGNOU and Central University for Tibetan Studies (CUTS). Then-Kalon Tempa Tsering, Representative of His Holiness the Dalai Lama in New Delhi, presented a cheque of Rs.5 lakhs to the Vice-Chancellor, IGNOU as His Holiness' token seed money to initiate the establishment of the Centre.