Dalai Lama vows to protect climate on 86th birthday
Celebrations were also held in other parts of the country including Shimla and Buddhist pilgrimage centre, Bodh Gaya, where prayers and a cake cutting ceremony were held.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi tweeted that he spoke with the Dalai Lama on the phone to wish him a happy birthday, disregarding any potential disapproval from China.
Beijing regards the Dalai Lama, who has lived in exile in northern India for more than six decades, as a dangerous "splittist", or separatist, and frowns on any engagement with him. Chinese troops seized Tibet in 1950 in what Beijing calls a "peaceful liberation", and the Dalai Lama fled into exile in 1959, following a failed uprising against Chinese rule.
