At last
Government of India walked through the uncharted territory, it enthused against
own policy of non-interference in country specific referendums and voted in
favor of US backed resolution against the Ceylonese Government for its
‘genocide of Tamils’ at UNHRC in Geneva. A half hearted measure though; king
Singh was quick enough to write a letter and explain the balance of his stand,
even when he no such compulsions to so. The only real compulsion India really
had was from the eighteen DMK MPs, a mere eighteen vote favored the Indian
stand for the US resolution, which again won by a single vote. Democracy had
its sweet victory.
Democracy is a game of numbers. One of the
first persons to feel the pinch of this game in the Indian sub-continent was
Mohammad Ali Jinnah. He clearly envisioned the disadvantages of a minority,
which would be at the mercy of hostile majority. Had India remained a single
Entity after 1947, the word secularism would have had a different
interpretation and probably by this time we would have seen many a civil wars
in this country. What we call as Indo-Pak wars would have been called as
Hindu-Muslim wars; this scenario is analogous to what ails Ceylon now. A
minority Hindu-Tamil population, at the mercy of hostile chauvinist-Sinhala majority;
the Sinhalese follow a form of Buddhism which is void of philosophy of Dharma.
Imperialism
and colonialism of the west created many an independent countries, which never
existed in the past. India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Ceylon, never existed as a
single unit as it exists today. India of the present day is more a creation of
a Lord Dalhousie or of a Queen Victoria than of a Sardar Patel or a Pandit
Nehru. Ceylon which was traditionally ruled by native Tamil and Sinhalese kings
for centuries was transformed into a single country by the British; the British
tea plantation brought a new horde of Tamil speaking Indian laborers to the
island country. Ceylon is a Bi-Linguist country, but religiously there are four
groups; a majority Sinhalese many of them pseudo-Buddhist, a small minority
Tamil/Sinhala Christians, Muslim Tamils, and Hindu Tamils. The Hindu Tamils are
of two origins; natives and Indians. As a race though all them look like dark
skinned Dravidians, the Sinhalese consider themselves as Aryans of Indians
origin and the Tamils, Dravidians of Indian origin; neither of them are
original settlers of the island. The Tamils are religiously guided by the
ancient Hindu constitution the Manushastra, and the Sinhalese by their own
Buddhist Mahavamsa. Mahavamsa represents the Sinhalese-Buddhist agenda for
Ceylon.
Years of subjugation to a foreign crown made
the Ceylonese, citizens of a vast empire; newfound freedom suddenly shriveled
their world. The search for a new national identity and exclusivity rattled the
minds of the ruling class of many nations, some like the Singaporeans,
Malaysians, and Indians decided to cohabitate and some like the Chinese,
Pakistanis and Ceylonese decided to dominate. The numbers always did the trick,
the largest faction always benefited from the game. The Sinhalese majority also
ensured reservation for itself in state universities and Governmental Jobs.
Democracy and positive affirmation further alienated the downtrodden minority
Tamils.
The Sinhalese atrocities started with the
disenfranchising of Indian Tamils most of whom were the backbone the Ceylonese
Plantation Economy. However unlike Uganda or Burma these Indians were never
deported, it took a forty years struggle for the settlers to earn their
citizenship. The state of Ceylon often indulged in terrorism against the
Tamils, colonization and ethnic cleansing. Prominent among the various
atrocities include-the 1974 World Tamil Conference attack in Jaffna, burning
down of Jaffna public Library in 1981 , the 1983 anti-Tamil riots called as
Black July and the recent 2009 genocide of Tamils by the Sinhalese army.
As far as the 1974 attack is concerned,
comparisons could be made to Jalianwala Bag massacre, the similarities being
police firing on unarmed and peaceful gathering and seven innocent deaths by a
native police force being the difference. The incident gave a fertile ground
for the formation a separatist armed struggle against the state of Ceylon and
resulted in the formation of LTTE by V.Prabakaran; a terrorist under Indian
Law, but as the saying goes ‘one man’s terrorists in another man’s freedom
fighter’. The conference attack was avenged by the Murder of Jaffna Mayor
Alfred Duraiappah by Prabakaran in 1975(Opposition to Simon Commission lead to
the death of Punjab kesari Lala Lajpat Rai, whose death was avenged by a
freedom fighter Chandrasekhar Azad, recognized as a terrorist by the British).
The
Jaffna Public Library was the pride of Tamil Diaspora, it consisted a
repository of ancient Tamil Palm leaf manuscripts and nearly 97 thousand books.
The Library was considered as one of the richest collection of Tamil Knowledge
and learning, it had no equals in the entire world. On the night of May 31 of
1981, the Sinhalese authorities burned the Library and muddled up centuries of
Tamil Knowledge in Jaffna’s fertile loam.
An ambush of 13 army soldiers formed the
backdrop of 1983 riots; nearly 3000 Tamils were killed as 25,000 Tamils were
injured (Similar to Direct action of Calcutta 1946). The last and most gruesome
of all the other atrocities, the reader is referred to the channel-4
documentary on YouTube titles ‘Lanka’s Killing Field’.
The cause of LTTE was a noble one and had the
blessings of Indira Gandhi and India in the initial stages of its formation.
The LTTE cadres were trained by Indians in India, Armed by Indian weapons and
Financed by Indian Tax payer’s money. India trained LTTE on the lines of Mukthi
Vahini of Bangladesh. Indira Gandhi had a clear pro-Tamil foreign policy for
Ceylon.
The
Sinhala only policy of the Government made the life of Tamil youths a living
hell, who found it difficult either to enter Universities or Government Jobs.
The opposition to official policies did start with a lot of peaceful protests,
but Gandhigiri failed to cut any ice with a hostile Sinhalese Ethnic group.
Tamil leaders considered M K Gandhi and J N Nehru as their role models; their
demands were pressed through sathyagraha, even the sathyagrahis were violently
attacked by organized Sinhalese mobs, which finally lead to riots in 1958. A
demand for separate state resolution was passed by Tamil parties in 1976 in a
small town of vadukkodai (Purna Swaraj Resolution of Congress at Lahore session
in 1929). The in same year the LTTE was formed (Indian National Army by
Gen.Mohan Singh 1942) with an objective of creating a Tamil Homeland called as
‘Tamil Ealem’.
The LTTE though had the support of Indian
Government and sympathy of the Indian Tamils failed to capitalize any political
mileage of it. It failed to portray itself as a Mukti-Vahini, or an IRA or as
PLO; rather it projected itself more of a ruthless terrorist organization than
as a Liberation Army. The going was well for LTTE until the ‘the twentieth
century fox’ J Jayewardene convinced Rajeev Gandhi on IPKF mission. The IPKF
ventured to disarm the LTTE of its weapons supplied to it by Government of
India. This policy marked a conflicting shift in Indian Foreign affairs from
Pro-Tamil to an Anti-Tamil stand. In the later phases the LTTE and the
Ceylonese forces joint their hands against IPKF.
Much has been written against the IPKF, but
the cruel fact was India blood was shed for the thankless Sinhalese, by weapons
manufactured by Indian Ordnance Factory Board and paid by Indian taxpayers
Rupees. A total of 1200 soldiers (Kargil war 527 Martyrs) lost their lives
defending a foreign and a racist country. The wounded faced severe hardships;
for the war injured ones in Jaffna the nearest Military base hospital was
situated in Chennai. The entire operation cost the Indian Exchequer over 10000
crores in 1989.
The
LTTE on its part Killed many Tamil leaders and failed to convince the world for
its action. The Lankans were always projected as victims and not as a racist
nation. The country was oblivious of its own official racial policies. Even
after the IPKF war the LTTE had enormous sympathy even among the ruling class
of Tamil Nadu, the IPKF was unpopular among Tamils and even in Tamil Nadu. The
LTTE signed its own death warrant when it waged war against India by
assassinating Prime Minister Rajeev Gandhi. The assignation was carried
allegedly by an Indian trained Lankan terrorist Dhanu; the cruelty of the
assassination wiped all the sympathy India had for LTTE. The second opinion of
Indian Tamil changed the personification of LTTE within the Tamil World. The
LTTE was a terrorist organization and was not expected to follow any
International rules or treaties.
The civil war with LTTE ended in 2009, with
the Lankan Army accused of violating various UN and other international
treaties. As a national force the Lankan Defense Force was bound by
International rules and regulations, which it failed to honor. It evidently
imitated the LTTE tactics while executing combatants but crossed all the limits
of decency while dealing with women, children and unarmed civilians. The
accusation was not about plundering, cross firing or sporadic rapes but about
colonization, ethnic cleansing, Genocide and Government organized mass rape and
murders. The Lankan forces known for its notorious indiscipline (The Naval Guard
of Honor given to PM Rajeev Gandhi) should be punished for its atrocities by
the UNHRC.
As a long term vision India must have a
hawks’ eye on that cursed Island, which has tons of Buddhists statues,
literature and legends but still annulled of Peace and Prosperity. Inspirations
must be drawn from Lord Dalhousie’s doctrine of Lapse; India must annex the
whole of Island. The Tamil territories of Ealem must be attached to the State
of Tamil Nadu and remaining portion Sinhala Pradesh or SinhlaLand must be
acceded to Indian Union. Imposition of Indian constitution would provide a
lasting solution to the ethnic problem of Ceylon.
