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The Hindu nationalist government in India is happy to use Buddhists and Buddhist pilgrimage as a diplomatic tool internationally, but they will not allow Buddhists to control their own holiest site.

https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2025/3/24/buddhisms-holiest-site-erupts-in-protests-over-hindu-control-of-shrine

There is a long history behind this - for anyone who is interested, I would suggest reading Verardi's _The Gods and the Heretics_. Raj and Indian textbooks blame the destruction of Buddhist monasteries in South Asia on Muslims, but the archaeological evidence suggests it was Shaiva and Vaishnava orders.

#Buddhism#BodhGaya