By Tenzin Chokyi

DHARAMSALA 17 March: The budget session for the financial year 2025-2026 of the Tibetan Parliament-in-exile(TPIE) opened today, with the Central Tibetan Administration’s(CTA)Finance Minister declaring the USAID freeze not an “insurmountable challenge” but lacks a clear path forward. 

“The Kashag (Cabinet) consistently urges the public not to take political and economic matters for granted,” CTA President Penpa Tsering, who doubles up as the Finance Minister, said as he tabled the CTA’s budget,  ₹3675.30 million for the fiscal year 2025-2026 to the TPIE. 

“Though the current situation may not be an insurmountable challenge, it serves as a strong reminder that both the CTA and the Tibetans must move in the direction of self-sufficiency”, CTA’s Finance Minister said. 

“The fiscal Budget for 2025-2026 was prepared and submitted before the USAID freeze and the subsequent termination of the aid to the Tibetan community therefore, the current budget session will unusually witness more budget reduction and alteration”, the Finance Minister said, minutes before the session began. 

Of the total budget, CTA President Tsering-led Cabinet has allocated ₹ 2441.04 Million for Social Welfare, ₹ 791.28 Million for Political projects and campaigns, and  ₹ 442.98 Million for Administrative purposes. 

Khenpo Sonam Tenphel, the Speaker of the Tibetan Parliament in Exile, stated in his opening remarks that “USAID blockage has affected the fiscal budget of the CTA and other programs under it”. 

Foreign aid and funds, largely from the US and India, amount to 91 per cent of the  CTA’s annual budget.

After the CTA’s Finance Minister tabled the budget in the House, he was questioned by the MPs seeking clarity on whether the USAID is being cut off or being reviewed owing to his conflicting statements over the matter. 

Sikyong’s statement ranges from announcing the complete termination of all US funds to the Tibetans only to announcing the continuation of the PRM funds from the US days later and assuring Tibetans of the unchanged policy of the US on Tibet. 

He also faced objections on the budget appropriation over the lack of funds allocated for political projects and campaigns as Tibetans are “political refugees” over social and infrastructure development. 

While Sikyong declared the discontinuation of the USAID as a wake-up call to the CTA Tibetans to forge a path towards self-sufficiency, he also spoke on the need to be self-sufficient when he ran for Sikyong’s office in 2021. Nearly four years into office now, the CTA President is yet to come up with a concrete path forward to self-sufficiency.

“From a long-term perspective for both the leaders of the CTA and the public, we should do away with dependency on foreign funds and prepare to become self-sufficient to meet most of our needs,”  Penpa Tsering stated in his election manifesto.