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May
Vol. 2
 

ISSN 1391-8656
7 2003
No. 1

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Published by lines Publications Distributed by
Social Scientists' Association 425/15, Thimbirigasyaya Road Colombo 5, Sri Lanka.
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Cont
From Berlin to Bonn to Baghda Humanitarian Militiarism
Vasuki Nesiah
Averages and Outrages...
Nanthikesan
The Violence of Peace
Ahilan Kadirgamar
Man-made Laws and Feminine Encounter with the Law in Sri l
Yasmin Tambiah
Displaced Women - Rights and
Sri Lanka: 2003
Centre for the Study of Human
Sophia Elek
Review of the Assessment of Ne Areas of the North East
Muttukrishna Sarvananthan
Gujarat Revisited Jean Drèze
Trikle Up
Anika
Q & A with Lionel Bopage
Q & A with Kethesh Loganatha,

ISSN 1391-8656
ents
d: The Axes of
01
06
08
Feelings: A Lesbian
anka III
Resettlement North & East
18
Rights
eds in the Conflict-Affected
27
36
42
47

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Categories, Identity and Diffe (bhikkus) and Peace in Sri La
Chandra R. de Silva
“Imagining Karma”
Pradeep Jeganathan
REVIEW Against Race: Ima Beyond the Color Line, Paul
Nilanjana Bhattachariya
The Secularism Debate in In
Lawrence Liang
Human Rights Protection an Urgently Needed for a Just a

2rence: Buddhist Monks anka
gining Political Culture " Gilroy, 2000
dia
d Effective Monitoring nal Democratic Peace
70
82
86
90
99

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From Berlin to Bonn to
Humanitaria
Vasuki
An Iraqi soldier presses down an and asks him what the war was aboutquestion by trying to pour oil down the another news clip from the Gulfa là CN specifically, from the 1999 movie Thre Gulf war, fourymerican soldiers seek to d back to the US at the end of operation I they seek to track down and steel a stasl Three Kings presents, with at times brillia that underlies the war at many levels -o also the tough economic conditions of military recruitment. Equally interesti economic motivations against the humar accountings, were amongst the bigges namely the Kurds. By the end of the m abandoned, disillusioned and critical o flout all rules and work in solidarity wit escape - and in doing so the soldiers m their superiors, and indeed the policy ac
Thus one of the principle narrativ an imperial militarism to military humar politics of this shift: is military huma militarism, or is it part of the same proj and imperial impulses for intervention si to how the legitimacy afforded by argum arguments for“imperial”intervention sin It even suggests that humanitarian rati complement and legitimize more imperi precisely because, in discrepant locall and restrains the excesses of militaris three kings may pay a lightening visit to don't windup their royal operations, clo uppolitical solidarity with shepherds and as they return to their palaces, the overtul only enhance their royalty - their pow being welded with such benevolence! Ir

Baghdad: The Axes of
Militiarism
Nesiah "
American soldier he has taken captive, - and then proceeds to answer his own throat of his prisoner. No this was not NN but rather, from Hollywood-more e Kings. Set in the wake of the first losomebounty hunting before returning Desert Storm - cynical and war weary, h of Kuwait gold that is hidden in Iraq. intsatirical verve, the political economy il revenues that fuel US militarism, but the American working poor that feeds ngly, it tests the gravitational pull of litarian demands of those who, on many t losers of Operation Desert Storm - ovie, their quest for gold thwarted and f American policy, these four soldiers h a Kurdish community to enable their aneuver and fight against the charge of ivanced by the US government.
ve threads of the movie is the shift from hitarianism. How do we understand the initarianism an alternative to imperial ect? In placing humanitarian impulses de-by-side, Three Kings draws attention hents for humanitarian intervention and multaneously compete and complement. onales for intervention fundamentally all claims for intervention so effectively, pattles, humanitarianism also competes m. Even in the biblical narrative, the a lowly manger in Bethlehem, but they pse shop on kingly privileges, and take carpenters as a full time calling. Rather, tes they made in the slums of Bethlehem er appears all the more legitimate for onically, then, the pitch for humanitarian

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2 motivations for intervention articulate the enabling conditions of imperial in the second Gulf War, are we going to mobilized to offer post-facto legit adventures? Some of the building bl humanitarianism that may now retrospe in Iraq may have been generated by th intervention that was advanced in the and even the hand wringing about the Rwanda, or in solidarity with the plig Gulf War. In Kosovo, reasonable peo should have been an intervention-ifal whether the intervention came too latel whether the intervention should have fo bombing and so on. When the world Rwanda, in many countries it was often the UN and members of the Security-C Afghanistan came along, the superpo their military aspirations by appropri and succeeded in getting the UN on bo their effort to mobilize humanitariani intervention - in fact, imperial inte humanitarian militarism by the French we look back on over a decade-long ris humanitarianism as the dominant lens relief, rather it raises important questi bringing together humanitarian and int as Rwanda - as we survey the terrain humanitarian militarism may play out occupations all the more effectively complementing an overtly imperial ler
In 1884, after their respective
different parts of Africa, colonial powe. argue boundary lines, and divvy up th hundred years later, after the bombi Germany was once again the venue of powers - this time the maps were of A explicitly about the contours of Europe land in Africa; there were no Africans century, with the ghost of Berlin glossi

|by the Europeanpowers, may be one of ervention today. In fact, in the wake of observe humanitarian operations being mation of Anglo-American military ocks for the discourses and practices of ctively seek to legitimize the intervention : discourses of multilateral humanitarian bombing of Kosovo and Afghanistan, failure to intervene to halt genocide in it of the Kurdish community in the first ple disagreed about whether or not there lything, the primary argument was about because they were slaughtering Muslims, cused on ground troops rather than aerial I was confronted with the genocide in the left who took the lead in condemning ouncil for not intervening. By the time wers themselves had sought to buttress ating the language of humanitarianism, ard. In the operation to 'shock and awe sm did not succeed in legitimizing the 'rvention was often counter-posed to and German governments. However, as e of humanitarian militarism, a return to for military intervention may offer little ons for us about our own complicity in erventionist arguments in contexts such ahead of us, it may well turn out that its role in the ethical economy of future by simultaneously competing with and S. military expeditions had laid claims to 's convened in Berlinto pour over maps, e continent among themselves. Over a g of Afghanistan in the fall of 2001, a conference among the great European fghanistan. The Berlin Conference was an sovereignty over different parcels of present at the gathering. Yet, in the 21st gour current discourse of intervention,

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the conference in Bonn was ostensib. sovereignty; the UN searched all overth beaches of Cyprus, to find Afghans for years later, in the "liberation of Iraq, B. for recognizing sovereignty - an effort with little intentional irony) is about Ira( In seeking to trace the continuit Bonn to Baghdad, letus look at how a dis was produced through the norms and Afghanistan. The fact that there were h military campaign against Afghanistani intervention in general-almost every promoted by its advocates as a just war. the history of the “humanitarian' bombi was striking about military assault again role of humanitarian arguments. Not S! the human rights of women', featured however, were other discourses regarding alleviation and economic development cultural authenticity, peace, and so on. outlining their evidence against Osama 11 constituted the formal briefs support Yet in many ways the evidence cited inth law of self-defense, were not that pivotal In fact I would argue that much more cruc post-Cold War discussions regarding hu of international norms. The terms of ref space for the military intervention by g. the Anglo-American coalition in challel Taliban government. Of course this al direction, from the military rout of th American coalition to the Bonn proces seamless. Afghanistan, I would like to intervention before September 11th; theid bombastic talk of the "axe's of evil and m of reluctant advocates (by definition th intervention as mid-wife to religious to rights and liberal modernity...
We began by tracing the shift fron intervention in the Three Kings - today

3 ly to be on the contours of Afghan e world, from the hills of Rome to the the conference. Today, less then two aghdad has become yet another venue that George Bush says (and apparently
is choosing their own regime. les and discontinuities from Berlin to cursive space for military intervention conventions of "humanitarianism' in umanitarian arguments supporting the s in itself not a new feature of military war, anywhere, has probably been In fact, Afghanistan itself follows on ng of Kosovo. As with Kosovo, what st Afghanistan was the very prominent urprisingly, human rights, particularly large. Accompanying human rights ginter-civilizational dialogue, poverty , democratization, multi-culturalism, The US and British government reports bin Ladin for the events of September ing the case for military intervention. ese reports, and indeed the international to the legitimation of that intervention. xial in this regard were the past decade's manitarian intervention in furtherance erence for these discussions created the ving content to the moral authority of nging the policies and practices of the so enabled movement in the reverse e Taliban government by the Angloses of the United Nations, to be quite argue, had been "available' for military eological ground was laid not by macho ilitary conquest, but by the soft promise ere are only reluctant advocates) of lerance and women's freedom, human
n imperial intervention to humanitarian we see aspirations towards such a shift

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4
emanating from efforts (particularly by in generating post-facto legitimacy f this second Gulf War. To the extent missiles that 'shock and awe', but al and rationalize, the Anglo-American The strength of the anti-war moveme ensured that 'coalition' forces were spe of humanitarian discourses to legitim "liberation' of Iraq. By honing critical power and its distributive consequen oil, asserting democratic claims for political, economic and military powe coalition building across multiple fron intervention in Iraq was conquest ratl now is whether humanitarian initiati mop up the legitimacy gaps an imperi term legacy of the global anti-war el been disabled as a weapon of mass d from Berlin in 1844 to Baghdad in 20
Notes
In fact, against the backdrop of the first C rooms via CNN's tele-drama of smart bc movie is stylistic experiments with techni speaks to the production of news as popu product for popular cultural consumption. This should be situated in a gradual trans. eignty in a post-colonial context. In the in alism, sovereignty was often asserted to a the last few decades, (in the global North have been often deployed to defeat the der subalterns... this has been accompanied b tudes towards the sacredness of territorial t ereignty as the response to colonialism do the arguments, humanitarian and otherwis Bismarck convened this conference, 1884 "Because of our recent military gains in people, "women are no longer imprisoned is, she says, "a fight for the rights and d marriage offeminists and interventionists is women to launder a dirty war, we are rem

the British) to mobilize humanitarianism or the occupation of Iraq in the wake of that the war was not only about cruise so ideological discourses that legitimize coalition faced an extraordinary defeat. it that mobilized against the intervention ctacularly unsuccessful in their invocation ize their interventions in advance of the antennae regarding the structure of global ces, unpacking the political economy of ccountability regarding the (mis)use of rby governments all over the world, and tiers, the dominant reference point of the her than humanitarianism. The question ves for the "reconstruction of Iraq will alist war has left behind- or, if the longfort is that humanitarian militarism has estruction. Have we connected the dots 03?
julf War making its appearance in our livingombs, one of the interventions made by the cal stunts about the theater of militarism. It lar culture, while itself being a newsworthy
formation in the left’s attitude towards soverdependence struggles of anti-colonial nationdvance democratic participation - yet, over and the global South) claims to sovereignty mocratic aspirations of minorities, dissenters, y a concomitant complication of earlier attiboundaries. Yet the disillusionment with sovesn't diminish the critical scrutiny we pay to e, used to justify "intervention'....
4-85. Afghanistan,” Laura Bush told the American in their homes. The fight against terrorism” ignity of women.” Lest we think that this merely apost-facto appropriation of Afghani inded that many feminists had been chiding

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the US government for not taking a strong Foundation has been campaigning for seve ment and the United Nations "to do everythi of Afghan women and girls.” http://www.fe Multiculturalism is another piece of the no fact, linking domestic multiculturalism and effort as a "crusade' for a multicultural wo Judaism ... the Hindu faith and ...Islamic commitment over military goals, "our coalit terrorism out of the world. It's one to bind t( helps people in need.” (Speech by George Washington, DC, October 4, 2001).
Reconstruction assistance has also been lin alleviation and economic development. In cess enabled by the defeat of the Taliban, t humanitarian relief operation. On the eve ( officials urged that "you can initiate... dev war and a famine.” Encouraging reporterst tunities for pursuing humanitarian goals int cited books such as Rising from the Ashes learned optimism about compassionate mili By drawing attention to the prominence C culturalism, I do not intend to dilute the cc chismo and other received markers of mil though the traditionalist discourses ofmilita mark an extraordinary moment in the inte backdrop ofa decade-long tussle with huma "humanitarian discourses constituted a spa As David Chandler has noted, "Humanitar 1999 Kosovo war, would have been an oxyr a tautology.” In fact the bombing of Afgh assumptions of the world of large-scale hun going a tectonic shift.

5 *r position earlier. The Feminist Majority 'al years to pressure the American governgin their power to restore the human rights minist.org/afghan/facts.html mative map situating the military effort. In foreign policy, Bush situated the military ld bringing together "the Christian faith... radition.... Foregrounding this normative ion,' he says, “is more than just one to rout 'gether, to knit those traditions in a way that W. Bush, President, US State Department,
ked to a deeper normative vision of poverty fact, citing the political and geographic ache military intervention is translated into a of the US military effort on October 4, US elopment programs in the middle of a civil o beef up on the literature regarding opporhe context of military engagement, officials and Disasters and Development to urge a tarism! fissues such as women's rights and multiontinued force of self-defense, racism, maitarism in the public sphere. However, alry muscle remained potent, Afghanistan did rnational public sphere, where, against the nitarian engagement, the normative force of ce forwar. ian militarism, widely advocated during the noron before the 1990s; today it has become anistan came at a time when the founding lanitarian intervention was said to be under

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Averages an Nantl
Hardlyanyone woulddisagreetl as having many dimensions-to nar participation, women's empowerment model system of redistribution by mos They point, quite correctly I may interventions played in improving pub less than one half the per capita incon likely to live longer than her Brazilia Indian female child is half as likely to female child in Sri Lanka is almost asl average. Raising these averages are de it is worth reiterating that these gains in the record of other countries across th disadvantaged must be at the heart of Yet the question remains: Can heading on the right track? More impo: such hotshots in sharing the benefits of the fact that in the late '80s and '90s w on the planet (over a hundred disappea in this issue)? What explains over a di I would like to take on three ol offering valuable lessons for the devel the international financial institutions:
Most obviously, when we speak of the injustice against those who are sy were distributed better than in most co do persist in important ways and have North the civil war in the North and t pushed these provinces back by mai marginalization underperformance ofU parts of the country has been a conti Lanka. In the plantation sector, one ou complications while the corresponding tenth of that. According to the socio-e Sri Lanka, national inequality remains than that of the US (which has the wor and continues to increase.

d'Outrages.
likesan
at progress/development must be viewed he a few-health, literacy, democratic etc. Sri Lanka has been presented as a 'good' guys (read: those on "our side). add, to the significant role that state lic welfare. For instance, Sri Lanka has he of Brazil - yet, a Sri Lankan child is n counter part-on average. While an be educated as her male counterpart, a ikely to be educated as a male child - on finitely praiseworthy achievements, and eed to be sustained and extended; given he globe, concern for the weak and the any progress. averages tell us if we are doing well or rtantly, what is the right track? If we are progress more equitably, what explains e had the highestrate of disappearances rances per day—see Bopage’s interview acade of debilitating civil war? f the many plausible explanations, each opment plans of the State, the LTTE and such as the World Bank. of averages we tend to ignore the strength stematically left out. No doubt, benefits untries, however, domestic inequalities consequences to the South as well as the he East had, developmentally speaking, ly decades. In addition, the persistent va and Central provinces relative to other nuing feature of post-independence Sri t of four women die due to birth-related figure in the North and East is nearly a :onomic surveys of the Central Bank of significantly high - indeed it is higher st record among developed countries!)-

Page 15
Secondly, while improving a accompanied by meaningful opportu dimensions of development and progre The upheaval in the South is directly li attain progress in terms of providing ed people, it did relatively well in terms of However, while human capacity was participation was not. This lack of bal instance, university graduates suffering no avenues to influence the policies that the State for providing them with better world counterparts.
Finally, we have learnt the hard itcomes to day-to-day perceptions ofre founded, can be as relevant as 'reality. sense of deprivation experienced by dif stratum ofupper-crust Tamils were favore on the Sinhala nationalist world view til this legacy; similarly, the Tamil nationali were winners and victims among the Mu of the view that all Muslims in the Eas Tamils.
All this is a roundabout way of which how we lump aggregate has vit quantifiable facts cannot capture qualita social antagonism? Second, acknowledg in many different dimensions of progre preferences ofeach ofthese-income, ed etc? Is there a democratic way of settin measure national or regional outcomes. Lanka mean when we know little or n North and the East? Whose voices does does it silence?

7 verages is important, it should be nities to participate in the different
nked to this. Sri Lanka did manage to lucation and better health status for its promoting overall gender equality, etc. s enhanced, political and economic lance did have its consequences. For long-term unemployment and finding lead to stagnation, are not likely thank education than most of their other third
way that averages seldom matter when ality. These perceptions, even when ill Thus averages often fail to capture the ferent social groups'. That only a thin :dby the British legacy had little bearing hat held that all Tamils benefited from st perception rejects the view that there islims (and Tamils) in the East, in favor it are taking away the opportunities of
saying that there are three arenas in al significance. First, averages about tive perceptions- how can we measure ing that we need to balance our priorities ss, how do we settle in on the relative ucation level, and political participation, g these goals? Finally, when we try to : what does the average income of Sri othing about the income levels in the this average represent? Whose voices

Page 16
The Violen
Ahilan K
The last few months in Lankah a dangerous trajectory of a renewed cult that is both physical and structural. The of assassinations. There is renewed ramp have been displaced. The Sri Lankan violence in the interest of pursuing its business; policies that are in the realm o for peace was welcomed by all early la as argued by many contributors to thi peace, providing cover for the LTTE to a to the Southern ruling class to cynicall
In the last thirty-odd years of sta militarization of society and outright w deeply regrettable. Such paths have led A culture of economic violence, a cultu cleansing and a culture of fear, all flow Lankan state, political forces in the Sol
In the realm of structural and ecc in tandem with the ethnic conflict was the UNP in 1977, with arrogant disreg an environment of arrogant power led to on strike, and macro-economic policie sections of the lower classes. An intensi the ethnic pogrom of 1983, which tar, What had been violence aimed at the with the reign of terror during the second of such a destructive trajectory was a consumption went hand in hand with m
In the North, a dangerous po individuals as "traitors' was escalated Duraiappah in 1975 and the murder of S in 1985. These were the first steps that 1 targeted killings multiplied into the th such as Rajani Thiranagama, Selvi, Sant to name a few.

ce of Peace
adirgamar
ave been tumultuous to say the least, as ure ofviolence is taking root. A violence LTTE has recently carried out a number age in the East, as thousands of Muslims state in turn has chosen to ignore such own agenda of a peace that is good for feconomic violence. While a new dawn st year, its outcome might be deceptive, S magazine. It is becoming an illusive ttack its perceived enemies, and strength y pursue its own power interests. e repression, heightened ethnic tension, ar, there were many paths taken that are to the creation of violent sub-cultures, re of "traitor' killings, a culture of ethnic ing out of crucial steps taken by the Sri uth and Tamil political formations. onomic violence, one of the major steps the open-economy policies brought by ird for questions of social justice. Such the sacking in 1980 of 80,000 teachers s leading to the pauperization of larger fied system of patronage contributed to geted and destroyed Tamil businesses. Tamil community spread to the South, JVP insurrection. The logical conclusion war economy, where production and urder and massacre. litics of labeling and marginalizing further by the assassination of Mayor t. John's College principal Anandarajah ed to a culture of “traitor killings'. Such Ousands including committed activists nathiyar, Manoharan and Kanthaswamy,

Page 17
In response to indiscriminate massacres ( LTTE massacred Sinhalese villagers for followed by the decimation of other Tami and expulsion of Tamil-speaking Muslim repression of all dissent, of both individu a culture of fear took over. A culture off life and crippled civil administration anc The dual history of violence noted the current trend in Lanka seems to warr history. First, certain crucial steps lead to direction. Second, the impact of policies/v of society can come back to haunt all of In that context, the recent LTTE a and others is a dangerous step. Numero Army personnel, former LTTE members and murdered by the LTTE since the ceas rights activists. Not only is this a grave vi step in the direction of a renewed cycle c Some may argue that the militant groups i are not without their own history of vio only feed the cycle of violence. While actors have to be addressed, the present immediately and resisted. Furthermore, noted that many living in the North an violence has already gone beyond the become pervasive in Tamil society, cha but the horrendous violence of child cons and intimidation of ordinary people by t On the other hand, the Sri Lan financial and labor reform supported by business. Its abdication to the violence-el are showing signs of what is in store fo rising as the impact is beginning to be policies have the character of irrevers financial institutions is assured through
During the last few decades, bc economic deprivation were figured into building. The vision of a Sinhala-Buddh the vision of a liberated Tamil nation ir justified both the crushing of dissent anc

9 of civilians by the Sri Lankan state, the the first time in 1985. That step was l militant groups and then the massacre is by the LTTE. It eventually led to the lals and the community as a whole, as ear that eventually restricted everyday l private business. above is a familiar story. Nevertheless, ant learning two lessons from its tragic spiraling escalation in an irreversible iolence restricted to a particular section society. Lssassination of rival political activists us cases of political opponents, Tamil , Tamil and Muslim civilians targeted efire, have been documented by human plation of the ceasefire, it's a calculated of violence and suppression of dissent. nquestion or the Tamil army personnel lence. Such arguments, however, can past violations of human rights by all cycle of murder has to be dealt with in the interest of honesty, it should be d East believe this renewed cycle of point of no return. Such violence has racterized not only by assassinations, cription, extortion aimed at businesses he LTTE. kan state is rapidly pushing through its vision of a peace that is good for gendering policies of the World Bank, r the people. Cost of living is already felt by society at large. Finally, such bility as bondage to the multilateral the debt cycle. th the physical brutality of war and he cost of saving the nation and nation ist dominated nation in the South and the North were the war cries, which poverty-inducing policies. Ironically,

Page 18
10 during the last year, it is peace and the used to dismiss the new round of viol people are told, as long as the war continues. Similarly, the state's W development is rationalized as a pri ideology of peace (not a democratic and nation for not addressing a cultur
It is the responsibility of all sec onslaught of this renewed culture of consume all of society. There is very criticism from the political formatio Tamil militant groups, PA, JVP or UN] manipulating the populace for future e. speaking of the illusion of peace is n breathing room coming out of the cea large guns, but even pockets of peopl supported wholeheartedly to counterth targeted killings and a renewed culture to a democratic peace. It is not a ques peace.

continuance of the peace process that is ence. What is a murder here or there the loes not resume and the peace process orld Bank dictated vision of narrow :condition for peace. Hence a crooked vision of peace) has now displaced war
of violence.
tions of society to condemn and resist the violence, before such destructive steps little substantive debate or constructive ls, whether it is the TNA, LTTE, other P. All of them are merely concerned about lectoral gains, control and power. Finally, ot a rejection of the peace process. The isefire has led not only to the ceasing of e's resistance. Such resistance has to be he authoritarian and technocratic policies, of fear. It is such resistance that can lead tion of war or peace, rather what kind of

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Man-made Laws and Femi
Encounter with the
Yasmin T
The use of law to regulate arena familiar a phenomenon in South Asia as site where particular kinds of sexual consequently determining who is deserv therefore of protection by the state. The are made possible because the law simu regardless of the nature of consent of actors, especially those perceived to be co prohibited acts. The law is thereby im personae or identities, both normative an by which laws are made, interpreted an they are intimately linked with, and ref and constructs. That is to say, the law is r impact. Nor, contrary to its intentions, d or fix a subjector her/his actions. Its part discursive and otherwise, that may serve The process by which elements o with sexual acts, consensual and noncor exemplifies how social concerns and an: actors in the legal domain. Using this la reported in the press in 1998, I want to lo "talked about in Sri Lanka, and the imp women outside the projections of compl The sections in the Penal Code r the rubric of "unnatural offences'. Sectic
“Whoever voluntarily has carnal with any man, woman or animal, shall be description (i.e. simple or rigorous) for and shall also be liable to a fine.'
Until the end of 1995, its subsection, 35
"Any male person, who in public commission of, or procures or attemptst person of, any act of gross indecency wi of an offence, and shall be punished wi

11 nine Feelings: A Lesbian
Law in Sri Lanka
ambiah"
s of sexuality and sexual speech is as it is elsewhere. The law is a discursive acts are established as permissible, ing of legitimacy as a sexual actor and se moves of permission and legitimacy ltaneously prohibits certain other acts the actors involved. It outlaws select onstituted through participation in such plicated in the construction of sexual d dissident. In examining the processes ld implemented, it becomes clear that lect, other social and political fictions lot 'neutral', either in its articulation or oes it completely circumscribe, define ial nature therefore leaves open spaces, : sexually subversive intentions." f the Sri Lankan Penal Code that dealt sensual, came to be amended in 1995 Kieties (re)form sexual behaviours and lw as a point of entry, and an incident ok at how women deemed lesbians are lications for women who desire other iance with heteronormativity. elevant to this investigation fall under on 365 of the Penal Code states: intercourse against the order of nature : punished with imprisonment of either a term which may extend to ten years,
5a, stated the following:
or private, commits, or is party to the o procure the commission by any male th another male person, shall be guilty th imprisonment of either description

Page 20
12 for a term which may extend to two ye. also be liable to be punished with whip In 1995, parliamentarians appro instance (section 365) increased the per ten and twenty years if the offence was years on someone under sixteen. In th indecency, "any male person' became 365, if one person was over eighteen a along with a provision for compensati payable to the person under sixteen.
A new section, 365b, also appea defined as 'committed by a person whi by the use of his genitals or any other pa on any orifice of any other person, bein under section 363. It is applicable in consent is deemed to have been obtaine of poor judgment. The general penalty i and twenty years, and ten to twenty y 1998, this was amended to include an place 'statutory gross indecency', whe person under sixteen had given her/hi there were changes made to the lawso the first time, a proposal to criminalize The background to the Penal Co in permissible and prohibited sexual enc of increasingly reported instances of chi 1990s. Most notably, the motivating is boy children“ by foreign/white men, li source of national income that has had of the inter-ethnic civil war. While this "outsiders' glossed over the long-stanc male "insiders, especially in home, Committee constituted to draw up reco at least one prominent feminist legal sch laws that had an impact on both wome consisted of a mixed group of pract representatives, representatives ofreleva protection advocates, who nonetheless made a number of progressive recommel of homosexual acts between consentin

ars or withfine, or with both, and shall ping.'
ved ofan amendment that, in the first alty to rigorous imprisonment between S committed by a person over eighteen e second instance (365a), that of gross person', and the same penalty, as for ind the other below sixteen was added, on to be determined by the court and
red. 365b addresses grave sexual abuse o, for sexual gratification, does any act art of the human body or any instrument gan act which does not amount to rape situations where there is no consent or 'd through coercion or in circumstances s rigorous imprisonment between seven ears if the victim is under eighteen. In additional section that, in effect, put in re the law was to be applied even if a is consent. In addition, in 1995, while n rape, and incest was criminalized for marital rape was severely attenuated.
ode amendments is very much couched ‘ounters. They were spurred by concerns ld sexual abuse, highlighted in the early sue became the sexual exploitation of nked therefore with tourism, a primary a roller-coaster history for the duration focus on boy children violated by male ling systemic abuse of girl children by /domesticated spaces, the Technical mmendations for legal amendments had Iolar who utilized the occasion to review -n and girls. The Committee in general icing lawyers, legal scholars, police int government ministries, and children's came to an accord on several issues. It hdations, including the decriminalization g adults, and therefore a repeal of 365

Page 21
and 365a, which were usually interpreted activity. 365b, which covered coercive amounting to rape, was meant to repla consensual but non-normative sex. Som probably in the domain of the Legal D recommendations of the Technical Com of consensual “unnatural” acts between ac was made gender neutral. Male pers then to females as well. As interpreted b was thereby criminalized for the first time was understood to have been the subjec reference to gross indecency between m in parliament on either the continuing c or the new criminalization of sex bet Parliament called for the decriminalizati adults.
In the three years following th deployed against any woman by the state citizens threatened to use it against othe in the agents of the law. The exampleth weekly English-language newspaper a between the media, law, its interpretati culture; and legitimate and illegitimate ( The story is of two Sinhala wom Kusum. Other residents of the village, are more than just good friends, and a attempted to end the relationship, and w police. According to the article the two y relationship but finally “under pressur different response - that they are not l relationship because of police brutalit concerned about the well-being of Kusu disappeared from the village, Sunithaal harassed by her (Kusum's) father and f the army, while Kusum's mother accused a measure ofmaterial independence, Sur for the rest of my life'. Sunitha anxiol prevent them from living together. The and culturally such a thing is unaccept basis on which to intervene. The newsp

13 las applying to (male) same-sex sexual acts other than vaginal penetration ce the clauses that had criminalized ewhere along the law-production line, raftsman's Office, not only were the mittee regarding the decriminalization lults disregarded, but also the language on became simply person, extending by legal scholars, sex between women , since specifically male homosexuality t of the original section 365a, with its ales. Significantly, there was no debate riminalization of male homosexuality ween women. Only one Member of ion of "homo-sex between consenting
e law's passage, it was not formally , but there were instances where private rs, usually family members, and roped at follows draws on a 1998 report in a und brings into play the relationship on and its keepers; understandings of lesire for women.
en of village background, Sunitha and and Kusum's mother, allege that they re sexually involved. The mother had hen she was unsuccessful, called in the oung women at first denied any lesbian 2,” had admitted to it'. Sunitha has a overs, but were forced to confess to a y. Sunitha is, nonetheless, extremely m (who at the time of the interview had leging that Kusum was being sexually acing pressure from the family to join Sunitha of hiding her daughter). Having itha states, "I can take care of Kusum) usly asks the journalist if the law can police, while remarking that: 'socially able', respond that they have no legal aper then points out that “Article 365a

Page 22
14 of the Penal Code may be used to prol that this provision has never been depend a lot on interpretation. In ge sympathetic manner, and ends with 'th women in the face of such opposition is { to weather all odds for the sake of the
This narrative prompts reflecti newspaper's reading and representation its implications: The report is titled “A states 'Man-made laws threaten femi Kusum's mother is the caption, har obviously, the invocation of stereotypi terrain of law against feminine, amorp mother, it suggests that the "hard timer presumed here to be hard/nonmalleabl to bear on this all-female, “soft” relatio By positing the megalithic cei uncontainable, feminine feelings, th relationship is undeserving of serious
female affair', that is, it is not male ho any other configuration which engages In a context where the density or levity not the weight of the law may be broug read into this the possibility of the ne relationshipperceived by family, comm the newspaper's ambivalence seeps t relationship, by further extension desi law, it also publicizes 365a in the Penal the women from living together in a 1 evidence that the police had independ utility of this particular Penal Code pro Secondly, the reactions of the pc discussions on the law: The article sa legal records to find grounds for stoppi They are concerned that they have no either living together or even marrying so. The challenge to legally constructe institutionalized as marriage, is reveale “we can neither tell them to go ahead accompanied by the police officer's ol

hibit such a relationship', but concedes applied in a court of law and it would neral, though, the story is written in a e determination displayed by these two 2vidence enough that they are determined feelings that bind them. on on a number of issues. Firstly, the h of desire between the two women, and Female Affair', and the lead-in byline nine feelings'. Under a photograph of il time with a soft relationship'. Most c gendering pits the masculine, factual hous feelings. More subtly, through the 2sults from cultural expectations (culture e, homogenous, static) that are brought nship. tainty of masculine law against light, e newspaper hints that the women's attention by the law because it is an all mosexual or subversive heterosexual or men as the subjects or objects of desire. of a situation is signaled by whether or ht to bear on the matter, it is tempting to :wspaper's backhanded tolerance for a unity and the police as lesbian. However, hrough, for while it suggests that this re between women, is vulnerable to the Code as a possible basis for preempting marriage-like arrangement. There is no 2ntly concluded the same regarding the
vision.88) olice, and the subversive implications of ys that the police had 'scoured through ng the relationship”, but found nothing. basis in law to prevent the women from g each other if the women desired to do land thus legitimated (hetero)sexuality, 2d in the police's perplexed anxiety that and get married, or stop them. This is bservation that the relationship (or is it

Page 23
the possibility of a lesbian marriage?) is n but, as far as the police can see, there is no either. Thus, while the police attempt invoking culture as inhibitor (the police the same terms noted above), Kusum's law's seamless hegemony to counter the against a lesbian relationship where hel whose perimeter keeps changing stand S It is at this point in the narrative that the newspaper intervenes to direct at Penal Code, but is compelled to concede in a court of law, and its efficacy is very also at this moment that the possibility o conditional and tentative, emerges. But it whose treacherous nature is not to be at disabilities women are often compelled gender, class, ethnicity, rural or urband the legal process itself.
Thirdly, the sex root of the dis-e mother: They are explicitly concerned ab which to them is the variable that disti else. The dis-ease is projected in a cont woman publicly known to be sexually ac female premarital virginity is prized, a women is condemned. It is only by occup and space of stigmatised sexuality, that intimate intimacy with Kusum only by d place them both beyond the tentacles of The implications of the sexual sc compels Sunitha to exclaim: "If they relationship, then where are the photogra and its (homo)sexual basis, however, d materially support Kusum, from observir but on no account will I end my friends the tension-fraught, sexualised space a whatever the contradictions inherent ir concerned that the law will prohibit then referred to only by recognising that ver that she is pressured to deny.

15 either socially nor culturally acceptable, thing in the law that says it is impossible to compensate for the law's lack by officer understanding culture in much mother looks to what she sees as the ; inadequacy of cultural-moral censure daughter is a partner. In that fissure Sunitha and Kusum. , after the police officer's conundrum, tention to section 365a of the amended that this statute has not yet been applied much dependent on interpretation. It is f subversion for the two women, albeit is a very precarious subversive moment, all underestimated, given the systemic into on the basis of locations such as welling, let alone the hostile terrain of
:ase among the villagers and Kusum's out the sexual aspect of the relationship, nguishes a friendship from something ext where a respectable woman and a tive are a contradiction interms, where nd where extramarital (hetero)sex for lying this stigmatised space of sexuality Sunitha can speak of sex at all. She can enying sex, and thus also (unwittingly)
the criminal law.
ript are not lost on the two women, and say that Kusum and I have a sexual phs or video to prove it?'The ostracism o not deter Sunitha, who is willing to g: "I no longer care about my reputation hip with Kusum'. Even as she chooses the context for voicing her defiance, this moment for her, Sunitha is also 1 from living together, a law that can be aspect of the relationship, the sexual,

Page 24
16
I place the term ‘lesbian’ in the to signal this and other sexually fram rather than to ask whether or not this qu two women. The treacherous terrain o the nature of the relationship that Suni by the articulated depth of emotional which Sunitha refuses to forswear ev and which sustains her strong desire statement that they are not (sexually) 1
mother insist that they are (Kusum's r and later reckoning it is true while Si Sunitha’s challenge to the community relationship is sexual by showing pho where gossip, while damaging, may no and where any such recording of sexual too as being sexually deviant, in commi and pornographic intent.
Fourthly, there is the freedom conventional way, as they relate to representation, the women are able to
made available for them in the mainst newspaper's motivation for enabling si lofty. At the same time, the women's cla To what extent did they have the powe their own terms, even as they did not out?? The law, almost reluctantly drawn at the behest of a sex regulator from w deemed to have been flouted by the ti attracting the media, which in turn is u (alleged) sexual transgression there undesired, the creation of an opportun speech makes known the dangers as we this particular legal space.
In conclusion, the alleged hege practice in this instance is undermined in the larger legal text and procedure, a gendered sexual subjects under paren that entangle with the law's lack. But ar as ‘harmless’, or undeserving of, or cap is thwarted by the depreciation of opr

title of this piece within quotation marks ed contradictions as voiced by Sunitha, alifies as a relationship of desire between f both admitting, and denying-to-admit, tha in particular negotiates, is conveyed intimacy between Sunitha and Kusum, en in the midst of immense opposition, to live together with Kusum; Sunitha's overs, even as the villagers and Kusum's nother at first disbelieving the villagers, initha was a lodger in their houseo; and u to demonstrate the allegation that the otos or videos of the same, in a context ot be infallible evidence in a court of law, activity is likely to implicate the recorder anity or court, for entertaining voyeuristic
of speech issue, even if articulated in a - the story. However problematic the publicize their experience through space ream press, even though this particular ich space may not necessarily have been iss location raises an important question: r to resist the press, or engage with it on reject the media as a means to ‘speak in at an instance of sexual transgression, rithin the family whose bid at control is ansgressive subjects, is instrumental in sed by the subjects to ‘speak’. The act of by catalyses, however risk-filled and ity to resist being silenced, and through 1l as the subversive potential inhering in
mony of the law as both discourse and or countered by the gaps and partialities s well as by the stereotypic renderings of al, communal and cultural surveillance y tendency to read a lesbian relationship able of escaping serious (legal) attention ortunities for autonomy or empowered

Page 25
negotiation that results from any kind c brutality), notwithstanding police puzzle who want to live together. Hopeful howe nor intervention of the law completely d in fact Sunitha's query whether the law ca of the women's willingness to interrogat transgressive (sexual) subjects, howeve
Notes
Several legal scholars have written compel the realm of sexuality. Especially useful here Prudery: The Moral Face of Obscenity Law i (1997), and 'ALoveSongto Our Mongrel Se Social and Legal Studies, 353 (1999); as we and the Limits of Justice (London: Routledg Penal Code (Amendment) Act, No. 22 of 1 Penal Code (Amendment) Act, No. 29 of 1 laws apply to a female under sixteen years.
Children of both sexes are defined by thes ments as under eighteen years of age.
Interview with Professor Savitri Goonesek Colombo, November 1998. “Sanayi Marcelline, Sunday Leader, “Revie ”Thearticlestates that Sunithais29yearsol otherwise this would have been the main po * I consciously move from journalist to extent the journalist herself may have been ri 365a. 'Mothers are often astute observers regardi how they interpret their observations or wha
Yasmin Tambiah is a director at the Centre fo a research fellow at the International Cent revision of a paper presented at the CFLRs Desires. Intersections Between Speech, Sex

17 of police intervention (let alone police ment as to how to deal with two women :ver is the fact that neither the presence iscourages or silences the women, that n disallow their relationship is evidence e its power, and to secure a foothold as rtentative, within its fissures.
lingly on the reach and limits of the law in have been Ratna Kapur, “The Profanity of n India, 8:3 Womens Cultural Review, 293 lves: Hybridity, Sexuality and the Law; 8:3 ll as Carl Stychin, Law's Desire: Sexuality e, 1995).
995, 31 October 1995. 998, clause 7, 4 June 1998. Statutory rape
state and international human rights instru
cera, member of the Technical Committee,
w” section, 12 April 1998, p. 1. d and it is unlikely that Kusum is a "minor, int of controversy.
newspaper because it is unclear to what esponsible for including the information on
ng the behaviour of their children, even if it they do consequently is unpredictable!
r Feminist Legal Research, New Delhi, and 're for Ethnic Studies, Colombo. This is a 2minar on Prohibited Pleasures/Forbidden and Culture, Khajuraho, 1999.

Page 26
18
Displaced Women - Righ
& East Sri
Centre for the Stu Soph
At present, thousands of displ East of Sri Lanka are leaving the cam endured nineteen years of conflict. Th a further upheaval that for some ma displacement.
A number of recent studies doc Displaced Peoples (IDPs) within Sri work exists on factors affecting wom the Study of Human Rights (CSHR) enhancing understanding of the specif within Sri Lanka. Our focus was on th February 2002 Ceasefire Agreemental this study prohibits an exhaustive anal are displaced but living in the broade issues facing displaced women living resettlement and/or relocation villages
During October-December 2 and East of Sri Lanka, meeting with international and local non-governme. centres on IDPs and their "host' comm
The importance of Women's Voices
Rather than being subsumed into the b
to highlight that displaced women fac
the displaced communities do not. Th
by displaced women:
The varying roles women play
displaced - we look at differences th
Statu S:
O The needs of female-headed hc The practical concerns of wom traditional roles of women
O Violence against Women becau boundaries that result from dis

its and Resettlement North
Lanka: 2003
Idy of Human Rights ia Elek
aced women throughout the North and ps, villages and homes where they have ey will meet an uncertain future-facing y be a final chapter to a life shaped by
ument the overall situation of Internally Lanka, while internationally a body of en in conflict. However, the Centre for embarked on this study with the aim of ic experiences and needs of women IDPs he factors affecting women following the nd resultant peace process. The nature of lysis of the problems facing women who r community, and instead focuses upon in welfare centres (WCs, or camps') and
002 CSHR travelled through the North DPs - women, men and children - and ntal organisations (I/NGOs) whose work unities.
roader needs of all IDPs, this report aims ce specific issues that other members of e following issues were named as critical
within the common experience of being at arise due to ethnicity, age and marital
useholds (with an emphasis on widows) en during displacementarising from the
ise of the confusion and changing social placement

Page 27
O Positive features resulting from as increased participation in pre crucial in reducing the challenges
relocation O The importance of involving all
males - to effect broad change O Women's role in decision making were also changing in many are: O All of these factors listed remair
return. Upon resettlement/reloc. immense. They include: Wome particularly-may not have the sk or relocation
O Negotiating with relevent autho.
a difficulty faced by many IDP
O We conclude that adopting a Rig would be one way that the need sectons of the community may b
We raise the questions as to whe recognised within the peace process - internationally. The answer we found broader debates, the rights of women expressed a dissatisfaction with the c women's rights so far during the proces not knowing how, who or where to establishment of a women's commi resettlement issues for women may see may become audible.
As we began our research into the resettlement or relocation, displaced wo ways in which they have experienced di factors have coloured their experiences to varying degrees - the decisions they n For this reason, before tackling the 'pr: land and property rights, we saw the nec in conflict, and how the experience of gendered lines.

19 displacement have also resulted, such viously male domains; these may be for displaced women upon resettlement/
members of the community - including
, conflict resolution and empowerment as throughout the North and East
for women when they contemplate ation the practical needs of women are n- from female headed households ills or resources to consider resettlement
ries in relation to assistance packages is
WO1116:11, ghts-based Approach to Resettlement s of women, and other marginalised be addressed.
ther the rights of women are adequately - both within their communities and was that it appears already within these
are marginalised. Displaced women urrent level of commitment shown to ss, but largely felt unable to contribute: direct their concerns. The recent ttee advising the government upon : this situation change, and their voices
factors facing IDPs as they contemplate omen spoke immediately of the specific splacement. As we will examine, these as displaced peoples, and will shape - nake following the Ceasefire Agreement. actical' features of resettlement such as cd to look further into the role of women displacement has been informed along

Page 28
20 Diverse Roles of Women in Conflict
While the role and involvemer now following the Ceasefire, share ma Women of different ethnicities, of differ all fall under the title of IDP', yet their li respond differently to programmes tha and marital statuses.
We feel that acknowledging wo developing strategies that accommodate persons. However, this does not mean individuals with a will and capacity t about resettlement.
Many women spoke highly of needs that they themselves identified, them. For example, older women, who a wealth of knowledge and skills that a born in the welfare centres. A few pro older women and cross-generational wi These opportunities strengthen connec weakened during displacement, and aic knowledge vital for women who live a
Female-Headed Households
Of all the issues that were rais may be the factor that stood out the mo: this fact; that the needs of single, fema are not adequately met. To their credit, some way to address this issue.
As men are traditionally more l action or 'disappear, thousands of V social support for their families. Notor but these women must learn to relate t of among the challenges are finding government forces, militants and aid off values continue to pervade many discrimination against widows of majo) in addressing the political or structura

it of women IDPs during conflict, and ny features, they are also richly varied. 2nt marital status, ages, and backgrounds ves and experiences are unique. Women t are offered due to their ethnicity, ages
men as victims of war is a first step in their positions as marginalised displaced that women should not be recognised as o contribute to the current discussions
NGOs that sought to meet the diverse rather than imposing an agenda upon have become displaced late in life, have e unknown to those who may have been grammes sought to bring together both omen to share and learn from each other, tions and culture that may have become i the practical transmission of skills and nd work on the land.
ed by displaced women, martial status St. All who work with IDPs are aware of le headed households are immense, and many NGOs we met were attempting in
ikely to join militant forces, be killed in women are now the sole economic and ly must their gendered roles be fulfilled, o the world in ways previously unheard external employment, and liaising with icials. Despite these changes, patriarchal aspects of women's lives, with the concern. Substantial challenges remain l issues faced by women.

Page 29
Ethnicity
Ethnicity is clearly far too large One thing we can mention is the import programmes for women. A trend that is for men to leave their families to assess joins them in resettlement. Because of needs for adequate protection while the spoke to, Muslim women also named t take a leading role in their communities. to resettle is an enormous one, and mov voices -Muslim, Tamil and Sinhalese - a that Sinhalese women were the most developmentinitiatives, followed by Ta
Gendered Dimensions of Conflict
What we found striking, howeve that their needs as women were the sam feel is due to the shared responsiblities a to these responsiblities, women suffer other sections of the displaced commu women to fulfill their responsibilities \ family's basic needs including food, wat the scarcity of resources and dangerous Displaced women told us that seeking ac was increasingly difficult, if not impos are some of these services becoming a GoSL and I/NGO intiatives.
Risk of Sexual Abuse
Because of the confusion and b. flight and displacement, women suffer f forms of violence from external forces members of other ethnic groups and f justice for these abuses is rare, and has pr This is due to a combination of insensiti and a lack of awareness among many v

21
an issue to cover in a brief summary. ance of offering culturally appropriate occuring in the Muslim community is he state of their land, before the family this, Muslim women in spoke of their r men are away. Of all the women we hemselves as slow to come forward to Making the decision of whether or not es can be made to enusure all women's reheard. Consistently we heard reports eager to take part in programmes or mil and Muslim Women.
r, was the number of women who saw e despite differing ethnicities. This we ind work that arises due to gender. Due violations, threats and insecurity that Inities do not. Attempts by displaced within the family - providing for their er and healthcare – become difficultby lue to military presence and landmines. lequate health care, schools and support sible during displacement. Only now |vailable, through the work of various
urred social boundaries resulting from 'om increased threat of sexual and other military, police or militant cadre, etc.), rom their own communities. Seeking oved largely ineffectual when attempted. e and inadequate reporting mechansims "omen about their rights.

Page 30
22 Dependency
We found that a 'dependency NGOs we met. We felt that this is displaced peoples have been recipient and the manner in which this has be spoke of the non-participatory, lal emergency and development assis contributing to the sense of apathy disp to a lack of desire upon the part of d direction of their lives.
If resettlement strategies can in designing and implementing a Innumerable international studies participation in emergency relief anc can well be used in Sri Lanka's resettl to development consistently point t WOCI).
Positive Features for Women
Although women have stuggle that have resulted from displacement positives that have resulted. Strict ge offering women the oppurtunitiy to ex parameters. Many women spoke high oppurutunities for women gained thu that would have taken years to bring
Many hope, however, that the their options will be strengthened wit has not been the case for women, and gains achieved for women must notb majority of women throughout the No for them; our hope is that their confide of those in power will make a differe
The existance of LTTE female strength by Tamil and Muslim womer the LTTE will involve women in ame - in a potential Interim Administratio statements about women's equality an

syndrome' was commonly spoken of by closely connected to the length of time of government and international assistance en given. IDPs and a number of NGOs gely top-down structures that provide tance. These were commonly seen as laced peoples commonly feel-as opposed isplaced peoples to take control over the
nvolve displaced peoples from the outset :tivities, this factor may be lessened.
point to the importance of women's l development - theory and practice that ement schemes. A rights-based approach ) the benefits that result from involving
d and suffered with the losses and changes and the upheavals of return, there are also nder roles have become more malleable — perience life outside of generally accepted ly of these changes, and saw the increased ough the war as 'fast-tracking a process about in normal conditions.
ability for women to work and expand h an absence of war. Internationally this many women felt it to be critical that the e lost in the transition to 'normalcy'. The rth and East did not see this as a possiblity ince in their own abilities and the attitudes
CC. cadre was continually cited as a source of L. However, it remains to be seen whether aningful way - and other minority groups n. It is too early to tell whether the LTTE d inclusion at high-level decision making

Page 31
will be put into practice. We met some their beliefs about women's integral role but the overarching control that themal citizens and cadre does not point towar
Economic & Psychosocial Issues
We also looked at how I/NGO attempting to meet the needs of displace( of programmes has not been attempted, a woman's ability to earn a livelihood the emotional needs of displaced wo programmes.
We have seen that as women bec( provider in their families they also gain that impact on their own lives. Eco enhanced options for women, and many facilitate women's income generation. order to meet their basic needs was a This employment however, often place stuggle to meet all the needs of their fau Providing opportunities for women to become financially secure upon resettle
The field of psychosocial progr the rapid development of a wide variety application, with an absence of regulat with a number of recent studies which f are not adequately recognised by natio) outset of assistance or development an may result for women.
Empowerment
The majority of NGOs we met with, ho through the establishment of women's
women was viewed as the first step tow found a clear distinction between the sn about change through actively promoti NGOs who prioritise women's practic platform into issues of rights and empo

23 LTTE women who were inspiring in n the LTTE's future political structures, e leadership holds over the lives of its lan inclusive leadership.
s working in the North and East are women. While an exhaustive analysis wo areas stood out in their importance: und be economically independent, and men addressed through psychosocial
ome the sole, or a significant, economic in their ability to partake in decisions nomic independence provides greatly programmes offered by NGOs seek to Entrance into external employment in necessity for many displaced women. is a double burden on women, as they milies in the public and private realms. continue their economic activities, or ment, is essential.
ammes is one presently challenged by of programmes with differing aims and ng standards. Our experiences concur ind that if the specific needs of women hal and international agencies from the ineffectual - or negative - experience
vever, sought to effect change primarily groups; strengthening and empowering ards a broader campaign for rights. We all number of NGOs who seek to bring ng women's rights, and the majority of al concerns, and then move from that werment. Whatever the methods, these

Page 32
24
moves were welcomed by a broad enhance their identities as strong i essential for women upon resettleme
The Role of Men
Because gender discriminati women — and in some cases sanct addressing these issues cannot be don the proliferation of programmes for remain in addressing the political o values continueto pervade many aspe conflict resolution and agency overtl
Peace and Resettlement
Despite these myriadhardship striking features of the majority of wo extremes of poverty, trauma and col astounded us with their commitment Their ingenuity and imagination we and the possibility of it breaking do displaced once more, the need to paramount. Facilitating this, a large emphasised the centrality of address conflict in order to effect sustainable shifts occuring in the social and politi practicalities of peace and resettlen parallel emphasis on inter-ethnic rec
Resettlement: Practical Issues
Practically, women share mar safe, dignified and supported way to more permanently where they are. were the clearance of landmine establishment of essential infrastructu assured of ways to support themselv.
For women, female-headed h physical realities ofresettlement — inv

:ross-section of women as being ways to dividuals with rights worthy of respect: nt.
on is perpetrated largely by men toward ioned by traditional societal structures - 2 without the involvement of men. Despite displaced women, substantial challenges r structural issues they face. Patriarchal cts of women's lives, with decision making, heir lives an unmet ideal for many women.
s, spirit, determination and resiliance were men we met in the North and East. Facing ntinuing uncertainty, women consistantly to their families' survival and well-being, re infectious. As we spoke about peace, wn and rendering some of these women bring about permanent peace became : number of displaced women and NGOs ing the underlying causes of Sri Lanka's , long-term change. Within the immense cal landscape of Sri Lanka, addressing the lent needs to be strengthened through a bnciliation.
y needs felt by all displaced people: for a resettle, relocate or establish themselves The top priorities for those we spoke to ; and un-exploded ordnance (UXO), re, such as schools and hospitals, and being 's financially.
ouseholds particularly, the economic and olving heavy work of clearing dense bush,

Page 33
building shelter and establishingfields and tasks. Women spoke of selling their fo taking out loans to meet their costs. Won rumours that result from engaging with r familes that stopped some of them askin A number of displaced women a successfully negotiate with aid and gover assistance packages, compensation for deceased spouse. It is imperitive that rel way they can understand.
The trend we witnessed of males settlement to assess a family's land and be relocation is also an option many female landless women are also among those rights and options for the future.
Rights-Based Approach to Developme
These are the main issues that stc We hope that a greater understanding o affect women may assist in forming po and in the future. Looking for solutions early on in our study to become intereste 'rights-based approach' to assistance and
This approach has been develope non-state actors to respond effectively assistance and development. The guid most widely recognised set of minimu dignity. It offers a perspective that pla citizens with entitlement to the full realisa to passive recipients of resettlement pac women throughout the process of desi gender-responsive resettlement strategie
A Rights-based approach to devel to ensure accountablilty of all actors, stre participation and priority setting in orde) those in need. To achieve this in practic of the international human rights system integrated into their resettlement plans determining how resources are distribut to this. A Rights discourse will give voi

25 crops-are daunting, if not impossible, od rations to gain money for this, or hen also spoke of the harsh gossip and men who are not from their immediate gassistance from 'outsiders'. also felt unsure about their ability to nment agencies with regard to official lost land and property and/or for a evant information reaches women in a
leaving camps and areas oftemporary gin the physical work prior to a family's -headed households do not have. The who are not moving; unsure of their
nt & Gender-Sensitive Policy
bod out in our fieldwork and research. f the ways conflict and displacement licies that ensure their protection now to some of these issues, we were led :d in looking at the models set out in a
development. d to strenghten the ability of state and 7 and appropriately with emergency 2lines have been developed upon the m standards for human survival and ces those receiving aid as partners - tion of their human rights-as opposed kages. This would mean inclusion of gning, implementing and evaluating
S. opment has been developed in attempt ssing the importance of clear planning, to empower and build the capacity of e, the norms, standards and principles could be agreed to by the GoSL, and
The rights of IDPs to participate in 2d and policies formulated are central Ce tOWOmen.

Page 34
26
While challenges and uncertai take advantage of what is now known women. If aid, assistance or support flexible, contextualised and responsiv Displaced women throughout the No simple: a safe and productive place to and communities, services and facili families' needs to be fulfilled, and mc
Notes
While the UNHCR and others oppose centres, others pointedly use this term to tion made between the living situation of term 'camps' as it is used by IDPs thems them.
Sophia Elek is an Australian currently wc Rights, based at the University of Colombo training and research in the field of hun human rights and development has led he

nty remain, unique oppurunities exist to about the experience of displacement for is to achieve its goals, the importance of 2 programmes cannot be overemphasised. rth and East told us that their needs are live, to be respected within their families ties that will enable their own and their 1st importantly – to live without fear.
the use of the term 'camps' for IDP welfare highlight what is seen as the arbitrary distincIDPs and refugees. This report will use the alves and state/non-state actors working with
orking for the Centre for the Study of Human . Her time is spent divided between education, nan rights education. Her interest in gender, er to work in Nepal, India and Sri Lanka,

Page 35
Review of the Assessment of N
Areas of the
Muttukrishna S
Multilateral organisations such as (WB) and the Asian Development Bank (. of Needs in the Conflict Affected Areas presented at the forthcoming Sri La WWW.peaceinsrilanka.com). This docume and sub-sectoral reports, which should be as well. This note will briefly comment c contents of this document.
There was a fundamental probl document. This exercise was meant to North&East (N&E) in a pause-in-confli consultation with the people themselves. each and every person in the N&E. Neve the district level (at least) could have be the elected members of parliament and 1 proxies for the people. Hence, the nee consulted the elected representatives in t Instead, the consultation process central government representatives in th kachcheri staff), N&E provincial admini representatives of Non-Governmental C and international) working in the N&E, a businesses. Many local NGOs and trade a manipulated, and therefore cannot be re The need assessors bent overbackwardst which is unrepresentative. Although most the needs of the local people, the consult meeting the people themselves and their { drawback of the needs assessment exerc As regards the contents of the n two elements; one is the identification o the identified needs. The needs identified However, there are some key component United Nations Development Programn needs on the issue of governance in the rights that have been covered in the 1

27 eeds in the Conflict-Affected North East
arvananthan
the United Nations (UN), World Bank ADB) jointly prepared an Assessment of the North East in April 2003 to be nka Donor Forum in Tokyo (see 2nt was based on a number of sectoral made available for public consumption n the process (of preparation) and the
em in the process of preparing this assess the needs of the people of the ct situation, but there was hardly any Of course it is not practical to consult rtheless some focus group meetings at en arranged. Further, in a democracy ocal government could be reasonable ds assessment exercise should have he N&E as well.
involved meetings with the LTTE, le province (Government Agents and strative staff, local government staff, }rganisations (NGOs-local, national cademics, and representatives of local associations in the N&E are politically garded as independent and objective. o accommodate the needs of the LTTE of those consulted may have expressed ation process is not complete without alected representatives. This is a major ise. eeds assessment document, there are f needs and the other is the costing of in the document are by and large real. Es missing. For example, originally the ne (UNDP) was expected to identify N&E. Governance transcends human needs assessment (Section 3A). We

Page 36
28 understand that due to objections ra assessment on governance was left ou the people were sacrificed in order to because sound governance is a prerequ in the aftermath of conflict (see Reconstruction in Afghanistan, prepa January 2002). Besides, the extent of i the time limitation.
Capacity building is obviously is clearly acknowledged in the needs to take place, sound governance is sing the MoU, qualified professionals, adm et al, are hesitant to work in the N& those areas, especially in LTTE-contr implanted from outside; it has to in retaining human capital. Retention of dramatic improvement in governance t held areas. Therefore, Sound govern which is unfortunately not covered in The costing of the identifiedne impractical to do a proper costing inj given for the exercise because the peo in the shortest possible time. The origi that presented in the document. W government wanted the original estim known to it. First of all, there is no guar is asked for. Secondly, there is nog Tokyo Donor Forum will be actually similar Tokyo Donor Forum for the re. has still not materialised for a variety ( decision to downsize the original cost Economic infrastructures (roa power, irrigation, water and sanitation infrastructures (education and health) Therefore, almost 60% of the total economic and social infrastructures. I conflict it would be prudent to use la heavy machinery based) as much as on time taken to complete the wo rehabilitation and reconstruction of ec

ised by the LTTE, the proposed needs ut. This is an instance where the needs of appease the LTTE. This is very unhealthy isite for reconstruction of a region/country Needs Assessment for Recovery and red jointly by the ADB, UNDP & WB in dentified needs cannot be authentic given
the overarching need in the N&E, which assessment report. For capacity building e qua non. Even a year after the signing of inistrators, managerial/finance personnel, .E, primarily due to poor governance in olled areas. Capacity building cannot be digenously develop within the N&E by human capital is not possible without a hroughout the N&E, particularly in LTTEance is central to reconstruction efforts,
the document. eds is at best guess-estimates. It is simply ust two months. More time could not be ple expect tangible benefits on the ground nal cost estimation was more than double le understand that this is because the late to be slashed by half for reasons best antee that the donors will pledge whatever larantee that whatever is pledged at the paid. Most of the foreign aid pledged at a construction of Afghanistan in early 2002 ofreasons. Under these circumstances the testimation was a blunder. ds, railways, ports, telecommunications, ) are expected to consume 46% and social 12% of the total reconstruction cost (p4). reconstruction costs are apportioned for in a region emerging out of two decades of abour-based technologies (as opposed to possible (in so far as there is no trade-off rk and the quality of such work) for 'onomic and social infrastructures, so that

Page 37
maximum employment opportunities ( labour-based technologies have been reconstruction of Cambodia. Perhaps tl reconstruction could be considerably re labour-based technologies.
The second largest component ( total cost of needs is for housing, which on damage to and destruction of houses housing needs (Section 3D) should be t The assessment of needs in the a fishery and forestry) (Section 3F), the p is very disappointing to say the least. F industrial sector is submerged in the S Development part of the “livelihoods” si lacuna in the needs assessment docume1 been given greater prominence.
It is amusing to note that "livelihc sector (Section 3G) in the needs ass crosscutting theme and therefore can Furthermore, the section on protection a covered livelihood issues. This is a demo of this document. The employment anc 3G should have been covered as a sepa character, like capacity development (S It is a pity that the section on m immense importance, is not made availa experience of management and utilisati Now, in the present context of the recon of donor funds would acquire greaters flow of foreign aid to a region, whic transparent.
Muttukrishna Sarvananthan is a Research F Studies, Colombo, Sri Lanka. The views ex and not of the ICES. Corrections, comments Terrace, Colombo 08 or sarvi(d)slt.lk

29 :ould be created. For example, these quite successful in the post-conflict he cost of infrastructure rehabilitation duced if more emphasis is placed on
after economic infrastructures) of the is 18% (p4). There is a dearth of data in the N&E. Hence, data presented on reated cautiously.
griculture sector (including livestock, rimary economic activity in the N&E, 'urther, the assessment of needs in the Small and Medium Enterprise (SME) 2ction (Section 3G), which is a serious nt. Industrial development should have
pods' have been identified as a separate ;essment document. Livelihood is a not logically form a separate sector. nd resettlement (Section3A) has partly 1nstration of the donor-driven character il skills training component of Section rate section because of its overarching ection 3H).
anagement of donor funds, which is of ble for public scrutiny. The Sri Lankan on of foreign aid has been rather poor. struction of the N&E, the management ignificance because of the anticipated h is largely unaccountable and non
ellow at the International Centre for Ethnic ressed in this paper are those of the author and suggestions are welcome, to 02, Kynsey

Page 38
30
Who Wins the Neo-liber; Informationn Asymmetries :
Sri L
Darini Rajasin
Representing Development: Inf Knowledge Hierarchies
International measures, indexe: of nation-states, economies, or peop. authoritative descriptions, and const regress. Indeed a number of theorists (Escobar 1995, Nandy 1983, Gupta 1 'world development, peoples, nations to see themselves as more or less dev in need of development, or social cap orglobalization etc. They have also su actually de-develop societies, and hav conceal increasing economic inequali
In countries with skeptical p development and financial institution because of the presumption that they than government figures. In turn, th narratives of developmental progress local conditions. Sometimes, these col counter-reactions and ethno-nationali how a country may be measured, development,” my purpose is not to su do not exist. Rather it is to mark ho conflict, are constituted as objects of a intervention (read power/knowlec legitimated.
In the late nineties as the war political-economic processes and representation and interpretation of the that growth with war was possible. The is a corollary of the economic reductio "violence is economically rational' a fuels conflicts (Collier et al. 2001). 19

al Peace? The World Bank, and the Economics of Peace in anka-2
gham-Senanayake
ormation Asymmetries and Power/
s and observations of 'successor 'failure' le, have their own logic. They establish ruct truths about "national progress or of development and developmentalism 998) have noted, that in the trajectory of , regions, and the "third world' have come eloped underdeveloped, and more or less ital, or institutions, or better governance, ggested that development processes might e traced how development indicators may ties and social and regional polarization. ublics, information from international Is are sometimes given greater authority may be more independent and accurate ese authoritative indexes, measures, and or regress configure local perceptions of nstructions and their policy agendas elicit st backlashes. In noting this dynamic of 2valuated, and restructured for 'world ggest that poor people or armed conflicts w poverty qua poverty, or conflict qua und for analysis anddevelopmental-relief ige), and how such interventions are
escalated in Sri Lanka, local and global imperatives configured the dominant conflict-development nexus in Sri Lanka, notion that war with growth was possible inism that characterizes the argument that ind it is greed rather than grievance that

Page 39
and the IMF were increasingly critique violence in the Asian Tiger economies. had criticized IMF policies and suggested fuel and deepen the crisis and ensuing 1997, 1998; Wade: 2000). In this contex societies were needed. In "Missed Oppo country report in 2000 suggested that Sri economic liberalization and structural ac
Astory of operative fictions and m financial institutions and a government f economic policy is increasingly globall dysfunctional democracy, emerges in ti possible in Lanka. This entrapment in ti developed a self-sustaining momentum ( myth was shattered after the LTTE attac which impacted on sectors dependent o tourism, and shipping and the growth f digits overnight. This entrapment may with the government and the Bank promo The myth that growth with war was poss perception of the island as an “outlier” in 1 discourse. Sri Lanka had always follo independence in 1948, armed conflict agenda. The island's social indicators, v region despite very low per capita incom in the development discourse for decades multifaith, and multicultural land, Cey considered a "model democracy until conflict, growth in the south despite a d east further buttressed Sri Lanka's st development discourse, and enabled the opportunities”. The “outlier” perception development and deep regional divisio island.
Indeed, it is arguable that the re affected north-east and the rest of the challenges of peace building and devel human development in Sri Lanka may be lacuna. The engineering of information at the highest levels of policy and opin

31 d on the crisis and escalating social nternally, in the World Bank, Stiglitz that developmental macro-policy may violence in South East Asia (Stiglitz t, success stories even in conflict-torn tunities', the World Bank's Sri Lanka Lanka is a relative success in terms of justments. utual entrapment between international ghting a dirty war (given that national y configured), amidst an increasingly he myth that "growth with war” was urn sustained the war dynamic which Rajasingham-Senakayake 2001). The k on Katunayake airport in July 2001, in external markets, particularly trade, igures dipped from 5% into negative continue with the peace dynamic too ting an unsustainable neo-liberal peace. ible was also enabled by the history of the fifty-year-old 'world development' wed the path of the unexpected. At was not on the island's development which were the best in the South Asian e, placed it in the category of ‘outlier” Moreover, a multilingual, multiethnic, flon as it was called then, had been the mid-eighties. In the years of the ebilitating armed conflict in the north anding as an “outlier” in the world perception that it was land of "missed of Sri Lanka masked the island's dens that fuel the armed conflict in the
gional disparity between the conflictisland constituted one of the biggest opment, even as the central barrier to the information divide and information and the resulting ignorance generated on making on the national impacts of

Page 40
32 the war was one of the reasons that the giving rise to an anti-war peace mov
Conclusion: De-Development and Policy
Post/conflict reconstruction, a industry led by the Bretton Woods inst global-local hierarchies of knowledg and models of development. Recognit. that Sri Lanka was a "complex eme undo years of development achievem of the converse process: that the m development may also structure ( transformations and societal polariza linkages between development proces a number of social tensions (JVP anc overdetermine the north-south 'ethnic for mainstreaming conflict analysis il hardly acknowledged. There is a need the local war economy in the conflictz It is arguable that trans-historic Lanka and neo-liberal myths that gro economies of the global south have inequality that structured the two dec south of Sri Lanka. They also obscured society and political economy. But economic justice are inextricably lir unfulfilled promise without economic 3. After the initial de-politicizati would be necessary to move on and de; by linking civil and political issues o social justice issues or economic and must have a holistic approach and m devolution and power sharing among t issues such as poverty, inequality an economic adjustment and conflict. Ot might once again become a blue pris between armed groups, and politicia peace to shore up their vote banks. Rat

war escalated to dire proportions, without ment in the late nineties.
he Poverty of Theory in Post/Conflict
growth sector in the world development tutions is about information asymmetries, e and power and the marketing of myths on by the development policy community rgency” and that violent conflicts could ents, has not entailed acknowledgement acro-policies and practices of (uneven) und fuel domestic political-economic tion leading to violent conflicts. Possible ses that exacerbated social inequality and l LTTE youth uprisings), contributed to divide in the island, and hence the need nto development policy and planning are to link macro-policies of development to one, rather than treating them as separate. :al "ethnic' readings of the violence in Sri wth with war' is possible in the dependent obscured issues of economic and social :ade-long armed conflict in the north and how the war had transformed the island's issues of political representation and ked: self-determination will remain an and social rights. on that the peace process necessitated, it alseriously with political economic issues f demilitarisation and de-escalation with social rights. Post/conflict reconstruction )ve beyond a formalist legal approach to he armed actors and the State, and address d their relationship to macro-policies of herwise, the risk is that a peace agreement t for more war, or be merely a trade-off ns who peddle ethnic conflict or ethnic her, the need is for substantive democratic

Page 41
reform and transformation of political ( institutions (including the state's coerciv fuelled multiple conflicts and much of the The dominance of the World Ban industry and the manner in which a rang (including the recently stymied labour bill as the peace process takes centre stage otherwise. Structural adjustment usually m they get better-if ever. Things getting w conflict that is very hard to stop once start these interventions in the long term unemployment, spiralling cost of esse unravelling of the peace process by spoil Argentina, where riots and social unrest neo-liberal reform, sounds a warning to u
My purpose here is not to decry energy, education, public and social sectol structures are necessary. The point, hov may not be the most appropriate type of r the post/conflict and developmental emph the model and language of corporate gover and the expanding of corporate scandals) social, cultural and political processes. constitutions often reduce democracy to act and may result in a new cycle of war as spiralling costs of living and real and percei to upset the peace.
Finally, the question remains: wil effectively subsidize Structural Adjust country's adjustment to Global Capitalism, Canada, etc, for constitutional models the third world Latin American countries in that have a far closer profile, and learn fr that region not to mention Africa. What infe may suggest is that after almost two deca building a sustainable peace would entail at achieving substantive rather than ritu need for redistributive justice. Substantiv and social as well as civil and political as

33 2ulture and economic ideology and 2 apparatus) that have generated and
violence over twenty years. k in the post-conflict reconstruction ge of structural adjustments projects are being pushed through parliament 2 in national politics, may suggest eans that things must get worse before orse usually means another cycle of ed, as Darby has noted. The timing of may lead to increased levels of ntial services and living, and the ers who exploit popular disaffection. has occurred in the wake of massive s all. all reform. Certainly reforms in the is and administrative and governance wever, is that the neo-liberal agenda 2form. What seems to be forgotten in Lasis on 'good governance' (based on nance despite Arthur Anderson Enron ) is that institutions are embedded in The formalist focus institutions and tually existing free-market democracy peace spoilers use the grievance of ved increases ineconomicinequalities
l humanitarian and post/conflict aid mentt Programmes (SAPs) and the As the various MPs tour Switzerland, y may as well read Stiglitz and visit conflict and post/conflict situations om economic debate and debacles in brmed critical debate in those countries des of armed violence in Sri Lanka, political and economic reform aimed al or procedural democracy and the e democracy means here, economic pects of democratic practice.

Page 42
34
A striking example of the failu political reform is evident in how th being addressed as if the pattern of v peasant communities had no relations peasants of the various ethnic comm redistribution. Redistribution has bee in Guatemala and El Salvador and o1 failure to address the issue of land in recent land disputes from which Mug conflict settlement in Sri Lanka, if it is issues of poverty and property rathe international corporations. In short, t right of return of the (individual) (collective) allotment of territory th individual rights with notions of coll Finally it seems apropos to q winning economist's response, to a q Lahore-based Dawn:
Journalist: “Conditions impos Sometimes prevent recipient countric interests of their own people. How ca
Sen: "I think that is a correct worse than they are today. In the past World Bank proved quite counterpro. the poor. They often saw expenditure ( supplementation through cheapening expenditure that hinders a country's This is, of course, a mistake. But the l the Bank under the leadership of Ja Bank's practices may not be entirely course, there is need for the IMF to si Sen sounds optimistic that the have to wait and see and monitor wha streets of Colombo and in the post/c there are signs that some people are b when the cost of living was less burc liberal peace looms on the horizon. Ir conflict analysis of the post/conflict r between the macro-policies of “deve violence. Sri Lanka simply cannot af

reto connect issues of social justice with e property rights of displaced people are iolence and displacement in the agrarian hip to prior competition overland between unities, and issues of land settlement and h a fundamental aspect of peace processes her parts of the world. In Zimbabwe the the first instance arguably has fuelled the gabe has made political capital. The post/ to be sustainable, must take into account r than seeking to extend the interests of he peace process will have to balance the broperty of the displaced with the new at the war has affected, and notions of active or social property.
uote, Amartya Sen, another Nobel Prize uestion by a Pakistani journalist from the
ed by international financial institutions 2s, even democracies, from acting in the In this problem be solved?" diagnosis, though things used to be even , conditions imposed by the IMF and the ductive instead of serving the interests of pn such things as education and nutritional g of food as bureaucratic, governmental efforts towards economic development. understanding has improved in the case of mes Wolfensohn. However, some of the in accordance with his guidelines and of eize these issues more fully.” : Bank can learn from the past. We will it's being said on the peace process in the conflict zones of the north east. Already becoming nostalgic for the war economy, lensome than it is was today as the neothe meantime, it may be relevant to do a econstruction package by analyzing links lopment” including SAPs and cycles of ford another cycle of conflict between its

Page 43
diverse ethnic and religious communiti for centuries before the 'world developm institutions and the international militar
References
Collier, Paul "Greed and Grievance in Civil Wars.' http:/www.worldbank.org
Darby, John 2002 The Effects of Violence in Peace Proces for Peace.
Fine, Ben 2001 Social Capital Versus Social Theory. I
Mayer, M, Rajasingham-Senanayake, Than 2003 Building Local Capacities for Peace:
Silva, Tudor 2003 in Mayer et al. eds
Stiglitz, Joseph 2002 Globalization and Its Discontents Nev
Wade, Robert 2000 Showdown at the World Bank, New L.
Wood, Elizabeth 2000 Forging Democracy from Below: Ins Salvador. Cambridge University Press.
Notes
Michael Foucault's work on the dynamic represent an authorized social reality, and N. to structure local realities and subjectivities mechanisms by which certain orders of knc of being and thinking, while others are di experience, if not the teleology of “world d
Darini Rajasingham-Senanayake is an ant) Scientists' Association and ICES, and a Fu York University's International Center for A

35 es, which co-existed in relative peace ent' industry led by the Bretton Woods y industrial complex came along.
ses. Washington DC. United States Institute
ondon. Routledge.
garaja. Eds. New Delhi. Macmillan.
w York. Norton and Co.
eft Review
urgent Transitions in South Africa and El
s of discourse and power to construct and andy's work on how global discourses come have given us the tools to unveil some of the wledge are produced as permissible modes squalified, also in the historically singular evelopmento.
ropologist and Senior Fellow at the Social bright New Century scholar; 2003, at New dvanced Studies.

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36
Gujara
Jean
So much has been written ab further comments may seem pointless from a recent visit to Ahmedabad, it i quite different from the images I ret convinced that the public sentiment kind of violence that took place there
Before elaborating on this, I economic aspects of violence and pea conflicts' around the world suggest economic roots, ranging from strugg! the profits of the arms trade. It woul
massacres in Gujarat exclusively in t sight of the economic dimension of t)
Consider for instance Narodaof the violence that swept through Al worst violence occurred in Kumbharv predominantly Hindu area, which als activism. According to survivors, tł large house known as “Balochi Hous road. Four Muslim families used to li (a few rupees a month), presumably Patel, had tried for several years to p court (unsuccessfully) and offering to would leave. On 28 February, Balo construction started the same day. Fur Alauddin and his father, two former t
Interestingly, there are two ot According to one of the occupants, the had also approached the owner of these to demolish them. But the owner, w
man”, politely declined, saying that he are intact.
In Patia, the worst violence o close to 500 houses (including about were demolished on 28 February. Th being transformed into shopping c factories, and so on. Land prices ha

t Revisited n Drèze
out the recent massacres in Gujarat that - If I feel moved to share some impressions s because what I saw and heard there was cained from media reports. Briefly, I am in Gujarat today is quite opposed to the - from 28 February onwards.
would like to comment briefly on some ice in Gujarat. Recent research on 'ethnic s that these conflicts often have crucial Les for the control of primary resources to d probably be a mistake to see the recent hose terms, yet it is important not to lose nese sinister events. -Patia, widely considered as the epicentre amedabad on 28 February. In Naroda, the vas, a Muslim neighbourhood located in a o happens to be a hotbed of RSS and VHP Le first building to be demolished was a e”, situated on prime land near the main ve there. They were paying very low rents " due to rent-control laws. The owner, a ersuade them to move on, even going to » pay large sums to the occupants if they chi House was razed to the ground and ther, the first victims of the violence were enants of Balochi House. her Muslim houses just across the road. : same people who torched Balochi House e two houses (another Patel), and “offered”
ho was thought by them to be a “good : wanted none of this business. The houses
occurred in a working-class basti where 50 houses belonging to Hindu families) Le surrounding neighbourhood is rapidly omplexes, affluent residences, modern ve shot up year after year, and it is not

Page 45
difficult to guess that many a property de There are, in fact, hushed accusations til leader, played a key role in the massacre: Aside from Patia and Naroda, at occurred on 28 February is Gulbarg Socie compound, with about 50 flats owned b burnt and looted that day, and more th horrendous circumstances. The visit In inquiries, but one ominous detail struck buildings there were intact. They had bee in good shape. As it happens, this is exac wished things to be done. Here, unlike it valuable. They can be rented out as they In each of these three neighbourhc the Muslim families have decided to opportunity to sell their plots and move t to predict that the sites of these awful 'developed' by enterprising dealers.
In pointing out that some peop communal riots', I am not suggesting that minded the riots. Yet it stands to reason have played a part at various levels. Ther violence also helps us understand the mi place in areas like Patia, Naroda and C hard to understand how ordinary people c someone into pieces. But if the objective to the extent that everyone leaves, then difficult to imagine how trained goondas is indeed what seems to have happened i
It is worth adding that economic much as on the side of violence. Among Akshardham, one frequently cited factor very concerned to avoid "trouble' at the b by all accounts the earlier wave of riots business. In Surat, I am told, that the problem early on, and played an import violence after the Godhra incident.
Another economic aspect of the C the call for an "economic boycott' of M the boycott actually worked, or whether

37 :aler must have his eyes on that basti. lat a local dealer, who is also a BJP
hird place where large-scale violence ty in Chamanpura. This is an enclosed y Muslim families. All the flats were an 50 residents were burnt alive in hade there was too brief for detailed me. Unlike in Patia and Naroda, the n burnt inside, but the structures were tly how a property dealer would have n Patia and Naroda, the buildings are are, at a very profitable price. rods (Patia, Naroda and Chamanpura), leave. They are just waiting for an o a Muslim-dominated area. It is safe massacres will soon be bought and
le make large economic gains from tthese people have necessarily masterthat hidden economic motives must ole of economic motives in communal ndless cruelty of the attacks that took hamanpura. Personally, I find it very 'an be driven to slaughter babies or cut is to terrorise entire neighbourhoods cruelty has a function, and it is not can be mobilised for the purpose. This, n these neighbourhoods. motives can be on the side of peace as the reasons why calm prevailed after was that the business community was eginning of the Diwaliseason. Indeed, in Ahmedabad has been disastrous for business community anticipated this ant role in preventing an outbreak of
ujarat situation that interested me was uslims. I was curious to learn whether it was just rhetoric. I was very pleased

Page 46
38 to find that almost everyone dismissed caution is required in interpreting t naturally hesitate to admit that they app I spoke to generally said that the boyc phase of economic boycotting did hap of intermittent violence, but that it has including some who had clear VHP clarity that it is impossible to be a succ that way' (that is, discriminating b business', they said. It seems that the traders and businessmen to shoot ther
One important qualification is lost their jobs, and who saw this as ar had gone back to work after several n whether discrimination was indeed inv have met the same fate. In some cases discrimination, suggesting that the e edge. However, these cases were fev pressures from right-wing Hindu o spontaneous discrimination.
The fact that the economic boy out, at least in Ahmedabad, illustrates namely that the earlier anti-Muslim r for Ahmedabad on 26 September, I e inexplicable wave of barbarity. As it uplifting experience and even revived I spent three days cycling arou people as possible about the recent"ri people why the city had been so calm a with the waves of violence that follow people, whether Hindu or Muslim, wi time the government was keen to avo situation when the violence had the fi were blind to the complicity of the stal evidence on this was overwhelming.
There is no doubt that the Modi in the aftermath of the Akshardham in in averting a new wave of violence. really explain the remarkable calm th September. On 27 September, when I

the economic boycott as nonsense. Some hese responses, because people would rove of such a thing. But even the Muslims cott did not actually work. It seems that a pen earlier on, in the charged atmosphere largely faded away. Several businessmen, sympathies, explained to me with great essful businessmanifone starts “thinking etween different clients). "Business is VHP has over extended itself in asking mselves in the foot.
that I did meet Muslim workers who had act of discrimination. But most of them nonths in the camps, and it is hard to say olved or whethera Hindu employee would , there was fairly convincing evidence of conomic boycott is not without a sharp w, and they were generally attributed to utfits on the employers rather than to
cott (such as it was) has apparently fizzled what appears to be a more general pattern, age has considerably abated. When I left xpected to find a society engulfed in an t turned out, however, this visit was an | my faith in humanity.
nd Ahmedabad and talking with as many ots”. To broach the subject, I often asked fter the Akshardham massacre, in contrast ed the Godhra incident in February. Most ere quite clear on this: they said that this bid trouble, in contrast with the previous ull support of the authorities. Few people te in the earlier massacres, and indeed the
government was anxious to avoid trouble ncident, and that this played a major role Yet, state vigilance on its own does not at prevailed in Ahmedabad at the end of reached the city, there was little police or

Page 47
army presence in the streets, and nothingt or murder. What seemed to prevent such collective restraint.
This collective restraintappearedt "People here are tired of violence” is hov overwhelming majority of the people I r the earlier massacres. Typically, these n intrigues, or to "katarpanthis". Most peo quite capable of living in peace, and bl trouble. The public aversion to politici upper-caste Hindu, told me: "I wish those their guns on the politicians.” His feeling I also noticed many signs of cor between Hindus and Muslims, especial enduring mutual respect for religious pla the middle of a Muslim neighbourhood \ on 28 February, I found a tiny temple. The it in a few minutes, but the temple was ir it is the fear of retaliation that restrainst you listen to the neighbours and credit th dismiss this thought. They are not demo does not occur to them to do this kind of asked Jahara Bibi, one of the neighbours Some of the most moving testimol in Patia who had been victims of the vio placed to see the pointless and abhorren instance Mahesh Sharma, a young Brah His house was destroyed and the goonda he was not circumcised and making him 1 works with the Islamic Relief Commi residents, both Hindu and Muslim. Like ( is emphatic that Hindus and Muslims th violence on 28 February was the job of houses', he said, "and we can rebuild hearts, and that cannot be repaired.”
In short, I found no evidence Ahmedabad. Having said this, two qualifi to interpret people's responses on these n were directly implicated in the massacre that the violence was perpetrated by "k

39 o preventisolated incidents of looting incidents was a kind of spontaneous
) spring from a deep longing for peace. v many respondents put it. Indeed, an met had nothing positive to say about nassacres were attributed to political ple felt that Hindus and Muslims were amed political leaders for fomenting ans was striking. One respondent, an terrorists in Akshardham had trained is appeared to be widely shared. ntinuing tolerance and understanding tly among the working classes. The aces is one example. In Patia, right in where horrendous violence took place local residents could have demolished ntact. The thought occurs that perhaps he Muslim neighbours. Maybe. But if Lem with a shred of sincerity, you will blishing the temple simply because it thing. “Why should we demolish it?” ... “God is one.' nies I heard were from Hindu residents lence on 28 February. They were well t nature of this violence. Consider for min who nearly lost his life that day. is spared him only after checking that ecite some Hanuman chalisa. Nowhe ttee, rebuilding the houses of Patia other people in this neighbourhood, he ere used to live in peace, and that the “outsiders”. “They have broken our hem. But they have also broken our
of generalised communal hatred in cations are due. First, it is often difficult latters. To illustrate, even persons who s may have their own reasons to claim atarpanthis”. Yet, the coherence and

Page 48
40 consistency of the responses gives me se sentiment in Ahmedabad is quite oppos encounter disturbing communal attitud caste traders and businessmen. In the them greeted my inquiries with reticer atmosphere of collective guilt. I also fou a section of the youth, particularly th worldview of some of these youngster: ground for VHP propaganda. On the po to different views.
On 28 September, I joined a ral. wide coalition of communist, socialist a thousand people walked through the slogans calling for the dismissal of the months ago such a public display of op have been impossible. Here was a furtl intolerance in Gujarat had begun to sul
Another train of thought entere am sure that many of the people I had ta Does this mean that they were deceivin, Perhaps some did, but I believe that mos see it, is first and foremost a terrorist ory to most of its members. For them, the V their minds, need not be antithetical to role of the VHP in fomenting violenc another.
This idea may sound ridiculous. that many people support the VHP wi violence. But as I walked with the crowd, to me that many of the demonstrators This did not detract from their commi They had their own way of reconcilin the comrade who explained to me that elements in society”). And if well-inter what stops a peace-minded person fron
To avoid misunderstanding, le situation in Gujarat as extremely dangero and extremist Hindu organisations is happened earlier this year could happer

ome confidence in the fact that the public ed to communal violence. Second, I did es in some circles. One was that of highNaroda-Patia area, especially, many of ce if not hostility. There was a gloomy ad aggressive communal attitudes among e unemployed or underemployed. The s was a morass of confusion, and fertile sitive side, many of them were receptive
y against communalism organised by a and Gandhian organisations. More than e streets of Ahmedabad, shouting bold
Modi government. I am told that a few position to the Modi government would ner indication that the earlier climate of pside. d my mind during this demonstration. I alked to earlier were VHP sympathisers. g me in speaking the language of peace? t did not. The VHP, as we (its opponents) ganisation, but that is not how it appears HP stands for “Hindu ekta”, and this, in peace. They are either unaware of the e, or they rationalise it in one way or
. It is indeed difficult to accept the idea thout necessarily endorsing communal , thinking about these matters, it occurred
were communists who admire Stalin. tment to democracy and human rights. g themselves with Stalin's crimes (like : “Stalin had to deal with the capitalist ationed communists can admire Stalin, 1 supporting the VHP? t me clarify that I regard the present pus. The nexus between state institutions
frightening, and if it continues, what I again. Yet there is hope in the fact that

Page 49
human values are alive and well among ! at any rate, is the impression I retain froi
Jean Drèze is Honorary Professor of Economics. He has made wide-ranging ca
with special reference to India. He is al including the right to food campaign, til campaign for the people 's right to inforn

41
large sections of the population. That,
m this brief visit.
Economics at the Delhi School of ontributions to development economics, so active in India 's social movement, ne peace movement, and the national mattion.

Page 50
42
Tri
Pretending Peace, or the Obvious
First Person: Look at this piece, a forum free of this hysteria? Why do attacks and populist rhetoric? They their level. We're involved in a diff salvage the peace process here. It's e thing, but that's a luxury some of us c of the wash hardly different from the
Second Person: True. And very real For instance, if we don't ensure mainstreamed into the process at til complaining later. This is an opportu with those holier-than-thou types wh were not invited to the table.
Besides, the ordinary people of all el current process. Why, at those meetin the people were overwhelming in th
Third Person: Sure, in Puttalam toc particular process are two differentt
First Person: There is no other way no one is saying that the process is id it is clearly irresponsible to throws That's OK. No, no, I haven't fo Commissioner's cocktails at 6.00, an I'll meet you at the Wadiya at 8.00 t
Sorry, what was I saying... Ah, yes. that we have to walk here. Ours is a critical support of gain, god-knows!
Second Person: I don't think that yo these issues are black and white. I &

ikle Up Anika
Part of the Possible
nd in Circles, of all places! Is no public these "arguments’ degenerate into cheap rely on the fact that we never descend to cult, fragile, risky endeavour in trying to asy for them to be dismissive of the whole :an't afford. These spoilers are coming out a war-mongers they claim to abhor.
issues are at stake here, not personalities. that gender issues are foregrounded, he very beginning, then there's no point nity, however flawed, and I've no patience no are probably envious anyway that they
thnic groups are so much in favour of this ngs we had in Vavuniya and Polonnaruwa, eir support.
). But wanting peace, and buying into this hings, no?
you will get peace, but this one. You see,
eal. We agonize so much over our role, but tones from outside. Icellphone rings Hil orgotten, but I have the British High ld I can't get out of that. Let's make it late. hen, but bring the proposal with you.
Nobody seems to understand the tightrope
principled intervention, a provisional and
u should get defensive about this. None of am convinced that it is a mistake to even

Page 51
engage with this sort of attack. We have 1 will never be able to convince them anywa Have GL and Milinda confirmed? And the of course.
First Person: Sure, but it's impossible to I hope that there's no disruptive element recheck the invitees’ list. The funders a supportive, when we were under threat, a What about the human rights angle? You
Second Person: Nonsense! They don't go that name, it's so misleading, even immc label after so many years. See how exposé or imagined fear, that weakens and isolat are using their reports, and it is so one-s practical purpose in this peace process.
Third Person: One-sided, surely not?
First Person: Yes, one-sided in the senset and also they are virulently anti-LTTE. T.
Third Person: A little uncomfortable B are performing an important function?
First Person: Equally uncomfortable, b everyone has the luxury of working the w audience, engage with greater diversity.
Third Person: Changes subject, brightl was good, and yet, I hear, so difficult tog
Second Person: Shouldn't there have bee ground in order to underscore the fact til important because all is not currently wel
First Person: That would have been ir Besides, this is a statement of principle, I details that may become controversial. As

43 more important things to do, and you ly. What about Saturday's roundtable? other side as well? We need a balance,
get a firm commitment from anybody. , though. Which reminds me I must nd foreign missions have been very nd the least we can do is invite them. think UTHR should be represented?
anywhere. Besides, they should drop oral. They shouldn't hide behind this 2d we are. It's a mistake to live in real es them. All the Sinhala racist groups ided, so puritanical that it serves no
hat they only see violations, violence, hey are antagonizing everyone.
ut, surely, you acknowledge that they
ut for different reasons] Yes, but not ray they do. We have to forge a wider
y The human rights group statement get people to agree even on that.
in some reference to violations on the
hat Ian Martin's task is all the more 1?
mpossible, given the circumstances. don’t think it should be muddled with it is, no one can take official offence,

Page 52
44 though I'm sure it has upset both side because some of us have helped in tech is guaranteed.
Second Person: Sanctimonious hyp merely presenting alibis for Sinhala shedding crocodiletearson behalfoft when the war was raging and we were peace and accountability?
First Person: Exactly. And to play u play into the chauvinists' hands. It wo
Second Person: Quite. One needs to not easy at the best of times. If we an and the country cannot afford that att of them, but it serves no purpose.
First Person: Our role is to be watch it stays on track. This means that our ( major parties to the negotiation. Othe the process. But for the pressure we h in so short a time would never haven
Second Person: Exactly. The ordinar I think that the communities in the N response on human rights violations. south for too long.
Third Person: Hesitantly] But is thi about other similar concerns, or at o atrocities?
Second Person: There you go again! and disappear to New York or Londo alternative do you offer? A few close among marginal groups. What does til
Third Person: Not everyone can liv something that can be done from out

s considerably. You know how it is: just hnical areas, they think that our allegiance
ocrites, these spoilers. These people are (and Tamil) nationalism. Imagine who's he Tamil civilians now! Where were they in the trenches in Colombo, fighting for
p this as an issue right now would be to ould destroy the entire peace process.
be pragmatic. Dealing with the LTTE is tagonize them they'll just revert to type, his stage. How easy it is to be dismissive
dogs on the peace process, to ensure that lealings must necessarily be with the two :rs may choose to work in other areas of ave exerted many of the victories gained haterialized.
y people are so much better off now, and North and East must work out their own We have dictated their agenda from the
s consistent with what we've been saying ther times, or in relation to government
How easy it is for you to raise these issues on, or wherever it is you hang out. What d-door conferences and some sexy work hat have to do with the price of eggs?
2 in Sri Lanka right now. There has to be side as well. You're the one being purist

Page 53
now.Working at the policy and advocacy le a reconciliation process that learns from dismissed lightly. Also, there's the longer communities and non-hegemonic historie
Second Person: Of course. I was only k study and grassroots discussion that is ab people for the job is so difficult. The few pe are up to their necks in work. Even transla understand the issues are only a handful.
Third Person: Touché. That's what I can not as if they are saying anything new ol have used before, ones with which we gr that allows them to impose their tired old : on the back that they are the first to thin demand that's most galling. Why can't thi You and I disagree about many issues, ( discuss this rationally over a drink,
compromising what we believe. I gather kind of endemic discomfort or unease, an psych explanation for this! What gives anyway? Their approach is just as flawec
But to come back to the issue about bro What aboutbuilding capacity at the distri going which could fund this. Our mutual quite easily.
First Person: I agree, but all this killing extortion business is making our job diffic they just need to lie low for a while, butt
Second Person: You shouldn'tjump to col sources that they had nothing to do with the SLMM hasn't established a definite the act, it looks like. And, surely, the who parity of status if the negotiations are to

45 vels for constitutional reform, towards international experience cannot be -term work to be done with marginal
S.
idding. There's a lot of longer-term solutely necessary, but finding good :ople who are both able and committed tors are so scarce, and good ones who
tunderstandabout some of them. It's radical. The arguments are ones we apple even now. The sheer arrogance agenda on us, and then pat themselves k like this! It's the intensity that they ey live and let live, like the rest of us? ven on the conflict, but still we can even have a good time, without their modus operandi is to generate a d I'm sure there's more than one popthem the right to question everyone, l, and easier to maintain.
ad-basing awareness on core issues. ct level? I'm sure we can get a project friends in these areas can manage this
of political opponents and taxation/ ult. The LTTE is its own worst enemy, hat's precisely what they refuse to do.
nclusions. I've heard from very reliable some of the killings in the East. Even onnection. Everyone is getting in on le point is that there must be complete work.

Page 54
46
First Person: Parity and balance ar. understanding of the fact that the LTT and we can't appear to be condoni conscription has reduced. Peace has : more than anyone else that there’s ni
Second Person: Parity and the issue How can we expect the LTTE who he military?
First Person: But what of the argum
simply pious and not practical at th excruciatingly slow process. We have immediate challenge is to bring the Ll it takes. The ceasefire has held thus fa is so complex; let's take this a month
Fourth Person: Sure. Given the dire few more months at the current attı problem about this sole representativ matters is that a new sole representat south. Yet, there's no real incompatibi outcomes: It's a question of degreer
Notes
Widely known as PPOPP by the co
POPPoorest of the Poor) and PAP others.

a must. Besides, there needs to be some E is in transition. It'll take a few mistakes, ng these, but see, the reporting of child ts own momentum, and the LTTE realizes ) going back now.
of avoiding loss of face that comes with it. ve come so far to play second fiddle to the
ent that the peace process should be more TTE and the Government? Isn't that also is stage? Everyone knows that this is an to be patient, we have to be practical. The TE back to the negotiating table, whatever c; as GL said no one has died. The situation
at a time.
:ction of the LTTE'S transition thus far, a ition rate, and there won't be any more e business, either. What might complicate ive may emerge as the government in the lity in principle. Similar methods, different eally, and attention to detail.
gnoscenti, and clearly distinguished from Politics as the Art of the Possible), among

Page 55
Interview with I
lines co-editor, Vasuki Nesiah wo activist-intellectuals Lionel Bopage, ba (Kethesh) Loganathan, based in Colomt secretary of the JVP and former member Galle. Associated with the JVP since 196 a member of the Executive Committee, 1 in Canberra, Australia. Kethesh Loganat for Policy Alternatives (CPA) and Head During the 1983-94 period, he was a men negotiation processes spanning the Thim
Moonesinghe Parliamentary Select Comr . in the Tamil national movement as a mer in either the N-E Provincial Councils el parliamentary elections of 1989 and 199 The views expressed by him are in his p
Kathesh and Lionel both found th that fundamentally transformed the poli the South, and the other from the Nort represented voices of integrity and plu resisted the expedient, and promoted inter a fundamental commitment to struggle ag these political organizations. Holding on these Q and A with an interest in explor that were not taken - a lens into the pa future.
Interview with Lionel Bopage (Excerp
Q1. Could you reflect back on the o mood of the sixties and seventies – perh: social sectors that the militant moven within the Sinhala community that fec
I would like to begin my reflections com socio-economic and political events d ramifications for the future generations o

47
Lionel Bopage
orked on the following Q and A with used in Canberra, and Ketheshwaran Do. Lionel Bopage is former general of the District Development Council, 8, he resigned in 1984. He is currently Friends for Peace in Sri Lanka, based han is currently Director of the Centre of its Conflict & Peace Analysis Unit. mber of the EPRLF and partook in the pu Peace Talks of 1985 to the Mangala mittee of 1992. During his involvement mber of the EPRLF he did not contest lections of 1988 or in the subsequent -4. He resigned from EPRLF in 1995. ersonal capacity.
eir home in youth militant movements tical culture of Sri Lanka – one from 1. Within the EPRLF and JVP, they ralism that questioned party dogma, nal democracy - but they also represent gainst the social injustices that birthed to both these elements, we approached cing the alternative paths (lost paths?) st that may shed some light onto the
ts)
rigins of the JVP and speak to the aps if you could focus on the different nent drew upon, the social tensions I this militancy and so on?
mencing from the 1950s because the luring that period have had serious of Sri Lanka.

Page 56
48
Left movement and nationalism
The left movement, led by th Sama Samaja Party (LSSP), was quit overtaken by the Buddhist nationalist v in the south of the country. The le dialectical relationship between ther Tamils and the economic basis of th nationalism's threats to unity of Lan the momentum of the progressive an The left movement was unable to exp urban working class or to mobilize th maSS movement.
Mahajana Eksath Peramuna
The Mahajana Eksath Peramu power in 1956, by galvanizing only colonialism had subjugated. So mu switched to the SLFP by 1956. The ga a significant blow to the hitherto stri ideological affiliations), with far-reac
The MEP government carried pledged during the 1956 election car Languages Act (Sinhala-Only Act) o Sinhala students to study in their mc did not have a vision or planto utilizet only educated youth.
This wave also negatively affe the Tamil-speaking people'. Tamily the Tamil nationalist movements, and the trade unions affiliated with the Cl
Economic situation
The free education system an campuses and Sinhala education produ from rural areas and full of future exp of the faculties of science, agricu employment opportunities. In 1968 th youth looking for jobs.

e Communist Party (CP) and the Lanka e influential in early 1950s but was being ave that was rapidly gathering momentum ft parties did not clearly understand the lationalist currents of both Sinhalese and e country. Also, being preoccupied with kan social fabric, they could not harness ti-colonial trends of Sinhala nationalism. and their organizational base beyond the e working people to form a revolutionary
una (MEP) was able to capture political the Sinhalese, out of all the social forces ch so that, the bulk of the CP cadres had lvanized Sinhala-Buddhist wave delivered ong left (though divided on international hing consequences.
out a campaign of 'nationalizations' as mpaign. It also implemented the Official f 1956, and gave more opportunities to ther tongue. However, the government he skills of the new generation of 'Sinhala
:cted the relationship between the left and outh gradually shifted their allegiances to the plantation workers moved away from P and the LSSP.
d the numerical expansion of university ced waves of Sinhala university graduates ectations. All of them, including students lture and medicine, faced diminished ere were more than 500,000 unemployed

Page 57
There was manual work available plantations, mining, and other fields. How to work as farm hands or workers, which situation. Here the emphasis is deliberate Tamill-speaking youth faced a similar se discrimination.
Movement
The disadvantaged and the und opportunities to participate in economic became increasingly frustrated and aliena natural and ideal opportunity for the "mov a later stage) to expand its political base.
University students, particularly students becoming aware of their preca employment prospects, rural youth and thi and discriminated because of their back allegiance, etc.), all provided the JVP vi contrast to the rather privileged social leadership, JVP leadership and members poor.
The JVP became the harbinger o was Marxist in essence. Rather than beli of their helplessness as Buddhism taught commitment, dedication and effort they about social changes for the better.
The movement supported the suci at the general elections held in 1970. The imperialist policy platform including ther enterprises, which was very popular in m Within weeks of coming to power the lea NM Perera, commenced backtracking on made. Asthe government discrediteditse The public campaign of the JVP worked the traditional left who had believed in th The JVP was gradually expanding its ba among workers, peasants and plantation had become the strongest left force in Sr

49 in rural areas in agriculture, fishing, 'ever, many graduates were not willing further aggravated the unemployment ly limited to Sinhala-speaking youth. it of problems accentuated by ethnic
erprivileged of the society had no and political decision-making. They ted from the system. This provided a rement' (which was named the JVP at
those from the rural south, school rious future with no expectations of 2 urban poor who were being repressed ground of birth (caste, class, political tal growth hormones. As a result, in status of most ot the traditional left hip came from the marginalized rural
f the message of social progress and eving that their "Karma' is the source , they came to believe that with their
would be able to initiate and bring
2essful campaign of the United Front United Front fought on a strong antiationalization of colonial big business any developing countries at that time. ders of the United Front, in particular, the radical election pledges that were lf, the JVP rapidly grew in popularity. very well among the rank and file of election pledges of the United Front. se not only among the youth but also workers. By the end of 1970, the JVP
Lanka.

Page 58
50 Q2(a). How would you characterize different phases?
The 1971 insurrection was the against the State since the rebellions would characterize the JVP as a semilandless peasants, the unemployed an society. The main aim of the JVP was and equitable resource and income di different phases of the progress of the
Formation of the “movement'
Nine individuals led by Roha May 1965. By the time Rohana alias CP (Peking wing) he had laid a strongf The movement had established two Anuradhapura to finance itself. The arm itself to confront the potential th that could have been established by government. The movement was ab armed forces. In 1969 it started holdi five lectures.
At the end of 1969 the "group of the movement, met. The Mao Yc was expelled from the movement in
The first public event of the JVP July 1970 and the news organ of circulation in August 1970. Since Balaya island-wide, Rathu Lank Kekulu' for children. Their first August 1970.
Pre-1971
In September 1970, in an act
arm itself with whatever weapons propaganda campaign the JVP launche

the historical record of the JVP and its
first major insurrection of Sinhalayouth
of 1818 and 1848 against the British. I proletarian movement of the rural youth, dother oppressed sections of Sri Lankan achieving social justice for the oppressed stribution. I will now briefly outline the 2 JVP.
na Wijeweera, formed the movement in Loku Mahaththya was expelled from the oundation for building the new movement. agricultural farms in Hambantota and movement was of the view that it should reat of a neo-colonial dictatorial regime the pro-US elements of the then UNP le to establish some contacts within the ng educational camps based in the famous
twenty one', the first central committee uth Front led by GID Dharmasekera, 970.
was held at Vidyodaya University in the JVP, Janatha Vimukthi came into then the JVP started publishing Rathu a for the working class, and "Rathu public rally was held in Hyde Park in
of self-defence, the JVP again decided to they could get hold of. The massive -din late 1970s, which comprised of island

Page 59
wide poster campaigns, selling 50,000 cop large public gatherings and political lec expansion did not happen in areas where predominant. The leadership of the JVP to rural Sinhala-Buddhist families. Then areas were in the offing, but the JVP ( propaganda work in either Tamil or Engl class forces leading the socialist revolut activists hesitant to join the JVP ranks.
By early 1971, the governments: fact, after the assassination of a police o the US Embassy on 6 March 1971 by M the UF government. The government p powers of arbitrary arrest. By the end of in custody. In March, the governmer emergency regulations empowering the se without post-mortem examinations or in The pre-1971 period of the JVP w Many groups had moved away from the group led by Dharmasekera was promir together due to government repression att the two factions was so vast that each precautionary steps to protect their own
1971 Insurrection
It is still debatable whether the 19 plan to capture state power or not. It was political existence. In fact, the two factio two different lines of action. One factio) offensive was the best defense, which ha JVP. The other faction was concentratin out of detention using all available mean
In hindsight, I believe that our opposi to search and destroy JVP members co that could have led to mass agitations a repression. The JVP's original decis generated a vicious spiral of violence

51 lies of the central party organ Vimukthi, tures, led to its rapid expansion, The Tamils, Muslims and Christians were consisted mainly of individuals born ationalist militant movements in Tamil lid not have the capability to do its ish. The the JVP interpretation of the ion would also have made the Tamil
aw the JVP as an imminent threat. In fficer during a demonstration outside ao Youth, the JVP was proscribed by rovided the security forces with full March, thousands of JVP cadres were ut implemented the third part of the 'curity forces to dispose of dead bodies forming relatives. 'as also full of factionalism and splits. JVP due to political differences. The lent in this regard. Despite working he end of March, the mistrust between h faction was taking life-and-death action.
71 April insurrection was a short-term an action planto defend our rights for ns within the JVP apparently adopted 1 proposed that going into immediate d been the ideological position of the g more on getting Rohana Wijeweera
S.
ion to the inhuman state activities luld have taken otherforms, forms nd protests against the government ion to arm itself, in self-defence,

Page 60
52
During the insurrection, the UF laws and arrested all those who did cadres sacrificed their lives in combat a were arrested and destroyed by secur burnt alive, buried alive, and some w some of those who surrendered, follo
Mrs Bandaranaike, were killed. Des hundred of bodies of young men and w river near Colombo, where they were were found to have been shot in the b.
1971-1983
The pre-1971 period of the . tendencies, was replaced, after 1972, w of 1971 to 1972 was a period of refleo the JVP. Prison life enabled different p into a new thinking of the JVP. Drop expansionism, revision of the politi revolution' with less emphasis on milit sectarian political influences, developi a policy declaration, study of the natio political agenda, emphasis on organi were some changes that worth mentio
The second wave of public re after November 1977 when all politica Justice Commissions (CJC) Act were repealing the Act. The JVP gradu parliamentary forms of struggle.
Between 1971 and 1983 the J nations to self-determination accepting continuously rejected agitating for the of discrimination and repression agains remained deadly silent. At the beginnin what the JVP was advocating and wha have been advocating on the national
The JVP also rejected to establi organizations. In 1983, even without having ties with the Tamil militancy!

government introduced repressive labour not report to work. Hundreds of JVP and non-combat situations, and thousands sity personnel. After capture, some were ere cut to pieces using chainsaws. Even
wing the call of the then Prime Minister pite subsequent denials, in later weeks, omen were seen floating down the Kelani e collected and burnt by soldiers. Many
ack 8
TVPdominated by ultra-left adventurist
ith a more balanced approach. The period etion on the past policies and practices of olitical thoughts and currents to be forged ping the entire political lecture on Indian cal lecture on the path of the Lankan cary aspects, complete moving away from
ment of policy frameworks in the form of -nal question and bringing it to the fore in zation of the urban and rural proletariat -ning. building of the JVP began in 1976, and al prisoners sentenced under the Criminal released with the then UNP government ally moved towards limiting itself to
VP recognized, in principle, the right of g tthis as based on Leninism. However, it rights of non-Sinhala people. In the face t the Tamil people, the Central Committee g of 1983 there was no difference between at an orthodox parliamentary party would
question. sh dialogue with any of the Tamil militant such a dialogue, the JVP was accused of I feel that the JVP could expect to rally

Page 61
the Tamil people around the banner of revo
with the problems of the Tamil people sir and other peoples and agitated forcefully Initially, in 1977, there was general agre alliances on specific issues and working left parties. However, by 1983 this tend
1984-1990
In July 1983, by concocting a cons the JVP and drove it underground. While organizations and breakaway left partie proscription of the JVP. In 1985, the J organization and to use the national prot
Instead of relying on people pov hopes on their armed strength. The viciou leader of the Colombo University indep assassinated at the end of 1986. The sec vigilante groups such as Green Tigers, Ukussa (Eagle) had commenced assass civilians disappeared after arrest. In resp military wing “Deshpremi Janatha Vy concentrated attacks on selected securit earnest appeared to have begun in 1987, v and kill civilians who did not abide by it
Meanwhile, the government-spo Tamils had exacerbated the Tamil milit had become a full-scale civil war. In mi over the north east. to prevent a full-sca the Sri Lankan State. 1986 saw the i Vyaparaya’ led by the JVP, denoting a m
The signing of the Indo-Sri Lank JVP and chauvinist forces to make rura government and to arouse anti-Indian se had been redrafted to reflect the new t Indian expansionism was revived givin proposed a national liberation governm front. The new JVP slogans were antiJayawardena of betraying the motherla nationalist sentiments to liberate the m being agents of “Indian imperialism”. Se Indian sarees, and consuming Bombay or

53 »lution if and only if the party identified nultaneously with those of the Sinhala lemanding solutions to their problems. sement to take united action, forming on a united action program with other ency had become minimal.
piracy, the UNP government proscribed the old left kept silent, several civilian s and groups demanded lifting of the VP decided to build an underground olem to its advantage. ver, in late 1985 they had based their s cycle had just begun. Daya Pathirana, endent student union movement, was urity forces, its paramilitary units, and PRAA, Black Cats, Yellow Cats and sinating JVPers. Many JVPers and ponse, the JVP, in 1987, established its waparaya’ (DJV) which carried out y targets. The JVP terror campaign in vith the DJV decision to declare curfew Es orders. onsored July ‘83 pogrom against the cancy in the north-east, which by then d-1987 India planes dropped supplies ale invasion of the Jaffna Peninsula by Formation of ‘Mavubima Surekeeme ajor shift towards anti-Indian rhetoric. a Accord in July 1987 was used by the il Sinhala youth indignant against the ntiments. Apparently, the five lectures hinking of the JVP°. The lecture on g it a new lease of life. The JVP had ent under a national liberation united Accord and anti-Indian. Accusing JR nd, the JVP had started appealing to otherland and accused everybody else lling and buying Indian goods, wearing nions, Masoorlo dhal, etc. was banned.

Page 62
54
The JVP had started assassin SLFPers and the supporters of ti Kumaranatunga was killed in early 1 torture chambers islandwide with th brass of the security forces. Thous tortured, maimed, and killed. In the Accord, and the IPKF guns were aim National Army (TNA) to fight agains by the LTTE became advantageous south were under the dual power of government. Rate of killings by both s at the time the highest in the globe.
In December 1988 at the pres people to express their will by voting the repressive regime, the JVP used their votes. The JVP election strateg. the repressive regime. Having come i emergency, freed detainees, and asked It was too late. The state repression, would have prevented the JVP leader drew immense popular support in rui giving emphasis to driving the Indian curfews, transport strikes, lack of of children's education, started affecting the rich. People were forced to take :
Subjected to unmentionabl information on the whereabouts of th custody in November 1989 and assass military victory by killing about 80,0
I feel that the JVP should have 1984 and 1987. The JVP violence pi of its massive terror campaign. In a w 1971 politics. Nevertheless, there w that they used Indian expansionism a They fell into a similar trap of relying differences are that in 1971 the JV implement the election pledges of the reforms that benefited working peopl for the government not to implement : to the national problem, which the U.

Lating not only the UNPers, but also the he United Socialist Alliance. Vijaya 988. Government politicians maintained Le assistance and involvement of the top ands had been taken to these chambers,
meanwhile, the LTTE withdrew from the med at the LTTE. India formed the Tamil t the LTTE. Massacre of Sinhala civilians to the JVP. By late 1988, people in the the UNP government and the JVP minisides had reached a daily figure of hundred,
idential elections, instead of appealing to at the provincial council elections against violence to prevent people from casting y overlapped with the election strategy of to power President R Premadasa lifted the 1 the JVP to engage in mainstream politics.
police death threats and fear psychology s from coming to the open. The JVP, who cal areas, shifted its slogans in July 1989, is out. However, JVP activities, such as pportunities to get health care, food and ; the ordinary working people rather than strike action under death threats. .e torture, captured JVPers provided e JVP leadership. Rohana was taken into inated the same evening. The UNP gained 00 people".
negotiated with the government between ovided the government with justification ray this may be interpreted a return to preere major differences. Similarities were s the ideological front to fight the regime. g on arms rather than on the people. The 'P was demanding the UF government UF government and to carry out economic e. However, in 1988-89 the demand was a proposed bourgeois democratic solution
NP had pledged in its 1977 election.

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Modern JVP
Having embraced adventurism commenced since 1990s oscillating back now made a major shift towards class colla of the PA, thus taking a comparable route The JVP agitates claiming that Sri Lan national independence and sovereignty ar separatism and stop division of the coun oppose negotiations with the LTTE un separation and disarm, which is political Worst is their statement that there was a With regard to the national question ti chauvinist groups. Condemnation of tei condemning the terror campaigns conduo campaigns conducted by the security for there are favourable conditions worldwide implies is that Sri Lankan government sh eradicate the LTTE.
The JVP has moved away from acknowledging it. Instead of demanding working people, at least for the express p the capitalist regimes to do so, the JVP te acquires power to bring them heaven. It appraisal of its past and is competing responsibility of the capitalist regimes fo the process covers up the real current sta
(b). How was the political landscape of shaped by youth militancy of the JVP
Some have argued that the 1971 security apparatus of the capitalist state. been expanded both quantitatively and qu thousands in the forces, with technically In addition, since 1971 until recent times used emergency regulations to curtail populations.
The failed insurrection made t introduce minor reforms such as land refo

55
- at the end of 1980s the JVP has
to traversing a right wing route. It has aboration with the bourgeois leadership e traversed by the old left in the 1960s. ka's territorial integrity, unitary state, re in grave danger. They want to defeat try militarily and ideologically. They less the LTTE drop the demand for ly equivalent to a complete surrender. nd is no ethnic problem in Sri Lanka! ney have joined hands with Sinhala cror by the JVP is one-sided. While ted by the LTTE, they praise the terror ces as patriotic. They emphasize that e to eradicate terrorism. This indirectly ould invite a US-led terror coalition to
Marxism-Leninism without publicly s the capitalist state grant rights of the
urpose of exposing the incapability of ells people to wait until their ‘saviour'
does not wish to make a self-critical g with the old left to cover up the or the current political situation and in te of affairs.
f contemporary Sri Lankan politics
insurrection helped to reinforce the I agree. The security apparatus has alitatively. Now one can find hundred superior land, sea and air equipment. s, the governments have continuously
dissent among Sinhala and Tamil
he United Front (UF) government m, nationalization of several business

Page 64
56
ventures, and implementing some eco Committees were established but they the UF government! These half-bak realization of the aspirations of the Si I should mention here that the 1971 ins had negligible influence on the radical as a whole did not play any part in the
I would say the so-called low-c a certain extent, by the militancy of th oppression in the south did encourag oppressed Tamils in the north willingl
In hindsight, one could raise th exorbitant human and economic cost direct answer to this question, rather how one looks at it. When people rise on a cost-benefit analysis!
Q3. Could you highlight the issues : divisions within the JVP regarding a registers of internal debate?
Key debates within the JVP car after the 1971 insurrection. These deb the 1971 insurrection, modes of arm
Marxist ideology. The prisons had b where the majority of political prison constructive nature. However, the JVI Jaffna, had apparently maintained a carrying out constant threats and physi
Politics and militarization
The debate on politics and milit through to its conclusion. The Leninis
meet state repression and the position has many strands. Working-class lea formula. Military strength only compl and necessary. Emphasis and relian rather than on the strength of arms. Th available for defending its political ri

onomic self-reliance measures. People's people constituted only the supporters of sed measures did not at all represent a ahala youth who rose up in April 1971. urrection and the post-1971 JVP activities ization of Tamil youth. The Tamil people e insurrection.
aste people in the south were inspired, to Le JVP. In other words, the existing caste se the oppressed to join the JVP, as the
y joined the LTTE. Le question: Was it worth paying such an E to achieve social changes? I have no than to say that the answer depends on up for their rights they do not do so based
around which there were key debates/ alternative paths? What were the key
ne to a peak while we were behind bars, ates were on issues such as the failure of ned struggle, Indian expansionism, and een converted into ‘university colleges' ners were engaged in debates mainly of P activists imprisoned at Hammond Hill, virtual prison within the state prison by ical attacks on their political adversaries.
carization of the JVP had not been carried a position of relying on people's power to
of relying on arms and military strength adership is the important factor in this ements its struggle when it is appropriate ce should have been on people's power se JVP could have explored other options ghts. For example, leading of everyday

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struggles of the working people while ex aligned traditional left, united action of gr of protecting democratic rights, and pe awareness could have been useful tactics
Party and class
History is not an automatic mecl socialism at the end of capitalism. The vacuum, but in an environment of spot constant counter-revolutionary threats, resources, internal divisions, and agent !
within. These factors severely affected t. an increasingly hostile environment. degenerated into making a series of sub for the working people, the central com party, and the leader substituting for the f had neither discussed nor understood th party and the class properly. Before an been acting as the perceived ‘working o
working class, the very same process that 1 party of Lenin into the bureaucracy of St
National problem
At the Magazine Prison, Rohana drafting a policy declaration. We agreed
meantime, I was taken to Bogambara pi opportunity to talk to Tamil youth lo Regulations, for raising black flags agai Colvin R de Silva. Santhathiar and ot! already exchanged views on matters rela problems in the south. This discussion lai work on the national problem, the results by my extensive political experience in th Prison, Rohana and I discussed and agre policy frameworks addressing the probl drafting an article fell with me and this ar policy framework on the national proble in the policy declaration and in a booklet the JVP as a ‘Niyamuwa' Publication12.

57
posing the treachery of the bourgeois pups interested on a minimum program eaceful protest campaigns for raising
nanical process that inevitably brings
party and the class do not exist in a ntaneous activity of working people, massive psychological warfare, lack of provocateurs and destabilizers planted he JVP and it became more isolated in
In these circumstances, the party stitutions, the party substituting itself
mittee (CC) substituting itself for the politbureau (PB) and the CC. The JVP e dialectical relationship between the d during the insurrection the JVP had dass’, putting itself in the place of the ed to the degeneration of the Bolshevik
calin.
and I had discussed the necessity of 1 to do this as a joint exercise. In the rison for two weeks, where I had the ong detained under the Emergency inst the 1972 Constitution drafted by ners who were among the youth had uting to the JVP, the CJC trial, and the Ld the foundation of my future research of which had been confirmed in reality e north and east. Back at the Magazine -ed for the further need to incorporate ems of the Tamil people. The task of ticle later became the basis of the JVP m. This framework was incorporated on the national problem, published by

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58 Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA)
A major debate in the post-19 introduced by the UNP government PTA that it would be used against Ta
When I raised this issue at the united action against the PTA, it was my suggestion came from Rohana a the issue of PTA did not move far.
Rural population versus urban poj
In Sri Lanka, the other debate proletariat in Sri Lanka? The left in could get in terms of the Marxist def the plantation working class. In the plantation workers remained extrem with left trade unions. After their dis more interest in organizing them.
On the other hand, the urban sense of the word. Other than their jo of them enjoy capitalist property rela have their own non-urban properties them lend money and earn profits. F city. They have strong kinship links in alienation of urban workers is not living and their activities can easily fifties the influence of nationalism !
militant left trade unions. Having go1 they seem to fight only for economi exemptions to the norm of these gen
Q4. Looking back with the benei turning points that may have cha politics today?
The earliest turning point I expulsion) of the group led by G ID The split was on the question of the mi Rohana took the position that any

977 JVP was on how to react to the PTA in 1981. The UNP attempted to sell the
mils only, not against the Sinhalese. PB and proposed the need for initiating sad to see that the strongest opposition to nd the effort to build united action around
pulation
e centred around the question, who are the the 1950s concluded that the closest we inition of the proletariat in Sri Lanka was 1970s, the political consciousness of the ely low in spite of their long association enfranchisement, the left did not show any
workers are not proletarians in the strict obs, they have many things to lose. Many
tions both in rural and urban areas. Some s that generate profits for them. Some of Por work, many travel from villages to the
rural Sri Lanka. In this sense, the capitalist complete, but they sell their labour for a acquire an organized nature. Also in the nad permeated through the ranks of once ne through a long process of degeneration, c demands. There had been and there are eralizations, of course!
fit of hindsight, what were the critical rted a different course for militant left
can recall was the break-away (or the Dharmasekera from Rohana's movement. litary strategy of the Sri Lankan revolution. - future attack should be simultaneous,

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dispersed, and short term. Dharmasekera e on concentrated and long-term offensives and awakening people with gunshots as pi side had made many allegations against tl alleged that Rohana's movement was i Rohana's movement clearly pointed out t term offensives had not been advocated. possibility of successful use of moderr armoured vehicles to surround and destro bases for carrying out a sustained long-1 support bases cited included the Soviet U Union, and China in the case of Vietnam.
Publicity campaign, personality cult ai
The decision to launch massive f turning point that led to the disastrous siti After our release from prison in Noveml Rohana’s proposal to carry out gigantic propaganda strategy rather than policy. public rallies wave after wave. I expresse on the ground that such a campaign, lack with the JVP organizational work, would digest. The campaign led to the next logi of a few JVP leaders. Vas Tilekaratne h Mahinda Pathirana at the CC. The JVP Municipal Council elections. I raised my be associated with this decision. Again, For the first time photographs of several le campaigns. Raising the ugly head of pers personal allegiance were clearly visible in and sympathizers of the party treated the a differently.
Q5. How would you analyse the failui and economic justice to conjoin their s
In a more general sense, the nation were interdependent but did not take pla was a marked lag between the phases of th

59
espoused a “base camp” theory, relying
as practised in the Chinese revolution cactised in the Cuban revolution. Each he other. For example, Dharmasekera advocating an overnight revolution. he reasons why base camps and long
The factors considered included the a technology such as air power and y base camps, and lack of rear support term struggle. The examples of rear Union in the case of China, the Soviet
ad divisions
publicity campaigns, I believe, was a uation of the party in 1982 and 1983. per 1977, the PB of the JVP adopted publicity campaigns that dealt with
He was thinking of launching mass ed my reservations on this proposition ing a concrete dialectical relationship I compel it to "eat more than it could cal step of raising the personal profile ad put this proposition at the PB and then decided to contest the Colombo concerns about the dangers that could
I agreed with the majority decision. -aders started appearing on JVP poster =onality cult within the JVP and blind its future political activity. Members ctivists with different responsibilities
-e of those fighting for ethnic justice cruggles?
alist waves of the south and the north ce in a synchronized manner. There e two waves. Although the possibility

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60 of using one nationalist wave to coun use of such possibilities ultimately en This has been amply demonstrated 1 Lanka that occurred in the pre-1
Chelvanayagam Pact period, around and around the Indo-Sri Lankan Ac post 1995 period under the foreign p use sections of the Sinhala diaspo Tamil militancy by sections of the building almost total barriers between origins and even among people of t political views on the conflict.
Justice and war
The left in the south has not ta due to their own culpability, their į Some left groups are so weak that th The JVP with Sinhala chauvinism on opportunistic position, which may permanently divided into two or the The JVP's argument that Tamil mi which is not justifiable by any Mar reality. In a military sense, if the mi
wholehearted support and warmest bi the weakest forces like stone-throw the minimum, to propose Sri Lanka
without ruining its entire economy. political rights violations carried out but it must be seen as an unfortunate b
Q6. Today, with the bitterness an appears to be as deep as that I government - what are the prospe suggest that the left has been too ideological divides, too intolerant
I wish to commence by looking at situation of the country.

iter the other nationalist wave did exist, the Hed up in reinforcing both nationalist waves. py the events relating to the conflict in Sri
956 period, around the Bandaranaikea the Dudley-Chelvanayagam Pact period cord period. One noticeable feature of the olicy of the former PA government, was to ra to counter the support extended to the
Tamil diaspora. This process resulted in a communities of diverse Sri Lankan ethnic the same ethnic origin but having diverse
aken this situation to their advantage either political opportunism, or their incapacity. ney cannot take advantage of the situation. their side has taken an extremely dangerous y end up with either the country being
country being driven into economic ruin. ilitancy needs to be eliminated militarily, rxist standard, is very hard to achieve in ghtiest arms producers like Israel, with the Lessings of the United States cannot prevent ing Palestinian kids, it is hilarious, to say could militarily eliminate Tamil militancy,
I am not justifying here the human and by the Tamil militants including the LTTE y-product of the festering national problem.
d distrust within the Sinhalese left which between Tamils and the Sri Lankan cts for addressing these issues? Does it
ready to fracture about hair-splitting of internal differences?
the current socio-economic and political

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Socio-economics
Despite economic liberalization provided by free trade zones, a swelling se and increasing integration with the proces remains a backward, underdeveloped or ( between the rich and the poor has widene difficult to survive with what they are bein is on the rise. Deep penetration of final ranging economic, political and social li the spread of decadent bourgeois culture corruption. The burden of a future war
will be squarely placed again on the sho remnants such as family bandyism, la religious and caste oppression continues development.
The record of capitalist governmei inability to find solutions to the problen not even been able to fulfil the remaining organized working class will be able to the neo-liberalist agenda.
Urgent task
The urgent task of the left today is progressive views into a coherent strateg change. The left forces need to adopt a
with more tolerance towards new social critical assimilation. The Sri Lankan adversely affected by the neo-liberal ag before profits’. Given the mistrust that e would be impossible, in practice, to b umbrella. The left in the south needs to es formations and individuals in the north collaboration with forces opposing neo
may initially take the form of a loose : taking confidence-building measures am an alliance could provide the basis for b
movement based on a broad political immediately affecting the working peop

61
and privatization, industrial structure ervice sector, modern farming practices ss of capitalist globalization, Sri Lanka developing capitalist country. The gap ed. Working people are finding it very g paid for their labour. Unemployment nce capital in Sri Lanka and its widenks have provided a fertile ground for e dominated by cronyism, bribery and launched against the Tamil militancy ulders of the working people. Feudal and bondage relationships, national, - to inhibit even the liberal capitalistic
nts of Sri Lanka has demonstrated their as of the working people. They have s bourgeois democratic tasks. Only the counter the worsening crisis driven by
- to initiate a process to include diverse y and a minimum programme of social less dogmatic, less sectarian approach
thinking and developments and their left needs to unite all those who are genda under one banner, i.e., 'people xists between diverse left formations it ring all those formations under one stablish political links with progressive
and east and to develop international -liberalist globalization agenda. This alliance that may be strengthened by ong the elements of the alliance. Such uilding an extensive islandwide mass agenda that would focus on issues

Page 70
62 Q7. If we were today trying to r emancipation in the JVP to inspire for the future, which are the mover
would highlight?
This is a complex and hard qu Lanka in recent years, it is difficult there, in particular, of diverse parties
However, I know that there are like me without knowing where to scattered all around Sri Lanka and el from their past experiences both wit! who, having formed diverse politica succeeded in moving forward. In fact themselves by their own approaches have moved a long way.
I have a strong belief. A belie crisis point in their suicidal path, ho when they come to know the reality had engaged in, would join hands wi as the young generation of the 1960 from their mission and formed a bou
My only wish is that that day
Notes
'The MEP was a grand coalition of the Party (RLSSP) of Philip Gunewardena, the Vimukthi Peramuna) of the KMP Rajar. Pakshaya (LPP) of Dr W Dahanayake. 2 In effect converting colonial and capitalis with no real power transfer to the workin 3SWRD Bandaranaike did a complete ba Sinhala would be made the official langua power. 4 Initial anti-colonial actions took place a 5 The JVP was known as "movement” at 6 The five classes were: Capitalist econom Left movement, and Path of the Lankan 1 "This Group had established close links the movement.

eflect back on traditions of dissent and e a more democratic and inclusive path nents – or who are the individuals — you
estion. Having paid only short visits to Sri for me to grasp ground political realities
and formations. thousands and thousands who are stranded start, where to go and whom to believe, sewhere. They have learnt ample lessons nin and without the JVP. There are many al groups and formations, have not at all -, they have disintegrated and marginalized 5. The JVP with its deviations seems to
ef, that one day, when the JVP hits its next nest and committed people in their ranks,
of the deceptive politics their leadership th others in forming a better organization, Ds did, when the traditional left departed rgeois coalition.
will be not so far away!
SLFP, the Revolutionary Lanka Sama Samaja 2 Jathika Vimukthi Peramuna (not the Janatha atna family, and the Lanka Prajathanthravadi
st monopolies into state capitalist bureaucracies
g people in the enterprises. ckflip on his previous policy, by declaring that ige of the country within 24 hours of coming to
imong the Tamil youth in the north.
its early stage. nic crisis, Indian expansionism, Independence, revolution.
with the UF government, when expelled from

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* The 1971 Ceylonese Insurrection by Fred E 9 The new lectures were Indian Invasion, In Socialism. 10 Though imported mainly from Turkey, th was imported from Mysore, India. 11 Refer to Amnesty International reports on 12 Bopage, L (1977), “A Marxist Analysi Publications, JVP, Colombo (will be soon av

63 Halliday dependence, Economic Crisis, Patriotism,
e mistaken general assumption was that it
this carnage. s of the National Question,” Niyamuwa railable on the web).

Page 72
64
Interview with Ketheshv
Q: Could you reflect back on the o speak on the mood of the 1970s?
Although Tamil nationalist p electoral agenda in Sri Lanka fro discrimination in the spheres of langua the professional or the middle class, 1
was characterized by extreme youth in the sphere of education, most inapi "standardization”. This coupled with national level led to the youth, in part themselves in the Tamil nationalist sti violence, anti-Tamil riots and the rec the elders, at home as well as teachers politicization of Tamil school studen Pathmanabha, Pirabhakaran, Varat dropped out of school or used the scho of the Tamil Student Federation and were manifestations of the role being school students.
While there were instances of assassination of Tamil politicians bel Tamil policemen, there were also mov class-based struggles involving landle fisherfolks. The EPRLF through its Union of Eelam Students, and other f of social mobilization based on class.
The above combination of th was also seen as a threat by the tradi TULF and ACTC) and landed and pro the TULF, for instance, was engaged electoral mobilization, it also felt ins strong ideological overtones. There w to be collaborating with the State to o same time engaging in high-voltage i

Faran (Kethesh)Loganathan
rigins of Tamil militant movement and
olitics was already on the political and om the time of independence, due to ge and employment which largely affected he Tamil militant movement in the 1970s alienation stemming from discrimination propriately labeled by the Government as a increasing youth unemployment at the icular school students, to actively engage uggle. Undoubtedly the increase in State anting of memories of discrimination by at schools, would have contributed to the ts. Key personalities like Sivakumaran, narajaperumal, Sritharan (Sugu) either ol as a medium of struggle. The formation later the General Union Eelam Students played by the Tamil youths, in particular
: direct action involving bank heists and onging to the UNP or the SLFP as well as res to link the militant youth movement to ss agricultural workers, poor peasants and student wing for instance, the General rontal organizations, was in the forefront
e ideological and direct militant actions ional parliamentary political parties (i.e. opertied interests in Tamil society. While in ethno-populist rhetoric as a means of ecure in the face of youth militancy with ere instances where the TULF were seen ontain the militant tendency, while at the ationalist rhetoric and propaganda.

Page 73
Q: How would you characterize the hi movement? How was the political la shaped by the nature of Tamil militan
As I had mentioned in my respons of the Tamil militant movement, stemmin typically fired by idealism based on egali to Tamil nationalist sentiments, youth mili of Marxist-Leninist ideology, which wa
well as the increasing influence of libera the national liberation struggles in Afric strong anti-imperialist and an egalitarias movement. The virtual one-to-one re particularly in the Jaffna peninsula, als into the Tamil militant movement.
However, the militant youth mo ideological content soon became subor Resistance in the face of increasing State re after the firing and baton charging at tl Jaffna in 1974, the anti-Tamil riots of implementation of the Prevention of Teri of the Jaffna Library in 1981, and of c pogrom of July 1983. The militarizati emerging as a rear base to the Tami
parliamentary party, the TULF, giving wa evident at the Thimpu Peace Talks of legitimacy by the militant organizations
However, the killing of the TEL TELO cadres by the LTTE in the streets and the attack on the EPRLF in December fratricidal conflicts which were to cons youths who lost their lives fighting one fact, more Tamil youths were killed in fra in combat with the security forces. This earlier the LTTE joined the united front, (ENLF) comprising the EPRLF, EROS: 1984. This was also despite the fact ti EPRLF, EROS and TELO) and the PLC common negotiating position at the Thi 1985. The collectively called themselves

65
storical record of the Tamil militant endscape of contemporary politics
cy?
se to the previous question, the origins ng from extreme youth alienation, was tarianism and selflessness. In addition tancy was also fuelled by the influence
prevalent even before the 1970s, as tion theology from Latin America and a and Indo-China. Hence there was a a content in the Tamil youth militant lationship between caste and class, o inevitably brought the caste factor
vement with a strong egalitarian and Hinated to the compulsions of Tamil epression. This was particularly evident he International Tamil Conference in 1977, the passage and the ferocious rorism Act of 1979, the burning down ourse the State-sponsored anti-Tamil on of the ethnic conflict, with India | Resistance, led to the traditional iy to the “boys”. This was particularly 1985. Thus began the struggle for
O leader, Sri Sabaratnam, and 200 of i and the fields of Jaffna in mid-1986 1986 signaled the beginning of bloody ume the lives of hundreds of Tamil another than in fighting the State. In itricidal conflicts during 1986-87 than was despite the fact that only an year the Eelam National Liberation Front and TELO which had been formed in hat all four organizations (i.e. LTTE, ITE and TULF together formulated a mpu Peace Talks of July and August the “Tamil Delegation” while making

Page 74
66 joint written submissions at the tal submission of the 'Thimpu Principle
In addition to the fratricidal o intellectuals and politicians (e.g. Thiranagama, and Neelan Tiruchelva way of thinking and doing created a v politics, as well narrowed the scope f
But, it would be incorrect to sa The internal killings that took plac assassination of TULF politicians Dh TELO in mid-1985, the forced conscri and its allies in the post Indo-Lanka A the LTTE, the hegemonic politics ad the early 1990s, the rampage of the E 1990s under the patronage of Presid silence its critics even while functionin to the rot that began to set into Tamil transformation into mainstream dem
Successive governments and contributed to the rot through the o accountable to no one, but to their ‘ha State to use the ex-Tamil militant org campaign against the LTTE, instead o evolving a package based on substan discredited the non-LTTE Tamil orga "para-militaries”.
In short, all of the above (i.e. t) the self-seeking collaborationist polit contributed to the rot that afflicts con
Q: What were the internal debat paths? What were the roads not ta hindsight, what were the critical tiu different course for politics in the 1
One area of difference was on organization. The LTTE consciously “observers” who would contribute re. “saviours” sought it. The more left-or EPRLF held the notions of “People's

ks. This included the formulation and Es’. =onflicts, the subsequent killing of Tamil Amirthalingam, Pathmanabha, Rajani em) who did not subscribe to the LTTE's acuum in the political landscape of Tamil or involvement by the intelligentsia. ay that the LTTE was the sole perpetrator. e within PLOTE during the 1980s, the Larmalingam, Alalasundram and others by iption of adults and children by the EPRLF accord and the killing of sympathizers of - thuggery of PLOTE in Vavuniya during PDP as a “para-military" during the early ent Premadasa and the use of violence to g as a parliamentary party—all contributed
militancy and created distortions in their pcratic parties. their military-intelligence apparatus also Freation of ‘para-militaries’ which were andlers’. The tendency by the Sri Lankan ganizations as instruments in the military fempowering them as political parties by tial autonomy for the North-East, further nizations. They came to be stigmatized as
he hegemonic campaign of the LTTE and sics of the other ex-militant organizations temporary Tamil politics.
ces and tensions regarding alternative ken? Looking back with the benefit of arning points that may have charted a Camil community today?
1 the relations between the people and the
relegated the people to the state of mute sources and manpower as and when their riented organizations like the PLOTE and
War” and “mass-based” armed struggle.

Page 75
Both were in a way extreme positions whi as in the case of the LTTE, or “revoluti EPRLF and PLOTE. Ultimately, myopic - and the people the losers.
Another debate within the Tam ultimate goal. While organizations like L to the creation of a separate State of T nationalist fervour, organizations like EP to building links with the left, secular ar
were open to “alternative” paths. How south and the hegemony of Sinhala cha
mirror image – namely, Tamil chauvinism the Tamil national movement never s organizations like the EPRLF, which wa a separate State by linking with “revolu themselves were weak and fragmente nationalist position. But, even here th nationalists and ended up falling betwee
On the other hand, the “respectat parties like the TULF and the ACTC, wh the Tamil militants, found themselves thr to their tails. The present “Tiger by the T find themselves in, is a case in point.
Q: Could you highlight the issues ar divisions? For instance, class, ca organizational structure and relati politics?
My response here again refers formative stages of the Tamil militant org today.
Organizations like the LTTE “heritage”, structured themselves as pri was subordinate to the military. The EPR wing which was under the direct contro this eventually led to tensions between conflict. This could also explain as to v
militarily superior to the EPRLF. On tl ahead of the other organizations when i

67
ch either led to militarism and nihilism, onary romanticism”, as in the case of organizational interests was the winner
il militant movement was regards the ITE and TELO were firmly committed Pamil Eelam and were fired by Tamil RLF and PLOTE were more amenable id progressive forces in the south, and ever, the failure of left politics in the Luvinism only served to strengthen its 1. In this context, the left agenda within stood a chance. In due course, even is committed to seeking alternatives to itionary” forces in the south, which in d, were compelled to adopt a Tamil ey were no match to the “authentic" :n two stools. ole” and seasoned Tamil parliamentary sich were seeking to ride on the back of own off their backs and clinging instead ail” situation that the TULF and ACTC
ound which there were key debates/ ste, ggender, up-country Tamils, onship between militarizationand
to the late 1970s and 1980s (i.e. the canizations) and may not be of relevance
and TELO, which have a common
marily military organizations. Politics LF, on the other hand, created a military el of the political leadership. However, Chese two with the militarization of the why the LTTE and TELO proved to be he other hand, the EPRLF was clearly E came to mass mobilization. However,

Page 76
68 following the militarization of the co Tamil pogrom, political and mass me gun and armed propaganda..
Another area of difference rel: viewed the plantation Tamils as a peoj and oppressed on the basis of their et right of the plantation Tamils to figh own traditional homeland' (i.e. the up fodder to the Tamil nationalist moven buffer against Sinhala colonization as were engaged in. However, it must b Tamil riots that affected the plantation to an inevitable exodus of the plantat night converted from the status of a pl: peasantry and landless agricultural wo the LTTE to later recruit them into th
Q: If we were today trying to ref emancipation in Tamil politics to in path for the future which are the n you would highlight?
The individual I would hi revolutionary humanist who gave em the Soil. The moment I would highl Pirabhakaran to join the united fronti deinocratic Tamil alliance. But, this a by the LTTE is the cruel destiny that h of bloodletting within the Tamil com
Q. Today bitterness and distrust bety groups appears to be as deep as the State. Does it suggest that Tamil po the principal reference point for div
Yes and no. The bitterness is also manifest in my answer to the earl say that the bitterness and distrust that the Tamil national movement is due Ethnicity would cease to be factor only

nflict in the aftermath of July 1983 anti-bilization came to be subordinated to the
ated to territory. The EPRLF for instance ble who were exploited as a working class hnicity. Its programme was based on the E for their rights while remaining in their D-country) - and not to be used as cannon nent or to be settled in the North-East as a some Tamil NGOs with a political agenda e mentioned that the ferocity of the anti1 areas in 1977, 1979, 1981 and 1983 led ion Tamils to the Vanni. They were overantation proletariat to that of a pauperized orkers. It is this situation that also enabled
eir fighting forces.
lect back on traditions of dissent and aspire a more democratic and inclusive noments — or who are the individuals –
ghlight is Pathmanabha, who was a phasis to love of the People as opposed to ight is when Pathmanabha prevailed on (i.e. ENLF) in forging an inclusive and a lliance was not to last. His assassination Las befallen an entire people -- the destiny
munity.
veen Tamils with affiliations to different it between Tamils and the Sri Lankan litics focused too much on ethnicity as ersity that was relevant for minorities?
evident and palpable - and I suppose is ier question But, it would be incorrect to
has arisen and the decay that has set into ; to an excessive reliance on ethnicity. 7 when the Ethnic Question is resolved in

Page 77
manner that is equitable and just. That is on the importance of the resolution of the that I believe in a stage-by-stage theo conflict is seen by some as the pre-requ healing process within the Tamil commu sides of the same struggle and constitute to take up.
Just as much as how peace is indivisible
Ketheshwaran (Kethesh) Loganathan is cu Alternatives (CPA) and Head of its Conflict d period 1983-94, a member of the EPRLF . spanning the Thimpu Peace Talks of 1985 to Select Committee of 1992. During his involve member of the EPRLF he did not contest in ei of 1988 or in the subsequent parliamentary from EPRLF in 1995. The views expressed b

69
more so the reason that I would stress e Ethnic Question. This does not mean ry where the resolution of the ethnic uisite for the democratization and the nity. On the contrary, these are the two the real challenge that all of us have
- so is democracy and social justice.
rrently Director of the Centre for Policy & Peace Analysis Unit. He was, during the and partook in the negotiation processes the Mangala Moonesinghe Parliamentary ement in the Tamil national movement as a ther the N-E Provincial Councils elections
elections of 1989 and 1994. He resigned py him are in his personal capacity.

Page 78
70
Categories, Identity and I
(bhikkus) and P
Paper presented at a Panel on Difference” at a Conference on Challenges of Peace, Cornell Ur
Let me begin by saying how ł explore questions relating to what the the ‘Dynamics of Violence' and the ‘C the dangers and challenges that we challenges that confront us as we pursu in an environment that is fluid and cons by reinforcing what many others have in the context of peace negotiations in the enhanced concern for global se September 11, 2001, we also need to ! in mind. Firstly, these problems of vi today are, in some senses, perennial i have correctly emphasized, the analys but emerge from, and are embedded ir heritages. Finally, the solutions or pai ephemeral because the social structure are based are themselves changing as relation to politics . . . no settleme permanent; so the legal framework in finds embodiment will be subject to rec
Let me begin with the concept as a theoretical construct, it soon be assumption of the existence of categorie Buddhist, Sinhala Christian, Muslim, I concepts of identity are fluid, multiple contentious debates in the 1980s as t was “Buddhist” and whether the monl Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) were good clear that we begin not with a single n group of Sinhala Buddhists or one unit in very different positions in the social a

Difference: Buddhist Monks eace in Sri Lanka
"Social Cleavage, Hierarchy and Sri Lanka: Dynamics of Violence, niversity, February 7-8, 2003
Chandra R. de Silva
happy and honored I am to be with you to conference organizers have aptly named hallenges of Peace’. These words reflect face in the world today; dangers and e a quest for stability, peace and serenity stantly mutating. Therefore, while I begin said - how important these questions are Sri Lanka and against the background of curity in the wake of the incidents of keep three fairly obvious considerations olence and peace that we are discussing problems. Secondly, as post-modernists es we offer are not only context specific 1, our own respective social and cultural liatives we offer must be recognized as s, identities and cleavages on which they
we speak. As John Gray pointed out in ent is final, and only the provisional is
which any particular political settlement urrent revision, and eventual breakdown. E of difference. If you analyze this concept ecomes evident that it is based on the es that are defined as self-evident: Sinhala Hindu Tamil and so on. But we know that e and contested. For instance, there were
whether the Jayawardane government Ks who supported the opposition Janatha a monks or “criminals."? It is therefore honolithic group of Sinhalas or even one E of Buddhist monks, but multiple groups and political hierarchy engaged in spirited

Page 79
contestations and sometimes slightly shifi advantage.3
This does not mean that we are d many of us use categories on a routine bas and social leaders have shown us that su can be effective mechanisms as individua - sometimes called ‘strategic essentia hierarchy. What I wish to emphasize is m
we use.
In the rest of my presentation hierarchy, organization and education: perceptions about others, create and trans constraints of time, I will confine my ai order of Buddhist monks (bhikkus). Ho applied to a greater or lesser degree to al
In much of the recent literature some of my own writings, there have beer of many Buddhist monks in relation to emphasis in this paper is different. I star promote rational discourse we need to loc or at least what promotes them to articu true, examining how people get their idea or modify them is not merely an acader peace process itself.
I will begin with the concept o: that is often cited as one that most contemporary Sinhalas) support, and it is v settlement with Tamil leaders. I will arg and history of the sangha that inclines t that the equation of unity and a unitary s phenomenon. I also argue that there is make distinctions between a single state Lanka.
Ideally, each Buddhist monk is a Buddhist texts consistently urge individu deserving equal treatment,6 not as parts o the other hand, there is also the concept organization. There are canonical injunct bhikkus." This religious tradition is reini Sinhala Buddhist chronicle, the Mahavan

71 sing positions to gain political or moral
ebarred from using categories. Indeed, sis in the academic world, and political ach categories--ethnic and religious - al leaders or groups use such concepts alisms’—to make their way up the Lerely the malleability of the categories
I will try to examine how heritage, al background, as well as changing sform ideologies of difference. Due to nalyses to one group-the sangha or
wever, much of what I argue can be 1 kinds of ethnic and social groups. on contemporary Sri Lanka, including a some critical remarks on the attitudes
the civil conflict in Sri Lanka. The t with the assumption that in order to ok at why people think the way they do late the views they express. If this is s and ideals and what factors reinforce nic exercise but a crucial part of the
f a unitary Sri Lanka. This is a policy Buddhist monks (and indeed, most viewed as a major obstacle to a political ue that there is much in the tradition hem to value unity (eksathkama) but state (ekeeya rajaya) is a more recent
some leeway to affect opinion if we in Sri Lanka and a unitary state in Sri
truth-seeker on an individual journey. nals to deal with others as individuals of religious or social collectivities. On
of the sangha as a single indivisible cions against causing a schism among Forced by perceptions of history. The asa extols Buddhist rulers who unified

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72
the sangha and enforced the decisions for unity (eksathkama) have great res monk as an individual sojourner on a creates suspicion regarding policies t and discord, both among the sangha ar discord is heightened by a perception th the sangha and the people of Lanka wa in colonial times. When we connect Buddhists that one of the roles of the Buddhist heritages we can see why plans for political devolution.
This caution (and fear) sprin also from lived experience. Whatever i see themselves as very loosely organ number of Buddhist monks in Sri La and organizationally they are divided in Amarapura and Ramanna. Overall, th or about half of the Buddhist monks goyigama caste to which the majority has two major units (Malwatta and As one or other of the major units. There the Siyam Nikaya and, on the whole, Malwatta and Asgiriya is rarely challe
The second major order, th monks. Founded in the first decade open the sangha to more individuals grew swiftly, but later split into many d and other disputes. The push for uni because in the 1940s the Amarapura branches, each with its own mahanay succeeded in 1969, and today the Amar It might be worth remembering that th Ven. Madihe Pannasiha, was a leading
The smallest of the three maj to have between 6,000 and 8,000 mor nikayas, the Ramanna Nikaya is structu and is organized into regional units. I but has expanded into other regions in caste affiliations, many of its prominent caste.

of ecclesiastical tribunals. Thus, appeals onance. Notwithstanding the ideal of the a quest for liberation, the ideal of unity hat are perceived as producing division ad in the political system. The aversion to
at ‘disunity' or the disconnection between s something that was deliberately fostered this to the acceptance by most Sinhala Buddhist monk is to defend the Sinhala nany Buddhist monks are cautious about
gs not only from history and tradition but the perceptions of outsiders, monks often nized, weak and prone to disunity. The nka is relatively small, around 37,000,9 to three major orders or nikayas:10 Siyam, ve Siyam Nikaya has over 18,000 monks in Sri Lanka and has close ties with the
of Sinhalas belong. The Siyam Nikaya giriya) and five others that are aligned to e are no major doctrinal divisions within
the leadership of the maha nayakas of enged.11 (xi)
e Amarapura Nikaya has about 12,000 of the nineteenth century as an effort to
outside the goyigama caste, the nikaya ivisions due to geography, caste identity12 ty was perhaps strongest in this nikaya a Nikaya comprised over thirty separate -aka. An effort to unite these subgroups -apura Nikaya has a unified leadership.13 Le present head of the Amarapura Nikaya g figure in the movement for unity. or nikayas is the Ramanna. It is estimated nks. 14 [xiv] However, unlike the other two urally unitary, with a single maha nayaka, t is particularly strong in the southwest, the last century. While it has no specific Elay supporters are drawn from the karava

Page 81
While many of the distinctior muted in the second half of the twentieth live for periods in temples belonging to o like education - discomfort about possib extensive support among bhikkus for sta
major concerns within the sangha is an politics. Thus, the 1993 Constitution o forbids the use of official titles in the orga activity.16
All of the above would throws sangha opposed President Kumaratunga': of Tamil Elam (LTTE) in the 1990s andr devolution of power.17 Up to early 2002 there should not be any talks with the L organization) and that the solution to th terrorism. By mid 2002, however, the W have succeeded in persuading the maha LTTE were on the basis of a single count have remained united in support of the unity of Lanka has been separated from this question later on.
Let me now turn to a different c and recent experience have provided a b
might also argue that change comes s! organization encourages the primacy of emphasis on seniority. It is true that there decentralization within the nikayas. Ten nikaya, but rather by the chief incumben incumbents of temples choose a close 1 pupillary succession ensures that a templ extended family.
Nevertheless, seniority and re. advancement in the nikaya hierarchies. most democratic of the nikayas. It allow in an area to have a vote in the Prades However, the President and Vice-Preside with at least ten years of experience Traditionally, all other office bearers also half of the central Ruling Council (Palak up of ex-officio members. 19 Thus, wh:

73 as between the nikayas have become century—for instance monks routinely rders other than their own for purposes le dangers of disunity remain. There is te support of religion, 15 but one of the effort to avoid division through party f the Amarapura Nikaya specifically nization when participating in political
ome light on why the leadership of the s negotiation with the Liberation Tigers efused to support her proposals for the 2, the maha nayakas had argued that TTE (which they viewed as a terrorist e civil conflict was the eradication of ickremesinghe government seemed to
nayakas that its negotiations with the try and thenceforth, the maha nayakes
peace process.18 The concept of the that of a unitary state. I will return to
onsideration. It is not just that tradition asis for fear by Buddhist monks. One lowly in the sangha because bhikku
more conservative elements through e are some elements of democracy and nple properties are owned not by the ts of temples. In many cases, the chief relative as their ‘senior’ pupil so that e remains within the control of a single
spect among peers is a key factor in The Ramanna Nikaya is arguably the s a monk with three months residence heeya Sangha Sabha (Area Council). nt have to be maha Staviras or monks after their upasampada ordination. - come from such senior ranks. Almost a Sangha Sabha) of the nikaya is made ile all office bearers, including the

Page 82
74 mahanayakas, face elections before into the prevailing structure.
As Tessa Bartholomeus developments in the 1990s led to an e to work across nikayas. Up to 1990
monks through individual contacts a formation of the Supreme Advisory C to advise the President of Sri Lanka monks in this Council were to be app mahanayakas (of the Asgiriya and of the Amarapura and Ramanna Nik many times between 1990 and 1997, sangha more experience in working to nikaya lines. Thus, when the leaders due to a disagreement with Preside continue to meet periodically and is significance. It is thus more likely divisions in the rank and file of the . one voice on issues that seem impor
It might appear that these secure leadership within the Buddh case. Social changes in Sri Lanka in to increasing dissident voices within doctrinal. For example, there have be and the acceptance of Mahayana do social divisions. There are significa university training and some exposu had a more traditional education. So are very poor, and for a long time criticism, which was partly respons monks in the JVP insurgency of the I extra-nikaya organizations. Some of often quite important for short perio
A good example of the swit emergence of the Jathika Sangha Sal objectives in creating this organizatio organization of bhikkus who would i while remaining independent of all to political parties are specifically e bearers and active leaders of the JS

appointment, monks are usually socialized
z and I have explained elsewhere, 20 nhanced ability of the leaders of the sangha politicians could seek support from chief nd acts of patronage. In that year came the ouncil (Uttarithara Anusasaka Mandalaya) - on all matters related to Buddhism.21 All
ointed on the recommendations of the four Talwatta chapters of the Siyam Nikaya and ayas). The Supreme Advisory Council met and these meetings gave the leaders of the pgether on issues of common interest across s of the sangha resigned en masse in 1997 ent Kumaratunga, they were still able to sue joint declarations on issues of national today than twenty years ago that despite sangha, the mahanayakas will speak with tant to them.
developments have given rise to a more List sangha but this is not necessarily the
the last few generations have contributed the bhikku order. Some of the divisions are cen disputes about the ordination of women ctrines and practices. More important, are at rifts between monks who have received ere to left-wing ideas and others who have
me temples are richly endowed and others there has been an undercurrent of social sible for the involvement of many young 1980s. There has also been the rapid rise of them have an ephemeral existence but are
ds.
t emergence of such an organization is the Shava (JSS) in 1996.22 [xxii) One of the major n of monks was the desire to have a national pecome a factor in national policy-making political parties. In fact, monks belonging excluded from the JSS. The list of office SS included some of the most influential

Page 83
monks in the country.23 [xxii) The JSS h: constitutional proposals of the Kumara involved itself in other issues, such as exploitation of the mineral deposits at Er
Six years later, when the Wic) support of the mahanayakas for negotiatic Elam (LTTE), and some members of the policy, there arose the Jathika Sangha Se Conference of Monks.25 The JSSam org: rituals and processions to galvanize opp LTTE and the establishment of an interii rule the northeast. 26
Thus, despite their new connect leadership and their very identity as ‘tru challenged. I will present one example to and early May 2002, there was intense d proscription on the LTTE should be lifte Memorandum of Understanding between LTTE should be supported by the sangha in June 2002, the mahanayakas issued a st; the peace process because the Wickremas all negotiations were conditional on a sin
It is the sequel to the process th the reversal of the mahanayakes' decision Chancellor of the University of Buddhist heart of the mahanayaka of Malwatta t given to the Temple of the Tooth and the subsequent interview, Ven. Nanda, co Sammelanaya, pointed out that even a lay (let alone a chief monk) was prohibited fr indicated his revulsion at the practice of bought with public money, a practice th government. 30 In essence, this was a cha traditional leaders of the sangha.
In a publication that I co-authored ago, we argued that ‘we are what we kno our identity.31 It is well known that the po by a variety of influences, including the r the information we receive is often proces frameworks that are developed early in life

75
as not only campaigned against the tunga government, 24 but it has also
opposition to the privatization and -pawela. kremasinghe government gained the ons with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil e JSS expressed tacit support for the ammelanaya (JSSam) or the National anized a number of public meetings, Position to the de-proscription of the n council dominated by the LTTE to
cions, the legitimacy of the traditional e Buddhist leaders’ is open to being illustrate this last point. In late April lebate in Sri Lanka as to whether the ed and indeed, whether the February a the Sri Lanka Government and the E. After initially opposing the move,27 atement from Tokyo, Japan supporting singhe government assured them that gle state of Sri Lanka.28 hat is enlightening. In his criticism of , Ven. Akuretiye Nanda, former Viceand Pali Studies, linked the change of ɔ a gift of fifty-three million rupees Siyam Nikaya about this time.29 In a »-President of the Jathika Sangha Buddhist observing the eight precepts om accepting gold and silver. He also "mahanayakas accepting luxury cars at had prevailed under the previous llenge to the Buddhist identity of the
with Tessa Bartholomeusz two years v'; that knowledge defines and forms litical culture of a group is fashioned media, but we also know that much of sed and analysed through conceptual Most of the sangha has been educated

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76
with a worldview that has not only one that has developed a perception as from non-Buddhist minorities, 1 attitudes against change. Thus, w organization of the education and tra
Whatever be the nikaya aff knowledge through a common system begin their instruction under a senio often attend a pirivena.33 I have dis curriculum elsewhere.34 We need to 1 not include Science and does not in years. There is virtually nothing abo
Muslim culture or a western language Buddhist monks receiving education that the education that monks receive the culture and religious beliefs of til
The facilities afforded to ti The teachers are badly paid and ofte when the Buddhist laity is receiving education and when education in a mushrooming ‘International Schools' that they are becoming increasingly
In view of all that I have number of bhikkus have spoken out their readiness to support a negotiate there are other areas that need to be emphasized at the outset, the attitude are complex and varied. However, on If the Buddhist monks are to play a k certainly need to pay much greater at Buddhist monks. I suggest this not be view through a broader education bu take is based firmly on the best info “What we ought to be systematically of inventing, cultivating and instituti groups (“minorities” as well as the " language of number ought to be p articulate their moral-political conce (natural and conceptual) languages o other words, what we need is a frame

romanticized a mythical, ideal past32 but of threats (from the Christian West as well particularly Tamils), which has hardened -e do need to pay some attention to the aining of Buddhist monks in Sri Lanka. Sliation of the Buddhist monk, they receive a supported by the state. Most novice monks r ordained monk but after a few years they -cussed the limited nature of the pirivena be aware that the pirivena curriculum does clude ‘Social Studies' after the initial five ut Islam or Christianity or about Tamil and e in the curriculum. There are about 25,000 1 through this system. Suffice it to say here e gives them very limited knowledge about ne minorities in Sri Lanka. hem are among the poorest in the country. n lack training. This is happening at a time
a somewhat different exposure to modern and through English is being fostered by .35 (xxxv] Monks might be forgiven for feeling
marginalized in a changing society. said, what is indeed remarkable is that a in terms of their commitment to peace and 1 solution to the current civil war. 36 Clearly addressed in the peace process37 and as I s of the bhikkus towards the peace process, e clear message emerges from this analysis. cey role in sustaining the peace process we tention to broadening the training of young ecause I am aiming at changing their world it rather to ensure that whatever view they rmation available. As David Scott argued exploring in Sri Lanka are ways and means nalising cultural-political spaces in which majority” – though in my view this entire it aside as irrelevant] can formulate and rns and their self-governing claims in the f their respective historical traditions. ’38 In work that enables continuous renegotiation

Page 85
of the claims of historical (ethnic) comm and social groups. 39
As such what we should be aimii of views we do not agree with, or the total cultural concerns from the body politic. We through which constantly changing ‘differ articulated, defined and mutually compr need to work on if we are to build on and
TABLE 1: BUDDHIST MONK
(Estimates from data at Min
NAME OF NIKAYA
SIYAMOPALI
Malvatu Parshavaya (including Sri Rohana Parshavaya) Asgiri Parshavaya Rangiri Dambulu Parshavaya
Mahavihara Vansika Vanavasa Nikaya Kotte Sri Kalyani Saamagri Nikaya, Sri Kalyani Saamagri Dharma Maha Sangha Sabhava Uve Siyamopali
RAMANNA Sri Lanka Ramanna Sr Kalyani Yogarama Sansthava
AMARAPURA
Sri Saddhammavansa Mulavansika Amarapura (Ambagahapiya Parshavaya)
Udarata Amarapura Sri Dharmarakshitha Sri Saddhammavansa (Rasssagala Parshavaya) Ariyavamsa Saddhammayuththika Saddhammayuththika (Matara)

77 munities as well as of other economic
ng at is not the exclusion or vilification I exclusion of religious, historical and e should rather strive to build structures ences’ of all kinds might be constantly -ehended. This is a key task that we I preserve that elusive peace.40
S IN SRI LANKA (c. 1995) istry of Buddha Sasana)
TEMPLES
MONKS
6018
18,780
4923
565
?
14,944 1383 200(?) 889 230
11
85
352 22
1056 78
1117 1045 72
5048 4711 337
2154 367 130 132 335 125
7064 704 459 407 973 473 935
141
60 180 96
158 660 292

Page 86
78 Vajiravansa Dambulu Paramparayattha
Udarata Saamagri Sangha Sabhava Sri Lanka SwejinSaddhammavansa (Ekneligoda Parsha Chulagandhi Sri Sambuddha Sasanodhaya Sangha Mmrammavansabhidhaja Sri Saddhar Uva Kalyanavansika Sri Dharmarama Sad Uva Udukinda Amarapura Kalyanavansa
Total
Notes
1 John Gray, Enlightenment's Wake: Poli Age, London: Routledge, 1995, p. 128. 2 Ananda Abeysekera, ‘The Saffron Army and Difference in Sri Lanka, Numen, Vol. 31 See Chandra R. de Silva, ‘The Plurality Views Among Buddhist Monks in Sri Lar Identities in Sri Lanka, op.cit., pp. 53-73. figurations of identity se,e Ananda Abeys and Difference, Columbia: University of 4See Charles Briggs, ‘The Politics of Dis tion of Tradition,”” Cultural Anthropology SH. L. Seneviratne, The Work of Kings: University of Chicago Press, 1999; Stanle Politics and Violence in Sri Lanka, Ch Bartholomeusz and de Silva, Buddhist Fi Lanka, op.cit.,
Of course, the ideal is not always achie dhist monks looked down on ‘low-caste? Respectability: The Berava, Middle-Class Dance in Sri Lanka,' Cultural Anthropolo 7 Ideas on unity are underwritten by the ancient Buddhist community of the Lichch that had positive political consequences. * See Tessa Bartholomeusz, In Defense o Lanka, London: RoutledgeCurzon, 2002.

97
11
126 152 62 404 52 86 86 58
avaya)
93 Sabhawa mmayuththika
60 dhammayuththika 24
10
33
12
84
190
719
9289
30,892
tics and Culture at the Close of the Modern
- Violence and Terrorism: Buddhism, Identity
48, 2001. pp. 1-46 -of Buddhist Fundamentalism: An Inquiry into aka,’ Buddhist Fundamentalism and Minority
For an excellent analysis of the shifting consekera, Colors of the Robe: Religion, Identity South Carolina Press, 2002. cursive Authority in Research on the “Inven
, Vol. 11 (4), pp. 435-469.
The New Buddhism in Sri Lanka, Chicago: ey J. Tambiah, Buddhism Betrayed? Religion, Licago: University of Chicago Press, 1992; undamentalism and Minority Identities in Sri
-ved. For instances when contemporary Bud
drummers, see Susan A. Reed, ‘Performing Nationalism and the Classicization of Kandyan gy, Vol. 17 (2), 2002, pp. 246-277. Pali Canon, particularly in the images of the navis, which were known for its unified stance
Dharma: Just-War Ideology in Buddhist Sri

Page 87
9 These figures are extrapolated from a threeKotugoda Dhammawasa, Mala Lekhakadikari 29 July 1999, which estimates the total at 34, ordained and the rest are novices (samaneras 10 The term nikaya is used to denote a body ordination (upasampada) ceremonies but also elements of common origin or common gove monk (bhikku) to a novice (samanera). A nov five bhikkus are needed for higher ordination
"For a perceptive analysis of a rare instance gence of the Rangiri Dambulu Parshavaya, s op cit, pp. 250-271. For a brief survey of the Si eds. Kesbewe Wimalananda and G. H. Kahan 1995. 12 For instance, some Amarapura nikayas have castes, e.g. the karava and salagama castes. 13 See Buddhavansaya, Sasanavansaya ha Ai
Maharagama: Sasana Sevaka Samithiya, 199 14 In 1988, Mahanayaka Poththewela Pannasa in 2000 temples, Ceylon Daily News, Oct 31, 15 On this question see Chandra R. de Silva, Some Ideological and Policy Issues,' The Po racy, Identity, Development and Security, ed. London: Curzon, 2001, pp. 183-195. 16 Sri Lanka Amarapura Maha Sangha Sabha Printers 1993, p. 24. 17 See Ven. Akuretiye Nanda, An Analysis of the North-East Problem of Sri Lanka, Interna flict in Sri Lanka, Bath Spa University Colleg analyses ten statements made between 1999: 18 See Statement issued by the Mahanayakas 19 Sri Lanka Ramanna Maha Nikaya: Katika 1989 Articles 44, 46, 55, 58. 20 Chandra R. de Silva and Tessa Bartholome ciliation Process, Colombo: Marga Institute, 21[xxi) Buddha Sasana Amatyansaya: 1990 Bandaranaike Anusmarana Jathyanthara Sa Amathyansaye Karyabharaya Pilibanda Sar partment of Government Printing, [1990])
Mandalaya: Regulations, March 22, 1995. 22 Press reports in August 2000 indicate con political process in terms of both information protest new constitution' op. cit. and ANMA paign,' The Island, August 4, 2000.

| 79 -page typed report released by Anunayaka e of the Amarapura Sangha Sabhava, dated .000. About two thirds - 25,000 - are fully ). See Table 1 for figures in 1995.
of monks that holds independent higher p for a collection of such bodies that have ernance. Ordination confers the status of a rice can be initiated by a single bhikku but
(upasampada). e of such a challenge leading to the emersee H. L. Seneviratne, The Work of Kings, yam Nikaya see, Lakdiva Sanga Parapura, da, Colombo: Ministry of Buddha Sasana,
e been traditionally identified with specific
narapuravansaya, ed. Madihe Pannasiha,
ra (1986-) said that nikaya had 7500 monks | 1988.
‘State Support for Religion in Sri Lanka: st-Colonial States of South Asia: DemocAmita Shastri and A. Jeyaratnam Wilson,
va: Vyastha Malava, Mt. Lavinia: Sri Devi
Statements Issued by the Mahanayakas on utional Conference on Buddhism and Conge, Bath, UK, 28-30 June 2002. The paper and April 2002. in Tokyo, Japan, Daily News, June 5, 2002 vatha, Colombo: Department of Printing,
usz, The Role of the Sangha in the Recon2001, pp. 17-18.
Agosthu 20 Sita 22 Dakvaa Kolamba alawedi Pavathwanalada Buddha Sasana nantranaye Varththva, ([Colombo): De- p.2. See also Uttarithara Upadeshaka
cinued resentment at being shut out of the = and influence. See, “Thousands of monks AT launch protest march and fasting cam

Page 88
80 23Dharanagama Kusaladhamma was the worked as Treasurer. Murutthettuwe Ana for the JSS. 24For an analysis of the proposals, see Roh and Ethnic Conflict: The Need for a New War and Reconciliation, ed. Robert I. R Foundation, 1999, pp. 169-187. 25 The JSSam is led by a group of activ Medhananda (President), Ven. Nagoda Am Ven. Akuretiye Nanda and Ven. Athureliy 26 e.g. Public meeting on 11 May at Color in Colombo, motorcade from Kalutara to September 2002. See Chandra R. de Silve view, 2003, forthcoming. 27 Saroj Pathirana, ‘Ranil blessed by Budi April 2002; and Associate Press News Re 28 See Chandra R. de Silva, ‘Comment on Statements Issued by the Mahanayakas on national Conference on Buddhism and Co lege, Bath UK, 28-30 2002. 29 See Report by Walter Jayawardhana, Los. Suddenly Changed His View of the Tiger Rotten in the State of Denmark, says Out:
News in September 2002. 30 “Jata Rupa Rajata Patigghana Veramani undertake the precept to refrain from acce 31 de Silva and Bartholomeusz, The Role o 32 For more on this, see Steven Kemper, T and Culture in Sinhala Life, Ithaca: Corne 33 It is important to remember that the curr ent from the traditional training offered t concentrated on religious texts, language astrology, literature and statecraft (arthasas Sambhavya Adhyapanaya ha Mahasangan 195. 34 Chandra R. de Silva, ‘The (Mis)educati presented at the Annual Meeting of the Sou Asian Studies, January 12-13, 2001. 35 For a recent analysis of the Education sy Education in the Amelioration of Political Lanka, op. cit., pp. 109-129. 36 For examples, see de Silva and Bartholo 37 For a recent analysis, see Michael Rot Power Sharing in Sri Lanka, Indian Socio

Assistant Secretary and Kithiyawela Palitha nada and Athureliye Rathana were organizers
an Edirisinghe, ‘Constitutionalism. Pluralism nitiative,' Creating Peace in Sri Lanka: Civil otberg, Cambridge, Mass.: The World Peace
e educated monks including Ven. Ellawela arawansa, Ven. Dharanagama Kusaladhamma, e Rathana. nbo, procession and meeting on 2 September
Kandy and meetings along the way, 15-19 -, ‘Peace in Sri Lanka,’ Asia Pacific Law Re
dhist Mahanayakas,’ SLNet News Report, 27 port, 14 May 2002. Ven. Akuretiye Nanda's paper, An Analysis of the North-East Problem of Sri Lanka', Internflict in Sri Lanka, Bath Spa University Col
Angeles, ‘When Malwatte Mahanayaka Thero De-Ban Everybody Thought Something Was spoken Scholar Monk, circulated by Sinhale
Sikkha Padam Samadiyami,” which meant, 'I pting gold or silver.' f the Sangha, op. cit , p. 20. he Presence of the Past: Chronicles, Politics Il University Press, 1991. iculum in these pirivenas is somewhat differ» Buddhist monks in pre-colonial times that 3 and grammar but also included medicine, tra). See Abhayarayna Adhikari, Sri Lankawe ia (Colombo: S. Godage and Sons, 1991) p.
on of Buddhist Monks in Sri Lanka,’ Paper th-Eastern Conference of the Association for
stem, see Chandra R. de Silva, ‘The Role of Violence in Sri Lanka,' Creating Peace in Sri
meusz, The Role of the Sangha, op cit, p. 10. erts, ‘The Burden of History: Obstacles to logy, new series, Vol. 35 (1), pp. 65-96.

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|38David Scott, Refashioning Futures: Criticisi
University Press, 1999, p.185. 39 As Scott puts it ‘What this means, in effect spaces – spaces that practice different forms erning practices can be cultivated in the dif p.189. 40 This is what Ananda Abeysekera was air ‘explore how particular debates can enable standing within and speaking from their re mains, to authorize themselves to come int what constitutes religious identity, pluralism, tity for and against Itself, Religion: Religion the Department of History, Old Dominion U ful for comments by Ananda on the first dra
Prof. Chandra R. de Silva teaches at Old was presented at Sri Lanka: Dynamics of University, a conference co-hosted by li

81
m After Postcoloniality, Princeton: Princeton
-, is the establishment of intersecting public - of belonging, in which different self-govferent languages of identity.’ Scott, op cit.
ning at when he suggested that we might
plural persons, discourses, and practices, spective positions of secular\religious doo central view and battle out questions of and difference.’Ananda Abeysekera, ‘Iden, Criticism and Pluralization,’ Paper read at niversity, November 15, 2001. I am thankft of this paper.
Dominion University. The paper above "Violence, Challenges of Peace, Cornell
nes magazine.

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82
"Imagini
Pradeep.
[Remarks read at the launch of C Karma: Ethical Transformation i Rebirth (California 2002), on : Proceeds from the sales of the bibliographer H.A.I Goonathilek paintings and drawings, at the U
Today is indeed very special, Itt this day vividly, for quite some time seventh book - and as such, it is wort the sustained intellectual labor that has anticipating with pleasure, the volume
In addressing Imagining Karm occasion allows, to reflect on Obeyes
might do this, in any event, at the laur spent time with this volume I have felt the relationship between the scholar an self as such, which I can not address -
will, of the intellectual.
I warn you before I begin, that topic, doing no more than tracing out a - despite its many gaps, and unthough
I would start then, at what migh of publications goes, his 1984 classic, course, not really a text of the middle, the very beginning of serious intelle Obeyesekere has written, as an antid world, lost perhaps through reading world, re-living its enchantments beco work, that then becomes the work of But it is not, at the time, that is to say that point of origin. For Obeyesekere deep into the life-world of a small co1 after Malinowski were supposed to. I ritual over a broad area. There is, in th a sympathetic orientation to the structu and persistent. I shall return to it.

ng Karma” Jeganathan
Gananath Obeyesekere's Imagining in Amerindian, Buddhist and Greek 5th Jan. 2003, BMICH, Colombo. book will support the housing of e's collection of Modern Sri Lankan niversity of Peradeniya.]
aink for all of us; I certainly will remember . Before us is Gananath Obeyesekere’s a recalling and celebrating for a moment s forged his work over the decades, while es to come.
a I would like in some brief way, as this ekere as an intellectual practitioner. One nch of any important work, but as I have
my mind work back and work through to d his intellectual concerns, not the interior -- but the orientation to the world, if you
I shall hardly do justice to this ambitious a sketch, that might be worth considering at paths.
t be the middle, in as much as chronology
The Cult of the Goddess Pattini. It is of for one knows from the preface, that it is ctual work. The work of Pattini began, ote to alienation. Alienation from a lost English at Peradeniya. Re-entering this .mes for Obeyesekere serious intellectual
professional, disciplinary anthropology. - in practice, so disciplined as all that, at s method in that. project was not to delve mmunity, as disciplinary anthropologists His method was the opposite—to study a his methodological effort, it seems to me, ure of things which is original, remarkable

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More central for me right now, alienation into and within anthropology becomes the site where the alienated se starting point for Obeyesekere – Sri L anthropologists, it is said, than her small this has been a matter for reflection in di who have felt that in our everyday lives from something else, something “other, possessed and then lost, have inserted th; anthropology. It is worth pausing here to f in its classical philosophical form, to be. T values and practices that are fundame normative in the project of the European of that project. And in so doing, under difference, and in terms of the enlighter were once strange. Such is the conceit o
As I have myself made my way right from the very beginning felt uneasy of translating the exotic into the familiar from the time I was discovering anthrop even though I felt uncomfortable with it, ! and Obeyesekere was an anthropologist discipline -- to its most central and classi times with such care and passion that it with the force of his intervention.
I have never quite captured fully have struggled to over the years, and m read Imagining Karma over the past few that one aspect of that orientation I speak as a Buddhist and a Sri Lankan. And pert it does, but not because he complains, of h or a Sri Lankan. The identitarian compl: quarters, has to do with the assumption from one's identity, however fuzzily or pre simply, a preoccupation of Buddhists; themselves as Hindu, Malay or simply o is not Obeyesekere's invocation; his is
Most famously, I'd say, in the opening p tells us of his thoughts as a Sri Lankan, si listening to the distinguished Chicag

83.
is the disciplining of the problem of 1, so that socio-cultural anthropology If can be cultivated. This isn't only a anka has produced far more cultural size allows for, and from time to time, ifferent quarters. Possibly, many of us , manners and tastes, we are removed
” some thing different, that we once at feeling of loss, into the discipline of frame what I take cultural anthropology, "he claim of anthropology is to translate entally different from those that are enlightenment, back to the very terrain estand both in terms of that place of ament, those values and practices that
f anthropology. through the discipline, I have always, y with this project—with this business , the ‘grotesque' into the sanitary. And pology, even as an undergraduate, and I persisted, for I had read Obeyesekere, . There is some thing he does, to the cal concerns—that transforms it, some simply splits open, turning inside out
the analytic of that intervention, but I ore so, have renewed my efforts, as I - days. On the one hand, it is arguable
of is that Obeyesekere, at times, writes naps this has some significance. I think ow he has been wronged, as a Buddhist aint, increasingly fashionable in some that some kind of modern right flows ecisely delineated. This is not of course,
all manner of persons, positioning f color, might claim such rights. This an orientation of insight, of knowing. ages of his book on Captain Cook, he tting in a faculty seminar at Princeton, o anthropologist Marshal Sahlins'

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84
misunderstanding the good Captain's suspicion, that becomes a detailed argur an intuitive epistemological orientatior
In other moments of his worl orientation. Most vivid in my recollectic on the riots of 1983, when he paus grotesqueness that surrounds him. Tha
I want to step back for a mome anthropology, returning to that outline I spoke of, that is to say, in its dominant f of the anthropologist has a kind of thin well on my tongue. I do not mean by thi or amoral and unconcerned with good and often want to be committed too, to corner. But that place, even though i anthropologist lives, is often, too ofte famous phrase, "a moral elsewhere.” the translations I spoke of before, of bri grotesque to a place where it must be e commitments to become performative se to become mere verbal exclamations. Su will, I suggest, rather it is an inevitabl has no serious stakes in its concerns.
Imagining Karma is a deeply mo moral questions one can ask as a hı eschatology ethicized?” Or in other wo the end of things, the end of life, as it w of “the good." Obeyesekere's explor absorbing; but in my view, it is extraoi the question. First are the insights that o The problem of Greek rebirth, rele repositioned at the center of a reflectiv that could not take place before. The nea begins to dissolve, and then, suddenly, th of the northwest coast of the United Sta comfortably in the same book. A new v
And then again, there is the mor seeks to ask of the ethics of our existen passionate, committed and calm, which subtlest, yet most clear feature of the w

: reception in Hawaii. It is a seed of nent with Sahlins. That seed is, perhaps,
, being a Buddhist is a clear moral on is his not-that-well-known reflections es as a Buddhist to contemplate the E is a moral orientation to the world. ent, as I did, to distill what I take to be to add to it. In the kind of anthropology orm, the question of the moral orientation , yet sickly sweet taste that does not sit Es that such anthropologists are immoral and bad. In fact, they are so concerned, o some cause or value in some faraway t might be ten miles from where the n but not always, in Arjun Appaduarai A “moral elsewhere” is a production of nging home the exotic, the different, the encased and labelled, allowing political entiments, and for anger, pain and disgust ich is not a product of failed disciplinary e consequence of an anthropology that
ral book. It raises one of the profoundest iman being, "How is a given rebirth ords, how does the human concern with tere, intersect with another, the problem ration of this question is erudite and rdinary, for the orientation he brings to come to him, as he thinks as a Buddhist. gated to the mạrgins by so many, is te comparison with other such thought it nineteenth-century line around Greece Loughts on the subject from Amerindians tes, to the Balinese in Indonesia, can sit vorld is ordered. al orientation of the whole project, that ce in a way that is both under-stated and brings me what is the most remarkable,
'ork.

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The question of the ethics of a rebi its own terms. It never becomes some t. people who think its odd can compare iti its own coherence and integrity and so n the sickly sweet sentiments of stake-less this work remakes and enlarges a space been clearing for some time – the conceri those who know his 1968 paper, “Theoc Buddhism,” will recognize the concerns, presented at Edmund Leach’s seminar at now have flowered and blossmed, and has it inside out, allowing for new claims up
And if I may return now, to the orig to the problem of alienation that might
work; I would conclude, that here we se fully developed orientation that addre disenchantment and alienation that mar returns, magisterially to a distributed st does not divide the world into little culture of and between forms of life that are diff
Obeyesekere would not, I am qu cleared a space and stood his ground.
As I try, myself, to make a spa intellectual, and as I do so, hear on all sid funders need, what is good for my tenure we need to say to keep peace alive, I feel that Obeyesekere has, see a space that he to my heart.
Pradeep Jeganathan was trained as anthrop was McKnight Professor at the University of He is now a Senior Fellow at the Internation

85
rth eschatology is not translated outside hing else, taken out of its skin, so that o their own eschatologies. It preserves ever enters into the moral economy of anthropology. As such, it seems to me, in anthropology that Obeyesekere has as of this text are by no means new, for licy, Sin and Salvation in a Sociology rather than the terms, which were first = Cambridge in 1964. Those questions ve split anthropology open, and turning on the world. gins—his intellectual project in Pattini,
have been an orienting one for that e laid by its side a persistent and now esses that original problem of loss, ny of us have shared. And further, it cructure, that in Obeyesekere’s terms Es, but seeks resemblances and patterns, Ferent yet commensurate. ite sure, advocate immitators. He has
ce for my thoughts as a Sri Lankan es, what the donors want and what the , and good for another offer, and what strengthened that I may tread on a path
· has cleared, and hold this book close
ologist at the University of Chicago, and Minnesota, Minneapolis, from 2000-2002. al Centre for Ethnic Studies in Colombo.

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86
Against Race: Imagining P
Line, Pau
Nilanjana
An assumed sense of comm most effective means of mobilizing la In his latest book, Paul Gilroy asks these shared affiliations. Paul Gil Imagining Political Race Beyond transcends the discipline of black c proves essential reading for those inte of ethnicity. Departing from what he black political culture, Gilroy quest ethnic absolutism. Gilroy argues particularized ethnic affillations, pa often originate in European fascism “retain the power to destroy any possi democracy.”2
Gilroy throughout his text rev assertion of ethnic identity and fasc any articulation of ethnic identity nece articulation of ethnic particularity. E brings people together based on a p can only define itself through speci exclusion. We must therefore de-en "racial’ identities by creating, in Gilro that transcend those identities that re to eliminate. As he states, "Calcula difference, sameness and otherness,
He details the dangers assoc "lazily imagined'"3 shared identities competing against one another “ove ethnic groups have suffered the mo severely damaged; and indeed over racinated, nomadic, or cosmopolitar or paradigmatically ‘postmodern’ pe afford to mobilize on the platform o
I should at this point ment mainstream advertising and the med identities, mostly black identity, a spe

olitical Culture Beyond the Color I Gilroy, 2000
· Bhattacharjya
on ethnic heritage has proved one of the arge numbers of otherwise disparate people.
us to re-evaluate the motivations beyond roy's most recent book, Against Race: the Color Line, ' like his earlier work ultural studies from where he writes and rested in culture's relationship to the politics views as disturbing developments in recent ions the validity of solidarities defined on
that the contemporary valorizations of rticularly in today's globalized economy, , and that they, contrary to popular belief, bility of human mutuality and cosmopolitan
Feals the rarely discussed links between the ism. He observes, quite significantly, that ssarily predicates itself on the simultaneous ven as an assumed common ethnic identity erceived “sameness,” Gilroy notes that it fic terms, which are, inevitably, terms of iphasize those national, local, ethnic, and vy's view, alternative transcultural alliances sify those precise divisions we would wish iting the difference between identity and is an intrinsically political operation.” siated with bringing what he views to be to politics, because we too often lapse into er which peoples, nations, populations, or st; over whose identities have been most
who might be thought of as the most de1 and therefore more essentially ‘moderno oples on our planet.'"4 We therefore cannot f victimhood. ion that Gilroy's book focuses on how ia today thrive on transforming our ethnic stacular event that practices and perpetuates

Page 95
ideological devices identical to those use books on the subject of black cultural po exceedingly relevant for many of us. As the first time, I was struck by how deeply
with the current political climate, three y book is fascinating as a whole, I will sections of the text that I found most rele
One of the most compelling cor camp,” or the state formations resulting fi of imperial nations was actively imag particularity of premodern tribes."5 H emphasizes these formations “territorial, rather than their organic features that ha antidote they supplied to mechanized mo The following passage, in which Gilro startling ways the political environments States, today:
Politics is reconceptualized and rec between friends and enemies. At its v soldiery and the political imagina exaltation of war and spontaneity, 1 violence, the explicitly antimodern s and its colonization by civil religion i spectacles, all underline that ca phenomena. They are armed and pr only a temporary break in unforgiving phase of active conflict."
As American participants in the a one cannot be a good citizen in the United a dilemma that can be distinguished b degeneration Gilroy describes above.
Gilroy goes on to explain that the certain groups as invasions of others wh many instances throughout the book, discussion of “camps” to a more materia associated politics. Unlike many contem does not mention the Nazi concentrati specificity of that historical event, but i

87
ed by Nazi propaganda. Like his other olitics, however, his discussion proves
read Against Race this past spring for I some of Gilroy's arguments resonate ears after its publication. Although the liscuss within this review only those evant to the current political climate. ncepts Gilroy presents is that of “the rom the process in which “the integrity fined to derive from the primordial se maintains that the term "camps”
hierarchical, and militaristic qualities ve been more widely identified as the lernity and its dehumanizing effects. "6 iy elaborates on “camps,” evokes in of many locations, including the United
constituted as a dualistic conflict worst, citizenship degenerates into tion is entirely militarized. The Ehe cults of fraternity, youth, and acrilization of the political sphere, nvolving uniforms, flags, and mass mps are fundamentally martial Fotected spaces that offer, at best,
motion toward the next demanding
nti-Iraq-war movement already know, States without ‘supporting our troops,' y only the faintest of lines from the
se camps often present immigration of o threaten their kinship. As he does in
Gilroy glides from this theoretical 1 discussion, of actual camps and their porary discussions of Naziism, Gilroy Lon camp at this point to isolate the rather to situate the event and ‘camp

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88 thinking’ within a more extensive net colonial violence to contemporary e division between racism and forms “the exceptional state represented by extends the increasingly recognized. as demonstrated by the colonial stat associated with genocidal death camp camp, labor camp, concentration car
warns us that if genocide is not a racialized thinking associated with t closer to actual genocide.
Gilroy rearticulates this cor genocide throughout to convey the ethnic particularity is potentially dar cannot be taken for granted. Even exclusion. As Gilroy writes, that “ racialized social hierarchy do not h they need not only assert unbridgeat fascistic solidarity.""9
Against Race stands apart fi criticize racist thinking, in that—as critiques that recommend that we ab favor of an idealized universal. O denounce racist thinking as inadeq ‘human’ identity may be, it proves i Gilroy proposes in his book, therefor the idea of race, and its inextricable hopefully prove more productive.
Gilroy's book is a theoretica recommendations and solutions as mindset's dangerous potential. Gil diaspora to disrupt, and thus resolv between territoriality and the physic those who study dislocated and relo applied. .
Gilroy's book, although titled of ethnic absolutist and other cultural our coexistence. Given our widesp constituencies, Against Race is some it detail the unexpected alliances bet

work of events that extend from 19th century thnic conflict in Rwanda. Gilroy views the - of nationalism, regarded as ‘normal,’ to - genocidal fascisms, as tenuous."8 [8] Gilroy linkages between civilization and barbarity, e, to reveal the ways in which the violence es, also recurs within the space of the refugee np, and presumably, detainee camp. Gilroy lready underway, that the ‘raciology' or che theoretical camp brings us increasingly
nection between racialized thinking and urgency of his argument. The assertion of agerous, in even its most benign forms, and in its less pronounced forms, it performs members of a dominant social group in a ave to imagine themselves to be superior, ole difference to awaken the possibility of a
Com many other well-meaning books that
he himself explains, it tries to go beyond andon all claims to the ethnic particular, in lilroy criticizes these earlier attempts to uate, because as noble as a universalized mpossible to implement in practical terms. cre, an alternative that outlines the origins of confrontation with modernity, and that will
I one that does not offer as many practical s it does admonitions about our current roy offers the theoretical concept of the e the unhealthy relationships he observes cal body. While the diaspora is valuable to cated populations, it cannot be universally
LAgainst Race, is actually against all forms ly separatist forms of thinking that threaten pread faith in ethnically defined political etimes uncomfortable to read, especially as ween, for example, white supremacist and

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black nationalist organizations on the t particularity. Nevertheless, in light of the States, but also in Sri Lanka and other lo opportunity to reconsider the most basic affiliations.
Notes
'Paul Gilroy, Against Race: Imagining Polit (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2000 2 Gilroy, p. 7. 3 Gilroy, p. 113. 4 Gilroy, p. 113. 3 Gilroy, p. 68. 6 Gilroy, p. 68. 'Gilroy, p. 82. 8 Gilroy, p. 85. 9 Gilroy, p. 229.
Nilanjana Bhattacharjya is now completing British and South Asian music and culture a She will be at Mount Holyoke College in M Fellow.

89 rasis of their shared beliefs in ethnic e current political climate in the United cations, Against Race offers a valuable tenets of our political motivations and
ical Culture Beyond the Color Line,
her doctoral dissertation on 20th century t Cornell University in Ithaca, New York. Massachusetts next fall as a Five College

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90
The Secularis
Lawi
1. 1. Introduction
Secularism is perhaps the m. declared dead on a number of occasio it was declared to be conclusively
many more occasions to mourn the two instances when one must adopt concept. The first is when the con applicability irrespective of any co concept claims for itself, despite its of adaptability, where it redefines contexts.
The story of secularism in Ind heavy criticism against the relevanc strong support from people who see democratic experience in India. Thi of the debates on secularism in In represent the range of complexity is does it provide any conclusive answ secularism. Instead what it seeks to d on the secularism debate in India in manner in which these questions hav
The first question is with re secularism makes sense in the India has been. Why is it that certain scho India for the simple reason that there to the call of secularism in India. I w about the difference between a term sufficient condition of my possessi application of a corresponding tern believe myself to be in possession
mistaken. Consider for example the terms such as being or infinity. A wł applying the terms with perfect con that there is simply no concept whic what manner can we state that Skin

sm Debate in India
rence Liang
nost resurrected term in India. It has been ons, and recently after the carnage in Gujarat Head. And yet we know that there will be e demise of secularism in India. There are E a healthy skepticism towards any idea or cept claims for itself universal history and -ntext, and the second instance is when a
historical origins, chameleon-like powers itself within different social and political
ia is a complex one which oscillates between y of the idea on the one hand, and equally secularism as being an integral part of the s article seeks to provide a survey of some dia. It does not in any manner purport to nvolved in speaking about secularism, nor ers to the problems posed by a concept like o is to summarize some of the key positions
light of a few questions and examine the e been addressed by the different positions. espect to whether a term concept such as n context and, if it does, in what manner it -lars feel that the term can have no value in e is no corresponding concept that answers Fould also like to point to Skinner's caution
and a concept. He says: It cannot be a ng a concept that I understand the correct n. There is still the possibility that I may of some concept when this belief is in fact difficulties raised by certain highly general aole community of users may be capable of asistency. Yet it might be possible to show h answers to any of the agreed usages.” 2In ner's statement is applicable to the debate

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on secularism in India. Is it true that there and scholars who use the word without re
What then for Skinner is the relat He says that, “If our aim is to illuminate of linguistic disagreements, the first issue are we debating through a word when not it ought to be applied as a description { There is no doubt that in India the tern sense in a wide manner, from academi parties to the layman. What then is the the problems with such usage? I remain a
my burden of having to decide in favour instead play the role of chief witness ano debate that I shall be considering is the critics on the one hand (Ashish Nandy, and those who support the doctrine (Raj
There are various levels at whic The first disagreement is at the concep feel that the very idea of secularism is fla is at the level of the explanatory, that is become mandatory or under what condit concept? And finally there is disagreer terms of what is the desired ideal and he this front includes a critique of normati normative frameworks are desirable at a
2.1 The history of the western concep
The first objection to the idea of s is the argument that secularism has a ve context of the crisis in Europe between ti that the concomitant idea of the necessit and the state does not have a parallel iz the west implied a process of the remova of public life; and this is impossible in reasons: 1. Indians are deeply religious people an intrinsic part of the lives of people. Any behavior from the lives of people would

91
e might exist an entire set of academics ally possessing an underlying concept? cionship between concepts and words? ideological disputes through the study : we need to clarify is this: what exactly ve find ourselves debating whether or of a particular action or state of affairs??” a ‘secularism' is used in an everyday cs to practitioners, and from political hanner in which it is used and what are n agnost on the issue and shall abscond : or against the idea of secularism, and 1 leave the judgment to the reader. The ! academic one, broadly between the T. N. Madan, Partha Chatterjee, etc.)3 eev Bhargava, Akeel Bilgrami etc). h the debate is pitched and contested. tual level, where critics of secularism
wed. The second level of disagreement under what conditions does secularism ions does it emerge as a useful political
ment at the level of the normative, in Dw we get there. The disagreement on vity itself, and the question of whether
all.
secularism and its applicability to India ery thick history which emerged in the he church and the state. It is then argued y of the separation between the church a non-western societies. Secularism in al of religion form the various domains a country like India for three primary
d religion is a shared credo which is an attempt to remove aspects of religious
prove to be futile.

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92 2. It is an impossibility as the basis of to maintain equidistance in India w aspect of religious behavior, from th 3. Finally secularism is a normativ countering the rise of right-wing fun
The critics of secularism argu for any such separation, best exemp theories there is an assumption of
which is false. What then is the prob doctrine.' For Nandy the adoption o displacement of theories of knowing tradition, which may have more to conflict. Critics would argue that u conflicts were seen matters of reli category of experience for the we transformation of local dispute into a ethnic groups into a mass scale confli
would also argue that secularism say: generally incompatible with differen Nandy it is not a term secularism wh but a tradition of toleration which ne
The second level of critique ag possibilities of secularism. The argu for a secular state to exist and none of a secular state is premised on the idea liberty is often curtailed and there is n it is supposed to treat all religions w: one that can be satisfied because t. possibility of the equality principle, a able to follow the principle of neutral religious practices from administra therefore lies in the fact that while I secular, it is a self-defeating claim as i itself consists of in practise.

state action because it has been impossible here the state is involved in almost every e management of temples to Wakfs. e impossibility because it is incapable of
damentalism.
e that in India there has never been a need lified by Gandhi, and as with all western universal applicability behind secularism lem with adopting this form of a ‘western f western ontology will always result in a
and living that have pre-existed modern offer in terms of resolving forms of social nder colonialism, certain forms of social gious conflict as that the only available est, and hence you had the mass scale
clash between sects and communities and ict between religious communities. Nandy s very little or nothing about culture and is t concepts of self. At the ground level for ich makes any sense in the lives of people eds to be understood and revived. gainst secularism is against the ontological
ment goes that there are three conditions f the three can be satisfied in India. Firstly, I of liberty with respect to religion but this o absolute freedom of religious. Secondly, ith equality, but again this principle is not he principle of reservations negates the ind most importantly India has never been ity as the state is involved in all aspects of ition of temples, etc. The contradiction ndia consistently reiterates a desire to be t also constantly redefines what secularism

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2.2 Can secularism work in India?
For Nandy, the question is only 1 and communalism as the antithesis of communalism and secularism are not av each other. Like secularism, Hindu natio that seeks to use Hinduism as a nation proper nationhood. There are two religio or a way of life and the idea of religion allowed is the emergence of the use of re and this has displaced the tradition of to to recover a tradition of toleration. The can only survive in a highly nonsecular d people search for ideologies linked to fa any account of communal conflict, acco: by stories of communal harmony or abo of faith to help each other, and the idea provide for an account of these instance
Partha Chatterjee fails to see any i in his view it is inadequate to face the c has never had a problem with secularis accuses its critics of being pseudo-secula of secularism itself. Furthermore it is u state and according to Chatterjee the far of the western or the modern state. It ini true spirit of secularism, and in Vajpay there has never been a contradiction be question then is secularism enough to cl be fought where the challenge is being ensure religious toleration.
Chatterjee ascribes the rise of th reasons including the back-door entry 01 failure of the modern nation-state to ne people within the limitations of a moder a response from those who see secularis of religion in India. For Chatterjee, the e secularism but toleration. But when citiz lifestyles, secularism can become the cou because both begin to contest for the alle
He advocates a similar return to tradition

93
possible if one were to see secularism
each other. But his argument is that pwed enemies but inevitable aspects of onalism is also a modern phenomen on al ideology and shape Hindus into a ns in India, the idea of religion as faith 1 as an ideology. What secularism has eligion as ideology rather than as faith, leration. There is therefore a necessity argument further goes that secularism omain, and thus if faiths are in decline, Lith. Every account of a riot in India or rding to Nandy has also been mirrored ut individuals crossing the boundaries of secularism does not in any manner
atility in the idea of secularism, because hallenge of the far right. The far right n, and the Hindu right in India in fact arists without ever challenging the idea nlikely to pit itself against the secular right is perfectly at ease with the idea Fact often portrays itself possessing the ree's new year musings he states that tween Hindutva and secularism. The hallenge the right, or should the attack
made, namely the duty of the state to
he right-wing in India to a number of f religion into politics as a result of the egotiate with the religious identities of en liberal state. Communalism is, then, -m as the cause of the marginalization opposite of religious intoleration is not cens are uprooted from their traditional anterpoint against religious chauvinism giance of the decultured, the atomized. as of toleration outside of the narrative

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94 of the secular citizen subject as a mo the right.
3.1 In support of secularism
Akeel Bilgrami begins with th has been a failure or whether it part: Starting from a critique of Nandy's I upon people who did not want to sep an intrinsic part of the nationalist m argues that Nandy's analysis is n nationalism marked by traditionalisti the actual fault line which has nothir that both Nandy and the Hindu natio presumption that nationalism is a sin, Bilgrami argues that nationalism possibility of a singular narrative, an is not with respect to nationalism per exclusionism within nationalism.
Nationalism often creates excl the monolithic brahminism hindiuisi accurate to characterize modernity a these exclusions. What colonial mod construction a mass element and ind castes through electoral processes wit Bilgrami argues that instead of a b make more sense to divide con constructivism to see how parti consciousness.
For him the mere recognitior not render it any more malleable e entrenched into the polity and sensi now well entrenched, and precisely is relevant in today's context can no the selective use that Nandy makes describe the desire to bring religion imposition of secularism..
For Bilgrami secularism was of a modern imposition; rather it wa arena of substantive politics or politi

re fruitful venue of facing the challenge of
e question of whether Nehruvian secularism ially succeeded only as a holding process. position that secularism was an imposition arate religion form politics, because it was odernizing project of modernity, Bilgrami marked by a narrow and uncritical anti nostalgia. According to him, Nandy misses ng to do with modernity. In fact the mistake onalists make is that they share a common gle entity that can be transparently grasped. is a complex phenomen on beyond the d the real shift that needs to be understood - se but with respect to various practices of
usions by totalizing traditions. For instance, n displaces smaller traditions, but it is not s the transformative movement that causes lernity does is to bring to this pre-existing ustrialization as it seeks to co-opts various hin a larger monolithic rubric of Hinduism. lanket constructionist argument, it might structionist arguments into grades of cular constructions get entrenched as
1 of a phenomenon as a construction does or erasable, and these are often real and
bilities. For instance, electoral politics is for that reason the sense in which religion
longer be purely spiritual or quotidian in ; of Gandhi. It is therefore inaccurate to into poltics as innocent protest against the
an imposition but not in the Nandy sense s assumed that secularism lay outside the cal commitments. It was never seen as one

Page 103
among many political commitments to dialogue. What was imposed then was r different communities. But this is not t} Congress assumed that as a secular pa and secularism never emerged out of a o it procedural priority but never substant
The problem was that Nehru sa and the implementation of a socialist pro issues of communalism. He assumed t. composition would address or include however, to attempt to revert back to s vision of secularism, since the failure wa absence of negotiation especially throug substantive secularism is itself one am including Hinduism and Islam, and secul arena with its substantive commitments. an ahistoric transcendent liberal fantasy political commitment.
4.1 What is secularism for?
Rajev Bhargava attempts to cons satisfactorily answers the critics of secul strong argument for the political releva He takes on the three major criticisms a it is a western construct that is not a pa secularism is deeply insensitive to the re that while secularism is supposed to be ni any theory of secularism should be able
1. Is it possible to ever split and separat 2. Why must there be a separation betw 3. After such separation how do they re
He then argues that in India sepe secularism as a political concept woul that. Is it then possible instead to argue f religious institutions; so the issue is then i but posed more in the sense of the sepa

95
» be negotiated through a process of Lot an outcome of negotiation between he same as a critique of statehood; the rty-could represent all communities reative dialogic process, and this gave ive authority. w secularism as a transcendental idea, gram would allow the nation to bypass hat the mere fact of representation or implicit negotiation. The mistake is some kind of a premodern alternative is not to do with modernity but with the h the codification of law. An alternative ɔngst many other competing doctrines arism must therefore start in the political Secularism then does not emerge from put from a commitment to a substantive
truct a normative political theory which larism, while at the same time making a
ncy of the project of secularism itself. -gainst secularism, namely the fact that
rt of Indian culture, the allegation that Eligious traditions of people, and finally eutral it never is. According to Bhargava e to answer three questions:
e religion from politics? een religion and politics?. elate to each other?
ration in the first sense is not possible; a be a nonstarter if it attempted to do or separation of some religious and non not about separating religion and politics ration of institutionalized forms.

Page 104
96
There may be different argum for distance. On the one hand, there i (since both are very powerful insti autonomy), and equality (no person b should be guaranteed membership in a of the necessity for the separation of p political absolutism). Apart from thes
1. instrumental rationality and 2. argument from ordinary life.
According to Bhargava, the perfectionism, and a separation is req are grounded in an anti-perfectionist perfectionism but seek form the state calls the first set of reasons ethical se while the last two are political secularis polity). Separation can also be differe
1. separation as exclusion-absolute se anti religion 2. separation as the maintenance of bo an idea of a principled distance, and it that the boundaries between religion ar
Thus there are four versions of secula
1. ethical secularism—that excludes a 2. ethical secularism—that requires pri 3. political secularism — that exclude ones from the affairs of the state 4. political secularism—that demands all religious and non religious princip
Political secularism
Ethical secularism espouses the ultimate ideal, for example, equality o critiqued if it can be shown that the ci separation but by a relationship. Can

ents for why there should be a separation s the argument of the value of autonomy
utions, if they mixed they will thwart y virtue of membership in one institution nother). Finally there is also the argument pwer in a democracy (to curb religious or e two other kinds of reasons may exist:
first three arguments are grounded in uired for a better life while the latter two
stand, and they do not depend on any a practice of restraint and toleration. He cularism (based on some ultimate ideal) m (merely towards making a more livable ntially characterized as:
eparation, for example, the state must be
bundaries-this isn't absolute but based on entails that there be political neutrality or id politics be respected as distinct spheres.
rism:
Il religions from the affairs of the state acipled distance of state from all religions s all ultimate ideals including religious
that the state be primarily distanced from
.es.
cause of separation by referring to some ir democracy. Ethical secularism can be use of equality is better served not by a people who then have faiths reconcile

Page 105
themselves with ethical secularism. Th because there in a conflict between ethical through state intervention seeks to excl So what does political secularism do? i any ultimate ideal but by an appeal to j demands that believers give up everyth demands that they give up a little of wh
what is generally valuable.
For instance, the conflict over col is delinked from ethical conceptions an philosophy of secularism would state th, of religious orthodoxy and tradition becau of autonomy, full-blooded egalitarianis participation. Thus far secularism has alw state divide, but it also needs to be narra itself independent of deeply conflicting re there has been a conflict over the ultimat other and political secularism should be that arose in response to these crises. TI religion from politics—strong and wea entails the abolishment of every ideal fre with banning only ultimate ideals; it ab the protection of ordinary life. Furtherm impoverished by the abolition of ultima need not be hostile to ultimate ideals, an primary importance.
5.1 Conclusion
What we see clearly in the deb supporters of secularism is the fact that i the disagreement. While some disagre disagree on a descriptive or normative o purely instrumental reasons. Do we hav leaky umbrella because it is the only one

97 Le prima facie answer seems to be no I sec and religion, and ethical secularism ude from politics all religious beliefs. t justifies the separation not based on political neutrality. Ethical secularism ing of significance while political sec at is of exclusive importance to sustain
lective rituals in society - if secularism. ad given a political character, then the at such a state accommodates all kinds use it does not presuppose a high degree
m or mandatory and intense political ays been narrated in terms of the church ted as the struggle of the state to make =ligious groups. At every stage in history e ideals, which often conflict with each
seen as a part of the various practices here may be two kinds of exclusion of
k exclusions. While strong exclusion om politics, weak exclusion is satisfied candons ultimate ideals for the sake of ore, it is not necessary that life will be ate ideals because political secularism Ld it merely dislodges them in terms of
pate in India between the critics and t is difficult to find consistent lines for e on a conceptual plane, others may ne, while some may even disagree for ve a way out, or do we hold on to our e that we have?

Page 106
98
Notes
'This article will summarize the debate i anthology on secularism. See, Rajeev B} Delhi: OUP, 1999), which contains articl paper. 2Quentin Skinner, Language and Politic and Conceptual Change, (Cambridge: C 3It is only fair to note that I classify all tl of supporters and critics only for the pur reasons for supporting or criticizing the i each other.

is best represented in Rajeev Bhargava’s
argava, Secularism and Its Critics (New es by all the scholars summarized in this
al Change, in Ball et al., Political innovation ambridge Univ. Press). nese various thinkers in the rather easy binary pose of convenience, while in reality their
dea of secularism may be very different from

Page 107
Human Rights Protection and I
Needed for a Just ano
We the undersigned, have long HUMAN RIGHTS (HR) into every stage that this was not adequately reflected in t of talks in Hakone. We note that sinc participation in negotiations whilst at the to seek a negotiated political solution to
We welcome the appointment of Advisor to the two negotiating parties at Thailand, 6-9 January 2003. However, w conclusion of the Hakone sessions indic by the two parties and their Norwegian fa rights protection an integral part of the pe to a final constitutional settlement. We a still not made a clear and public commit norms in verifiable and effective ways. can be either just or sustainable in the abs of the full set of fundamental civil, politic as recognized in a broad range of inte therefore urge the two parties and their fa bi-lateral and multi-lateral donors to Sril the human rights of all Sri Lankans will i of the peace process.
In particular, we write to express our de
1. We were disappointed that the two opted for a markedly limited focus on HI Martin to draft a "Declaration of Human which would "reflect aspects of fundam standards," in our view this falls short of full range of rights recognized in interna law. We call on the Sri Lankan governme to a comprehensive and binding human force until a final constitutional settleme international norms) is agreed to and en

99 Effective Monitoring Urgently a Democratic Peace
been committed to the integration of of the peace process and are concerned he official statement of the last session ce then the LTTE has suspended its = same time reiterating its commitment
the ethnic conflict.
Mr Ian Martin as the Human Rights the fourth session of the peace talks in se note that the statement issued at the ated the apparent lack of commitment cilitators to making meaningful human eace process in the interim period prior re perturbed that the two parties have ment that they will be bound by these We believe that no peace in Sri Lanka ence of strong and effective protection al, economic, social and cultural rights ernationally accepted covenants. We .cilitators, as well as the community of Lanka to reaffirm that the protection of be guaranteed throughout the duration
ep concern over the following:
varties at the Hakone session of talks 2. While the parties have requested Mr
Rights and Humanitarian Principles" ental human rights and humanitarian a commitment to the protection of the tional human rights and humanitarian at and the LTTE to commit themselves rights document, which would be in nt (itself grounded in this same set of icted.

Page 108
100 2. We also call on the negotiating i mechanism for the monitoring and pr would require from the start a sti independent of the parties to the cont protection of internationally recogn The agreement by the two parties at H of fundamental international humai "respected in practice by their personi that would allow for independent an
We are disappointed to note commitment to any monitoring mecł been asked to submit "proposals fo Commission of Sri Lanka to enable effective monitoring throughout the involve international advice and ass UN High Commissioner for Human UNICEF, UNHCR, and the SLMM. the Human Rights Commission does human rights monitoring, we are d effective monitoring which would c
We are furthermore concern agencies would have - at most - the rights - "UNICEF in relation to ch protection of returning internally di in relation to acts against the civilian for an independent and effective bod SLMM to offer assistance to the Hur of "acts against the civilian populati that the primary commitment of th ceasefire agreement, not the protecti
3. With regard to the need for indepe emerging outlines of the "Action Plat of which "will be undertaken by a s and the Dept of Probation and Child
We are especially concerned by the the ranks of the LTTE will be hous Tamil Rehabilitation Organization ( "local probation and child care serv the transit centres" is in our view ina

parties to agree explicitly to an effective rotection of human rights. Any such system cong international element that is fully lict and that would have as its mandate the ized human rights and humanitarian law. akone to "undertake to ensure" that "aspects an rights and humanitarian standards" are nel" is no substitute for a strong mechanism d effective monitoring. that the Hakone statement makes no firm nanism. It states instead that Mr Martin has r the strengthening of the Human Rights it to develop the capacity for increasingly country," and that these proposals "would istance to the HRC from the Office of the - Rights" and in "close coordination with"
While we appreciate the recognition that not presently have the capacity for effective isturbed by the absence of provisions for ommence immediately. med that an arrangement whereby certain task of monitoring only a specified set of Fld protection, UNHCR in relation to the splaced persons and refugees, and SLMM a population"- is not an adequate substitute y of international monitors. Relying on the man Rights Commission for the prevention Lon" is clearly not adequate, given the fact e SLMM remains the preservation of the ion of civilians' rights.
ndent monitoring, we are concerned by the n" for the rights of children, the monitoring steering committee comprising of the TRO care Services, and facilitated by UNICEF."
provision that children demobilized from sed in "transit centres co-managed by the
TRO) and UNICEF." The provision that rices officials will have periodic access to dequate. Without specification of how long

Page 109
the children will remain "in transit," or si of the rights of the children involved, such grave abuse. Without independent, effe the strongest set of rules would be of lit
Many of the concerns outlined limitations of the tripartite "Governmen that the two parties seem to have accepted process of developing policies or form society participation, prejudices the qu of their implementation.
In conclusion, we call on all international donors, to ensure that m adopted in practice as an integral part o
SIGNED Sunila Abeysekera Sunil Bastian Sunanda Deshapriya Rohan Edrisinha Desmond Fernando
Mario Gomez Ketheshwaran Loganathan Manouri Muttetuwegama Ramani Muttetuwegama Jehan Perera Kingsley Rodrigo Paikiasothy Saravanamuttu Suriya Wickremasinghe Joe William Javid Yusuf
6th May 2003

101 vecific rules to guarantee the protection
an arrangement is subject to potentially ctive and continuous monitoring, even
le avail.
above are connected to the general It-LTTE-International Agency" model . The less than transparent and inclusive ulating action plans, excluding civilility of their content and effectiveness
the parties involved, including the eaningful human rights protection is
Sri Lanka's peace process.

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