Sri Lanka: Travel advisory and more...
N Sathiya Moorthy
It is heartening to note that
after a series of incidents where visiting Sri Lankans were at the receiving end
of mob attacks, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayalalithaa has promised that her
Government would ensure the safety and security of the common man from the
island-nation in the south Indian State. It was even more heartening that former
Chief Minister and Opposition DMK supremo M Karunanidhi had earlier drawn the
distinction between in his party's oppositioin to the Sri Lankan State and its
political leadership on the one hand, and the average Sri Lankans, including
those from the majority Sinhala community, on the other, who come visiting to
Tamil Nadu and other south Indian States, ad infinitum, for a variety of
reasons. Karunanidhi, who had earlier unwittingly called the 'TESO conference'
in Chennai, in which the solitary Sri Lankan participation was that of a Sinhala
political lightweight, who again pressed the idea of a 'united Sri Lanka', also
exempted Sri Lankan sportsmen, whom the Jayalalithaa Government had sent packing
home, alongside the attacks on Christian pilgrims and cultural troupes.
All these incidents had prompted
official reactions from the Sri Lankan Government at the time. Irony, yet it was
true. In a very limited way, the Sri Lankan Government could not have asked for
more. A week after it had been called upon to defend itself against a 'travel
advisory' issued by the UK for those citizens wanting to travel to Sri Lanka,
the latter was issuing one of its own. It was one in a series western
Governments have become habituated, and at times obsessed with - not to ensure
the safety and security of their people travelling in 'conflict areas' across
the world. Over the years, it has become a diplomatic tool targeting nations and
Governments in times of conflict.
The Sri Lankan Government's
recent advisory for citizens wanting to travel to and in Tamil Nadu may have
also changed the course of the discourse on the larger subject of 'ethnic issue'
and the Indian element in the discourse. There is, however, no denying the
attacks on, threat against, Sri Lankan citizens travelling in Tamil Nadu. The
'direct action' in this case, as against the 'indirect appeals' made by the
polity and the Government in Tamil Nadu, made through the instruments of the
Government of India as in the past, have other consequences, but none of them
life-threatening.
The irony does not stop with the
travel advisory. Amnesty International, which has thus far criticised only the
Sri Lankan Government for events and episodes relating to the ethnic issue in
the country, has turned its attention to Tamil Nadu, instead. Independent of
what the Sri Lankan Government and other critics across the world may have to
say about the objectivity and impartiality of international human rights NGOs
like the Amnesty, for the south Indian State to get notice for the wrong reasons
has not gone unnoticed, either.
In the past, the Tamil Nadu
Government in particular and the Government of India have come in for
international acclaim for their hosting of the Tamil refugees from Sri Lanka in
camps put up across the State. 'Competitive Dravidian politics' may also have
contributed to successive Governments in Tamil Nadu addressing the demands and
expectations of these refugees, periodically. For instance, when the rest of
Tamil Nadu was reeling under 10-12 hours of power-cut in the recent past - and
much of it continues still, to varying degrees - the refugee camps continued to
have power-supply, however, limited it be, to begin with.
For most parts, the travel
advisory should have been addressing the Sinhala-Buddhist sections of the Sri
Lankan citizenry as they used to be the targets of physical assaults and threats
on the streets of Tamil Nadu. Now after a recent episode, not only Sinhala-speaking
Buddhists, but even Tamil-speaking Christians have become targets. Either the
vandals did not have a clue about what they were doing, or did not distinguish
between the Tamils and Sinhalas, or the Buddhists and the rest, any more. Either
way, it has consequences going beyond the obvious. Both nations and their
Governments need to mull over the same even more.
Ahead of the attacks on the
Christian pilgrims, among whom many were Tamils, was Tamil Nadu Chief Minister
Jayalalithaa's directive for the State police to send back a team of
school-children playing friendly soccer games with officials of the Indian
Customs. This was accompanied by another directive to send back school children
on a cultural exchange programme. The impossibility of the proposition in the
Indian constitutional milieu apart, it deviated so completely from the professed
arguments of the State's polity for the Sinhalas to be more sensitive to the
Tamils' needs nearer home, and to Tamil Nadu's 'umbilical cord' sentiments over
the ethnic issue.
If anything, the reverse may
have become the truth just now. Unwittingly, and possibly unintended, the Tamil
Nadu episodes may have translated the post-war security concerns of the Sri
Lankan State into security concerns of a totally different kind. Now, individual
Sinhala homes across Sri Lanka may have had personal experiences, and
consequently personal interpretations to the term. It could come to haunt the
community feelings the same way it affects sensitivities and sensibilities in
Tamil Nadu when it comes to equality for Tamils in Sri Lanka.
In the post-war milieu, the
Sinhala-Buddhist citizenry may have desired their Government to give the Tamils
on the island-nation their due. Their desire may not be as strong any more.
Instead, they may have their own anxieties, fears and apprehensions of their
own. The personal episodes may fade away. But the cumulative conscience of the
citizenry may divine issues and causes, far removed from the issues on hand. It
cannot be helped. In a democracy where the polity is already dictated by their
perceptions of the public mood, demonstrative episodes of the kind leave a trail
of thought which would be hard to reverse and harder to erase.
The overall conduct of the Tamil
Nadu polity, with the singular exception of the Communist Party of India
(Marxist) or the CPM for short, has exposed their inadequate understanding of
the ground situation in Sri Lanka. Alternatively, it is a reflection of their
lack of seriousness and sincerity to the larger 'Tamil cause' in Sri Lanka. If
the idea was to have the Sinhalas and other Sri Lankans, both in Government and
outside, to understand and appreciate the Tamil sentiments, wherever they
emanate, the professed opportunity has been lost.
It will take a lot of time for
the Sinhalas as a community and the Sri Lankan administration otherwise to
revive the exchange programmes of the kind. It will remain so whether it is
coordinated by the Central Governments in the two countries, or undertaken by
individuals, whether or not in groups. Sri Lanka withdrawing the travel advisory
is only one thing. Even while back in Tamil Nadu, it will take the travellers a
lot of time to readjust to the then existing realities, to be open to
discussions and discourses that alone could, and could make mutual understanding
of issues and positions possible.
If anything, the reverse will be
the truth. The Sinhala community had learnt to forget earlier attacks on their
aged pilgrims travelling to Buddhist centres of reverence in northern India. The
Government of Sri Lanka did not protest, either. But revived attacks of the kind
have taken the 'message' from Tamil Nadu, to individual homes in the Sinhala
South, from where most of these pilgrims came. It has also taken the message to
Christian homes across Sri Lanka, language no bar.
The pressure brought on young
students of the prestigious Royal College, Colombo, has consequences for the
future, too. It is among many of the prestigious schools in Sri Lanka that have
traditionally shaped future politicians, administrative heads and national and
international diplomats of Sri Lankan origin would well be remembered for long.
Citing past experience of the Tamils in context is not going to help them
either, in their future interactions with the Sri Lankan State and the Sinhala
polity and society.
The avoidable anxiety that has
thoughtlessly been sown in the minds of 'innocent Sinhalas' -- as there are
innocent Tamils -- has its consequences. This again, the Tamil Nadu polity seems
to have seldom understood, for them to appreciate and act accordingly. The
protests against the Tamil Nadu attacks by the Tamil traders of Pettah, Colombo,
have a message of their own. Over the medium and long terms, the opportunity to
bury the past with the war has also been lost.
Even when the ethnic issue was
resolved through mutual agreement between the various stake-holders in Sri
Lanka, now or later, the 'Tamil Nadu factor' in India's Sri Lanka policy would
be interpreted by interested groups and individuals in Colombo to mean different
things from the past. There will be more people in Sri Lanka ready to 'buy'
those perceptions than in the past. On either side of the Palk Strait, it only
requires 'media management' or other propaganda tools to effect such conversions
and to practice mind-control of a kind. The 'innocent Sinhalas', if not all of
them, would then have been on the same page as many of the 'innocent Tamils'
during the war years - and beyond.
It is here that the
clarification statement of sorts from former Tamil Nadu Chief Minister
Karunanidhi gains some relevance and significance. Going beyond the traditional
war of words with Chief Minister Jayalalithaa, for sending off school children
and pilgrims back to Sri Lanka, he has also condemned the attacks on some of
them on the streets of Tamil Naduby pan-Tamil peripheral groups. As Chief
Minister during the closing weeks and months of the 'ethnic war', he headed a
Government that did not leave such attacks unaccounted for - or, unpunished,
either.
Yet, Karunanidhi should
acknowledge to himself that he may have himself sown the seeds of discord in
recent times, while in the Opposition. The 'TESO conference' that his DMK hosted
was in the news continually for days together, and not for reasons intended. The
ineffectiveness of the conference proceedings was also reflected in the
inability of the DMK organisers to have adequate and meaningful representation
from Sri Lanka, particularly from the Sri Lankan Tamil and other Tamil-speaking
communities.
The lone speaker from Sri Lanka,
a Sinhala political bystander, spoke about equality for the Tamils within a
united country and under a unitary Constitution of sorts. It may have tickled
other segments of the competitive Tamil Nadu polity on to an unthinking
action-reaction mode. They had been known for such political behaviour in the
past. Yet, for a State Government under the Union to take such positions is
another matter.
Issues, developments and
decisions of the Tamil Nadu kind have ways of lingering for long, and strike at
the unexpected hour and in an unanticipated way. Paraphrasing the relevant
portions of report of the Justice Jain Commission, which was appointed by the
Government of India, the then existing political climate in Tamil Nadu was seen
as being conducive enough for the LTTE to move around freely in the State and
commit the infamy 'Rajiv Gandhi assassination', unchallenged until after the
event.
The flagged issues may also have
consequences for their Tamil brethren in Sri Lanka in arriving at a negotiated
settlement with their Government in Colombo, using in the process the good
offices and acceptance levels of the majority Sinhala polity and community than
may be understood in Tamil Nadu. Their current efforts at pressuring the Sri
Lankan Government in addressing the legitimate Tamil concerns in Sri Lanka could
thus be counter-productive, if only they had followed the post-war Sri Lankan
discourse on power-sharing, particularly Police powers for Provinces.
The existing Sri Lankan State
anxieties involving national security concerns may now be compounded again by a
collective concern over the very concept of a unified Centre sharing police
powers with the provinces, with no adequate enforcement leverages for that very
Centre. After the not-so-successful and even less meaningful TESO conference, it
is time the Tamil Nadu polity consulted the Tamil National Alliance (TNA), or
whatever Tamil party they can identify and communicate with in the Sri
Lankan/Tamil context, to understand the ground realities in their countries.
The recent events in Tamil Nadu
may otherwise have exposed the inadequacies of the Diaspora approach to
conflict-resolution and problem-solving, if solving the 'national problem' of
Sri Lanka in ways that are commonly understood is in their milieu, to begin
with. If nothing else, the clarion call is for the Tamil Nadu polity to know who
they are dealing with from within the Sri Lankan Tamil community and polity, why
and where from they are doing so, and if it would have the effect desired by the
former, and not possibly disclosed to them by the latter.
The comparison may be odious and
at times irrelevant too, but the Tamil Nadu parties should take lessons from
their fading memories that they were neither consulted, nor kept informed but
were walked down the garden-path of Tamils' misery in Sri Lanka, ahead of the
Rajiv Gandhi assassination, too. Maybe, after a time, even the TNA and other
sections of the Tamil polity based in Sri Lanka should be asking the same
questions themselves. Many, if not all of them, have been favourably disposed
towards the Diaspora talk of encouragement, which has however not led them
anywhere. A part of the blame should lie at the doorstep of the Sri Lankan
Government, which has also taken the TNA negotiations nowhere, thus far.
Otherwise, too, Tamil Nadu
parties like the DMK can take lessons from the TNA, for instance, on procedural
issues of the international kind - with which the latter is much more familiar
with than the Indian polity, as different from the Government, may be acquainted
with. The DMK is now keen on taking forward the only 'effective resolutions'
flowing from the TESO conference, and move the UN on the party's demand for
assessing the Sri Lankan Tamil mood in matters of political solution. For one
thing, no other Tamil group, particularly active and registered political
parties in Sri Lanka, have made any such demand. So, there will be the question
of locus standi for parties not affected by the ethnic issue, war and violence
to approach the UN or any arm of the international body, directly.
Two and as a procedural matter,
the TNA, it may be recalled toyed with the idea of going to Geneva ahead of the
UNHRC vote in March. Newspaper reports at the time had indicated that the TNA's
decision not to go followed questions about the effectiveness of and need for
such an effort when the international community was seized of the matter. Then,
there was also the procedural question of the TNA, being political party or
grouping in Sri Lanka, though not under the same name and title, may not enjoy
the status of an 'accredited NGO' in the UN context, and might be turned away,
after all.
In context, what was supposed to
be applicable to the TNA may apply to the DMK or any other political party as
well. More importantly, unlike the TNA, the DMK is also a party sharing power at
the Centre in India, and hence may be considered 'Government' in the UN context,
for which different rules might apply, after all. A lot would thus depend on
interpretations -- and interpretations of the externalised and relatively
irrelevant kind is what the Sri Lankan Tamils, and their political
representatives negotiating with the Colombo Government can do without, now or
ever.
Sure enough, the TNA may not
have anticipated that its call and preference for the 'internationalisation' of
the ethnic issue has consequences that were not intended or even dreamt of in
the first place. That is also how interested parties, concerned as they may be
otherwise in the larger ethnic issue, tend to play out their chosen part, on the
paths chosen by them. It is no different in the case of 'international
community', as is commonly understood. The solution to the problem lies in Sri
Lanka, and nowhere else.
It was no different in the case
of the Tamil brethren from Tamil Nadu, either. It was in his "Heroes' Day"
speech of 2008 that LTTE's Prabhakaran made his customary appeal to Tamil Nadu
and the rest of India for supporting what was essentially a peripheral cause on
the Tamil agenda, but enforced through the gun. Post-war, when the Tamils'
situation in Sri Lanka has vastly improved - though not necessarily to the
desired levels - and when there is no appeal of any specific kind from any
identifiable Tamil community or political leader residing in Sri Lanka, the
developments in Tamil Nadu leave much to be desired in every which way.
The TNA reacted appropriately to
the events and episodes in Tamil Nadu. Senior party leaders, Maavai
Senathirajaand Suresh Premachandran, said that the episodes of the Tamil Nadu
kind were just not on. The last time, he spoke on a Tamil Nadu related issue was
when he was in the State, meeting with DMK's Karunanidhi and explaining the
party's position on the 'TESO conference'. The TNA did not attend the
conference! What more, the fact remains there are close to 80 flights per week
between Colombo and destinations in Tamil Nadu per week. Not all travellers are
Sri Lankans or Sinhalas. There are Tamils, too, from both the countries which
have personal business of whatever kind to transact. This is a reality that
cannot be ignored - and should not be ignored, either!
It would mean that the Sri
Lankan Government too would have to withdraw the 'travel advisory' sooner than
later. That can happen only after Colombo had duly satisfied itself about the
safety and security of its citizenry. The latter, unlike their leaders, whom the
Tamil Nadu Government has anyway barred without advance alert - and not for
wrong reasons - need to re-imbibe the traditional sense of security that used to
be absent in their own environment until not very long ago, but across the Palk
Strait. Though the comparison itself is incomparable beyond a point!
(The writer
is a Senior Fellow at Observer Research Foundation)
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