| by Gajalakshmi Paramasivam
( August 13, 2014, Melbourne, Sri Lanka Guardian) A valuable reader of Sri Lanka Guardian responded in relation to the article ‘Transparency – LTTE v the Sri Lankan Soldiers’ that Jaffna Tamils did not Equal Sri Lankan Tamils. I interpreted that as a protest against Jaffna Tamil leadership in the Sri Lankan ethnic issue. The leadership was highlighted in the above article through the laws of Thesawalamai which are the customary laws of Jaffna Tamils. Eastern Tamils have their own Customary laws. To my knowledge – Hill Country Tamils who are the latest group of Tamils to arrive in Ceylon / Sri Lanka – do not have Customary Laws specific to their areas. They are naturally covered by Indian Tamil culture more than any other group of Tamils in Sri Lanka.
Former Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M G Ramachandran was born in Sri Lanka as a Hill Country Tamil. As stated by me in the Sri Lanka Guardian article ‘Reconciliation between Tamil Eelam & Tamil Nadu’ LTTE was funded by MG Ramachandran.
In his article ‘UNRESOLVED ETHNIC DIVIDE CAN ONCE AGAIN STALL DEVELOPMENT’ Jehan Perera highlights the plight of Hill Country Tamils as follows: ‘The only hope of the poor people in the estate sector for their economic progress can only be that the benevolent eye of the government leadership will fall once more upon them, and will keep the promises made. In his last election manifesto, Mahinda Chintana, President Mahinda Rajapaksa promised “One of my major goals is to make the plantation community a house owning one. Accordingly, instead of living in line rooms, every plantation worker’s family will be a proud owner of a new home with basic amenities by the year 2015.” As the coming year, 2015, is set to be an Election Year, there is every possibility of the government seeking once again to woo the support of the estate Tamil community. The President’s budget speech for 2014 contained the promise of constructing housing complexes with 50,000 housing units to replace poor quality housing available in the estate sector.’
Jehan Perera highlights also ‘The tragedy is that even today most of the estate Tamil population continues to live in line rooms. Those who were mortified when the displaced Tamil victims of the war in the North were put into welfare centres at the close of the war, would see a resemblance between the tin roof shelters of those refugee camps and the line rooms in the estates today.’
Therein lies the essence of the ethnic issue in Sri Lanka. The Government, dominated by Sinhalese leadership would naturally try to compensate itself from within the Tamil wealth to balance handouts to poorer voters whose votes could be won more easily than that of the more educated Tamil from North. The demotion in the standards of Housing for Northern Sri Lankans for whom the Government is responsible taken along with the Government’s promise to promote Housing standards of Hill Country Tamils is to rob the highly educated Sir Ponnambalam Arunachalam’s heirs to pay Actor M G Ramachandran’s heirs.
The parallel of that for us Australians is the meeting by our Immigration Minister the Honorable Scott Morrison (an heir of Mr. John Howard’s Political heritage) with the Government Appointed Governor GA Chandrasiri instead of the Chief Minister elected by current Jaffna Tamils. As per ‘The Australian’ of 10 July:
[After attending a morning commissioning ceremony in Colombo of two Bay Class patrol boats donated by Australia to the Sri Lankan navy with Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa and his defence secretary brother Gotabhaya, Mr Morrison flew to Jaffna to meet Governor GA Chandrasiri, a former senior military officer…….. But former Supreme court judge CV Wigneswaran, who was elected chief minister of the northern province last September, told The Australian he knew nothing of the Immigration Minister’s visit.
Editor of the Jaffna-based online news site Malarum.com Nadesapillai Vithyadharan confirmed Mr Morrison arrived late to Jaffna and met only with the governor.
Senior Tamil National Alliance MP and lawyer MA Sumanthiran said he was disappointed that Mr Morrison had squandered the opportunity to learn more about the plight of Tamil citizens in the war-ravaged north, particularly in light of Tony Abbott’s comments that Sri Lanka was a country at peace.
“Nothing could be further from the truth. We had been trying to reach the Australian high commission for days to see if we could meet with him,” Mr Sumanthiran said.
“It’s very strange that he would choose not to meet with elected representatives.”]
The development achieved by Jaffna Tamils is clearly demonstrated by the leaders we have elected. Many of us in the Diaspora vote through the Residents to represent the values that we continue to uphold beyond the seas. We contribute similarly to the minds of our leaders in parts of the world we currently call our ‘home’. To the extent we do so naturally through our long term governance values – we not only connect the two groups but empower each other.
Mr. Morrison represents the Federal Government of Australia. To the extent the above mentioned Patrol Boats were out of Public money and to the extent Australian Tamil Community is owed by the rest of Australia – debt due to lower pays compared to Australians of British origin – for the same standard of work – the funds for the boats have come from us – but without our approval. Thus Australian Tamils have been robbed to pay Sinhalese to reduce the power of Sri Lankan Tamils. My book ‘Naan Australian’ is a declaration by this Australian Tamil – of Self-Governance. This would dilute the karma being accumulated towards violence against Australians through reverse discrimination.
Is Australian Tamil Equal to Sri Lankan Tamil? - YES
Does Tamil Australian represent Australia on Equal basis as Mr. Scott Morrison - YES
Does Tamil Sri Lankan represent Sri Lanka on Equal basis as Mr. Rajapakse from Hambantota - YES
As Gandhi said – there is room for us all. Most subjective leaders in power would tend to ‘dismiss’ self-developed democratic leaders – as Mr. Scott Morrison also did. It has become an irredeemable sin on their part. The only avenue available is ‘surrender’.
The avenue available to minority is simple renunciation of inheritance from such subjective leaders and establish their own self-governance Above & Independent of the oldies – as demonstrated by Lord Muruga the Presiding Deity of Tamils (Appendix). Tamils through Murugan on the Hill of Kathirgamam – close to Hambantota - the home electorate of President Rajapakse - are taking good care of their Sinhalese relatives also.
The Sri Lanka Guardian article ‘Gota's blunder: Tamil Nadu billboard shows President pleading’ confirms the reaction by the MG Ramachandran lineage. Hill Country Tamils need Jaffna Tamil leadership to respond as Global Tamils.
Appendix – Mango Legend
Those driven by subjective powers would tend to use mentors to complete the journey. Those driven by current merit and therefore objective powers – would tend to do the journey from zero base and on their own allocating credit to themselves by themselves and producing objectively measurable outcomes. As per the Mango Competition example in Hindu Tamil legend (Naan Australian – Chapter 17 - Vertical Intellectual Analysis or Lateral Observation?) the elder sibling uses the hidden force to mentally complete the target of going-around-the-world through his mentors. His mentors were his whole world. By going around the mentors he won the prize mango. That is usually the academic way. The younger sibling did the physical journey from zero base and physically went around the world. But given that there was only one prize - there was no prize to be ‘given’ to the younger sibling. Given that both were from the royal family - the younger sibling was entitled to equal leadership. He declared this and ‘took’ his place as an equal. This is also the case with many migrants in Western countries.
Once we go global we include all cultures in ourselves. Except for the current part of the world that is seen at the physical level – the rest are invisible as knowledge driven by belief. The elder sibling (i.e. management) goes around the parents (mentors) and takes the subjective path to realise divinity. Parents are the only visible part of the world seen by the first born in a subjective system. The equally capable younger son – goes around the world – from zero base and physically completes the journey to claim ‘new territory’ and realise divinity through the objective path. There are no hidden forces needed to assess such a claim and therefore no subjective power is needed to calculate the younger son’s win. Since there are no witnesses the declaration has to be by the self – as in Affidavit evidence.
In that legend – the younger son who completed the global journey from zero base – promotes himself to reign from Hill-tops (to have aerial view) and therefore ‘see’ the whole picture from above.
Migrants of a country are the parallels of the younger son and hence a country / land area with high proportion of migrants – needs to use the objectively measurable path of democracy. Areas where local population is high – is better off using the Traditional vertical subjective path instead of reinventing the wheel.
In the above legend – the younger son – renounces his share of inherited wealth before claiming self-rule. Migrants likewise need to renounce their inherited wealth from their countries of origin to ‘show’ self-rule from a higher/global position. In the Sri Lankan context – Tamils using global values need to renounce their inherited wealth and use UN laws and principles towards self-governance – in Sri Lanka as well as other parts of the world. Towards this they need to consciously and visibly include the outcomes produced by Tamils all over the world – as if they had travelled the world like the younger son did in the above mentioned Mango Story.
I find that when I write I am less disturbed by external influences. To me that is like ‘staying at home’ in the consciousness of the essence of my seniors/guru/Truth. As per wise elders the great epic Mahabharatham was written by Ganesh - the elder son in the Mango Story. When we are in the company of others we tend to be affected by their expectations and this makes it difficult for us to bring out outcomes that are ‘homemade’ – from within ourselves.
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