Introduction
It
is indeed very heartening that Human Rights and the allied theme
of Conflict Resolution are beginning to get academic recognition
as disciplines for study in academia around the world. That the
UGC should come forward to sponsoring a national seminar on New
Perspectives in Human Rights is also very encouraging. This
development is taking place alongside of the widening of the
horizon among Human Rights Activists and organizations. In
earlier days Human Rights activism was predominantly limited to
making the police behave themselves in using the Cr P.C.;
challenging custodial torture, custodial deaths, confrontation
killings, the all too frequent neglect of the officialdom in
bringing to book people who commit crimes against women, trying to
keep a check on the all too trigger happy cops who try to silence
uncomfortable group protests resorting to their fire power against
unarmed civilians ... In other words, only state violations of
rights of individuals and ad hoc groups have been taken on board.
Religio-cultural sanctions which were at the root of oppression
against women, age long denigration of Dalits based on social
stratification and the denial of political rights of peoples who
get marginalized in the contemporary trends of majoritarianism
were not taken up as issues by human rights groups. Having made
such a sweeping statement, however, I must go on to qualify that
statement by admitting that eminent human rights advocates like
Justice V.R. Krishna Iyer, K.G. Kannabiran, Justice Rajindra
Sachar and several others have been throwing their weight behind
the just claims of politically marginalized peoples as well.
Things have changed and now. The rights of people as well as
rights of individuals have become concerns of the human rights
realm. And, it is not just the State versus people, it has become
imperative to take note of religious, sociological and cultural
factors into consideration. It is in keeping with this
development that Human Rights concerns have begun to find a place
within academia as well.
My major
interest for some years has been the plight of Sri Lankan Tamils.
I would like to narrate their story briefly and draw certain
inferences and conclusions with far reaching implications for all
who are committed to safe guarding the rights of a people whose
sufferings have been immense and unrelenting for more than two
decades. I am well aware that many may jump to the conclusion
that I am trying to hold a brief for the LTTE. Yet others may
even get incensed that I am trying to rationalize and justify the
many political assassinations which have been done supposedly on
behalf the Tamils. And a few others may think that I am inserting
the thin end of a wedge to argue for separatism. Yes, this last
guess is not far out except that I shall try to point out that
much as unity of a country is desirable if separation alone will
safe guard the rights and security of a people who have suffered
tyranny and terror from a chauvinistic State then we should be
open to that idea. Having made that admission, however, let me
say emphatically that there will be no defense of the way LTTE
have conducted themselves particularly their dastardly act of
assassinating Rajiv Gandhi and the many subversive killings of
Tamil politicians within Sri Lanka who differed from them, many
mass killings resorted to, with a view to intimidate and
terrorize people into accepting their leadership and the
undeniable tactics of extortion to collect money to sustain their
armed rebellion in their quest for Elam (i.e. an independent state
for the Tamils in their traditional homeland). Well, I shall
argue that in principle there should be no objection to the quest
by a people to live on their own in their own land. Especially
when they have found coexistence with people of another ethnic
origin who have the power in their hands but do not have the
intention to treat everyone alike this seems to be the only way.
In other words the rights of people to self determination are
superior to the claims of the integrity of a state.
Such a
stance has far reaching implications for the State of the Indian
Union too. I am well aware that I have to contend not merely on
the basis of principles. Powerful opinion makers have already
laid a strong foundation and have built an edifice of opposition
on sentimental as well as on the objective merits of staying
together as fellow home makers in the global village. Let me
say that at least some opinion makers have deliberately presented
a one sided story playing down the atrocities of the Sri Lankan
State against its own people. LTTE unambiguously have resorted
to terrorism as part of their military attack on the Sri Lankan
army but it is not always that the Sri Lankan State hit back only
in retaliation simply to counter further terrorist attacks with
the pure intention of safeguarding the lives of unarmed citizens.
In the earlier part of the struggle and in fact even now the Sri
Lankan State resorts to many subversive acts of provocation and
the rest of the world is prepared to wink an eye over it. The
Norwegian mediators also by and large choose to be silent
observers of State violations. Otherwise, they would be asked to
leave. Now let me try and narrate to you the story of the Tamil
peoples of Sri Lanka as briefly as I can. This story is made out
of gleanings from personal conversations, from participation in
several Consultations organized by NGOs and by the National
Council of Christian Churches in Sri Lanka. I have some knowledge
of the happenings as I have lived in Sri Lanka for short
interspersed periods of 3 months to one year from time to time
through the last twenty years. Please let me add that my
gleanings have not been purely from Tamil people. I have quite a
few Sinhala friends who would not have any disagreements with the
way in which I have tried to shape this narrative. Within
India
I am sure I can count on the endorsement of this story by no less
a person than Justice V.R. Krishna Iyer, though he may not approve
of the conclusions I reach from the story.
The Sri Lankan Tamils
There are
three different people who have Tamil as their mother tongue in
Sri Lanka. They are the Native Tamils who live in the north &
north eastern regions of
Sri Lanka,
ie. the region north of Vavuniya including Mannar in the
northwest, and the Jaffna Peninsula. The coast line which is
contiguous with the eastern coastline of Jaffna where the famous
harbour town of Trincomalee and Batticolao also belongs to the
traditional homeland of the native Tamils bordering on the Amparai
District in the south east. In the East also live Tamil speaking
Muslims. They, however, have developed a different ethnic
consciousness. They claim Arabian descent and explain their Tamil
speaking as due to the necessity of having to learn the language
of teachers of Islam who came from Tamil Nadu. The Eastern
coastal strip has all three ethnic groups, namely the native
Tamils the Tamil speaking Muslims and the Sinhala Buddhists. The
Eastern Province's demographic distribution is even among the
three groups with each approximately claiming 33 %. The word
claiming is used deliberately because as of today many Tamils have
had to flee from home either as refugees to other countries or as
internally displaced people. The Sinhala population has been
artificially boosted with deliberately settling many Sinhala
released prisoners in the Maha Veli Irrigation project area with
the definite intention of breaking the contiguity of the Tamil
Homeland and upsetting the demographic distribution. The Tamil
people of the North-East would constitute 12 % of the total
population of the
Island.
The Tamil speaking Muslims would constitute 5%.
The third
group of Tamils of the island are the Tamils of Indian Origin.
They are themselves subdivided into two groups. The majority of
them are those who were taken to Sri Lanka as indented labourers
who were later rendered stateless and under Shastri - Sri Mao pact
were to be totally repatriated back to India. However, this was
stopped after two lakhs people landed in India. Further
repatriation was stopped by Mrs. Indira Gandhi and a vast majority
of them have now become naturalized citizens by the efforts of
late Thiru Thondaman who achieved this by becoming a supporter of
the Sri Lankan Government. The second small group among the
people of Indian origin are those who went to Sri Lanka as
bureaucrats and business people who did not suffer any state
oppression. The Estate Tamils live in the pocket of Tea Estates
right in the heartland of Sinhala country. It must also be
pointed out that nearly 25 % of the native Tamils of North-East
live in Colombo in the Wellawatha - Bambilipitya belt down the
western coast line of the Colombo City. The total population of
the
Island
according to census taken nearly three decades ago was 20 million.
Of this the Native Tamils were 12%; The Tamil Speaking Muslims
were 5%; the Tamils of Indian Origin were 5 % the Burgers i.e. an
Eurasian community accounted for about 1% and the rest were
Sinhalese. Religiously, 7% are Christians, Muslims 5% and Hindus
among the Tamils were about 10 % and the rest were Sinhala
Buddhist. The Christian Church alone has both Tamils and Sinhala
people in it. To a large measure there is good understanding and
amity among the two communities within the Church. Worship
Services are printed in English, Sinhala and Tamil in parallel
columns and hymn books also are multilingual. Very often Sinhala
preachers would attempt to summarize their sermons in Tamil and
vice versa and if the priest were not bilingual then some one who
was would be requested to act as interpreter. Rarely if ever the
ethnic divide shows its ugly head in the choice of leaders. So it
is possible for two different communities to live in amity and
cordiality if there was an all round commitment. Please understand
that I am not holding a brief for the Church. Recent attempts in
the East among young people of the Tamil and Islamic background to
bring about mutual understanding too are proving to be enormously
successful. However, the socio political scenario nation wide
today is one of mutual suspicion and occasionally outright
animosity. I would like to point out the reasons for this.
Sri Lanka
was under colonial rule first under the Dutch and then under the
British. Both Colonial masters were adept in using the divide and
rule policy by pampering the minority and marginalizing the
majority. So the Tamils did very well under the colonial rule.
Added to this official patronage, we must concede that the Tamil
people were far more hard working and enterprising. So there were
many who got well educated among the Tamils proportionately than
among the Sinhalese. In business too the Tamils did well. There
were yet two other factors that acted as a spur towards Tamil
Development. The land terrain of the North is not very fertile
and did not enjoy much rain. So cultivation depended on
underground water whereas in the deep south land is fertile and it
enjoys a lot of rain. So the Tamils had to work hard. Among the
elite Tamils there was a lot of migration towards
Britain,
Canada and Australia. This factor also helped enhance the well
being of Tamils compared with the Sinhalese community.
The
Sinhalese psyche on the other hand was home to two extremes. On
the one hand their Buddhist upbringing made them passive,
contended and far less ambitious so especially the poor farmers
among them did not experience much development. The Sinhalese
soldiers do not have a fighting spirit and the rate of desertion
in the army continues to be high and there was not the effort
among the lower middle class and the poorer sections were not
interested in improving their lot through education.
Notwithstanding the spirit of passivity and contentment and
unwarlike temperament, however, there was a simmering discontent
deep within nurturing resentment and sullen anger especially
within the
Colombo
based Sinhalese people which started seeping down into the
communities in the deep South. The JVP - The Janata Vimukthi
Pramuna a Maoist-Leninist group fanned this discontent a great
deal to gain political mileage. Of course their initial targets
were not the Tamils. They wanted to dismantle the Ruling Kandy
Elite and capture power. The resentment against the Tamils became
an easy starting point The Buddhist clergy also played their
part by encouraging the Government to declare Buddhism as national
religion, and a Sinhala only language policy to stem the
development of the Tamils. All this resulted in the following:
There were many Tamils among the top brass in the Police force and
in the Armed forces. Gradually they got phased out to the end
today the army and the police are exclusively Sinhala. Entry of
Tamils into middle level bureaucratic positions was also made
difficult as they had to take exams in Sinhala. A policy of
standardization went beyond the quota reservation policy and near
exclusive priority was given to Sinhalese candidates even when
their entry point attainment was way below reasonable academic
standards.
It was but
natural that the Tamil community started agitating. Tamil United
Liberation Front which was established by the famous Tamil
politician Selvanaygam to which movement belonged the slain
leaders l Neelan Thiruchelvam and Amirthalingam was the first
political movement which tried to protest against all the above
mentioned policies of suppressing the Tamils through democratic
means. Even today they remain an unarmed political front although
thoroughly decimated by the LTTE which did not like the fact that
this movement was led by many from a high caste group, all well
educated, that they were opposed to armed rebellion and were
prepared not to press for separation if the reasonable demands for
territorial autonomy and justice in the matter of equal
opportunities were met and the insistence on Sinhala only were
given up.
Armed
rebellion erupted when the Sri Lankan army set fire to the Tamil
Library in Jaffna in 1981 and the so called Security Task Force
set up by J.R. Jeyawerdene the President (which was commanded by
his nephew and was kept outside of the control of the Armed Forces
Command) started unleashing terror against the civilians. Women
were molested and killed. Some women were subjected to extreme
forms of torture and were made to bear indescribable ignominy.
This happened at such large scale many young children who watched
what was done to their mothers/sisters became psychological wrecks
when they reached adolescent age. What is being stated is no
exaggeration. I met a Roman Catholic priest in the year l992 in
Jaffna
who had started a Counselling Centre to help these traumatized
young people and was saying that the numbers were so large that he
and his small team of counsellors could not cope with the need and
so he had simultaneously started training programs for other
counsellors.
The
eruption of armed rebellion with the demand for a separate Elam
brought out another spate of reactionary violence. What is now
known as the Black July in 1983 mobs in Colombo started looting
and killing the Tamils who lived in the ghetto Wellwatha down
Galle Road to Bambilipitya. The riotous mob seemed to have been
well prepared prior to the uprising. They knew the odd houses
where non Tamils lived and their homes and the inhabitants were
spared. There were of course many exceptions. Not all Sinhalese
by any means approved of this mob attack on Tamils of Colombo.
The Methodist Church headquarters was also on Galle Road as the
Tamil settlement was thinning out. The President of the Church
Rev. Soma Perera was an exceptionally courageous man. He was the
President of the Civil Rights Movement of Sri Lanka. The Church
headquarters is in a large campus with a school building and a
Church housed within it. He threw open the gates of this campus
and spent practically three days and nights at the gate and
allowed all the fleeing Tamils inside and dared the riotous mob to
enter only after killing him. Some political leaders like Colvin
De Silva the leader of the Lanka Socialist Party and many other
ordinary Sinhalese citizens also gave refuge and looked after
those who sought refuge with their own resources until the riots
abated. The JRJ Government did precious little to stop the
rampage.
The black
July riots of 1983 were by no means a one off riot. There have
been mob uprisings in 1956 and 1977. These two earlier attacks
were aimed at stopping the Government from scrapping the Sinhala
only policy and the attempt at a small measure of devolution
through setting up District Councils. Any concession to the
Tamils and even small attempts at devolution has been resented by
the chauvinistic elements up to today. Today there are provincial
governments which are no better than Municipal Corporations. The
Sinhala only policy has been given up with all Government
communications and sign boards using all three languages. This
latter change came due to the intervention of the Privy Council
when the Queen of Britain was still nominally the head of state.
The LTTE demanded some time back a structure called Interim Self
Governing Authority with representation to the Government at the
Centre and representatives of Sinhala and Muslim communities with
majority in the authority for the LTTE. The mandate of this ISGA
was to be only rebuilding the ruins and development in the war
devastated North-East and administrative infra structure relevant
to such a mandate. The Norwegian mediators recommended the ISGA.
Mrs. Chandrika just stalled time and did not do anything because
once again the party of the Buddhist clergy now a political forum
and the JVP violently opposed the proposal as a thin end of the
wedge towards full autonomy. In the mean time Tsunami came. The
Western Governments said that unless there was a common structure
they would not give the sanctioned aid. Chandrika then went ahead
and signed an agreement to allow the LTTE to have a say in the
areas controlled by them under the MOU. But the JVP went to the
Court and had the PTOMS - Post Tsunami Operations Monitoring
Structure stayed. Chandrika shed crocodile tears and the Western
Governments handed over the money to her without any further ado.
I need to
say a word about the ceasefire violations of the Sri Lankan
Government also. It has been reported in the News papers whereas
LTTE committed more than 3000 ceasefire violations of a serious
kind the Sri Lankan Governments violations were only about a l000
and they were of a minor nature like harassments caused to
passengers at check posts. Usually the gullible readers in India
have been ready to believe this all too readily. The Sri Lankan
Army set up a unit called Deep Penetration Unit and infiltrated
deep into Vanni forests an area accepted as LTTE territory in the
MOU and assassinated more than 16 second level leaders. This was
done with the help of EPRLF cadre who knew the territory. The
Tigers chose not to shout about this fearing that an impression
will develop that they are not invulnerable after all. The Sri
Lankan Government also gained over Col Karuna the former commander
of the East of the LTTE and since then has been using him and his
forces extensively in hitting at LTTE always disclaiming any
connection between Karuna's forces and the GOSL. Most recently we
have been witnessing a sudden influx of refugees into our land.
Once again it has been put out that refugees arrive because they
fear reprisals, extortions and recruitment of young people and
that is why the people want to find a safe haven in Indian
shores. While this may be true to some extent it is not the whole
truth. Bishop Joseph Royappa, the Roman Catholic Bishop of Mannar
has sent a gruesome report of what goes on in Mannar. Immediately
following the bus bomb incident in Anuratha Pura soldiers of the
SL army went on a rampage in the Mannar District. They have
killed batches and batches of fishermen as they were getting
ashore even after verifying their identities making them kneel and
shooting them through their mouths. They had two aims. First to
wreak vengeance for the Anurathapura killings assuming that
bombing was the handiwork of the LTTE without clear proof. The
second reason is to kill as many fishermen with boats as possible
to prevent them from carrying the refugees across to India. One
Sinhalese Human Rights Activist provides an analysis for the
initial act of warlike attacks on the LTTE camps following on
close heals of the attempt on the Army General as a stage managed
act with readiness to retaliate using the incident as an excuse.
While LTTE are capable of conducting many dastardly acts it is not
impossible that the GOSL should contemplate stage managing
supposedly subversive acts of LTTE in order to find an excuse for
well contemplated attacks which would pass as inevitable
retaliation by a security conscious Government.
Well I have
given you my view of what goes on within
Sri Lanka.
The Indo Sri Lanka Friendship Society to which I belong and for
which we have Justice V R. Krishna Iyer as patron has condemned
the LTTE's political assassinations, internecine killings of
deemed rival militant groups, recruitment and deployment of child
soldiers, their extortionist methods in raising funds for their
sustenance... unequivocally. Of course we could not but concede
that armed rebellion was thrust upon the Tamil militants. As such
their attacks against military targets should not be considered as
acts of terrorism. But we have been also painfully aware of the
cunning strategies of the GOSL. For want of space I shall barely
mention that the Tamils of Sri Lanka have suffered also from the
Indian Peace Keeping Force. This is unpalatable for patriotic
Indians. In such a situation inevitably one is forced to raise
certain questions, and to which task I now turn.
v
Is the
integrity of any State permanently sacred and non-violable?
v
Is there an
optimum size for a State in terms of territorial extent and size
of population?
v
What are the
democratic rights of a minority people who have been pushed to
limits of seeking a separate political identity?
v
What does a
ruling majority stand to loose except its pride in letting a
people have their own politically autonomous State in their own
homeland? What is the role of opinion makers and human rights
advocates?
v
Conclusions
Answering the
first two questions is simple and straight forward. The integrity
of any State is not sacred. Many States have come into being due
to historical contingencies such as for example our own country
Bharat, some were united on ideological commonality such as the
erstwhile USSR. The State came into being mainly because the
British brought all the different units they conquered into one
administrative entity. The Former USSR had been ruled as one
State because all the various regions shared a common ideology.
The ethnic identity proved to have a stronger pull on people and
so it has disintegrated. So too
Yugoslavia.
It looks as if the process of splintering into different ethnic
identities forming their own nation-States is still not over.
So too with
regard to the optimum size for territorial integrity or for the
size of a national population. We need not elaborate it any
further.
When people
are pushed into seeking spa ration with undeniable reasons of
suffering under a chauvinistic State all concerned should try to
intervene and seek justice for the affected people. The United
Nations usually washes its hands off saying that its charter does
not provide for interference into internal/civil disputes. This
same sentiment restrains neighboring countries also. When we take
into consideration that there are other geo political and market
considerations enter into the field the ulterior motives of the
players set the agenda for relations with the chauvinistic State.
This is what happens with regard to Sri Lanka. There is an
international game going on centering on the control of Trinco
harbour between India and the US. There is also the interplay of
market forces. For India Sri Lanka has become a big market. It
may sound cynical to say, but it is true nevertheless, that the
ethnic conflict going on helps expand the size of the market.
Therefore the excuse of the policy of non interference in a
neighbour's internal policy is a convenient cover to keep the
conflict alive. As far as Human Rights perspectives are concerned
we need to give top priority to the rights of self determination.
Of course, it may be necessary to point out that totally
independent State may be detrimental to their own people. We need
to take the potential threat to the Tamil dwellers of Colombo and
the plight of the Estate Tamils and the possibility of the three
communities of the East demographically evenly distributed
continuing to vie with each other a federal structure may be the
more conducive solution. However, many safeguards need to be
built into such a structure if the Tamils are to live in peace and
amity with their Sinhala and Muslim neighbors. But such help to
the people have not been offered by
India
since the first abortive attempt of the Indo Sri Lanka Accord and
the 13th Amendment. It failed because the confidence of the LTTE
was not won. India attempted to set up a puppet provincial
government with EPRLF after rigging the elections! The IPKF
turned into an occupation army and committed atrocities equal to
that of the STF of GOSL.
As has been
hinted at the Sinhala people stand to loose nothing by letting the
Tamils have their own political autonomy. Somehow people get into
false patriotic modes of thinking and shut their minds totally to
suggestions such as what has been given above. I can vividly
remember with shame one Press Conference in Chennai convened under
the aegis of the Indo Sri Lanka Friendship Society with Justice
V.R. Krishna Iyer and Advocate Kannabiran seeking to update the
information gaps in Indian minds because our opinion makers, the
journalists had chosen to censor away much information that would
be detrimental to the glorious image of India patriotically held
in the minds of the people. As soon as Justice VRK mentioned
the failure of the IPKF experiment and also the undeniable fact of
its misbehavior one journalist representing an eminent daily stood
up and protested that he did not come to the Press Meet to hear
slander about IPKF and left. Immediately several others also
followed him and we were left with just two or three personally
known to our convener T N Gopalan. The promulgation of POTA and
its abuse by the Government has also acted as a powerful deterrent
in the minds of the people. Of course, the gruesome assassination
of Rajiv Gandhi heartlessly and mindlessly executed allowing only
the vengeful spirit full play has been yet another powerful
deterrent in thinking why should not the Tamils of Sri Lanka be
granted political autonomy and why our nation does not exert more
pressure on the Sri Lankan Government which has been letting lose
State Terrorism on its own people for nearly three decades. The
only way forward for Human Rights Activists and Groups is to help
our nation and its leaders transcend prejudice and put the
affected people's plight first. It may be helpful to think that
many Tamils of Sri Lanka, even those who point out the absolute
must of the armed conflict do not agree with all that LTTE has
been indulging in supposedly on their behalf. There is a whole
new generation which wants peace in their country and peace and
amity with their immediate neighbors who may be ethnically and
religiously different. We need to keep the welfare of this whole
new generation in mind, overcome our own prejudices, our own
policies of non interference... and do all we can to evolve a
different opinion and mount pressure on our national leaders also
to do justice in their dealings with our closest neighbors.
Wish to
thank you all for your patient listening and your restraint in not
walking out on me.
