Myths and Realities! - An Analysis

By Veluppillai Thangavelu

    I have read with mixed feelings the article written by Rajeev Srinivasan titled "Damned if we do, damned if we don't" and published by Rediff. Though interspersed with a few compliments, in totality this article is promoting many myths about the LTTE and its supporters.
 
    Brahmin- owned Tamil Nadu as well as Indian print media are conducting a persistent and destructive campaign against the Tamil people's struggle for freedom. The Hindu, Frontline, Hindustan Times, Indian Express, Rediff etc. are after the LTTE daggers drawn. These newspapers are making desperate appeals to the de-moralised Sinhala occupation army to stay put and fight as they have no where to run!

    It is crystal clear now the solid military exploits of the LTTE have sent shivers down the spines of the editors, analysts and reporters of these newspapers. With LTTE on the outskirts of Jaffna, an independent Tamil Eelam is now on the horizon. This distinct possibility has caused political convulsions and turmoil among the ruling circles of Sri Lanka and India. President Chandrika has asked the Sinhala soldiers to fight the LTTE to the last man just like their ancient and medieval kings who after initial setbacks supposed to have defeated the Tamil Kings in battle.

    Prem Shankar Jha, The Hindu analyst, in an article titled "Dire Threat to India" is openly advocating the elimination of Tigers once and for all. He wrote, " India should help Lanka to eliminate Tigers once and for all." Jha predicts that military success for the LTTE in Jaffna would ultimately lead to a separatist movement in Tamil Nadu. The Sri Lankan government controlled Daily News published from Colombo readily agrees and reproduced Jha's article with understandable glee.

    Rajeev Srinivasan is the latest LTTE baiter to join this "elimination squad"! At the outset itself he claims that he has made a study of all the materials he could find regarding Sri Lanka's problem. This is a sad confession for someone who writes on Indo-Ceylon affairs. If this is indeed true then his study is half-baked and the article reflects that reality. Except in regard to Trincomalee, his analysis reveals his lack of an in depth knowledge on the subject. What is worse he suffers from the same in-built prejudices like other columnists who write on Sri Lankan crisis. He states that "that the Indian army was handicapped by its orders not to inflict casualties on Lankans "(who are Lankans any way? There are no such human species in Ceylon Only Tamils and Sinhalese!), but this assertion is palpably false.

    M.R. Narayan Swamy author of Tigers of Lanka states that 'Indian assertions that civilian casualties were minimal were quite dubious!" (Page 274). A paranoid IPKF shot and killed hundreds of Tamil people like dogs. On October 21, 1987 11 days after the commencement of the conflict, IPKF troops entered Jaffna Hospital and shot dead 14 doctors, nurses and patients despite pleas to spare their lives with both hands raised! IPKF troops raped Tamil women and were rightly perceived by the Tamils as barbaric and brutal out performing the Sinhala army.

    Rajeev Srinivasan says Jaffna has changed hands more than once and therefore why should this be the end game? This question helps to reveal his private ignorance in public. Has he not heard about the appeal to India by the Sri Lankan Foreign Minister that India should help evacuate the trapped Sri Lankan army? Unlike in the past the Sinhala army will be thrown lock, stock and barrel out of Jaffna for good. This time the Palaly airport will be destroyed by LTTE artillery.

    "The long-suffering civilian population is not keen on either the Tigers or the army, so both parties may find it equally difficult to hold the place" - we are at a loss to know what makes him think that the civilian population of Jaffna is not with the Tamil Tigers and that they treat the LTTE and the Sinhala army alike. In this he is sadly mistaken and wide off the mark. We wish he would put his thinking cap before he writes the next time on this subject. He should at least read the first-hand news story filed by Luke Harding, the Guardian (U.K.) newspaper's correspondent from Vavuniya to know the truth. The Tamil refugees housed in detention centres in Vavunia told Luke Harding that :

"When we found out that Elephant Pass (a key military base) had fallen, it was like Christmas, except we could not celebrate," and one refugee says-

"We were very happy. The Tigers are our sole representatives. The government is claiming they are terrorists. But they are our warriors, they are freedom fighters, they are fighting for Tamils. We are certain they will move into Jaffna. It is our soil."

Mind you these are the views of refugees languishing in makeshift camps, which are in effect open prisons, undergoing severe hardship and tribulations because of the war.

    Rajeev is dead right when he says that the "Tigers demolished the old colonial myth of the 'martial races.' The history of Tamils will show that early Tamils' pre-occupation was love and valour. Dying in battle was esteemed an honour par excellence. Those who attained martyrdom in the battlefield were honoured by the erection of "Nadu Kal" (Remembrance stone). Purananooru, one of the eight anthologies of Sankam literature, speaks about a young mother who dresses and sends her only child to the battlefront on hearing the sounds of war drums. Only the previous day she had lost her husband and the day before her father when they were killed by enemy troops while defending "Anirai"(Herd of cattle) against capture. So the emergence of the Tigers is simply the stoking of the embers and rekindling the old flames that was waiting to be set on fire after 400 years of slavery (Tamil Nadu Tamils 700 years of slavery).

    His supposition "that Pakistan's ISI, and its terrorists in Jamnu and Kashmir, as well as the Mizo/Naga and other tribal terrorists have links with the Tigers" is poppycock. In all probably the Tigers may not even have an idea where Mizoram/Nagaland is! If the Tigers have links with ISI then why is Pakistan sending MBRL and 1.600 rockets to the Sri Lankan army? Does it make any sense?

    Accusing the LTTE of "piracy in the Indian Ocean/Bay of Bengal waters" by Rajeev Srinivasan is flight of fantasy. Can he cite one incident to prove his accusation? So is his stupid allegation "that they are likely middlemen in the narcotic traffic to the West from Afghanistan/Pakistan and from the Golden Triangle of Burma/Thailand/China." He makes all these wild and fatuous allegations without a shred of evidence to prove it! He has simply swallowed the Sri Lankan government's Goebelsian propaganda, which he read in its web sites. Does he seriously think that a highly dedicated, disciplined, motivated and committed LTTE cadres will indulge in such criminal activities? Could the LTTE which everybody agrees grew from a rag-tag guerrilla outfit to a full-fledged conventional army with a naval force depends on narcotic trafficking to prosecute the war? It is common knowledge that when Jaffna was under the control of the LTTE that was the only territory in the whole of the island that was free from any drug problem.

    He promotes all these myths spiced with phantom theories without any regard to facts or truth in common with other Indian journalists covering the war. He is wittingly or unwittingly promoting all these myths to discredit the LTTE and the Tamil people. "There will be a heavy refugee flows into India from Jaffna and surely there will be disguised Tigers among them" is another myth he is perpetuating. This is a supreme insult to the intelligence of the Tamil people. In any case why should Tigers come to Tamil Nadu disguised as refugees? How many Tigers have come to Tamil Nadu as refugees in the past? On the contrary the 100,000 Tamil people languishing in refugee camps in Tamilnadu will RETURN TO THEIR HOMELAND with dignity once the war is over.

    Rajeev Srinivasan's unsolicited advice to the Indian government that "the only option is to provide humanitarian assistance, perhaps weapons and ammunition, but not troops" betrays his pro-Sinhala and anti-Tamil stance. "No Indian troops to Sri Lanka"- that everybody understands because he doesn't want the Indian army to bloody its nose for a second time. The Indian army is still holding post-mortems and nursing its wounds received a decade ago. But he has not given any valid reason for giving weapons and ammunition to the Sri Lankan army. Perhaps you don't want to kill the Tamils; you want the Sinhalese to do that job for you. You are indeed very inventive!

    Rajeev should come to accept the truth that an independent Tamil Eelam will be a natural ally of India. Tamil people have strong cultural, religious and ethnic ties with India going back to 2000 years or more. After breaking free from the hegemonic rule of 15 million Sinhalese they would not opt to be over-lorded by the 50 million Tamil cousins across the Palk Strait! It is foolhardy to think otherwise. West Bengal did not join Bangladesh despite a common border. In our case an ocean divides us geographically. Tamils of Tamil Eelam will like to safeguard their separate geographical and distinct cultural identities.

    An independent Eelam is the best guarantee India can have about the security of its south flank. Hopefully the new state of Tamil Eelam might enter into fruitful negotiations and bilateral agreements with India regarding defence interests common to both, especially in regard to the use of Trincomalee seaport. Right now a de jure Tamil Eelam is struggling to be born and it is in labour! We would like India, especially Tamil Nadu to act the role of a mid-wife to assist safe delivery. It is our hope people like Rajeev Srinivasan who float or invent myths about the current conflict and its outcome are a minuscule minority in Tamil Nadu. Courtesy : TamilCanadian

(May 17, 2000. TamilCanadian)