"A Tamil Standpoint in Sri Lanka"

By Sebastian Rasalingam, Toronto

(March 09, Toronto, Sri Lanka Guardian) Rajan Philip's feature article appearing in the First March issue of the Island newspaper is a thoughtful clearly written article, with needs to be addressed and evaluated. He begins by saying that the "problem of finding Sri Lankans in Sri Lanka has become more than a matter of textual teasing as old divisions are hardened by the current war". I pick up a few of his dominant themes to remind the reader and to provide a basis for my comments:

1. Rajan P points out that the "Sri Lanka is for Sinhalese" concept has become dominant even though this is anathematic to all others including large numbers of Sinhalese who positively support a plural Sri Lanka."

2. Rajan Philip consider the specter of the North and East becoming "Garrison Provinces", and also bemoans that "Tamil politics has never been as rudderless as it currently is. Nor has it been as existential - their land has been scorched, tens of thousands of civilians are caught in the crossfire,..."

3.RP also seems to think that constitutional changes are imperative and that something MORE than the 13th amendment is necessary. This discussion of constitutional needs ends with a lot of hubris about Tirunavukarasar's "kudiyallom" about self-respect" and JR Jayawardena's defiant reply to the Indians.

Rajan Philips, in spite of his Leftist up-bringing, forgets about Tirunavukarasar's acceptance of Manu Dharma where this self-respect is destroyed and ossified into various caste strata. Jayawadena's notorious attitude to human rights is surely not a part of the "Philip's amnesia"?. Both Tirunavukarasar and Jayawardena demanded democracy and respect from those above their stratum, and abject obedience from those below them! Much of Rajan Philips's essay is built upon convenient partial truths which ignore the political realities and buttress a partisan view which arises from the hidden racist pathology behind the so-called National question.

In fact, if you look at the very title of his article, you see that he refuses to think like a Sri Lankan, but insists on thinking like a Tamil, and yet rebukes the Sinhalese of thinking like "Sinhalese". During the time when I grew up, the concept of being "Ceylonese" was dominant even within the church-influenced, English educated Northern society of the day. The Senanayake - Mahadeva - Oliver Goonatilleke pro-west leadership, as well as
the left-wing leadership accepted the concept of being "Ceylonese". The racist position had also been increasingly articulated by Ponnambalam, opposing the Donoughmore commission which proposed universal franchise, irrespective of race. Samuel J. V. Chelvanayagam in 1949, in founding the "Tamil Ilankai Arasu Kadchi" (ITAK), explicitly articulated the view that the "Sinhalese are invaders in the Traditional homelands of the Tamils". He worked tirelessly to achieve his version of ""Nam-arkum kudiyallom" from then onwards. In my view, Bandaranaike was not a racist, but a political opportunist who under-estimated the power of racism, and unleashed forces that played exactly into the hands of the ITAK.

If the ITAK were actually interested in "Federalism", as it claimed in its sanitized hand-outs to the Anglophone Ceylonese, it should have gone around the country explaining to the Kandyans, the Indian Tamils, The Sabaragamuva and Ruhuna people, the advantages that they too could obtain if regional government and some form of federalism were possible. S. W. R. D. Bandaranaike too had in several of his writings considered the advantages of Federalism for Sri Lanka.

Given that the Kandyans and several other groups had also been favourable to Federalism at the dawn of the Soulbury hearings, and it is my view that there would have been a favourable reception to federalism if the ITAK had honestly worked for federalism. Such federalism involves the building of trust and confidence among the groups hoping to confederate. In reality, the ITAK followed a program totally opposed to federalism. I have, in the 1950s, listened to fiery rhetoric and eloquent political speeches in Tamil, where we were told of the old "Kingdom of Jaffna", and to drive the Sinhalese and the Muslims out of the "Traditional lands" of the Tamils. The Tamils who faced the 1952 elections rejected that rhetoric, and regarded the ITAK as an extremist fringe party. Meanwhile G. G. Ponambalam had unleashed his nationalist rhetoric in the 1930s, but moderated himself and he had accepted the Ceylonese concept under the banner of Senanayake, and it was his party which was successful in the 1952 elections.

Of course, as every one knows, once the adroit touch of D. S. Senanayake disappeared, and given S.W.R.D.Bandaranaike's eagerly clumsy hands, the forces that had been kept at bay were ushered in. The ITAK also came to the front stage on the back-lash. SJV was a budding Eelamist in 1949, and all he could see was the vindication of his vision. He was not large enough to see that, instead of Satyagrahs and civil disobedience, his approach SHOULD have been to JOIN WITH BANDA, in the same spirit as Marikkar and other Muslims who supported the SLFP. The Tamil leadership could have cooperated with Banda, build up good relations and ethnic amity, while espousing the need for Tamil, as this is exactly the same sentiments that drove the Sinhalese of the day to dethrone English. Instead, SJV chose extra-parliamentary confrontation - an approach which is utterly idiotic for a minority community as the repercussions are always disadvantageous. The ITAK found it necessary to tarnish the image of the Senanayakes, claiming that they encouraged "colonization of the Traditional Homelands", while totally ignoring the influx of Tamils to the south which became a torrent after 1948. The activities of the ITAK even further destroyed the the amity that existed between the two ethnicities, and polarized the
influential Anglophone "Ceylonese" community into "Tamils" and "Sinhalese". By 1972 even the hard-core "internationalist" left-leaders also succumbed to this polarization. Was it at all surprising that the Banda-Chelva fact, or the Dudly-Chelva pact failed to materialize? In reality it was not the "Buddhist Monks" who foiled these pacts - it was the ITAK itself, because it failed to build bridges and instead openly advocated the ultimate liberation of the "Traditional Homelands", a fact well -known to many Sinhalese and the
Tamil-speaking Tamils.

In effect, there was a very large window of opportunity for nurturing federalism in Sri Lanka, from 1948 to perhaps 1972. As I already remarked, many groups had been favourable to federalism in 1948, and this included the left parties which also firmly supported "parity of status" to Tamil. Philip Goonawardena physically attacked Ponnambalam in the corridor of the State council after a strongly racist speech by Ponnambalam. It was Tamil nationalism, seeped in caste-based land-owner conservatism which rejected any links with the left. The racism and personal hubris of the elitist lawyers of Colombo, mostly Christian by faith but Vellalar in social-practice, became the driving force of Tamil politics. "Tamil" was emphasized by the ITAK as that was the only way to justify the "traditional homelands (TH)" concept. A. J. Wilson writing in the late 1960s asserted that this TH had become the essential basis of Tamil politics. This concept has seeped into Tamil ethos and its unconscious mindset, just as much as the sinhalese have their "sinhala mindset". Today, even Rajan Philips, with a conscious "internationalist" leftist background cap, unconsciously subscribes to this TH concept, and "la rasion cachee" which motivates his essay is also this TH. That is precisely why he is not happy with the 13th amendment, or anything else other than some super federalism? Just recently, a Tamil expatriate writing from Australia argued for Federalism, and in his mind he was thinking of the Tamil Homelands federating with India!

Thus, unlike in the 1950s, the word "Federalism" is a dirty, treacherous word in Sri Lankan constitutional discussions. In my view, it cannot be resurrected for at least another two decades, when a new generation of young voters would be the king makers.

But why do we need federalism? If I follow Rajan Philp's dialectic, it is perhaps to avoid "Garrison Provinces", and give room for the flowering of the "Nam-arkum kudiyallom" of Tirunavukarasar. But I remind him that Jaffna and the Tamil parts of the East have always been garrison provinces from time immemorial. The lower-caste people of these regions could not even draw water from a well, bury their dead where they wish, buy land even when they had the money, or worship in a Kovil at will. There was a ruling class that ran the Garrison, and those others, the poor Tamils, who were the inmates of the
garrison. The LTTE physically eliminated the Colombo managers of the garrison,
and they became the overloads of the new garrison. One of the good outcomes of the LTTE-Colombo conflict has been that some of the kith and kin of the earlier governors of the garrison, the Gajan Kumars, Sampanthans and such others, have had to take orders from the likes of Thamilchelvan. It is the subconscious racism that has penetrated into the mind of even a man like Rajan Philips that drives him to naively disregard the enduring character of the age-old social garrison-nature of Tamil society.

The ordinary Tamil living in the Valagnchiyan Veli of the Vanni, or around
Addalaichenai in Ampare, has very different concerns to a Tamil living in
Scarborough, Ontario. The latter, together with Roi Ratnavel of Vancouver, may dream of an existentialist Eelam, where the "Nam-arkum kudiyallom" is the major concern. Velu from Valagnchiyan Veli of the Vanni has to worry about his basic animal needs, a roof for his head, and collecting enough money to pay a dowry for his daughter, educate his son, and live the traditional life. He does not even mind bowing his head to the upper-caste politician Pillai-type who drives around in Jeeps and NGO vehicles, as long as he does not get assaulted for not getting out of the way fast enough. What if this politician were given some more "Arasu" powers delegated to him? Does he really need more?
Doesn't he already have virtual life and death powers over the poor Velu living in Valaippadu? He gets treated better only when the diplomats and politicians from Colombo descend into the village. May be, what is needed is NOT devolution of power into the hands of the local thugs (even though they are Tamils), but more central control and exposure of these depressed areas to the external world! Then, the Rajan Philips and Tisaranne Gunasekera types might even visit these people and see that the so-called "sinhala-buddhist" mindset of the Colombo rulers, or the "Tamil-nation mindset" of the expatriate Tamils, are less important than the harassment from local Tamil chieftains with no mindset what so ever.

The Garrison provinces had been garrison provinces from time immemorial. The Tamil leaders of yore tried very hard, in the 1940s, to prevent the building of causeways which connected isolated villages because they felt that if these people were given roads and development, then they would "get uppity". Rajan Philips does not understand that the "kudiyallom" was not proposed for every body! Today, the talk of regional devolution is once again the old causeways debate where the Tamil leaders wanted to isolate their areas of influence from the center. Instead of devolution of power and divisive constitutional haggling, I propose the building of fast rail links to every part of the Vanni and the East, to get full integration of the country. A fast rail connecting Mullaitivu to Colombo in two hours would make Mullaitivu no different to Negambo or Chilaw in accessibility. That will literally pave the way for leveling social and economic differences between the North, East and the Western-Southern regions. The devolution debate would become totally irrelevant. The battles about "discrimination at university admissions", which mattered to vellalar children but ignored that poor or low caste children could not often even get to a school, would also gradually disappear.

Rajan Philips moans that there is no Tamil leadership to speak of. Indeed, we DO NOT NEED leaders who think of themselves as "Tamils" or "Sinhalese". Just as 1956 presented a unique opportunity for a great Tamil-speaking leader to collaborate and cooperate with Bandaranaike, today a unique opportunity has arisen for Tamil-speaking Sri Lankan leaders to cooperate with the Rajapaksa government and build ethnic bridges of goodwill and friendship. One does not attempt to go against history as attempted by SJV, but one must go with History.

The TMVP has publicly handed over its weapons. Although the East is still a bit of a ackwater as far as democracy is concerned, it is far freer than when it was under the LTTE. Once the mines are cleared in the Vanni, the IDPs can be resettled, the Yali Devi train can be set up and democracy should also come to the Vanni, and this may take even ten years.

I believe that the Hon. Anandasangaree, Devananda, and Karuna, in spite of their historical antecedents and several short-comings, have the potential to rise to the occasion. The greatness of Thondaman Sr. was that he understood how to cooperate with successive Colombo governments, avoid the traps of suicidal separatism or Marxist mayhem, and guide his people to a state of dignity and increasing integration with the host population.

So I do not share the pessimism of Philips and reject the existentialist imagery where individual dignity is warped into ethnic nationalism foaming into racism. -Sri Lanka Guardian