On May 13, 2011, the 17th Gyalwa Karmapa travelled from New Delhi to Kalimpong for the three-day celebrations of Buddha Purnima (Buddha Shakyamuni’s birthday) in Kalimpong, his former seat in West Bengal. Upon his arrival at Bagdogra airport, he was welcomed by his General Secretary Lodreu Rabsel Rinpoche and immediately guided to the VIP lounge.

Once the arrival formalities were completed he left the airport through the VIP gate outside of which delegations from the monks’ communities of Rumtek Monastery and Shri Vihara Buddhist Institute in Kalimpong, as well as representatives of the lay community of Rumtek, were waiting to welcome him and receive his blessing.

Then the convoy of cars left for Kalimpong, preceded by a pilot car and accompanied by a police escort.
Meanwhile, hundreds of monks and nuns from the different Himalayan regions had arrived in Kalimpong. They gathered in a long line along the road leading to the gate of Shri Vihara Buddhist Institute to await Gyawa Karmapa’s arrival.
The line was headed by dozens of monks in ceremonial garb, carrying the implements used to welcome a high master: incense, various musical instruments and the traditional high parasol. The monks and nuns were joined by hundreds and hundreds of lay devotees.

The queue became longer and longer, stretching all the way from the gate to the main road and beyond, and the atmosphere was vibrant with joyful expectation.
When the car came into sight, the traditional incense was lit and the music of gyalings and cymbals and the deep beat of dozens of drums resounded. The ceremonial parasol was held over His Holiness’s side of the car as the driver negotiated the last few hundred metres to the entrance of Shri Diwakar Buddhist Institute through the crowd at walking pace.

When the car reached the gate, Gyalwa Karmapa descended and was led to the shrine room in a solemn procession. Once he was seated on his throne, the welcome ceremony in the temple began.
General Secretary Lodreu Rabsel Rinpoche and the dechangla (chamberlain) of the Karmapa’s labrang (administration) offered him a mandala, and representatives of the monastic communities of Rumtek and Shri Vihara Buddhist Institute and Rumtek’s lay community presented him with an offering of ku sung thuk (enlightened body, speech and mind), respectively.

Gyalwa Karmapa then performed the rabne (consecration) of sixteen statues, representing the lineage of Karmapas from the first, Düsum Khyenpa, to the sixteenth, Rangjung Rigpey Dorje.