The Wolves (Part 02)

“Every time he lost consciousness, it felt as if he had fallen into a dark cave. It would seem as if somebody was calling out his name from a very far distance. Were they the God of Death’s messengers? Were they holding the rope of death in their hands? No, they were only holding dangerous guns from the Western countries! Where was the waterfall passing down? The ambulance was going through a valley.”
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Continued From Part One

by : Rajes Balasubramaniam

(March 17, London, Sri Lanka Guardian)The Army officer then attacked the youth. He had a big baton in his hand. It broke the Tamil’s head.

They brought Kumar forward. The shaking head signalled. Kumar, too, was pushed into the group of ‘Tamil terrorists’.

Someone who was watching all this from a distance was shouting out in Sinhala. It was a face known to him, that of Summanathasa, who had once studied with him, who was standing there and shouting, “He is not a terrorist”.
He could be heard shouting. But it did not seem to have fallen on anybody’s ears. One or two persons standing next to Kumar were shot down. Like unwanted trees being cut down and thrown away, the lives of Tamils were being shot and felled.

Summanathasa burst through the crowd and came running. He was shouting in Sinhala. He pointed at Kumar, “He is not a terrorist”.

The raised guns of the army delayed for a minute. In those few moments, a charitable fairy must have been opening its eyes. Just a few moments between a life passing away and a life escaping. Because of Summanathasa’s help, Kumar escaped. Two or three Tamil lives that came behind Kumar fell down dead.

Kumar did not look up at Summanathasa. They had both studied together one time. Summanathasa’s mother was a poor Tamil woman and his father was Sinhalese. He had studied with Kumar in a Tamil school at a young age. Though he had later gone on to a Sinhalese school, whenever he met Kumar in the market or the street, he would speak a few words with him.

Kumar looked up at Summanathasa. When they were small, they had played and fought together.

When during the ‘Vesak’ festival at a Sinhalese Buddha village, some Sinhalese youths had teased Pakeerathy; Summanathasa had gone to fight with them. Summanathasa’s mother’s name was Theivamai; she earned her living by weaving mats. The father, Somaparla, was a Sinhalese who did odd jobs in the village. He had joined as a labourer at a bakery in the town, and then got into a relationship with the owner’s daughter, Podi Nona, whom he eventually married, having set aside Theivamai. Heartbroken at this, Theivamai fell ill and died. Summanathasa’s father had sent his son away to the Sinhala school in the south of Sri lanka.

Summanathasa was looking at the plight of his friend of the youthful days. The blood flowing in Summanathasa’s body was that of a Tamil mother. He could not bear to think of a Tamil who had played with him at one time, falling dead lifeless. His educated and bold-mannered appearance must have made the Sinhalese officers think twice.

It was dizzying. The sky darkened. The dead bodies of Tamil’s were bundled together. Old tyres were heaped on the rubbish dump in the market. The bodies were flung into them. Hundreds of soldiers with arms were excitedly running all around the market.

Many Tamil youths, who had been signalled out by the mercenary shaking head, who had betrayed his own Tamil race, were bundled like coconuts into lorries. Among these youths were those who had been hurt, those who were semi-conscious, those with blood streaming, and yet those who were weeping.

In the distance, on the rubbish dump in the market, the bodies of the Tamil youths who had been shot dead just hours before, burning in the heat of the tyres set on fire, were spreading black smoke and the putrid smell of death all around.

The lorries were leaving. The moaning of youths on the edge of death inside the lorries was heart rendering. Outside, the smell of the burning Tamil dead bodies was nauseating. After the lorries speeded away, Kumar felt his head spinning.

At the Karaitivu junction, some more Tamil youths were bundled into the lorries. Now, the rain was falling heavily.

The lorries were speeding towards Amparai. In the lorries, one or two Tamils who had been struggling for life breathed their last.

When Sampanthurai junction was reached, more people were pushed into the lorries. An old man and some youths along with him, all with serious injuries suffered from beatings were among them.

The old man was a bald-headed and bespectacled person. He had an attendance register book in one hand and a bell in the other. “I am telling them I am a headmaster. No fellow is listening to me.” The headmaster wiped the perspiration mixed with blood from his head.

The young students who had come with him let out a scream when they saw the dead bodies lying with gaping mouths.

“Hey boys, shut up your mouths!” the headmaster shouted at them in anger. The lorry suddenly halted. The military vehicle that was coming behind it also stopped. One by one, the Sinhalese soldiers jumped out from their vehicle and surrounded the lorry. “Bloody dogs! What are you shouting for?” One of them, who appeared to be the officer in charge, attacked them with the rifle butt. The headmaster pointed out at the corpses.

David’s plight was pitiful. He was getting drenched in the rain. Both his hands were terribly swollen.

The soldiers pulled out two or three bodies from the lorry and threw them in the street. Drenched in dried blood, and with bulging eyes, they presented a frightful sight. Perhaps these corpses may end up as good food for the wild foxes in the forest.

The Tamil who had risen in the morning to the devotional music of 'Thiruvembavai' is now in the evening a vulnerable prey to the wild animals. Kumar closed his eyes. His head was aching terribly. Because of the injury on his forehead, his eyelids were swollen.

It was only now that he felt the excruciating pain from the kick that had fallen on his stomach. Inside the lorry, the stinking smell of blood and perspiration, and that of the excreta and urine passed by those who had been beaten senseless, turned his stomach upside down.

What would be the time now? The rainy darkness, along with the surrounding environment of the forest, made it look like a dangerous period of time. When they reached the military camp at Amparai, it had grown very dark.

Those in the lorry were brought down. The soldiers hit them in the front and the back, with their arms, and their hands and legs.

A very tall Sinhalese military officer with a curled up moustache came walking down with conceit, and looked at the Tamil youths being unloaded from the lorry.

He looked at them as if looking at a horde of animals. “I have no idea of wasting time with you. If you tell me which of you belong to which militant group, it will be good for you. Otherwise, you have to suffer unnecessary trouble”, the military officer said, curling his moustache.

“Sir, I am a Tamil teacher. I have brought the school attendance register book with me as proof”, the schoolteacher said almost crying.
“Hey, bloody old man. Shut your mouth”.
The military officer’s fist made mincemeat of the Tamil teacher’s front teeth.

Those Tamil youths who had been beaten up were staggering, unable to stand. The soldiers kicked mercilessly those who staggered and fell. A blow from a baton fell on Kumar’s head too.

When he opened his eyes, the lorry was moving. He did not know how long it took before he opened his eyes.

Hundreds of Tamil youths were arranged in the military camp. It might be midnight, or it might have been early morning. There was no way of finding out the time. Some glimmering lights were getting wet in the rain.

One could see a row of military officers seated in a building. Every one of the prisoners was being subjected to interrogation.

David was standing staggeringly by in front of Kumar. His hands, which might have been blue in colour, looked black in the dim light of the darkness. His eyes looked scary and he appeared a deranged man. The man behind Kumar must have passed stools and urine in his clothes. The stench was overpowering.

The Tamil prisoners who had been brought before the present ones were sitting huddled in a corner. There were both men and women. The women seemed to be in a very bad position. Most of them appeared to be students. They were in their school uniforms. It was quite apparent that they had been subjected to terrible sexual violence, with their half-torn dresses, and with their exposed femininity.

Kumar felt his head spinning once again. He closed his eyes tightly. Would they have gone to the village and caught Rathy? Would she also have suffered a terrible fate like this? Kumar mumbled, “Rathy, Rathy.” His eyes filled with tears. His thoughts floundered. The sudden laughter from David in front brought Kumar back to reality.

Has David gone mad? He looked at both his hands and laughed. Kumar stood aghast. A military officer came and slapped David repeatedly. David kicked that officer with his leg.

In a minute, there was a stirring of movement all around. The officer, attacked by David in an animal frenzy, had fallen down. The next moment a bullet had ripped through David’s body and flew past, grazing Kumar’s shoulder. David fell down.

Two or three officers attacked him ruthlessly. David’s body was kicked around like a ball. After a short while, his body lay without any movement.

David had come to the temple festival last year, and was taking photographs. He, who had come to describe the festival, did not hesitate to imprison the damsels who were going past in a procession in temple chariots in his camera.

The enticing eyes of Rathy, caught in his camera, appeared in a national newspaper under the heading of ‘Spectacle in the festival’. David had also given a copy of that photograph to Kumar. Kumar kept it with him always, in memory of Rathy. David, who had artistically captured festivals and festivities in his camera, now lay dead.

From the time they had left their homes in the dizzying morning, until now, how many of the Tamil youths had been killed?

“Hey…you!” The Tamil youth Rajkumar, the lover of the pretty, intelligent girl Pakeerathy, the dearest son of his mother, the pet grandson of his grandma, the dear youngest brother of his sisters, was called by a bare and empty ‘Hey!’

“Is this fellow your friend?” they asked him, pointing out at David’s lifeless body. When immorality is in the ascendancy, what can morality do but bow down?
“In which movement were you?”
“In what secret militant activity did you deal?”
“How long have you been working against us?” Kumar could not imagine how one man could treat another man as cruelly as he had seen just now.

That night, the next day, the day after that… how many days? How many nights and days had passed? Are all these tortures dreams?

Have the devils – the asuras – from hell come in the name of the Sinhalese Army? By the time he realised that all that he had told of his being not a rebel, and that he had never participated in any anti-government activities would only fall on deaf ears, Kumar was hung upside down, and was severely beaten on his heels.

“Must buy medicine for Amma!”, his inner voice cried. “Grandma asked me not to go. Should I have listened to her word then and stayed back?” The elder sisters were always eyes and ears over his security. Now they would be very nervous. They would pray for their younger brother.

They splashed water on his face. “Hey how many Sinhalese soldiers did you kill?” One of the soldiers jumped on his stomach. Kumar must have l some injury to his stomach; blood was coming out of his nose and mouth.

“You can only fight if you remain to be a man”, one soldier said maliciously and laughed. Kumar wondered how it was possible for men to behave like such animals. Men were stripped naked and then tortured while they twisted and twitched in pain. Sinhalese and Tamils are said to be enemies. Therefore, the other man avenged one man’s masculinity cruelly.

How many days is it now?

Between the nights he was brought to this camp and now, when he had lost his sense of feeling and was unable to recognise himself, how many days and nights would have moved on? What could have happened to those who were packed like animals into the lorry, along with him?

What could have happened to the Tamil teacher who had come with a school attendance register book, and had said that he was no rebel?

What could have happened to those girls who were huddled together, with their torn dresses, with tearful eyes, and with their dignity lost?

Even now, you could hear ear-piercing cries of girls from somewhere, cutting through the silence of the night. Are these too, cries of young virgin girls?

When Kumar was on the verge of losing consciousness, the world appeared to be enveloped in darkness. With broken hands and legs, swollen penis, blood-trickling nose and mouth, he could not retain his consciousness.

Is the Tamil race in the world being avenged? For all this, what has the Tamilian done? He could not continue this line of thinking, as his mind was weak.

Could one satisfy oneself by imagining that not all that has happened has occurred in real life? How would Amma be now? Would she have known that the son who had gone to buy medicine for her was now being tortured into half a man? Would she have been agitated thinking that he, along with the burning corpses in the market, would have been burnt to ashes?

“Where am I now?” He could not open his eyes properly. Was there no part of his body that had not been beaten, tortured?

“Rathy I told you that I would meet you, but will I be alive to see you?” They were dragging him to some vehicle. What is this, a stretcher? Why are they taking me to the hospital? Due to the torture they had carried out, already life is ebbing away slowly, is that not enough?

“There are plenty of matters to be known from this dog”, a man’s growling voice beat on his ears. They are going to keep him alive and elicit some information from him, it seems. They were finding it difficult to keep him alive.

The cold wind touched his body. He opened his swollen eyes, and looked at his surroundings. The blue sky was spotless. Like speckles of cotton wool thrown in the air, pieces of clouds were moving in the sky. The soldiers with arms were seen everywhere.
The military camp was in the heart of a big forest. Clouds were moving over the distant hilltops, like dancing damsels. The stretcher was being hurriedly carried into the ambulance. “Must listen to Rathy’s voice. How can I tell her that I am dying?” Kumar lost consciousness.

Every time he lost consciousness, it felt as if he had fallen into a dark cave. It would seem as if somebody was calling out his name from a very far distance. Were they the God of Death’s messengers? Were they holding the rope of death in their hands? No, they were only holding dangerous guns from the Western countries! Where was the waterfall passing down? The ambulance was going through a valley.

The memory of swimming and frolicking in the Thillai River when it was in its full flow came to Kumar. When the small causeway broke open, and the sea and the river mingled together, how the sight of the sea waves rising to the height of a coconut tree delights the mind!

Will his eyesight ever return? Would his legs walk? Could he do anything with his hands? The ambulance suddenly stopped. “Tamil pariah!” was it the man who was pulling the stretcher shouting out? They were throwing him like a rotten potato. His head was heavy. Somebody was pushing his shirt aside and putting something on his chest. It must have been a stethoscope; it felt cold on Kumar’s bare skin.

The doctor was saying something. Kumar was educated at a boy’s college.. He knew his English fairly well. “There seems to be a big wound in his stomach.” The unclear mumbling of the doctor was heard. “He has lost a lot of blood.” The doctor took Kumar’s pulse. The rest of the conversation was in Sinhalese. They were discussing whether it was necessary to keep him alive.

The officer who had brought him was arguing empathetically that he was an important militant and there was a lot of information to be got out of him still. Kumar could not fully comprehend their argument.

“I have nothing worthy of telling you”, Kumar’s lips muttered. No sound issued from his mouth, his chest pained him and the next moment he had lost consciousness. What a peaceful world this is. Was not this the lotus pond in which Kumar and his friends had swam and frolicked? It is on the edge of the village, near a cemetery.

It was quite a pretty sight to see, ever so many red and white lotuses piercing through the water, raising their heads and dancing in the wind. The elders had ordered the children not to go near the lotus pond. There were many reasons for this. For one, the pond was full of water snakes. On the other hand, wild buffaloes used it as their sleeping place. It was also near the cemetery, there was a foolish superstition that if the children played near the cemetery, ghosts or demons would afflict them.

Kumar and his friends were not bound by these reasons. They played and swam in the lotus pond whenever they had the time. Some of the buffaloes lying there, munching with their mouths would stare at the boys. Though it was frightening to see the water snakes leap and climb over the lotuses that had not been touched by the water, nevertheless it was a remarkable sight.

Kumar who had lost consciousness is now swimming in the lotus pond. He is a fifteen-year-old boy swimming with his friends. The wild buffaloes are staring, but these animals do not attempt to kill him just because he is a Tamilian.

He dips into the water and rises up, crossing the water snakes that are circling the lotus stems. Even though Tamil breath issued from him, those snakes did not try to destroy him. Kumar was breathless. He felt breathless where there was no oxygen.

The eyes tried to open up, but there was some kind of pressure. He moaned, one does not know if he moaned because of the pain in his body, or because of the desperate feeling of being about to lose his life.

When he opened his eyes, he saw the doctor standing. He felt as if something was crawling on his head. “Am I still in the lotus pond?” A Sinhalese officer was looking sternly at Kumar. It took some time for Kumar to realise that what he had felt as a crawling on his head was the saline drip the doctor had injected.

There were two policemen standing round him. They muttered that he was a terrorist, and might try to escape at any time. Kumar’s head was clearing slowly. There seemed to be some strength in his body because of the medicine that had been injected into his head.

There was some furore around him. The ward nurse was speaking in a harsh tone. What was happening? Kumar could not understand anything. With great difficulty, he turned his head and looked. There was a big crowd outside looking intently at him through the window. They had a frightened look, as if beholding a tiger imprisoned in a cage.

Kumar, who was to enter the teacher training college next month, was now an exhibit like a caged animal. There were many young girls outside the window. There were eyes that brought Rathy’s eyes to memory. The mothers who carried their village’s innocence on their faces reminded him of his own mother. A very old woman, with her sagging old breast, reminded him of his grandma. Tears came down from his swollen eyes.

“Tamil pariah who killed our soldiers, cry well”, the old woman spat out from outside the window. A Tamilian who killed the soldiers?

In Kumar’s memory, the explosion of a landmine in the village one night came to mind. That night, he was talking with the Brahman priest regarding the temple festival.

“May your eyes become blind, your legs maimed. Lose your brains and become mad. Let all the Tamils perish. This is our land!” One woman shook the window bars and shrieked.

The Sinhalese policeman standing by Kumar laughed at him with derision. “Your male organ should be cut off and thrown to the dogs”, an old man shouted.

“Tamil demon, Tamil demon”, all of them started shouting out in unison.

He should be unconscious; he should go into the world he sees frequently. He should dream of the lotus pond also. The water snake and the wild buffalo were not going to harm him. Even if the dead bodies buried in the cemetery turned up as ghosts, he would not be frightened.

Was it imagination or a dream? His his brother in-law, has come, along with his friend. His brother in-law married his elder sister when Kumar was seven years old. He had shown him how to make a catapult and play with it. He was standing with tears in his eyes, and looking at Kumar.

“Ahamed Kaka came and told us about the army taking you in a lorry. It was Summanathasa who helped me to come here by giving money to a Sinhalese man known to him”, said brother in-law, weeping. Under the immense Sinhalese politics, such innocents would continue to weep. What is the time now, what would be the time today?

“How is Amma?” The imperativeness of bringing medicines for Amma was pricking Kumar’s mind.

“Amma, Amma…” brother in-law murmured. Kumar felt pain in the pit of his stomach. It was not pain from the beatings he had endured by the Army. The thought of Amma was the real pain.

“Without thinking about Amma, you take care of yourself”, brother in-law kissed him like a child. Summanathasa was standing at a distance. He did not come to Kumar; there was no necessity to come. He was looking at the rural Sinhalese people who were standing and shouting at the window. The nurse came and chased Kumar's brother in-law. “We are praying for you”, he said, hurrying away.

Kumar's brother in-law did not tell him about Amma becoming paralysed because of her agony over Kumar. He did not tell him of the Sinhalese Army asking Rathy whether Kumar was her lover, and then taking her and raping her, and Rathy committing suicide over it. He did not tell him of the many terrible incidents in the village.

( This story based on a true event and 'Kumar' is a human right writer,lives in London, writing for the UNITY of the Tamils and Sinhalese in Sri Lanka)
Summanathasa looked at his old friend. The policemen were also looking acutely at their prisoner.

This Tamil terrorist should escape death. Additional matters have to be gleamed from him. Important military officers are waiting. In the Tamil parts of Sri Lanka, so many people like Kumar’s families are praying for the safety of their friends and relatives.

Concluded.

- Sri Lanka Guardian