Nepal's Buddha boy asks to stop sacrifices of animals, birds during Hindu festival

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS/Binod Joshi, File

In this Nov. 12, 2008 file photo, Ram Bahadur Bamjan, a Nepalese teenager revered by many as a reincarnation of Buddha, looks on in Nijgadh town, about 160 kilometers (100 miles) south of Katmandu, Nepal. Bamjan has asked organizers to stop the Hindu Gadhima festival which is celebrated every five years in southern Nepal where thousands of animals are typically slaughtered, his followers said Thursday, Oct. 15, 2009. There are plans at this year's festival on Nov. 24 for some 200,000 buffaloes, pigs, goats, chicken and pigeons to be slaughtered.

Ram Bahadur Bamjan made the appeal in connection with the Gadhimai festival, which is celebrated every five years in southern Nepal and attended by people from both Nepal and India. There are plans at this year's festival on Nov. 24 for some 200,000 buffaloes, pigs, goats, chicken and pigeons to be slaughtered.

Raju Shah, a member of the committee that runs Bamjan's affairs, said Thursday that the spiritual leader - who rarely meets visitors - held a meeting with organizers of the festival and made the request.

When they refused, Bamjan decided he would visit the area during the festival and appeal directly to the people to stop the sacrifices.

Bamjan's followers believe he has been meditating without food and water since he was first spotted in the jungles of southern Nepal in 2005. Believers say he spent months without moving, sitting with his eyes closed beneath a tree.

Buddhism, which has about 325 million followers, teaches that every soul is reincarnated after death in another bodily form.

But some Buddhist scholars have been skeptical of the claims that Bamjan is a reincarnation of Siddhartha Gautama, who was born in southwestern Nepal roughly 2,500 years ago and became revered as the Buddha, or Enlightened One.

 

 

 

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