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2.1
The current situation : Ideology and inequality
2.2 Land alienation in Trincomalee Town.
2.2.2
Forty two houses in front of Sirimapura, Love Lane Housing Scheme No.2
2.2.3
Encroachments in Love Lane area now named Wijesekerapura
2.2.5
Palampottaru Stage II, Pattinipuram
2.2.6 Main features of land settlement and its implications:
Mass
deportations of the autumn of 1983:
2.5
Discrimination in the use of land temporarily abandoned by owners
2.6
The land problems of returning refugees and displaced persons
2.7
Some salient features of government policy in Trincomalee
2.8
Tamil responsibility for the fate of Trincomalee
A Hindu schoolmaster in Nilaveli remarked,”
I have no problem with language or religion. Language is only a medium of expression.
It does not make one more or less human. It is the quality of thought that matters.
Religion is just a mode of worship. I visit all places of worship on festival
days, whether Pallivasal(Mosque), Kovil, Church, or Pansale (Buddhist temple)
and eat with the devotees”. These are sentiments of a man, not young, but
old enough to remember better times. They reflect a certain harmony that prevailed
in the Trincomalee District, which extended to the East as a whole, and gave
it a plural character. Cast iron divisions on the basis of language and religion
are recent impositions mainly resulting from state ideology.
Many traditions of the district going
back more than a millennium centre around Koneswaram temple at Fort Frederick.
Names of villages such as Thiriyai and Mallikaitivu are derived from services
they performed for the temple. The role of the tank at Kantalai which watered
the fields at Kantalai and Thambalakamam, and provided for the maintenance of
the temple was recognised by the government in an agreement in the 195Os. This
safeguarded the water rights to 5000 acres of these traditional fields.
The ancient Buddhist temple Vilgam Vihara between Kanniya
and Mudalikkulam (Morawewa) on the Vavuniya Road is another testament to the
plural character of Trincomalee. It has the Tamil name Rajaraja Perumpalli and
carries an inscription marking the endowments granted to it by the Chola king
Rajaraja about the turn of the last millennium. Although the Chola Empire was
an outgrowth of militant Hinduism in Tamil South India, religious polarisation
does not appear to have reached this country. Pragmatic Chola kings endowed
kovils as well as vihares in Ceylon [Chola inscriptipns in Ceylon, Prof.K.Indrapala,
University of Jaffna]. There are strong grounds for believing that Vilgam
Vihara was a shrine of Tamil speaking Buddhists [cf:Indrapala].
Hindu pilgrims of the East to the
shrine of Kathirkamam (Kataragama) , in the deep South, passed through
Sinhalese villages in Panamapattu along the southern coast of the Eastern province
who hosted them and even intermarried among them.
Gomarankadawela( Kumaresan Kadavai) in the north-west
of the district had a bilingual population, which now,as a consequence of state
ideology, have identified themselves as strongly Sinhalese. Its Wannihamys,
Wannikuralas and Korala Mahattayas (ancestors of former minister and one time
deputy prime minister, Maitripala Senanayake) often studied in Tamil.
Subsequently Muslims and later during the British
period, Tamils from Jaffna and Sinhalese migrated into Trincomalee for mainly
economic reasons and blended into its traditions.
This condition of peaceful co-existence
was brought to an end when state ideology from the 60s used its administrative
power and from the 80s brute force, to sunder the historical continuity
of the East. The healthy traditions inherent in this country’s
history by which communities had co-existed and intermingled in a plural
environment were violently cast aside. The thrust was towards mono-ethnicisation
and on rewriting history to suit the dominant state ideology.
What happended is well-known. From
the early 80s Tamils were subject to violence by politically instigated hoodlums
backed by the forces. In the wake of the July 1983 holocaust and its sequel,
many Tamils physically witnessed known people and even close relatives being
hacked to death. As a reaction many young joined a number of militant groups.
Almost every Tamil family had a close militant connection, frequently a son
or a brother. In addition to fighting the Sri Lankan forces many of them were
also party to internecine strife and reprisals against Sinhalese civilians.
A responsible government which had upon the arrival of the IPKF in 1987
accepted its past mistakes, should have, however late, initiated a politics
of healing.
With the onset of the war of June 1990 the Tamils were
at their weakest since July 1983. In place of a politics of healing, the political
weakness of the Tamils and their lack of representation in the provincial
council or parliament is being used to lay the foundations for endless strife.
Under the guise of resettlement the administration and the military are working
fast to settle Sinhalese in a manner that would trap Tamils into insecure pockets.
In the absence of Tamil representation, the laws of the land concerning property
ownership, distribution of crown land and places of worship are being broken
with impunity. Most of this activity is shrouded in secrecy.
There are many visible signs of this policy. For a district with a Tamil character, from Kantalai to Trincomalee, along the main Kandy Road, there are hardly any signs in Tamil except in a pocket or two. At Thambalakamam, a Tamil village, in front of the army camp a considerable Buddhist temple has sprung up where earlier there were only shrines to St.Mary and Pillaiar (a Hindu God). The next step is not hard to guess. New names like Lucky Wijyapura and Ranmuthugama (formerly Muthunagar) have suddenly appeared without any reference to history or tradition.[Top]
Questions of land have been
dealt with by the government unilaterally during an extended period of transition
in the country’s affairs. Meanwhile the government repeatedly pledged to
solve the minority question and did next to nothing. In the early stages the
matter was dealt with by administrative sleights of hand by bending or breaking
the rules where convenient. When the Government Agent and the Land Officer could
get together a good deal of mischief could be done under wraps. It is hardly
surprising that Trincomalee, a majority Tamil speaking area, is the only district
in the island, which never had a Tamil government agent. The present land officer
is regarded as one ideal for his given job. In 1979 when land alienation to
Sinhalese under Bandaragoda ,GA, was getting out of control, a group
of Tamils set fire to the land office in protest,in a bid to slow down the alienation.
Bandaragoda is described as a perfect gentleman who believed that every
man was communally inclined. Under his administration in Trincomalee, Sinhalese
officers were appointed to predominantly Tamil AGA’s Divisions, including
Town and Gravets, as Additional AGA’s and Additionsl Grama Seveka officers.
Trincomalee is the only District which had these communally based special appointments.
The present war has made the government’s
task far easier, since a very large number of Tamils are refugees or have been
forced to flee the district. Recently an attempt to regularise encroachment
of land by the sea used in temple festivals (Thirthakkarai) was stopped
only through taking up the matter at the highest level in Colombo. Earlier land
in Fort Frederick (Papanasam Theertham) used on Hindu festive occasions
at Koneswaram temple, was suddenly turned into a parade ground for the
army. Nearly all decisions have been unfavourable to the Tamils. Lands vacated
by Tamils owing to insecurity have been suddenly christened with Sinhalese names
unknown to the general public. We shall now look at some specific instances
of this policy; some of them refer to decisions taken at a land conference in
late December with leading officials from Colombo in attendance.
The area known as Love Lane,
just north of the town, once consisted of 33 lots amounting to 70 acres,
all owned by Tamils. In August 1939, just about the outbreak of World
War II, the British administration aquired these lands as part of its
expansion of naval facilities in Trincomalee, for use as storage facilites
and such like. When the British quit in 1958, the government of Ceylon
did not use this land for any public purpose. The land was left idle.
For the last 20 years, to this date, Sinhalese encroachers have settled in
the area with encouragement from ruling interests in Colombo as suggested
by new names like sirimapura, Nelsonpura and Sobithagama. The almost total
devastation of the area shows what this policy meant.
33 Muslim and 14 Tamil families who
were living on the land and had to flee in the aftermath of the June 1990
war. The local Buddhist priest used his influence to have the land released
to his temple. Thereafter he alienated the land to 34 Sinhalese families.
The former residents now in refugee camps complained. The land authorities
decided that it was ‘not practicable’ to evict
the present occupants to make room for the former. But for the sake of
propriety it was decided to cancel alienation done by the priest and for the
selection to be made at an interview by officials ‘with the consent
of the priest’!
In 1980 the NHDA decided
to build houses for Sinhalese at Love Lane and named it the Nelsonpura
scheme. This being a majority Tamil area, the MP, Sampanthan ,
protested. Premadasa, then prime minister, personally intervened
and ordered that the Nelsonpura scheme could be proceeded with only after
an equal number of houses had been built for Tamils. Hence the scheme
above was set in motion by the NHDA under the Aided Self Help Programme.
In the wake of July 1983, the Tamil occupants fled and the houses were taken
over by Sinhalese. When the IPKF arrived in 1987, the squatters fled
and the Tamil owners come into reoccupation. Following the June 1990 war,
the Tamils fled once more and Sinhalese took occupation. Now 22 of the former
Tamil owners have returned from India.
The land authorities discussed the ‘complex’ problem and
left it for an ‘amicable’ settlement between the parties!
Since
a Land Ministry circular forbade regularisation of encroachments after 27.10.89
it was decided to hold a land Kacheri. A notice was issued to hold interviews
for land alienation. Three senior citizens pointed out in a petition that the
names Wijesekarapura and Sobithagama have no legal status, the ordinance invoked
(Land Development Ordinance or Crown Lands Ordinance) was not stated, nor
were the total area of the estate and of each allotment given. A further point
made was that the land to be alienated is required by law to be first cleared
and should not be squatter occupied. They also observed that an applicant was
envisaged to be any one who has been a resident for 5 years according to the
notice. They concluded that the motivation behind the exercise was merely an
administrative means of getting round the circular and regularising encroachment
by those who had no permanent abode in Trincomalee. For these and other reasons
they called for a cancellation of the exercise.
This
land is on the edge of town on the left as one enters Trincomalee through the
Kandy Road, just before Orr’s Hill and the main Police station. At the
land conference the secretary ruled that this land should be put to urban use
as a middle class residential area planned by the UDA. He also said that encroachments
should be prevented. But the land is being rapidly encroached upon by Sinhalese,
no one knows from where. A Sinhalese when asked believed that it was land which
once belonged to a Sinhalese, Balasooriya , and was donated to Sri Jayasumanarama
Buddhist temple by him more than 70 years ago. He cited a current court case
as an indication of this.
A senior Tamil citizen when asked
about it said that the land in fact belonged to Shanmuga Boys Home, an
orphanage, and Justice Krishnathasan. He also said that the court case
involves a small piece of land at Mattikali accommodating the YMBA (Young Men’s
Buddhist Association) and a garage, the plaintiff being Balasooriya’s
grandson. The case,he added,is against the YMBA and the Buddhist priest. The
inmates of Shanmuga Boys Home abandoned the site in the wake of the 1983
communal riots.
Such problems are common in Trincomalee
where the ownership of several lands is being decided by squatters who indirectly
have the blessings of the authorities. Another example is land now termed Vijithapura
-part Kovil land and part private land - now occupied by Sinhalese fishermen.
As we have seen the tendency of the authorities is to decide in favour of squatters
and hold that it is impracticable to move them. Regularisation is a technicality
easily dealt with. This is not squatting under normal conditions, where there
is a case for sympathetic consideration. But this is squatting under military
occupation by persons coming from far away, in conditions favourable entirely
to one ethnic group.
Between
Thambalakamam and Palampottaru (Monkey Bridge), the land to the east of the
road up to the railway tracks was the Tamil settlement of Pattinipuram (Palampottaru
stage 1). The action of the Sri Lankan forces from the mid-8Os rendered the
lands practically inaccessible to Tamils. On the opposite side were lands designated
for the scheme Palampottaru Stage II that was not implemented [See Appendix
IV]. Now new houses for Sinhalese settlers have been put up with help
from NGOs LEADs and Sarvodaya, according to well placed sources.
LEADs is expected to put up 300 or more houses. According to sources
close to the LEADs, the organisation has so far put up 85 houses, 58
for Sinhalese and 27 for mainly members of the deserving gypsy(Kuravar) community.
For each house Rs 15000/- came from the Rehabilitation ministry housing grant
to displaced persons, and the balance Rs 10000/- from LEADs. Many of
these settlers were persons who had lived on encroached lands in that area prior
to the arrival of the IPKF and had then lived in refugee camps for Sinhalese.
[Top]
Land acquired by Sri Lanka Ports
Authority: In the early eighties more than 5000 acres of land was vested with
SLPA [See Appendix III]. From the very beginning Tamil leaders protested
that the SLPA would never use so much land and that the move was meant to facilitate
unfair land alienation at a later date.In fact the SLPA barely used 100 acres
at any time. Following the outbreak of war in June 1990, a number of Sinhalese
encroached on these lands without any obstruction.It was reported at the land
conference of 6th January 1993, with the minister of lands in attendance,
that a number of persons were living on SLPA land, some on plots of the order
of 1 acre and that the SLPA had agreed to release 700 acres. A proposal
was made to regularise the encroachments and to limit further alienations to
40 perches (1\4 acre). The cost of land in the area nearer town is 3 to 4 thousand
rupees a perch, so that some encroachers could receive up tp Rs 500 000/- worth
of land! Once more the matter was taken up at the highest levels in Colombo
and the verbal undertaking was given to limit any alienation to 20 perches.
We have seen that there is an underlying
trend in and around Trincomalee with the assistance of the whole state machinery
at its disposal. The state is bent on Sinhalisation of the whole area. The general
approach is that any Sinhalese coming to Trincomalee to do business should by
hook or by crook be given a permanent home. This is done under conditions
where Tamil land owners cannot exercise their ownership. Other than through
squatting, the Ministry of Fisheries for instance, has acquired land in Pallaththottam
(3rd mile post) and settled Sinhalese fishermen. In the case of Vijithapura
above Fisheries has made a request to acquire land which consists of both private
and temple land. 50 families, nearly all Sinhalese, either government officers
or connected with the forces, were given housing land in the vicinity of Dhoby
tank near the railway tracks. This was done after June 1990.
There is also land hunger locally
which is not addressed. 500 families of sanitation, health and UC labourers
in town have only recently been offered alternative land, mostly outside the
UC area, because of their present land being required for hospital expansion.
They are people of Indian origin who have been there more than 40 years. Their
area is now very crowded with often 5 families in an allotment meant for one.
It is important to note that, private land owners in
Trincomale are neither rich by national standards nor hold large extents of
land. The richer among them would hold at best 2 or 3 acres through which they
derived an income from coconuts and such like. One could hardly compare their
wealth with their counterparts in other parts of the country. Their lands are
being acquired for a song while they are being reduced to a very straitened
existence, not to benefit the local landless but to settle persons from the
south and others like fishermen who have come there seasonally for about 10
or 15 years at best. Even if the government was genuinely concerned about the
land problem faced by people in the South, it would have given them land not
by moving them to a distant place in controversial circumstances, but by using
state land near their homes or by acquiring land from the local land-owning
class. The motivations here are therefore mischievous.
Even in naming places a procedure has to be followed.
Under the Renaming of towns and villages Ordinance the Home ministry
must first receive a request and advertise it. If there are objections then
there is a procedure to resolve it. Here hatchet men in the local administration
and Buddhist monks pull names out of hats. Moreover, amidst a civil war situation
where the people see the armed forces as aliens, naming places after soldiers
who were killed, shows the blindness and insensitivity of government policy.
On the other hand it also shows that the government does not have any concern
even for these dead soldiers. If it did, they would have named in their memory,
places close to their native homes, where it would have a meaning.
All this activity involving wide discretionary powers in regularising
encroachments, urban development, cancelling permits of absentees, such as government
servants who were given residential land, and reallocating the land, is going
on without reference to the war, to the fact that a large section of Tamils
are refugees who cannot make a decision about their land, and have no representation.
The changes are such as to make Tamils feel more threatened and less willing
to live in Trincomalee.
It is believed that the manner in
which Sinhalese are being settled in the town area, while Tamils are encouraged
to move out has two motives. One is to break the control Tamil speakers have
in the urban council. The other is to divide the Town and Gravets AGA division
into a Sinhalese and a Tamil division.
We are able to see something of what
is going on here because there are senior citizens doggedly fighting a rearguard
action and there is documentary evidence to be examined. If one extends what
is going on here to the whole district, the picture becomes much more frightening.
With the carving up of new Sinhalese AGA’s divisions things will become
harder to probe until confronted with a fait accompli-at election time or during
a bout of communal violence.
When a state violently and in a brutal manner continues to follow a policy
which earlier forced Tamil youths to take up arms, ordinary people because of
their powerlessness, would legitimise any act, however inhuman, which gives
an impression that it counters the strategy of the all- powerful state. The
whole exercise of finding a political solution and portraying the current war
as fighting terrorism becomes a facade [See 2.5].
Since the outbreak of war
the move to rapidly induct Sinhalese into the Tamil AGAs division of Thambalakamam,
with a view to creating two AGAs divisions, is under way. Already it has two
AGAs (now Divisional Secretaries) a senior Sinhalese assisted by a Tamil. Morawewa
(Mudalikkulam) was a 40% Tamil speaking division with the AGA’s office
at Pankulam. With the introduction of the Air Force farm near the head works
in the late 6Os, Tamils have been subject to violence. In the 80s nearly all
of them fled as refugees. Now the AGA’s office has been shifted to Mahadivulweva
(Periyavilankulam) and the division is virtually Sinhalese. The objection
is not to do with having Sinhalese public servants. But from the mid 80s experience
has shown that key officers are picked persons with the qualities for the task
at hand. Often a pliant Tamil public servant can do equally well. Consequently
the level of corruption in areas subject to an ideological programme is notably
higher.
A good example is the land officer referred to above. He had been a
surveyor in
Trincomalee for a long time. In 1982 he had faced interdiction for
bribery. Recently, he was made a land officer and given crucial responsibilities
influencing the future of Trincomalee. The appointment was not calculated to
give confidence to the Tamil speaking people. The administrative machinery and
the military co-ordinating officer are said to be in close consultation with
him.
What
we have been saying is that the Sinhalisation of the administration is not a
neutral affair of changing Tamil heads or pen pushers for Sinhalese ones. It
is a prelude and a means to an ideological programme adversely affecting and
impinging on the rights of the Tamil speaking peoples. A stark manifestation
of how the fixing of the administration was used took place about November 1983
in the wake of the July 1983 violence.
A number of Tamils of recent Indian
origin from the hill country and the deep South, who were victims of the communal
violence of 1977, settled in the Tamil districts of the North-East, including
Trincomalee. Communal attacks with the backing of the armed forces began in
Trincomalee on 3rd June 1983, well before the July holocaust. Subsequently
many Tamils of both local and Indian origin were living in refugee camps. Those
of Indian origin displaced from places including Pankulam, Alles Gardens and
Kappalthurai (near 6th mile post, Kandy Road) were in refugee camps
at Nilaveli, Sambaltivu, Pankulam and Trinco town among others.
An order went down the line through Captain
Marshall of the Navy, Co-ordinating Officer/Trincomalee, to the AGAs,
to compile separate lists of Tamil refugees of Indian and local origin. Senior
Tamil officers, such as the Additional GA, were kept in the dark. Later, one
night, hand picked Sinhalese staff officers from the Trincomalee Kacheri were
asked to go with the lists in the company of the forces to the refugee camps
above. They were asked to get hold of the AGA concerned or the Grama Sevaka
of the division if the AGA could not be located.
The names of Indian Tamils were read
out, after the night callers had aroused the refugees from their sleep. Terrified
families meekly came forward and got into commandeered CTB buses as they were
ordered. Even if some of the family were not present, the rest were ordered
to get in, their pleas being of no avail.
The GA/Trincomalee, a Sinhalese, was
then out of town. About mid-night the Tamil Additional GA was aroused from his
sleep by a telephone call from Captain Marshall. The Additional
GA was told of the plan then under execution. The call, he was given to understand,
was to keep him informed for courtesy’s sake.
Several bus loads of Indian Tamils
were driven under armed escort to various parts of the hill country and dumped
in places with which they had no connection. Many families who had already suffered
from the violence of 1977 and ‘83 agonised for weeks not knowing what became
of their kin from whom they were forcibly parted. Most deportees collected whatever
relief payment was available and eventually found their way back to Trincomalee.
Captain Marshall, a Burgher,
himself acted under orders from the government in Colombo and was deeply unhappy.
He was powerless when naval ratings under his command ran amok in Trincomalee
town during July 1983.
This gives a picture of what the administrative
machinery was primed to perform. The official culture has not changed. But brazenly
crude manifestations such as these deportations and the national security minister’s
remarks below are unlikely to surface today. We are faced with the same game
in more subtle forms. It is significant how Tamil officials can be unethically
bypassed when needed.
With a GA and the AGA who understand their ideological task well, a new Sinhalese AGA’s division created will first become a no-go area for Tamils. Special arrangements can be worked out and what happens then is anyone’s guess. Now Sinhalese who had lived on encroached land have been brought back into the Thambalakamam area and have quickly received the benefits of displaced persons. In many such situations, Where they come from? From where and when were they displaced? Why did they not go back to their original homes? What is the rationale behind settling them in a Tamil area? are questions no one can ask. Only the GA, AGA and the GS concerned will know the special arrangements. Again there are Tamil AGAs divisions like Mutur which have not received their housing entitlements after their far-more-valuable houses were bull-dozed. At each succeeding elections there have been new voters lists more unfavourable to the Tamil speaking people, whose dependability have diminished with the rise of cloak and dagger methods by the state [Appendix IV gives a note on land encroachment] . [Top]
2.4 Colonisation in the district: The case of the Weli Oya Scheme
This is perhaps the archetypal cloak
and dagger scheme to crush a minority through a mixture of administrative and
military manipulation. There is so little accountability in its execution that
its protagonists could reap massive dividends in corruption.
Manal Aru (Sand River) runs through the Mullaitivu, Vaunia and Trincomalee Districts. The
area was virgin land. Before July 1983 there were two projects in the area,
Kent Farm and Dollar Farm, run by Tamils partly with a view to getting young
men involved in agriculture and partly to rehabilitate Hill Country Tamil victims
of the 1977 communal violence. Otherwise the area came under the proposed System
L of the Mahaveli Project, one of the last stages, and was not even part of
the accelerated programme formulated in 1978. With the July 1983 violence the
Tamils were driven out of the area. Then a plan to physically divide the North
and East was set in motion.
Once again the timing, like June 1990,
was crucial. The moment, like with the deportations above, was chosen when the
Tamils were at their weakest. They were reeling under the violence of July 1983.
The sixth amendment wiped out their parliamentary representation by the TULF.
Under Gamini Dissanayake as minister for Lands & Mahaveli development,
the lands were brought under the Mahaveli Authority in the spring of 1984 by
his ministry under an extra-ordinary gazette notification. With Manal Aru renamed
Weli Oya, a project in that area was commenced. Although the lands acquired
were from the Tamil districts of Vavuniya, Mullaitivu and Trincomalee, the administration
was transferred to Anuradhapura. The military took control and the area became
a no-go-zone for Tamils. Even administrative officials of the three Tamil districts
of which it was part could not enter the area without military clearance.
The progress was then monitored by JOSSOP at Anuradhapura
under Mr.Bandaragoda [See 2.2], Additional Secretary, Ministry of Mahaweli
development and former GA, Trincomalee. Very little was known about what was
going on Weli-Oya until the Tigers carried out a massacre of about a hundred
men brought in for the project in Novemeber 1984. It was also about the time
Lalith Athulathmudali, Minister for National Security, boasted that his
Government would solve the minority problem by settling Sinhalese toughs such
as ex-convicts and fishermen in all Tamil areas. It turned out that most of
those there together with most persons killed were in this category - being
ex-convicts or prisoners reprieved if they would go to Weli-Oya.
It
is well known that defence ministry requirements in this country however
sketchily and vaguely stated are seldom challenged or checked, and are audited
very leniently. This also allows wide scope for misuse. The defence budget
now at an annual Rs.24 billion (US $550 million) is a fifth of the national
budget. [Top]
Much
paddy land was temporarily abandoned by Tamil owners who fled as refugees. We
learn from several sources that some of these lands in relatively secure places
are being cultivated by Sinhalese in arrangement with the armed forces. One
such area is Pankulam where some of the lands along the main road, near Pilliar
Kovil are being so cultivated. These lands are irrigable and can yield 2 or
3 crops a year. The Tamil owners have, at the time of writing, not been given
security clearance to return. Another is Mulltipotana, Thampalakamam West Unit
9 of the Kantalai scheme. Originally 56 Tamil families were given allotments,
which expanded to encompass about 250 acres with natural increase, encroachment
and regularisation.
It is now reported that arrangements
are being made to return the Tamil refugees to Mullipothanai in May 1993. There
are now altogether 216 families.
There is on the other hand a sharply contrasting attitude
to lands in the Batticaloa District. Many lands there are at present inaccessible
to Muslim as well as some Tamil owners not on good terms with the LTTE.
Several of these lands are now known to be leased out by the LTTE. These
are cultivated by farmers not for the joy of it, but because they have no other
livelihood. After they had sunk in borrowed capital and put in hard work, risking
their lives and risking damage during military operations, the army has recently
been confiscating or burning paddy harvested on such lands. The highest military
officials have justified this in the name of depriving the LTTE of food
and resources. What is really happening is that unlike their Sinhalese counterparts,
hard working Tamil peasants are being driven farther into bankruptcy. The latter
problem does not appear to exist in the Trincomalee District. According to Muslim
sources in Mutur, the LTTE is demanding written permission from Muslim
owners for the cultivation of their lands in the interior by others.
It has recently been reported that
several Tamil farmers in the interior of the Batticaloa District allegedly cultivating
lands leased out by the LTTE, have been taken away by the army and have
not been accounted for.
The government is under
pressure from various sources to resettle Tamil refugees and those who returned
from India. But this is being done in a manner that leaves Tamil refugees anxious
and deeply suspicious. Up to Uppuveli just north of town, shells of Tamil
houses destroyed between 1983 and 87 are a prominent eye sore. Hardly any Tamils
were being resettled there. Nearly all those settling in that area are Sinhalese
and there are constant moves to regularise encroachments. Several houses built
by the NHDA and the provincial administration once occupied by Tamils are now
in occupation by Sinhalese.
Then between Sambaltivu and Nilaveli to the north,
including 6th mile post, security approval had not been given for
Tamils to reoccupy their lands and damaged houses. But the Kuchaveli refugees
in Nilaveli were in February being urged to return, Kuchaveli being further
north of Nilaveli. But their village which faced much deliberate destruction
is now dominated by a sprawling camp of the army, navy and police containing
the Roman Catholic Church. There is then an unresettled gap between Nilaveli
and Kuchaveli. These arrangements raise many obvious unanswered questions. The
refugees would feel more secure if the resettlement proceeds by continuous stages
starting from Trincomalee town. Several refugees have found their properties
in town encroached by Sinhalese and are afraid to take legal steps to dislodge
them. While gaps were being left in resettlement, there is seeming connivance
by the authorities in encouraging Sinhalese encroachments under protection of
the forces and consequent moves to regularise them. These have given rise to
both anger and resentment among Tamils. To them, the formula followed appears
to be: Destroy Tamil houses, Help Sinhalese to build houses and create conditions
where many Tamil refugees cannot or will not return.
Against new houses being put up for ‘rehabilitated’
Sinhalese, new Buddhist temples and existing Buddhist temples gaining in political
and material power,most Tamils outside town languish in huts and refugee camps.
Several Hindu temples have been damaged, some badly (e.g Sivan Kovil; Madathady,
Veeragathypillaiyar Kovil and Krishna Kovil in Trinco town) . The unfairness
becomes further evident, considering that in most villages outside town, few
Tamil houses are left standing. Some refugees said that they had rebuilt their
houses during the IPKF presence after they were destroyed by Sri Lankan
forces between 1983 and 87, only to have them looted and destroyed once more
after June 199O. Tamil houses along the road from Kiliveddi to Muthur and beyond
were looted by the forces and levelled down with bulldozers or explosives. The
Muslim village of Jinnahpuram was similarly treated, because having to live
with the LTTE by night and army by day, the army was annoyed with their
‘lack of co - operation’. Those who had got back to their lands
in the Mutur area were entitled to their meagre housing allowance from the state
which they did not receive for nearly two years. They are more hopeful now after
the matter was represented at the Mobile Presidential Secretariat in February.
Tamil community leaders feel that if the government
has security reasons for its attitude towards resettling Tamil refugees, it
must say so openly, and not use the current weakness of the Tamils to alter
the demography and destroy the Tamils’ economic and cultural life. [Top]
We
have referred to the secretive induction of Sinhalese into the district along
main roads and in a manner so as to isolate Tamils into pockets. Even if a military
motivation is cited, the government will not be open about it. Because it would
contain the assumption that the Tamils will continue to be rebellious, cannot
be trusted and therefore must be herded into enclaves where they could be monitored.
This would amount to an admission that the government is in fact seeking a military
solution to the minority question and that the president’s repeated pledges
to the international community and to donor nations that he is earnestly seeking
a political solution to the problem, will be seen as eyewash. It would further
imply that the government is not interested in earning the trust of the minorities
and whether in military, political or administrative terms, they will remain
second class citizens.
The crucial aspect of the ethnic question in Sri Lanka
relies on the character of the state and its ideology. It is not that ordinary
Sinhalese people wanted to marginalise the Tamil people. The ordinary Tamil
people who live in the South do not feel threatened by their Sinhalese neighbours.
But they are aware of the government’s ability to threaten their security
with direct or indirect involvement of its machinary. All the violence unleashed
on them in the past involved conspicuous complicity of the government and
its machinery. Ordinary Sinhalese people are simply the pawns of these bigoted
politicians. Hence it is superficial to argue that since the Tamils are at present
living in the South there is no ethnic problem. As we have shown above, the
state has not changed its character apprecialbly in this respect. The armed
forces are very much ethnically based. Those seriously concerned about a political
solution need to take into account these realities and work towards temporary
structural reforms, such as might help in overcoming barriers to a settlement
imposed by past actions of the state.
On the other hand if the government
continues to pursue the present course it is only destroying the basis for peaceful
solution and forcing the Tamil people into a very desperate position. Where
the Sinhalese are concerned, it would mean that instead of seriously addressing
their deep rooted socio-economic problems, the government is callous enough
to use their poverty as a military weapon, through planting them as colonists
in a war-zone.
Again where Tamil refugees abroad
are concerned, it would appear that host countries are simply trying to wash
their hands off them without ensuring that political and economic conditions
are right for their return. The reality on the ground in Trincomalee is that
many of these Tamil refugees were contented farmers who built up wealth and
stability over a decade or more. Their houses worth two lakhs or more were destroyed
by the forces rendering them penniless. The government has through manipulations
we have cited, shown that it is not serious about their returning to their lands
and livelihood in security. Their housing allowance from the government is only
a small fraction of the houses it destroyed. Is this fair by the refugees?
We
have in earlier reports criticised the military strategy, particularly of the
LTTE, which for its short term ends such as recruitment, placed the Tamils
in a helpless exposed position having to stomach the depredations of the Sri
Lankan forces. Most exposed were the Tamils of the East. Back in 1989 when the
LTTE entered into a partnership with the Sri Lankan government, its supporters
in Jaffna boasted that the first task was to get rid of the IPKF and
next the inevitable war with the Sri Lankan forces to attain the separate state
of Eelam. In trying to be smart without reference to principle the LTTE
and the Tamils have been taken through a series of somersaults and humiliations.
The people of Trincomalee and the East in general saw nothing but disaster in
this approach from the very beginning. If the strategists in Jaffna ever thought
little about Trincomalee, they are not thinking about it at all now. The key
issue seems to be how to let people travel between the Jaffna peninsula and
the mainland without jeopardising the LTTE’s income.
The general approach of the LTTE
in particular was that the structural problems confronting the Tamils could
be resolved by talking through the gun. The need for sound and capable political
leadership was neglected. The LTTE regarded such leaders as a challenge
to their sole dominance and hence an anathema. In this destrctive approach the
initiative was handed over to the government and the forces, who not just had
more guns, but resorted to every other form of trickery at their disposal. By
massacring Sinhalese, it made it much easier for ordinary people, who happened
to be Sinhalese, to rationalise the injustice being inflicted on the Tamils.
Abandoning the political approach and consistently
placing its own survival first, the LTTE threw away every opportunity
to stabilise the position of Eastern Tamils. The LTTE refused to accept
the fact that its intolerance of other militant groups, and the consequent weakening
of the struggle and gains by the Sri Lankan forces were the primary reasons,
which legitimised the arrival of the IPKF among the Tamils. Even at this
stage it could have accepted its errors and have forged a common front uniting
Tamils and Muslims in the interim administration. During its war with the IPKF
it blocked attempts by the IPKF and the provincial administration to
rehabilitate and stabilise the position of Tamils who endured much destruction
during 1983-87. Its only reason was that someone else would have received credit
for benefits acquired by Tamils. In early 1988 an IPKF vehicle involved
in the resettlement of Tamils in Pankulam was blasted with a landmine, resulting
in people being beaten and the exercise largely abandoned. Attempts to resettle
refugees in Thuwarankadu, Kanniya and Thambalakamam met with obstruction from
the LTTE,which by then was in league with the Sri Lankan government.
For the Tamil refugees these years became wasted years, with even the ruins
of Uppuveli near the town remaining as the Sri Lankan forces had left them in
July 1987.
In an ambience where the LTTE
competed with other groups which mistakenly tried to imitate the LTTE
and degenerated to new depths a number of Tamil civilians were killed by Tamils.
Among them were some of the ablest and loyal sons of Trincomalee, whom the Tamils
could ill afford to lose. B.Vijayanathan a doughty fighter of high integrity
was killed in August 1988 either by the LTTE, or more likely the LTTE
with the help of the EROS. The killers of Ganeshalingam, a highly
respected administrator killed in early 199O, are not known. But a pro-Indian
group is suspected. Dr.Gnanasekaran, a man both dedicated and remarkably
unselfish in his actions, was killed in September 1989. Almost certainly some
high ranking leaders of the EPRLF were involved.
In leaving Tamils without representation
at this crucial juncture, much mischief was wrought by the LTTE in partnership
with the government. At the February 1989 parliamentary elections the EROS
put forward several candidates backed by the LTTE’s guns. Others
contesting the elections were threatened and sometimes killed by the LTTE.
We pointed out in Report
No.2 that the EROS shamelessly carried on without condemning
the use of violence to prevent the people from choosing candidates of their
choice. These 12 EROS MPs went to parliament and walked out when the
LTTE pulled the leash, just after June 199O. They effectively accepted
that the LTTE elected them and saw no obligation towards the people who
gave them their vote. Presently the Trincomalee District has a Sinhalese SLFP
member identified with the extremist Hela Urumaya and a Muslim member.
Of the two EROS MPs elected, largely through Tamil votes, one, a Tamil,
is said to be doing business in London. The other, a Muslim, went back to teaching.
The North-East Provincial Council,the
first step in an exercise of devolution, was dissolved by the government after
the commencement of the war with the LTTE, acting on a request by the
LTTE made before the war.
This lack of representation at crucial
fora has greatly facilitated the changing of the ground situation to the detriment
of the Tamils. Ironically, it is former Tamil MPs from the TULF who are
working hard behind the scenes for the Tamil speaking people of Trincomalee.
A brash and violent militant politics which arrogantly claimed to have the answers
to everything, finally showed itself weak, cowardly, sycophantic and totally
irresponsible.
It looks as though everyone is still learning lessons that they are finding hard to swallow. The Sri Lankan government is yet to learn the consequences of trying to resolve minority questions through force and deception. The IPKF interlude has been forgotten. Through all this suffering Tamil society still remains corrupt and insensitive.[Top]
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