Dharamsala, June 12 (AHN) Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama, who underwent a left knee replacement surgery at a hospital in New Delhi, was discharged on Friday, a medical bulletin said.

Earlier in June 2024, the elderly Buddhist monk underwent a right knee replacement at the hospital for special surgery in New York City and made an excellent recovery.

A Senior Consultant at the hospital said: “His Holiness the Dalai Lama underwent successful left knee replacement surgery on Monday, June 8. Throughout his treatment, His Holiness’s personal medical team and the office of His Holiness the Dalai Lama remained in close coordination with the administrative and medical staff at Apollo Hospitals. His Holiness is stable and expected to make a full recovery. He was discharged on Friday morning, June 12. It has been a great honour for the hospital and the medical team to serve His Holiness the Dalai Lama.”

After recovery, the spiritual leader is scheduled to visit Ladakh towards the end of June for an extended stay, his office has already announced.

The spiritual leader, a symbol of Buddhism, loves travelling across the remote, mountainous Ladakh region bordering Tibet to give audiences to people of all faiths, often drawing criticism from China. His Holiness will also attend a public programme in honour of his 91st birthday on July 6, likely in Leh.

In 1959, the occupying Chinese troops suppressed the Tibetan national uprising in Lhasa and forced the Dalai Lama and over 80,000 Tibetans into exile in India and neighbouring countries. On reaching India after a three-week treacherous journey, the Dalai Lama took up residence for about a year in Mussoorie in Uttarakhand.

Currently, the Tibetan government-in-exile is based in Dharamsala, the hillside town in northern India in Himachal Pradesh, where a community of Tibetans lives in exile with the Dalai Lama, hoping to sustain their struggle to secure complete autonomy in their Chinese-ruled homeland, Tibet.