Will Tuladhar-Douglas<p>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.</p><p><a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2025/3/24/buddhisms-holiest-site-erupts-in-protests-over-hindu-control-of-shrine" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" translate="no" target="_blank"><span class="invisible">https://www.</span><span class="ellipsis">aljazeera.com/features/2025/3/</span><span class="invisible">24/buddhisms-holiest-site-erupts-in-protests-over-hindu-control-of-shrine</span></a></p><p>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.</p><p> <a href="https://todon.nl/tags/Buddhism" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Buddhism</span></a> <a href="https://todon.nl/tags/BodhGaya" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>BodhGaya</span></a></p>