Page 1
Tamil
TIME
Wol XI No.1, ISSN 0266-448, 15 NOWE
A Mandate for P.
A. Govi. Vsi For
BCe:Sofio
Ie siet and is ea
a Was C.N. Annaduraf
a CIA Agent?
 

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UKW nicia/SriLanka,.....E5E5E5; TFF, ... -Aus 5 Canada. Carlso
AMI. Der Countres 2OVUS535
... Assassination: A Challenge
to the ecce Process
Free Media Movement Contens Satienterference

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15 NOVEMBER 1994
I do not agree with a word of what you say, but I'll defend to the death your
right to say it.' .
Voltaire.
ISSN 0266-4488
Vol.XII No. 11 15 NOVEMBER 1994
Published by
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CONTENTS
Shortest Race to Presidency. . . . . . 4
Reaction from Tamil Parties. . . . . . 5
A Mandate for Peace & Change... 6 Postscript to a Famous Victory.... 7
Hopes of Peace Too Short. . . . . . 10
Assassination and the Peace Process. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
An Era of ConsenSUS Needed. . . .14
ASSassination and its Aftermath. . 15
Building a People's Movement
for Peace. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
Tamils Should Wake Up... . . . . . 20
| Sub-Continental Scene. . . . . . . . . 24
Two Reviews of a Banned Book. . 28
Classified. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
A
No doubt that the presidential electio tion of its candida, diminish in any wa ga which is a mag per cent Votes she nearest rival speak from the electorate ga's triumph is th Sinhalese populat Other Communities
In spite of the fa Mrs. Kumaratunga she fought her ca Would seek to bri process to achieve Violence and to res executive presider bring back decenc Clear Verdict.
There is no C Dissanayake, mar ders has reSultedi that this setback is Continue their effo
Reports confirm engage in offensi week following Mr. forces too seen against LT TE unii absent, the contin Sides Will no dou process.
In regard to the with any other cor fO reCOnSider its Ch publicity with dozo descending upon that the parties upmanship after e parochial constitué to analyse and dis infrequently with in issue may be cha ments may be mag breakdown of talk,
No major politi Palestine Or North sought to be res publicity. Recent e standing conflicts private discussion be, the Services of Case of Israel-PL Crucial and Constr
The rapturous government's pea and the outcome C View that there is conflict through ne
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

TAMIL TIMES 3
Verdict for Peace
United National Party's campaign in the recently held in in Sri Lanka was disrupted by the brutal assassinate, Mr. Gamini Dissanayake. However that does not y the crushing victory by Mrs. Chandrika KumaratunInificent performance by any standard. The sixty-two amassed and the record two million majority over her ( eloquently about the massive mandate she received 2. What is of singular importance in Mrs. Kumaratunat she received support not only from the majority ion, but also from an overwhelming majority from the , Tamils and Muslims.
Ict that some of her detractors alleged that a vote for would be a vote for the Tigers to divide the country, Impaign with a clear message to the people - she ng an end to the war and continue with the peace a lasting peace; seek to end institutionalised political store human and democratic rights; the abolition of the icy, and the eradication of corruption and waste and y in public life. In return, the people have given her a
foubt that the bomb attack which killed Gamini ly other UNP leading members and several bystanin a severe setback for the peace process. One hopes temporary and the President and her government will rts to resurrect the presently stalled peace process.
that the LTTE leader has ordered his Cadres not to ve operations against government forces during the S. Kumaratunga's election as President. Government to have avoided engaging in any offensive action 's during this period. Although a formal ceasefire is lation of the avoidance of offensive operations by both bt greatly assist in the resuscitation of the peace
recommencement of the peace talks with the LTTE or icerned parties, the government may well be advised losen methodology of having such talks in the glare of 2ns of foreign and local newshounds and TV Crews the scene. The problem inherent in such a method is are likely to engage in public posturing and oneach round of talks with a view to satisfying their own ancies and pressure groups. The media itself will seek sect every word and phrase uttered by the parties, not halevolent or mischievous motives. Agreement on any racterised as a capitulation or sell-out, and disagreegnified and misrepresented as a complete deadlock or S. cal conflict, whether it be South Africa, Israel and ern Ireland to mention a few recent examples, were olved through talks being held in the full glare of xperience in attempts to resolve intractable and long has shown that the approach has to be patient and s between the parties or their representatives. If need. well meaning mediators should be employed as in the O negotiations in which the Norwegians played a uctive role. welcome given by the population of Jaffna to the ce delegation during their first visit in mid-October, of the recently held presidential election reinforced the a groundswell of support for an early resolution of the gotiations.

Page 4
4 TAM TIMES
Shortest Race to Pre:
Rita Sebastian, Colombo
For Chandrika Kumaratunga it was the shortest race from Prime Minister to Executive President, 81 days in her mercurial rise to the highest office in the land.
And keeping to the Bandaranaike tradition of making political history, her mother Sirima Bandaranaike was the world's first woman Prime Minister, daughter Chandrika Kumaratunga became the country's first woman Executive President.
Kumaratunga's confidence even before a single vote was polled that she had won by a million votes was more than amply vindicated. Kumaratunga secured 62.28 per cent of the total vote as against her nearest rival the United National Party's Srima Dissanayake who secured 35.91 of the vote.
The UNP which had hoped to cash in on the sympathy vote, following the assassination of Presidential candidate Gamini Dissanayake in a bomb explosion on October 24, and the substitution of his widow Srima as Presidential candidate, made a poor showing reducing its August General election vote from 44.04 per cent to 35.91 per cent of the Presidential poll.
For the IPA it was a resounding victory, winning all the 22 electoral districts conceding only the single polling division of southern Mahiyangana to the UNP.
In the eastern province Chandrika Kumaratunga got 90% of the Tamil votes polled. It was the minority Tamil and Muslim votes that made up almost 10% of the overall PA votes.
And what this election also did was to explode the myth of the 500,000 plantation vote bank regarded as the exclusive preserve of the Ceylon Workers Congress (CWC) pledged to the UNP for over two decades.
Inspite of CWC boss Thondaman, inducted to the PA government a week before the poll changing his "neutral' stance and calling on the CWC membership to vote for the PA, the vote was almost equally divided between the two opposing camps, with the PA getting only a
few thousand v UNP. And this Minister P. Char CWC General samy who has n plantation trade Thondaman moi to get the Plan PA.
Addressing th being proclaime atunga said that victory of millior political intimid terror tactics at previous regime'
She also told t massive mandate ple was an endor ernment's peace
"Clear N
From Rita Seb
'We have got a mandate for col process. It has b per cent of the and by 85 per ce what is touching people have also process,' said P. Kumaratunga a and foreign m being sworn in dent. It was he function, said th Responding t dent Kumaratul was no timefra peace talks will and her govel strengthened in tinue with it. T peace talks wi suspended follov tion of Gamini D ber 24.
It is not goin not without pri the light of what the President.
Asked whethe for the LTTE, s was a message f give heed to i against war an peace'.
Answering a

15 NOVEMBER 1994
sidency
tes more than the inspite of Deputy drasekeran, former Secretary S. Sellaow formed his own union and Minister unting a campaign ation vote for the
2 nation soon after d elected Kumarthe “victory was the s who had suffered tion, violence and
the hands of the
he nation that the given by the peosement of her govinitiative.
This was significant she said in face of the low and inflammatory campaign by the UNP to incite racial violence to get a few more votes'.
It was the end of a 'dark era and the beginning of a new one of light and freedom' said Kumaratunga.
As executive President, Chandrika Kumaratunga will combine an awesome assembly of executive and constitutional authority. She has vowed however to abandon the powers she has won by abolishing the Executive Presidency by July 1995. Whether she will, and in what manner, will be the subject of public comment and controversy in the months to come.
Looking ahead the ethnic conflict will engage almost all the attention she can spare from re-energising the economy and re-writing the constitution. It is a formidable agenda. but then she is a formidable lady who will brook no obstacles in her way.
Mandate for Peace Process'
astian, Colombo.
strong and clear ntinuing the peace een endorsed by 90 people of the north, nt in the east. And is that the Sinhala endorsed our peace "esident Chandrika ddressing the local edia shortly after as Executive Presir very first official e President.
o questions, Presinga said that there me as to when the pe resumed, but she nment had been their resolve to conhe second round of h the LTTE was ving the assassinaissanayake on Octo
g to be easy and is blems specially in has happened,' said
r she had a message he said the verdict or all who wanted to , “that people are passionately want
question whether
- Chandrika
when she said she would pursue peace 'at any cost she had the military option in mind, the President said that in pursuing peace she would "not abandon the principles of equity and fairplay on all sides of the political divide'.
Asked how she could accommodate Ceylon Workers Congress (CWC) President S. Thondaman in her cabinet when he was part of the government against whom she had levelled charges of bribery and corruption and abuse of power, she queried "Are you telling me that Thondaman is corrupt?
As for the abolishing of the Executive Presidency, Kumaratunga said she had already committed herself to abolishing it by July 1995.
Whether there were any state visits lined up . . . There were some and India would be one of the first countries she would visit, she said.
She also defended her right to have a private holiday if she chose. That came in the wake of criticism of her unannounced trip to Singapore shortly after she filed her nomination papers for the Presidential stakes.
President Kumaratunga also told journalists that she will retain the
Continued on page 6

Page 5
15 NOVEMBER 1994
Reaction from Tamill
The landslide victory for Chandrika Kumaratunga at Wednesday's Presidential election is considered by Tamil Parties as a strong mandate to continue peace efforts to end the ethnic conflict.
Ms. Kumaratunga obtained more than 70 per cent of votes in the three Eastern districts while in the Jaffna and Vanni district, where there was limited voting she managed to secure 85 per cent and 96 percent of the votes respectively.
Tamil Parties believe that the massive support from the voters in the South as well to Ms. Kumaratunga is a clear mandate to continue with the peace talks which were suspended immediately after the assassination of Opposition Leader Gamini Dissanayake on October 24.
A spokesman for the Tamil United Liberation Front said the party was very pleased about the outcome of the election and hoped that Ms. Kumaratunga would be able to live up to the responsibility cast on her and the promises she had made.
"This was a vote to end the war and bring about peace and normalcy to the country - a just and fair political solution to the ethnic problem”, he said.
"It is our hope that all communities will be treated in an equal manner with no discrimination. It was definitely not a vote for the LTTE. That slogan has obviously been rejected by all the districts which opted for the PA,” said A. Thangathurai, the spokesman for the main Tamil political party.
Another TULF spokesman said
that had the LTT to take place in hundred percent ( have voted for C increasing her ma half a million.
Kumaravel K. People's Liberatic Tamil Eelam (PL ty was happy th endorsed the peac drika Kumaratur
"The people in rejected racism a he said.
Commenting or tiom that a vote vote for the LTTE condemned it as slogan coined up
M. Sudhakar volutionary Org dents said this w for the peace mov minorities would Kumaratunga. I majority of the So her, showing tha peace, he said.
Former State samy, President National Worke break-away grou Ms. Kumaratung showed that all t tive of race and issue in mind - p.
He said the p their faith in M because she had s openly and freely, country about se like the settleme East problem.
The travesty of an election in the island's northern province in August, had a repeat performance on Wednesday, when the islands off Jaffna and the army controlled areas of the peninsula voted in the 1994 Presidential election.
At the August 16 general election the northern electorate sent 10 members to parliament even though only 2.3% of the 600,000 electorate voted.
Since the LTTE boycotted the poll there was no poll in LTTE controlled territory.
Jaffna Election - A Tra
The polling
northern Jaff Wednesday only addition to the tages and nothi port town of Ka People's Alliance and got 91.3 p. UNP polling six 4.2%. In the po Nallur the PA po secured 95% and just 2 votes. In s polling divisions candidates secur ary vote.

TAMIL TIMES 5
Parties
E allowed elections Jaffna almost one f the voters would handrika, thereby jority by a further
andasamy of the on Organisation of OTE) said the parat the people had e process of Changa.
the South have nd communalism,'
the UNP's allegafor the PA was a E, Mr. Kandasamy
an opportunistic by the UNP.
of the Eelam Reanisation of Stuas a great victory re. “We thought all support Chandrika n fact, even the uth also supported at they too want
Minister, S. Sellat of the Ceylon r's Congress, a of the CWC, said a's victory clearly he people irrespec
religion had one 2ace.
eople had placed s. Kumaratunga poken very clearly,
in all parts of the veral major issues nt of the North
H
vesty
figures in the na district on
contributed an overall percenng else. In the nkesanturai the polled 116 votes ercent and the
votes obtained ling division of led 21 votes and the UNP polled }me of the other ome of the other ed just one solit
Ms. Sellasamy said at least 75 percent of plantation workers had voted for Ms. Kumaratunga this time, breaking away from the UNP which they had backed from the 1970s. He said the estate workers had voted against the communal propaganda of the UNP.
Kumar Ponnambalam, leader of the All Ceylon Tamil Congress, said it was a clean sweep for Ms. Kumaratunga, a wholesome and handsome sweep, but he believed the PA and the UNP should come together and put forward a solution to the ethnic crisis.
TELO Secretary, M. Sivajilingam said the massive vote given to Ms. Kumaratunga was a mandate to proceed with the peace negotiations and find an early solution to the ethnic crisis.
The EPRLF in a statement said the peace initiatives aimed at ending the ethnic conflict has been endorsed by broad sections of the Sinhala people.
“It is encouraging that the sincerity of Ms. Kumaratunga and that of the Sinhala people, has been reciprocated by the broad Tamil-Muslim national minorities. It would not be an exaggeration to state that the foundation has now been laid for the forging of a truly secular and democratic consensus that cuts across the ethnic divide, the EPRLF said.
EPDP leader Douglas Devananda hailed Ms. Kumaratunga's victory and said now was the time to implement the 13th Amendment to the Constitution without further delay.
He said the new President could have talks with the leaders of Tamil speaking people of the calibre of S. Thondaman, M.H.M. Ashraff, M. Sivasithamparam and also the leaders of the various Tamil groups like the EPRLF, PLOTE, EPDP and others who had given up their armed struggle to join the mainstream. It would be then seen who was opposing the amendment. Implementation also meant devolution of power, he said.
"The near 20 lakhs majority which Chandrika got is a slap in the face for the LTTE. It exploded in the LTTE's face like a volcano. The LTTE never, ever expected Ms. Kumaratunga to get this overwhelming majority. After the assassination of Gamini Dissanayake the LTTE expected a backlash but it never materialised. Now no-one can ever expect backlashes in the South. They are a thing of the past,' Mr. Devananda said.

Page 6
6 TAMIL TIMES
A CRUSHINGVICTORY WI
“A Mandate for Pe and Change' President Ku
The verdict of our people in the recent election leaves 1 the depth and intensity of their desire and commitme must be, however, peace with honour for both parties to to be strong and durable', declared the new President Kumaratunga in an address to the nation on 12 Novem after taking her oath of office following her crushin, record two million majority over her main rival at the held on 9 November.
After reading out the oath of office in all three lan Tamil and English, the new President addressed the n languages. Before speaking briefly in Tamil, she said, "I
to speak in the language of the Tamil People'.
The following is the text of President Mrs. Kumarat
the nation:
“I assume office as the Fourth President of Sri Lanka at a momentous turning point in the history of our nation. The people have overwhelmingly demonstrated their collective desire for democracy and peace, for honesty and efficiency in Government affairs and for an economic policy which will offer to everyone the privileges so jealously guarded by a handful of cronies and henchmen. I have no words to express appropriately how deeply touched and overwhelmed I am and how humbled at the expression of the immense confidence and faith the nation has shown in me and my Government.
Continued from page 4
finance portfolio she held as Prime Minister. "There is no need to play musical chairs in the short time left before the abolishing of the Executive Presidency' said Prof. G.L. Peiris.
As for appointing her mother Srima Bandaranaike as the Prime Minister . . . "It was I who decided. Why is it nepotism?" Asked what message she had for the opposition UNP, "Close up and Sleep'.
And for her brother Anura Bandaranaike ... "I usually don't speak to the deaf and dumb."
Answering a question on the government's foreign policy, Foreign Minister Lakshman Kadirgamar said "we have neglected the family of Asia and we are going to pay much more attention to countries like China and Japan but that does not mean we are downgrading anybody else.'
The scale and mandate that has knows no parallel elections of the dem it is even more sign all the peoples of Sr diversity, have spok unswerving voice. tunity to bow in courage, the politic quiet determinatio the resolve to trium of state terror and tion.
"I also take this homage to my f mother for teachin sincerity and comm ple of our land was than money could homage at this m band Vijaya for th the support that throughout our pol The unsurpassed victory cannot be in terms of an a individual or even i al party. Our peop that whatever strel and will I possess service of the na dedicated myself ti my country and to ate day for renew ment.
"This victory is n the fruit of pains resolve by every : Lankan communit days of darkness land in the recent tions of this victor the extent to whi

15 NOVEMBER 1994
H A RECORD MAJORITY
ECC
umcarotungO
me in no doubt of nt to peace. This the conflict for it Mrs. Chandrika ber immediately g victory with a
presidential poll
guages, Sinhala, ation in all three will now attempt
ungaʼs address to
dimension of the
been given to us
in the history of hocratic world. Yet, ificant to note that i Lanka, in all their ken in one loud and I take this opporhomage before the al acumen and the n of our people in nph over the might political victimisa
opportunity to pay ather and to my g me that honesty, hitment to the peoworth much more | buy. I also pay oment to my hushe courage and for he gave me right litical life together. dimensions of this understood merely chievement of an in terms of a politicble are well aware ngth of mind, heart are entirely at the tion. I have long o the well-being of day is an appropriall of this commit
ot mine alone. It is taking labour and segment of the Sri y spread over the which engulfed our , past. The propory are indicative of ch the people of a
country happily motivated and enthused can strive against overwhelming odds and achieve for themselves and for posterity emancipation from the harshest tyranny. It is to the vast mass of our people who have contributed to and kept alive in the face of terrific odds this struggle, in the darkest era in our country's contemporary history, that I pay warm and humble tribute on this occasion.
In the words of my father, S.W.R.D. Bandaranaike: “The indomitable, unconquerable spirit of our people has proved strong enough to challenge and eventually to prevail against the oppressive regime of the past seventeen years".
It is appropriate at this time to take stock of the current national condition and to reflect on the reasons that underpinned this avalanche of popular feeling. The people of our country in displaying their strong resolve to give me and the People's Alliance a victory of this scale signifies their profound
desire for change. Their vote is in essence, and, above all else, a vote for change. The changes which Sri Lanka's electorate look forward to are as diverse as they are far-reaching. Preeminent among the changes that our people yearn for is the rejection, absolute and uncompromising, of violence and terror they had endured in silence - the pain of senseless killings and disappearances of their loved ones.
"During that era that spanned almost two decades, human life became incredibly cheap. State terror raised its ugly head and continued unabated in its destructive path. A callous regime which looked upon political power solely for the attainment of its narrow and selfish ends, violated with impunity, all canons of decency, equity and fairplay and left behind a society yearning for a sense of security and fulfilment in the absence of all accepted norms and values.
"The people of Sri Lanka have said with patent clarity to all who care to listen, "gone are the days when might was right, when everything was negotiable and when the state refined and streamlined all forms of organised violence”. The verdict of the people was in favour of supremacy of law, the enthronement of democratic ideals and values and the restoration of decency, morality and conscience to the process of government.
"Our people have voted decisively against corruption and the abuse of power which had taken deep root and spread right through the social and

Page 7
حكصحاصمسحصحصفحص 15 NOVF i 94
political fabric of our nation. It had terribly bedevilled every civilised institution we held sacred. The people have demanded transparency and accountability in all spheres of government. They have insisted that political power is normally justifiable, only so long as it is used for purposes connected with the well-being of the people and the upliftment of their condition. We have brought to an end an era when politicians were a law unto themselves. The country has endorsed in the most explicit terms the measures which my Government has already taken to wipe out political violence and state terror and to restore integrity and honour to the politics of the country.
"The crippling burden of a high cost of living and the economic hardships caused by inadequate employment opportunities and a variety of other evils which have bedevilled the economy demand urgent action. We have been accustomed to an economic order which in the name of an open economy has enabled unconscionable benefits to accrue to a small coterie while the rest of society languished in poverty and squalor. Essential services including health and education were woefully neglected.
"One of the priority tasks of our new Government is to ensure that our economy is truly free and competitive. That there is honesty and transparency in all transactions. Clearly development perspectives would ensure expanded and vigorous growth of national production and thereby the generation of new employment and income opportunities for our youth. Foreign investment will be encouraged and protected. We will also ensure that the benefits of this development will reach the poorer segments of our population through equitable and efficient distribution of income transfers and increased employment.
"Our people have acted with extreme restraint, intelligence and political acumen in the face of strong efforts to push them into the abyss of dark, dangerous and wild attitudes of racial and religious bigotry and hatred.
"They have given a mandate for peace and human values. They have convincingly proved to the world that all the might of the bullet can be defeated by the ballot. Their commitment to democracy is poignantly courageous.
The youth of our nation have responded to our call to eschew violence and take up with us the banner of freedom, of democracy, of human decency and prosperity for all. We pay
Continued on page 10
POStSc
By Ajith Samar
August has bee months to the Pe August 16 the m PA led by their r ka Kumaratung fusilade at the U had remained in last 17 years. I last-ditch attemp Horses and all supported by sc muttering into UNIP Governmen leaving Preside splendid isolaton not even two mon the ramparts has People's Alliance own right both a lons of the Exect the Legislature. summit is Presid who within a litt magically under carnations, from Prime Minister who pledged hers discharge the du office "not as a d people's humbles
Memories of course, go back to in 1953 when t Ceylon. Forty or August, the wo LSSP and the CP country to a sta protested against price of rice. Th done in governm and trains did n South jubilant baked hoppers on Government was Cabinet met on b in the Colombo ) were killed in Prime Minister D vacated the pl throne in favour lawela.
Three years la Eksath Peramun by the Presiden Minister Bandara er on the mome mass uprising in tical history. The released the mass arena and gave t and sense of self-v logical sustenanc most crucial fac accomplishments,

:ript to a Famous Victory
Inayake
n the kindliest of ople's Alliance. On assed ranks of the ew hope, Chandria, fired the first NP bastion which pregnable for the n spite of all the Es by all the King's the King’s Men, heming politicians their celltels, the t fell two days after nt Wijetunge in in his Palace. Now, ths after the last of been stormed the is in power in its the highest echeutive as well as in At the apex and ent Kumaratunga, le over a year has gone three reinChief Minister to to President, but lf last Thursday to uties of this high ictator but as the ervant.”
the Left will, of that other August he Hartal rocked he years ago that rkers led by the brought the entire ndstill when they the increase in the ere was no work ent offices, buses ot run and in the militant women the rail track. The in retreat and the pard a ship docked Port. Eight people Police firing and udley Senanayake oime ministerial of Sir John Kote
er, the Mahajana a Government led t's father, Prime naike, was in powntum of the first 'ontemporary poliMEP Government es into the political nem a new dignity 'orth. This psychowas perhaps the or of the MEP's for the people had
not felt really free even after eight years of so-called independence. They remained outside the pale of the anglicised upper classes who ruled the country in English and the westernised intelligentsia which formed public opinion in the same lingo. For any oppressed, ex-colonial people this mental and psychological release from the bondage of alien values is crucial to their selfdiscovery. This was the signal task which fell on the MEP Government
Naxalite
By 1970 when President Kumaratunga's mother led the United Front Government to power on the crest of another popular wave the people had come into their own. The workers were self confident, the students and youth, nurtured by years of free education, articulate and politically conscious. The economic and social measures initiated by the MEP Government and continued by the first SLFP Government of Mrs. Bandaranaike in 1960 were going on apace. A new awareness had emerged in literature and the arts and a new generation was knocking at the doors of power.
It is that new generation to which Chandrika Kumaratunga belongs. Though the daughter of two Prime Ministers she has not inherited political power as a family heirloom or assumed office with the ease of donning a new sari. She has had to struggle for it throughout from the time the SLFP was roundly routed in 1977. From the reign of terror which the UNP unleased in the wake of the elections to the deprivation of Mrs. Bandaranaike’s civic rights. The harassment of her husband Vijaya on the absurd Naxalite charge, his incarceration when she had to take him three meals on a single visit only to be rifled and messed up by hostile jailors so that he often went hungry, the mini-war that was the Mahara by-election in 1983 in which Vijaya was nearly killed, Vijaya's assassination and her own self-exile are all memorable landmarks in Chandrika Kumaratunga's struggle to
Continued on page 8

Page 8
s مة
Continued from page 7
obtain power not for herself but "for my party and my beliefs' as she termed it in an interview with this newspaper only last Sunday.
And what are those beliefs? Chandrika Bandaranaike was intellectually nurtured in the heady atmosphere of the 1968 French rebellion when the revolutionary students who occupied the Odeon Theatre proclaimed "When the General Assembly becomes a bourgeois theatre, we must make bourgeois theatre into a General Assembly.' The students believed that they could supplant the workers as the engine of the revolution but their revolt was foredoomed. A combination of the Leviathan State and the retrograde trade union hierarchy defeated that idealistic crusade but it was good to be in Paris then at the boulevards with their cobblestones pulled up to make the improvised barricades.
Significant
Mrs. Kumaratunga does not conceal her belief in socialism, her early intellectual influence, but she is flexible and agile enough to temper the idealistic belief in the humanism of the socialist doctrine with the realities of a world where doctrinaire socialism, organised as a command economy and a cen
tralised bureau lapsed. But her still the workers a the youth and t the deprived and to all of whom sł bring the larges market economy confined to the Recognising the
for the reality th Government atte the benefits of t wider sections wh poorest of the po net and not perI fare State to be ru
At bottom, the the People's Allia leader Chandrik is to the basic people. To a peop bound hand and sive Executive P bragged that th could not do w person’s sex anc 1982 to roll up tl for ten years, to a with the aggrand at the expense o suffering from t dered by armed rampage with p the PA's call touched the basi good sense of th vated their sense made them stan
Govt. Has Political W A Balanced Solut
By Prof. G.L. Peiris, Minister of Justi
and Constitutional Affairs
The Presidential election of November 9, 1994 represents a watershed in the history of the electoral process in Sri Lanka. Ours is an entrenched democratic tradition: we have been accustomed to the exercise of the franchise ever since 1931.
We have seen governments made and unmade at elections: the power of the ballot has prevailed against the mightiest of governments. Nevertheless, at no time have we witnessed so overwhelming a mandate given by the people of our country to any political leader.
When the government of J.R.
Jayewardene secu in Parliament in
vote he received d When J.R. Jayew magnificent victor tial election held
than 52.9% of th the suffrage, end ture. The dimensi victory this week son. More than ( voted, favoured
She polled 4.7 r nearest rival, sanayake of the
2.7 million vote meagre 35.9%. T)

cracy, has colconstituency is nd the peasants, le intelligentsia, he dispossessed, e now strives to se of the open hitherto largely nercantile class. market economy at it is, the PA mpts to extend hat economy to le protecting the or with a safety hitting the Weldely dismantled.
appeal made by nce and its new ì Kumaratunga lecencies of the le who had been foot by an excesresidency which e only thing it as to change a threatened in he electoral map people disgusted isement of a few f the many and ne fears engen
gangs on the olitical blessing, went home. It c decencies and e people, reactiof propriety and ld up in revolt
For ion
red a 5/6 majority 1977, the popular d not exceed 51%. ardene claimed a y at the Presidenin 1982, no more se who exercised orsed his candidaons of Chandrika’s bear no compari2% of those who her candidature. illion votes. Her Mrs. Srima DisJNP, trailed with , representing a is is quite unique
against those who had condemned them to this political hell, a revolt accomplished not by arms but through the ballot.
What is even more significant is that this appeal has cut across all barriers and touched all sections of the people. Whether Sinhala, Tamil or Muslim, urban or rural, peasant or intellectual, the people have responded in the mass in spite of all the ugly character assassination and the desperate jingoism which a cabal of recent UNP converts engaged in on behalf of their Presidential candidate.
Mandate
The people's mandate, then, has been for the restoration of democratic values, a rejection of corruption in public life and above all for peace, not at any cost but on the basis of a shared dignity. After a long winter of enforced cynicism and charlatanism the people have responded with an upsurge of idealism for long suppressed. The very enormity of the popular mandate exemplifies the mass expectations which it enshrines. It is an enormous faith which the people have reposed in their leader, a salutary and sobering thought as that leader now ascends to the highest office in the land.
(Courtesy of the Sunday Observer).
in the annals of elections in our country.
Many features of this historic mandate warrant comment.
The first of these is the unanimity of public opinion in every part of the country. There was not the slightest variation or divergence from province to province, from district to district, from community to community, from the rural to the urban sector. Quite starkly and evidently, there was one constant view right across the board. The scale of the nation's confidence in, and enthusiasm for, Chandrika's leadership is reflected in the capture of every polling division barring one, by the People's Alliance which Chandrika led.
The most refreshing characteristic of the people's response was their emphatic and unhestitating rejection of the communalism the pettiness and the rancour which doggedly underpinned the UNP's election

Page 9
15 NOVEMBER 1994
campaign, especially during its closing stages. The appeal to the baser instincts of human nature was scarcely muted. Communal passions were sought to be ignited by the crudest of methods. Character assassination, not merely by nuance or innuendo but by the most explicit of defamatory assertions, constituted the hallmark of a campaign which was personality rather than issue based and smacked of spite at every turn. It is a signal tribute to the political maturity and perception of the Sri Lankan electorate that a campaign orchestrated on these lines was acorded the treatment it richly deserved.
One of the fundamental issues on which Chandrika and the People's Alliance launched and sustained their campaign was the dismantling of the Executive Presidential system, which is plainly identifiable as the centrepiece of Sri Lanka's current constitutional structure. Speakers on PA platforms, including Chandrika herself, cogently stressed the numerous aspects and overtones of the Executive Presidency which are altogether destructive of democratic and participatory values in our political culture. We made it clear that what we desired from the people was an unequivocal mandate for the removal of an institution which had a chilling effect on Parliament, the judiciary, the public service and the Ombudsman and served only the purpose of rulers bent on the naked exploitation of political power for their own aggrandizement. In this sense, the recent Presidential election had the complexion of a de facto referendum on the abolition of the Executive Presidency.
A significant consideration here is credibility and consistency. This is a far cry from the UNP's own political credo. In the initial stages of the campaign which preceded the Parliamentary election on 16th August this year, the UNP suggested that the Executive Presidential system is detrimental to our national interests and that its eradication is timely. Surprisingly, however, the UNP manifesto underwent a metamorphosis on this point and, in its final version, clearly adopted the position that the Executive Presidency is of benefit to the country and should be maintained, subject to structural modifications.
There was a further shift of opinion in the immediate aftermath of the August election, when the UNP
offered to co-op government in si ity in Parliamer the present Cons to suppressing t idency.
Yet another ifested itself whe out that their o would not hold gi of the Presidenti they would the retention of the cy. To discover a ence or continui dictory postures enuity.
By contrast, respect of const firmly anchored sincerity of purp mere expediency There were sc that the PA wou monstrate its re with the Executi the total power way into Chan would seem stra Chandrika and should forge ah vigour to aboli Presidency, des] political advanta nure so visibly a volves.
This, however the PA has set government has establishment of Select Committe Reform to unde tion of a new col ment unfettered the Executive P. government has nite time-frame work of this cor reiterated in the
the President-ele
on the occasion o the results of th Elections.
Chandrika and find themselv thwarted by the M cy imposed on 1 Jayewardene ad Jayewardene, ha majority in the F with a 51% pop general elections that majority to g Second Republica 1978. However, contained 2 decisi regard to amend and repeal of the

TAMIL TIMES 9
rate with the PA curing a 2/3 majort for the reform of itution with a view he Executive Pres
aberration mann the UNP pointed fer of co-operation od after completion l election, and that eafter support the xecutive Presidenny vestige of cohery in these contradefies human ing
he PA's policy in tutional reform is n conviction and in ose rather than in
ptics who doubted uld continue to desolve to do away ve Presidency, once it entails found its drika's hands. It unge to them that
her government ead with renewed sh the Executive pite the sectarian ges which its teund abundantly in
is precisely what out to do. The PA already secured the a Parliamentary e on Constitutional take the preparanstitutional instruby the thraldom of residency. The PA also adopted a defiwith regard to the mmittee. This was
clearest terms by ct when she spoke f the declaration of e Commissioner of
l her government es un acceptably Machiavellian legathem by the J.R. ministration. Mr. ving acquired a 5/6 'arliament of 1977 oular vote at the
proceeded to use ive the country the an Constitution of that Constitution ve limitations with ment substitution
Constitution. The
limitations consisted of a 2/3 majority in Parliament and a referendum.
Mr. Jayewardene, as an integral part of this exercise, made it virtually impossible for any succeeding administration to change the Constitution of his making. He brought about this result by seeing to it that no future government was at all likely to command a 2/3 majority in Parliament. He did this by changing the electoral system, supplanting the Westminster-style first past the post system (which brought him into power with a 5/6 majority) with the wholly divergent system of proportional representation.
The underlying anomaly is horrendous in its proportions and in the magnitude of the ensuing justice. If Chandrika's government had the benefit of the system which put J.R. Jayewardene into power in 1977, reform of the Constitution in conformity with the criteria spelt out in the Jayewardene Constitution, would hardly present insuperable difficulty. It is the replacement of this system with proportional representation of the kind contemplated by the Jayewardene Constitution, coupled with the rigid stipulation of the 2/3 majority, that has produced the current impasse. The result, predictably, is grotesque.
This anomaly highlights the need for consensus as the key to the crucial work of the Parliamentary Select Committee on Constitutional Reform. A principled and pragmatic way has to be found out of the present predicament which is the direct consequence of devious manipulations embedded in the Jayewardene Constitution.
As TULF Secretary-General Sambanthan picturesquely pointed out at a recent symposium (at which J.R. Jayewardene himself was present), the situation resembles that of a man with an albatross round his neck, confronted with a choice of drowning with the albatross or finding an unconventional way of ridding himself of the albatross and surviving.
If there is an unhealthy polarization of attitudes, conventional wisdom may prove inadequate to supply the answer. But the government has the courage of its convictions in refusing to allow an authoritarian and idiosyncratic Constitution to be frozen for all time against the clearly articulated wishes of the people. Chandrika's government certainly has the political will to arrive at a balanced practical solution.

Page 10
10 TAMIL TIMES
Hopes of Peace La For TOO Short AP
by Prof. Bertram Bastiampillai, University of Colombo
There has been a strong sense of euphoria that gripped especially the people of the Jaffna peninsula in North Sri Lanka, consequent to the government's move to negotiate with the LTTE. But equally happily hopeful are those from among the Sri Lankan Tamils compelled to live outside the northern and eastern provinces. After a decade of frightful civil war and a still longer period of violence, peace was being given a chance. The reply was the promising prospect of both Tamils and Sinhalese living, if not in cordial amity, at least, with tolerance and acceptance of one another in the same island which although beset by unceasing war, wounds and deaths, the blurb of Air Lanka, the National carrier, still calls Paradise.
A round of peace talks between the newly elected government, headed by Prime Minister Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga, and the intractable insurgents, the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), took place through governmental emissaries and representatives of the leader of the LTTE, Mr. Velupillai Prabhakar
an. Emissaries Colombo were,
Fernando, the r Jaffna Governm the LTTE. In selected by the devoid of the
earlier negotiat or Anton Balas desirable beca could have ant tions that the t and at least ga' approach to and aspirations and LTTE speaking Tamils. Simult: representatives would not have pate the stand the government
The first rol apparently focu routine yet gra the LTTE did opportunity. Th nomic needs marooned in th sula to be met. that were take opening up of th sage to Jaffna travel much eas
Continued from page 7
homage to our youth for placing their hope in our ability to deliver the goods. The ravages of war in the Northern part of the country have inflicted an enormous toll in terms of loss of life and resources.
"The verdict of our people in the recent elections leaves me in no doubt of the depth and intensity of their desire and commitment to peace. This must be, however, peace with honour for both parties to the conflict for it to be strong and durable.
"My Government and I will continue our quest for peace recognising that the path is a difficult and tortuous one. We will ensure that our approach to peace will fully address the necessity to safeguard and strengthen the rights of the Sinhala people, while recognising dignity, self-respect and equality of
treatment for all will form the e negotiated solutio lem. Convinced as ly harmful effec Presidential syst and the vigour democratic way ol have solemnly this blemish fron our country.
In dedicating ernment which plishment of thes continued suppo you have given u you have placed which lights our and support you us the courage a Let us together able heights! Let cult but beautifu

15 NOVEMBER 1994
Sted eriod
despatched from xcept for Lionel uch liked former 2nt Agent, new to turn, the team LTTE was also Familiar faces of ons such as Yogi ngham. This was use neither side cipated the posieams would take, re hope of a fresh a new study of the 2xpectations of the on behalf of the .neously even the in the LTTE team peen able to anticithe emissaries of could take.
und of talks had sed on preliminary ive concerns. And not let slip of the ey wanted the eco
of the Tamils e Northern peninOther vital issues h up had been the e Sangupiddy paswhich would make ier than across the
communities. This sential basis of a 1 to the ethnic probwe are of the graves of the Executive lm of Government and vitality of the life of our people, we edged to eradicate the Constitution of
lyself and my Govhead to the accomgoals, I ask for the and co-operation The hope and faith n us is the beacon path. The guidance xtended to us gives dedication to go on. imb those unreachıs realise that diffilream
present Kilalipassage and a ceasefire. On both these questions, the government had thought that Sangupiddy could not be made available along with the concomitant dismantling of the adjacent military camps; and that while cessation of hostilities could be considered, a ceasefire was impracticable. However, in regard to the other concerns of rehabilitation, repair and restoration of normalcy of the war-ravaged peninsu la, the government's response wal positively constructive.
A clear understanding derived from the initial talks is that Jaffna and all the other adjacent areas, usually the locale of the Tamils, had been seriously devastated owing to the ravages of the unending ethnic conflict that has wreaked so much misery, on helpless Tamil civilians. Of course, the Muslims meanwhile had been asked to vacate by the LTTE and they are now not there among the Tamil peoples.
Evidently, therefore much has to be done to bring about some semblance of normalcy, to allow the Northern cultivator and fisherman to eke out their existence, and also to usher in some of the trappings of modern-day life such as electricity and bus transport. No doubt, peace is a prime necessity, and the euphoria and hopes of the Tamils are understandable indeed.
The government too had been equally infected with a high degree of optimism. No surprise. then that another visit by the same emissaries was to take place on the 24th of October. This visit to Jaffna to parley with the representatives of the LTTE was to last only a day. But the government obviously is disturbed by the reactive stances that apparently had been taken in the meantime by some of the higher personnel from the security services.
This had occasioned the first ever call to heel of the top level echelons of the armed services by any Sri Lankan government. Several commentators were surprised and have remarked on the ripples of disturbance Prime Minister Chandrika's candid comments had caused among some of

Page 11
15 NOVEMBER 1994
the senior security personnel. It is true that war is too serious to be left to the Generals alone but without them if the talks fail, as it had happened before, then it has to be back to the Generals again. However, some among the higher cadres had come in already for serious criticism because of suspicious but profitable arms deals; and some had been found to have been implicated in lucrative smuggling of embargoed goods into areas under control of the militants. There, no doubt, was room to caution the top ranks of the security forces, although it may not have been tactical to do so just yet.
As one of the retiring Indian Army Generals recently had remarked, no government should for long entrust to the military, obligations and services that the civilian machinery should perform, because then the military could nurse the idea that they can do better, what the civilians had failed to do. The growth of such thinking is perilously portentous.
Furthermore, it is also good to avoid the development of a situation as in Pakistan where the military has overgrown into an indispensable factor in any political or national reckoning. In a civil society, the army should be definitely subordinate to the civil government, and should not call the shots in political and national affairs. Yet, with all this in favour of the Prime Minister's position in regard to the recent peace initiative the government needed to be somewhat wary in handling a numerically overlarge security service, equipped with oversophisticated weapons. After all, attempted coups have been known in many a decolonised country. At the same time, it is patent that there is no military solution to the violent ethnic conflict and a political solution has to be unavoidably worked out to usher stable peace.
But suddenly there came the assassination of Gamini Dissanayake, the principal opponent of Prime Minister Chandrika in the Presidential stakes on 24th October, which fouled the atmosphere. Worse, a few other political
leaders too from side were killed a ber of ordinary
were maimed fo blast at an ele meeting in north has sealed for a t chances of talking the embarrassme government, obse that the undoubts none other than t peace negotiation ated in mid-Octol peace could turn
to most of the S and politicians, a
The high hopes the long suffering lasted all too sho
ASSa Pr C
Tragedy has stri politics again. At country was lil peace, democracy the political cond Dissanayake and others have bee unnamed, yet ul political violence bomber.
This, as we all
first time that su gigantic proportic in Sri Lanka. Ju leading politician Lallith Athulathm dent Premadasa ated, within the si obviously as a me certain political ol survived all the sh of April-May 19 thinking Sri La that the year 199 phase of politics where violence a had no relevance emerging politica newed democra waves of the bom lives of so many
langa appear to h

TAMIL TIMES 11
the contending s well as a numfolk, and many llowing a bomb ction campaign Colombo. This ime at least any g peace. Much to 2nt of the new rvers concluded 2d suspects were hose with whom S had been initiper. Now talk of to be anathema Sinhalese people hd it looks so.
3 entertained by northerners had rt a period. Get
ting Sangupiddy opened out for travelling and any ceasefire implemented however were never quite certain, and now will remain almost remote likelihoods. If anything appears likely it is that the intensity of the ethnic civil war might escalate and remain hung round the island like an albatross. Death and violence, and certainly not civil society, will continue to be experienced in the Tamil peopled areas of the North. Peace talks have turned into a mirage, the first round of them could also be the last for some time. Nevertheless, if one wishes law and order, civil institutions and stable development in the country, peace has to be relentlessly pursued despite impediments.
issination and the Peace OCess: A Challenge to handrika's Leadership
by Dr. Jayadeva Uyangoda, University of Colombo
luck Sri Lankan a time when the mping towards and civility in uct, Mr. Gamini
more than fifty n slain by that timate agent of - the suicide
know, is not the
1ch a tragedy of
ons has occurred st last year, two s in the South, udali and Presi
were assassinpace of one week, ans of achieving bjectives. Having hocks of the crisis 93, many right nkans thought 4 heralded a new
in our country ld assassinations or validity in the ul culture of recy. The shock that blasted the people at Thotaave ripped apart
the edifice of Sri Lanka's political stability as well.
De-stabilisation
Perhaps, de-stabilisation in the South is what the agents of death who planned and executed this bomb blast intended to achieve. If we subscribe to the widespread theory that the LTTE is behind this military action, we must also admit the conclusion that it was not merely an act of revenge on Mr. Dissanayake, the co-architect of the Indo-Lanka Accord of 1987. The LTTE could have easily killed Mr. Dissanayake when he had very little security cover as a mere opposition politician. A lone gunman, not a suicide bomber, could have completed the task without much theatricality. The timing of this particular "revenge killing points to its political objectives, too. Other than the destabilisation motive, those who planned the October 23rd carnage perhaps sought to effectively stop the peace process as well, initiated by the Chandrika Kumaratunga
government.
Continued on page 13

Page 12
12 TAMIL TIMES
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15 NOVEMBER 1994
Continued from page 11
The greater tragedy now is that the politicians, particularly those of the part-time variety, are unconsciously completing the destabilisation agenda of the LTTE. Politicians in the South do not seem to have yet learned even the elementary lessons from the past political assassinations, believed to have been carried out by the LTTE. When both Mr. Athulathmudali and President Premadasa were killed last year, our politicians were out to gain immediate, narrow and partisan advantages, even going to the bizarre extent of accusing each other of the complicity in these killings was the heightening of the animosity between the ruling party and the opposition, plunging Southern politics into further chaos and instability. Unfortunately, we are now witnessing the same sordid history repeating itself. If Prabhakaran really wanted to de-stabilise Colombo politics, he must be thanking Colombo politicians for perfecting his task. One is tempted to conclude that prudent management of suddenly erupted crisis situations is one of the least known faculties of our politicians of all persuasions.
Collective Political Target
As the LTTE has repeatedly proved in the past years as well as on 23 October, Southern politics is not determined in Colombo alone. Jaffna - or if we reduce it to a single individual, Prabhakaran - appears to set the tone and agenda of Southern politics. This all politicians in Colombo need to understand even at this belated hour and respond with political maturity. The actual target of the Thotalanga suicide bomber, was not restricted to Mr. Dissanayake or the UNP. The PA government, the peace process, and the emerging political stability - all these also constitute the collective political
target of the LTTE. Yet, many of
us in the South fail to understand this aspect of the tragedy, because our habit has been to immediately politicise the post-assassination developments for narrow political gains.
It is perhaps not a mere coinci
dence that the Athulathmudali, now Dissanayake for the worst mo ment-opposition tion campaigns. gle for power bi bitter and acri election campa many in the So sciously though, the political coho afar.
Although our appear to be rel politicisation of order to gain ele political advanta spelled disaster. ple, the assassir lathmudali and proper investiga conducted into political killings, investigation or Lanka is perhaps where the assassi dent was not prol sion of inquiry.
Politicisation of
When politica are politicised, in little or no mot know what ex: When all are eng excercise of theo who did it, the f analysis and less become totally then the agents ( a relatively easy the next strike, il lodging houses i letarian quarte elementary lessC from the twin as year. Mr. Diss have been advis Thotalanga — th world of Colombo ous hour of mid day. Well, e elementary les tragedies of mor tions, we need to post-assassinatio that requires a g tical maturity - find among huma of heightened e mities.
Chandrika Ku

TAMIL TIMES 13
issassinations of Premadasa and have been timed ments of governrelations - elecWhen the strug'comes intensely monious during gns, there are uth who, unconvolunteer to be rts of the enemy
political leaders uctant to admit, assassinations in ctoral and other ges has always Take, for examlations of AthuPremadasa. No tions have been hese two major either at criminal political level. Sri the only country nation ofa Presibed by a commis
Assassinations
l assassinations fact there is very ivation at all to actly happened. aged in the easy ry building as to acts, truth, hard Ons to be learned irrelevant. And if death will have
job in planning side their rented in Colombo's prors. If at least ns were learned sassinations last anayake should ed not to go to e virtual under- at that dangernight on a rainy ven to learn ons from such umental propor
de-politicise the squabbles. And reat deal of polia rare quality to n beings in times notions and en
maratunga's PA
government is as much a victim of the Thotalanga blast as is the UNP which lost its Presidential Candidate and a number of top party leaders. Having won th Parliamentary election on a popu lar wave just two and a half months ago, the PA government has done a number of good things in the area of democracy, human rights and good governance. At the same time, the Colombo middle class critique of the Chandrika Kumaratunga leadership has centered primarily on her perceived lack of professionalism and management skills in policy making as well as implementation. Now, the Prime Minister and her colleagues can no longer shrug off such criticism as mere trivia, because the bomb blast has magnified all the minor misdemeanors of the government into major political blunders. The political vulnerability of Chandrika's leadership emanates ironically from the fact that all aspects of her behaviour - including what she wears at public functions and her legendary disregard for punctuality - have been subjected to microscopic public scrutiny, precisely because of her immense popularity and charisma. And the explosion at Thotalanga and its aftermath is the first real crisis that has placed under test - a severe one at that - Chandrika Kumaratunga's leadership.
Caught in a Peace Trap
The PA government invested during the past two and a half months most of its energy on democracy, peace and new ethnic relations in Sri Lanka. Thus, the blast that killed the Opposition Presidential candidate has also weakened the government's own election campaign. In a way, the PA government finds itself in a peace trap, a point very clearly understood perhaps only by the clever Mr. Prabhakaran. While it is true that the blow to peace process has also resurrected the argument that peace is a misplaced item in Colombo's political agenda, Chandrika Kumaratunga will have to stick to her peace promise. Any deviation from her original position at this moment is
Continued on page 18

Page 14
14 TAMIL TIMES
Continued from page 13
certain to undermine her political credibility beyond salvage.
If Prabhakaran actually wanted to derail the peace process, as the now familiar catch phrase goes, then what does he really want? The answer is quite simple: renewed war and the continuation of the conflict at an intensified military level. Perhaps, little do the military optionists in the South appear to realise that one does not give on a platter what the enemy wants - in this case, the war. Renewed war is most likely to re-legitimise Prabharkaran's claim that he is the only protector of the Tamil people in the North. Policy makers as well as opinion leaders in Colombo ought to realise that what Prabhakaran has derailed is not the entire peace process, but the particular peace track that the PA government opted to follow. A peace process to achieve even relative success and executed with the same seriousness as in war. Similarly, no peace process anywhere in the world has been exempted from setbacks and unforeseen derailments. Therefore, the IPA government need not regret or apologise for its peace efforts in the face of setbacks.
Whither Peace Process?
Meanwhile, the question being raised in Colombo and elsewhere in the country is: will the peace process be abandoned by the PA government? The cautious, though somewhat clumsy, res p on se of the government spokespersons is that peace talks are only suspended at the moment and there is no intention to stall the peace process. It is to the credit of the Chandrika Kumaratunga government that enough care is taken to resist the military option argument. Even if forensic and other investigations prove the LTTE's culpability in Dissanayake's assassination, the government will not be in a position at all to take any steps that will amount to letting down the Jaffna Tamil people who have demonstrated a colossal faith in Chandrika's peace initiatives.
The timing of back to the peact unfortunate one, rabble rousers locl idential election ba ing their access t media to assail t ment for its less th approach to the n the Tigers. A p. emphasised by tl lobby in Colombo is have been executi plan to wipe o' Sinhalese political bid to wrest contr island. Meanwhile twist to the eve spiracy theories, med, former Spez ment and a leade even went to the ex ing the existence spiracy between t
An Era
The cruel cycle of sination in Sri Lal several new via prominent leaders National Party Leader of the Op Dissanayake were explosion which h revolted all Sri L 18 months ago Ranasinghe Pren principal politic Athulathmudali v ing the Provincia tions in April-Ma. The recent eve dark shadow over had been besieged cide and politic almost two decad of optimism follo of Chandrika Kur Prime Minister of last Parliamental electoral verdict interpreted as an and reconiliation took several bold economic embarg lines of commun LTTE at the high a peace delegatio process of polit The initial react

15 NOVEMBER 1994
he present setprocess is an because all the ed in the Presttle are exploitthe electronic ne IPA governan professional gotiations with int repeatedly e Bhumiputra that the Tigers ng a diabolical ut the entire leadership, in a ol of the entire , in a bizarre o-renewed conM.H. Mohamker of Parliar of the UNP, tent of suggestof a joint conhe IPA govern
ment and the LTTE to kill the UNP's Presidential candidate.
The ultimate saving grace of conflict-ridden Sri Lankan politics is the greater political maturity of the Sinhalese people, who refuse to be persuaded by the demagoguery of a whole host of Bhumiputra types. The inflammatory propaganda campaign of the UNP for six days when Gamini Dissanayake's body was still lying in state failed to arouse even a single act of revenge. The meaning of the political change occurred in August and social expectations for peace and democracy appear to remain strong, making it easy for the Sri Lankan society to absorb sudden political shocks of extreme magnitude. And that, and that alone, will augur well for the future of Sri Lankas political stability.
of Consen SuS Needed
by Dr. Neelam Thiruchelvam
political assashka has claimed 2tims. Several s of the United
including the position Gamini killed in a bomb as shocked and ankans. Almost then President hadasa and his al rival Lalith vere killed duril Council Elecr 1993.
nts have cast a a country which by ethnic fratriall violence for es. A new mood ved the election laratunga as the Sri Lanka in the y elections in an hich was widely andate forpeace Prime Minister teps to relax the , open up direct cation with the st leveland sent to commence a cal negotiation. ons to the talks
on both sides appeared to be positive and the second round of talk which was to commence on October 24, 1994 were intended to focus on issues relating to the cessation of hosilities.
The PA government which had been in a state of shock over the recent violence soon recovered and clarified its position on the issues of peace. The Prime Minister made it clear that there was a distinction between the peace process and the peace talks. The latter would be suspended until the investigations are completed while the former would be continued including measures for reconstruction and rehabilitation and humanitarian relief towards the north.
The immediate concern relates to the Presidential election. The PA suspended its campaign until the state funeral was over. This in effect meant that there would be only about seven days of campaigning left before the elections scheduled for November 9. Both political parties are unlikely to have large public rallies and will focus on media advertising, posters and house to house canvassing.
Continued on page 27

Page 15
15 NOVEMBER 1994
Assassination and its Al
The presidential election campaign that was gathering momentum was thrown out of gear and pace with the assassination of the UNP's presidential candidate, Mr. Gamini Dissanayake, and many of the UNP leaders in a suicide bomb attack at an election rally on 24 October.
For Sri Lanka racked by more than a decade of civil strife and horrendous violence, the latest assassination came as a cruel reminder that the culture of political violence in the country had not seen its end. And with the deadly bomb blast which killed over fifty and maimed over one hundred people, many of them mere bystanders, the days of emergency rule and round-theclock curfews had returned to the beleaguered island.
The immediate political fallout from the assassination was a severe setback for the peace process initiated by the government of Mrs. Chandrika Kumaratunga. The government called off the visit to Jaffna by a team of officials for a second round of talks with the Tamil Tigers. To the long suffering people of the northeast of the island, particularly those of Jaffna who turned in their thousands to give a rapturous welcome to the government delegates during their first visit only two weeks earlier, the turn in the development of events must have represented an enormous disappointment. A sense of betrayal was felt among those of the Peoples Alliance government, and by Chandrika in particular, who had invested so much confidence in the peace process.
The editorial of The Hindu aptly commented on the resulting situation:
"The chances for peace have reduced further into the darkness that now envelopes the island's politics. . . . The derailing of the peace process reflects in the postponing of the second round of discussions scheduled in Jaffna between the Government's representatives and those of the LTTE. Undoubtedly, another tragedy is fast unravelling in Sri Lanka. For the first time in years, the Government in Colombo was demonstrating in an unambivalent idiom a commitment to begin a process of reconciliation of an alienated minority people. By lifting the economic embargo on essential commodities to Jaffna, the Government was signalling to the people in the embittered North that it cared. The fact that the Prime Minister, Ms. Chandrika Kumara tunga had appointed a Cabinet committee to examine all the aspects of the question of the Northeast and to formulate plans for the rehabilitation of that area,
reflected what sh attempt to build 'a ture for peace'.
Many have con sination of Gamir his colleagues in u "It is most regrett when our governm to wiping out all violence and intr and decency to Sri same despicable vi again", said Mrs. atunga. She adde while condemnin strongest possible rapid action to as this incident, and "that the offenders be will be brought dealt with imparti
Gamini was wel of India, and his deep shock wav
Gamini Dissanaya known to a large high positions in outside. He was weeks before hi visiting the Hindu presumably invok in his presidenti commentators fe known affinity w him his life.
The Indian P. Narasimha Rao e over “the dastardl: conveyed the sym ernment and the bereaved families victim. The Indi pressed 'deepests the violent death and others in the Profoundly sh grieved' by the de and colleague', fo) ternal Affairs, M said: "Mr. Dissar friend of India an
 
 
 

TAMIL TIMES 15
termath
e described as an political infrastruc
demned the assasi Dissanayake and nambiguous terms. able that at a time lent was committed
forms of political oducing democracy Lankan politics, the plence should strike Chandrika Kumarl, "The government g this act in the terms will take ertain the truth of promised the people
whoever they may ojustice and will be ally and effectively'.
I known as a friend assassination sent es there. He was
ke
number of people in che government and
in India only two s untimely demise
temple at Tirupathi ing divine blessings al campaign. Some lt that it was his rith India that cost
ime Minister, Mr. xpressed deep shock y act of violence' and pathies of the Govpeople of India to the of all those who fell an Government exhock and distress' at of Mr. Dissanayake bomb attack.
ocked and deeply ath of a “close friend mer Minister of Exr. K. Natwar Singh Layake was a good l his death is a great
tragedy not only for his party, UNP, or Sri Lanka but also for India because in his international vision India figured prominently'.
The Catholic Archbishop of Colombo said: "We deplore and condemn the dastardly act of the assassins who caused the death of Mr. Gamini Dissanayake, Leader of the Opposition and presidential candidate of the UNP and many other leaders of the same party and bystanders... Our country has lost a number of political leaders in the recent past and the culprits have escaped detection so far. This senseless murder can be brought to an end only if the perpetrators of such criminal acts are discovered and brought to justice'.
Describing the "untimely death' of Gamini Dissanayake as a "personal loss to me as well as a loss of immeasurable dimensions to the country', the President of the Ceylon Workers Congress, Mr. S. Thondaman, said: "In a civilised society there should be no room for the elimination of political personalities through recourse to assassination. Such outrageous, dastardly and revolting acts must be condemned in the strongest manner possible”.
The Tamil United Liberation Front (TULF) said that it was 'shocked and outraged by the cowardly attack on Sunday which resulted in the death of several prominent leaders of the United National Party, including the Leader of the Opposition, Mr. Gamini Dissanayake. Mr. Gamini Dissanayake was a gifted and courageous political leader who repeatedly advocated a political approach to the national question. He maintained excellent personal relations with several TULF leaders. This is an action by irrational and anarchist forces to weaken the process of peace and reconciliation in Sri Lanka. We call upon the government to fully investigate this crime and ensure that the perpetrators do not succeed in frustrating the faith of all communities in the inextricable link between peace and justice. The TULF has also experienced the trauma of political assassinations and lost many of its political leaders'.
The United Nations Secretary General, Boutros-Boutros Ghali deeply regretted the death of Gamini Dissanayake and fifty other bomb victims in Colombo. In condemning all such terrorist acts, the Secretary General expresses the hope for an early resumption of the peace process in Sri Lanka', his statement said.
The US Government said that it extended its condolences to the victims
Continued on page 16

Page 16
16 TAMIL TIMES
Continued from page 15
of this attack and 'strongly condemns this appalling act of violence. The Sri Lankan people's desire to resolve their country's difficult ethnic problems and their long standing commitment to democracy make this new act of senseless violence especially regrettable'.
The Canadian Government said: "Canada strongly condemns this premeditated, cowardly and brutal act. Democracy and peace cannot be held to ransom by thugs and terrorists'.
The Foreign Secretary, Mr. Douglas Hurd on behalf of the British Government said: "It was with shock and sadness that I learned of the murders at a political rally of Hon. Gamini Dissanayake, MP, and other leading members of the UNP, as well as many members of the public. It is particularly saddening that these murders should have taken place at a time when so much was being done to try to end violence in Sri Lanka. I hope that this terrible act will not be allowed to deflect the people of Sri Lanka from the path to peace. Those responsible should realise that terrorism can never provide a solution'.
"The Norwegian government strongly condemns this act of violence. This unacceptable terrorist action which killed the Opposition Leader and about fifty others can bring negative effect on the peace process.
For the first time since the days of strident 'Sinhala Only' in the mid 1950s, the presidential campaign witnessed the development of a sort of consensus between the two main parties, the PA and the UNP, in the south of the island on the question of settling the ethnic conflict through negotiations. The PA and Prime Minister were committed to the peace process that they had initiated. As for Gamini, he supported the government's move to talk to the Tigers. "Any process that leads to the cessation of hostilities is welcome. The UNP is committed to searching for peace. Talk to the LTTE, move cautiously and build up the momentum', Gamini said in an interview before his death. He stood by the Indo-Sri Lanka Accord of July 1987, but he did not regard it as the final word on the question of the resolution of the ethnic issue. He even sounded in certain interviews as if he was in favour of a federal solution.
In the days following the assassination, UNP stalwarts sought to gain political mileage in the presidential campaign by accusing the PA government of conspiracy with the LTTE in the murders. "The LTTE scented Dissanayake's victory at the presidential poll and they assassinated him to help
The severed head of assassin
the government', the Mr. M.H. Mohamed ference in Colombo. releasing LTTE detail ment had assisted il tion.
Sarath Amunugam of Parliament and a c the slain Mr. Dissan, government is bend wards to prove that partner had nothing assassination'.
Mrs. Chandrika anrgily denied the conspiracy in the mun ity in a cover-up at a on 27 October chara "diabolical and malici ing the UNP as havin a 'culture of murder' previous regime of ha with thousands of p tenure, adding that death threats at th UNIP. Both the UN had been known for unhesitatingly murd ments for political adı
Mrs. Kumaratung like the many previo solved murders and a investigations of v bungled, the goverr vestigate the assas sanayake and othel UNP fully and see perpetrators to just prepared to whitewa know that they have people including ma and their own people herself had been wa that she too was on t
In view of the dev panying the assassi with the Tiger leader
 

— -- ... --—
15 NOVEMBER 1994
the alleged
former Speaker old a press conHe said that by nees, the governin the assassina
a, UNP Member lose confidant of ayake said: "The ling over backits negotiating
to do with the
Kumaratunga, JNP's charge of "der and complicpress conference cterising it as a ous lie”. Describg been steeped in she accused the ving ‘done away eople' during its she too faced e hands of the and the LTTE consistently and ring their oppoantage'.
added that unus cases of unressassinations the hich had been ment would insination of Dis
leaders of the k to bring the ce. "We are not h the LTTE. We murdered many y Tamil leaders adding that she "ned in the past le LTTE's hitlist.
lopments accomation, the talks ship and the visit
of the government delegation had been suspended, Mrs. Kumaratunga said adding that her government was committed to continuing with the peace process with the Tamil people. She could not say when the suspended talks with the Tigers would be resumed.
Answering journalists at a press conference held on 26 October, the Inspector General of Police, Mr. Frank Silva, confirmed that just three weeks prior to the assassination, the police intelligence had warned Mr. Gamini Dissanayake of an impending threat to his life and that he was provided with additional security. He added that Gamini Dissanayake was on the hit list to be murdered for more than a year and that he had been warned. Answering a pointed question as to from which group the threat to Mr. Dissanayake came, the IGP said that it was from the LTTE. However, until the investigations were progressed he did not want to accuse the LTTE of being responsible for the bomb attack just because a suicide bomber was involved.
The family of the late Mr. Dissanayake has requested from the government that assistance from Indian experts who carried out investigations into the assassination of the former Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi should be sought. It would seem that the government of Sri Lanka has no objection to this course of action.
The police have been given a free hand with instructions from the government to conduct a thorough investigation. The site of the bomb blast had been video filmed and photographed and would remain 'sealed off covered with plastic sheeting until the completion of the investigations, and no one would be permitted to enter or tamper with the site without the permission of the Colombo magistrate.
Among the articles recovered by police at the scene of the crime were the badly mutilated severed head of the alleged woman suicide bomber, a piece from the denim jacket allegedly worn by the bomber packed with a large quantity of metal shrapnel and ball-bearings, traces of RDX C-4 plastic explosive, a 9-volt battery, pieces of wire, a hand bag with a bottle of nail polish, some personal effects and a photograph of Gamini Dissanayake.
The Judicial Medical Officer and the Government Analyst Department pieced together the mutilated face of the suspected assassin and quickly released the photograph to the media which was shown on national TV. Meanwhile, the CID of the police in Colombo confirmed that blood sample

Page 17
15 NOVEMBER 1994
and a piece of skin from the suspected assassin and some other remnants of evidence recovered from the scene of the blast had been sent to Scotland Yard for DNA and other relevant tests. The Police also released photographs showing the presence in the crowd of the suspected assassin at other previous UNP election meetings addressed by Gamini Dissanayake, thereby suggesting that those involved in the assassination carried out 'dry runs' prior to the bomb attack on 24 October.
One redeeming feature of the investigation by the police on this occasion is that they have not resorted to indiscriminate arrests of thousands of Tamils as had happened in the past after similar assassinations or bomb attacks allegedly carried out by the Tigers. Though there was some fear that communal violence might break out directed against the thousands of Tamils living in the south, particularly in Colombo and its suburbs, in the wake of the assassination and the reported involvement of the LTTE in it, not a single incident of such violence occurred. Some felt that violence might break out on the day (29 October) of the funeral of Gamini Dissanayake, it did not materialise. In fact Tamils felt completely secure enough and were seen going about their normal business without fear all over Colombo. "The dark days of July 1983 are over and over for good, and they are unlikely to be repeated, said a Christian clergyman.
From the items recovered at the scene and the method used in carrying out the assassination, police investigators and commentators have drawn an exact parallel between the assassinations of Rajiv Gandhi and Dissanayake and sought to point the finger at the LTTE as the culprit for this bomb attack.
The editor of the Lanka Guardian, Mr. Mervyn de Silva, who in his other incarnation as Kautilya writing in the Sunday Island had this to say: "The choice of target, the motive, the timing and the modus operandi established a patently obvious parallel, I thought, between the Gandhi 'hit' and the Dissanayake killing except that the number of "innocents' dead was much larger here. The salient difference lies in the larger motive. The message is addressed to the government, while scores were settled with Dissanayake. The 50 dead in the city is a reminder to Prime Minister Kumaratunga that her capital is vulnerable'.
While other commentators in Colombo were speculating on the possibility of LTTE involvement, their Indian
Free M Mi
“The FMM stro, media and the Alliance presid FMM has been too has come ur, reporting of the ofUNP preside The incidents former UNP re placed on the media freedom 1. After 17,000
Dinamina given orde by non La 2. Strict orders Broadcast Independe Newspape assassina 3. Certain stor Меиvspape pressure f 4. The state ouvri propaganc
5. The Chairm conductin, to slant all
The duties of th restricts the ch General is the C
The chairman to counter vario publicly agains, this country. It duties of an i entrusted to hin 6. The SLBC
reported t, 17 journa LTTE S Dissanayac Mr. Balla press brie Minister C Senanaya had been
The Free M. immediately ref misusing the si individuals inte Minister and t expressing their
counterparts were : about it. The edit Nov. Int.Ed.) said
the slaying by a s "human bomb” be print of the LTTE

TAMIL TIMES 17
edia Movement Condemns Suse and InterferenCe
gly condemns the misuse of the state owned electronic
Lake House Group of newspapers by the People's "ntial candidate Mrs. Chandrika B. Kumaratunga. The informed that the mainstream independent print media der strong government pressure to restrict free and fair election campaign in the aftermath of the assassination ntial candidate Mr. Gamini Dissanayake. stated herewith reminds us of the worst practices of the gime. The FMM unreservedly condemns restrictions media by the present Government which proclaimed as one of its main promises. 'opies of the Ceylon Daily News and 25,000 copies of the of 28.10.94 had been printed, the PA Government had 'rs to stop the printing. The lead stories were re-uritten ke House staff have been given by the PA Government to Sri Lanka ing Corporation, Sri Lanka Rupavhini Corporation, "nt Television Network and Lake House Group of rs not to publish stories that implicate the LTTE in the tion of Mr. Gamini Dissanayake. es that were to appear in the Lake House Group of rs implicating the LTTE had been pulled out under rom authorities. led electronic media has been used for blatant election da of the PA Government.
an of the SLRC Mr. Vasantha Raja is blatantly g a personal campaign using his authority as chairman 'l news coverage in favour of the PA. he chairman which are clearly stated in the SLRC act airman's functions to policy making. The Director hief Executive Officer.
using SLRC in the form of an interview by an outsider us personal allegations made by opposition politicians t him is unprecedented in the broadcasting history of is also unprecedented for the chairman to perform the nterviewer which is not part of the responsibilities
2. on its morning news bulletin of October 24th 1994, hat Mr. Anton Balasingham of the LTTE had told the lists who were in Jaffna to cover Peace Talks, that the not responsible for the assassination of Mr. Gamini tke. No journalist of that team neither met nor spoke to singham. When questions were raised at the cabinet fing on this blatant lie broadcast by the SLBC, the f Information, Tourism and Aviation, Mr. Dharmasiri ka promised an immediate inquiry. Up to date no action initiated to investigate this incident. edia Movement calls upon the PA Government to rain from interfering with the private owned media and late owned media. It also calls upon all groups and rested in protecting media freedom to write to the Prime he Minister of Information, Tourism and Aviation protest on this grave infringement on media freedom.’
somehow more sure liminary assessments by the Sri Lankir of The Hindu (5 an police'. that "the pattern of The high profile editor of the much
uicide bomber or a respected Indian fortnightly Frontline, ars the deadly im
, according to pre- Continued on page 20

Page 18
18 TAMIL TIMES
The national peace conference on
Building a People's
Building a People's Movement for Peace' that took place on October 25 at the BMICH unanimously adopted a peace pledge and a statement which reaffirmed a determination not to permit bombs to derail the peace process. The participants also condemned the crime that had cost over 60 lives including those of the Hon. Gamini Dissanayake, senior members of the UNP and security personnel.
Due to the curfew on October 24 the first day of the conference had to be cancelled. However on the following day a large number of participants attended the conference from every part of the country, including Jaffna, and from a wide range of social sectors including the professions, business, Buddhist and Christian clergy, universities, NGOs and the media.
In addition several experienced foreign peace activists including the Most Ven. Maha Ghosananda (Sangha Raja of Cambodia and a Nobel Peace Prize nominee), Prof. Ed Garcia (Philippines), Ms. Mari Fitzduff (Northern Ireland) and Ms. Liz Philipson (United Kingdom), all of whom were part of an International Alert team, and Mr. Inge Grosland and Mr. Are Erikson of the Norway based FORUT attended the conference.
The conference was organised by the Peace Task Force, a group of concerned citizens and organisations with the objective of promoting the peace process in Sri Lanka. The conference was preceded by a peace march and peace rally held at the Vihara Maha Dewi open air auditorium in which several thousand people from all parts of the country participated and gave expression to the common aspiration for peace.
Through a process of democratic participation the conference reached a high level of consensus in defining the vision, goals, strategies and programmes of a people's peace movement.
By a unanimous decision the Peace Task Force was mandated by the conference to strengthen its
A Section of the was
present membersh lish a National Pea a secretariat to
peace bodies at th and initiate peace
wards consolidati
movement for peac
The Ven. Maha who is regarded as spiritual guide of t ment in Cambodia his peace work ar ras' involving thou and lay people, su Buddhist teachi which do not look tc the present momen kindness and grati individuals who be within themselve peace to their fami munities and to thi
Addressing the c Ed Garcia praise ment to peace of t in attending the spite a difficult env Garcia who has wo movements in th South Africa, Guat umbia said that th was never an easy no short cuts to pe out that the people the Philippines ha overnight but had years to build. work had to be sector, he said.
Speaking of t Northern Ireland, duff said that man country had paid while working for on her experience Irish communitie
 

15 NOVEMBER 1994
p and to establce Council and network with e district level, activities tong a people's Ꮎ. l Ghosananda, a founder and he peace moveas a result of d ‘dharmayatsands of monks ummarised the ngs on peace the past but to t, truthfulness, tude, by which 2come peaceful es also bring lies, their come nation.
bnference, Prof. the commithe participants conference deironment. Prof. cked with peace Le Philippines, amala and Cole peace process one. There were ace. He pointed 's movement in not sprung up
taken over 25 Organisational done sector by
he conflict in Ms. Mari Fitzy people in that with their lives peace. Drawing n working with at the gras
MoVement for Peace
: crowd present at the Peace Rally
sroots level she explained that the IRA had not previously wanted peace on the kind of terms it now appeared to be agreeing to. But they had responded to the demand for peace articulated by the people.
The conference was presided over by the Ven. Pallekande Ratanasara Thero, Ms. Jezima Ismail and by Fr. Oswald Firth who concluded the day's activities by reading out a peace pledge in which all the participants participated.
Peace Declaration
The following is the text of the Declaration of the National Peace Conference held on October 25, 1994 at the Bandaranalike International Conference Hall, Colombo:
For all who agonise over the destruction of a war that has lasted for over a decade, for all who cherish the values of solidarity, equality and non-violence as the foundation for building a democratic social order in which people can live without fear, the achievement of a just and lasting peace is the central issue of the hour.
Despite the horrendous bombing that yesterday claimed the lives of a large number, including several political leaders, the cry of the people for peace and reconciliation is one that must be heeded.
At this National Peace Conference, we who are gathered here as citizens and representatives of people's organizations, workers, professionals, academics, entrepreneurs, business persons and NGOs, and who are committed to a just and lasting peace, do hereby resolve to adopt and implement a plan of action to build up a culture

Page 19
15 NOVEMBER 1994
Rev. Nandagosha of Cambodia
of peace and justice before the force of vested interests and inertia move back in to continue with war making.
The political experience in our country since independence has shown us that we, the peace loving people of Sri Lanka, cannot rely on the established political system alone to achieve a democratic peace and national integration. A parallel people's initiative is needed that unites, networks and mobilises all the democratic forces in a strategic alliance for a just and durable peace.
The costs of the war are beyond measure. In terms of human life, more than 30,000 people have lost their lives in the decade that has passed... Several thousand members of the security forces and armed militants have also laid down their lives on the battlefield. The human suffering of those hundreds and thousands who have either been injured or have lost their loved ones and suffered mental trauma, especially women, cannot even begin to be estimated. More than 250,00 children live displaced in the country.
The economic costs of the war
are enOOS.
houses and 20,00 been destroyed. than 20 percen ment's budget w, defence. All the decades of develo negated upon the of civil war with ing most heavily
Mandate
We are conv wealth of spiritu the pervasive s among our peo enough to create for a breakthrou and heal the d behind by this wi
We have come neying togethe hardships, in se ourselves and for erations. With obtained at this Conference to st sent membership a National Peace accompanying Se work with peace national and dist initiate peace a consolidating the ment.
Examples of P
1) Peace Edu for peace educa integrating peac the human righ the school sylla seminars formed
2) Inter-Faith volving religious work, teaching other religions, fo groups at the loca in peace work.
3) Constitutio plementing the O Act, ensuring po devolution of pow
4) Economic Identifying grassl mic projects invol cooperation, di oppresed econom vise viable altern
5) Resource C. expert studies c. ethnic relations issues and public bying with policy.
 

TAMIL TIMES 19
In 1988, 70,000 )0 businesses had
By 1993, more t of the governas being spent on achievements of pment have been 2 ashes and ruins the burdens fallupon the poorest.
inced that the al resources and pirit of goodwill ple are forceful the space needed gh towards peace
eep wounds left .
3. a longway, jourr amidst many arch of peace for * our future genthe mandate National Peace rengthen its preand to establish Council and an ecretariat to neta groups at the rict levels and to ctivities towards people's move
eace Activities cation: Lobbying tion in schools, e education into ts component of bus, conducting lia personnel. Cooperation: Inclergy in peace children about rming inter-faith all level to engage
nal Reform: Imfficial Languages wer sharing and
rer.
Development: roots level econoving multi-ethnic aloguing with ic sectors to deatives.
entre: Collecting oncerning inter, summarising ising them, lobmakers.
Professor Thurairajah Memoria Fund
The untimely death of Professor Thurairajah, formerly Dean of the Faculty of Engineering, Peradeniya and later Vice-Chancellor of University of Jaffna has shocked his friends, his former students and the academic community in Sri Lanka. He dedicated his life to better the life of others through higher education. To show our appreciation for what Thurai had done and achieved during his lifetime, former students of Hartley College, Faculty of Engineering, Jaffna University and friends have started a Memorial Fund to (i) Award scholarships in memory of Thurai and (ii) Dedicate a building such as a laboratory or library at the Faculty of Engineering. Similar funds are being organised by friends and former Students in USA, Canada, Australia and Singapore.
Please make a contribution to the memorial fund as soon as possible, of a cheque for any amount you like and send to one of us.
Dr. K. Sivakumaran Mr. W.Santhalingam 60 Blakes Lane, 15 ThanesCroft Gdins
New Malden Croydon KT36NX CRO 5 JR
Phone:
work: 07-322-2319 work: 071-921 2275 hone: 081-949 2614 home: 081-6863,356
Cheques to be drawn in favour of "Prof. Thurairajah Memorial Fund'.

Page 20
20 TAMIL TIMES
Tamils Should Wal
Point of View by Rajan Hoole
An even darker gloom hangs over the future of this country and particularly of the Tamils following the recent bomb explosion in Colombo, where a suicide bomber ended her life together with the lives of 55 others, including that of the UNP's presidential candidate, Gamini Dissanayake.
Where this differed from such incidents earlier was that we were at the beginning of negotiating a settlement to our devastating civil war. Where the new government led by Chandrika Kumaratunga was concerned, the sincerity was beyond question. Nor were major snags envisaged on the government’s side at this juncture.
A particular incident gives an indication of the Prime Minister's mind. She drove up to the residence of a Tamil group and went to talk to him without any security. The leader who himself faced a security threat thought her rather reckless. She spoke to him words to the effect, "I am very desirous of
bringing an end do not know hov get the Tamil gr talk to them. We all the groups in But at this stag settled program
The peac
The most imp the course for pe ground in the So firmly prepared a by a number of c through journals mass meeting chauvinistic posi attack. Even the chy was not spa atunga herself nistic positions idential campai. those holding th kill Sinhalese B the battlefields ( in the name of sa Buddhist nation,
But on the Tau no public reap)
there any move the level of intel
Continued from page 17
Mr. N. Ram, has absolutely no doubt about Tiger involvement: "Who assassinated Gamini and more than fifty others so brutally on October 24? Only those with political blinkers or worse can entertain even a residue of doubt that it is the LTTE - and further, that it is the LTTE as an organisation carrying out orders from the very top.
“First, there is the question of capability. No other extremist, separatist, terrorist organisation in the region has demonstrated anything remotely approaching this capability to take out top and highly secured political leaders through military-grade explosives. Ranjan Wijeratne, Rajiv Gandhi, Premadasa and now Gamini....not one serious investigative or intelligence expert in India, Sri Lanka or Pakistan has the whiff of a doubt whose capability this represents. . . .
"Secondly, the capability is multiplied manyfold and rendered a great menace to democratic politics by the self-sacrificing suicide element fielded by the LTTE through its shadowy and little researched arm, the Black Tigers. . . .
Thirdly, there is us operandi and grade RDX explosi pellets, the batter ing system, the d cealment under a thing, the severed bomber thrown to tance, the LTTE friend and motiv cyanide capsule, t able parallels wit assassination. . . .
Finally, there
motive, as imp analysis as it is t tion. It has been n that Gamini wa LTTE as an anta capable political le extremist path an as one who ente about the ways c supremo, Prabak known, high prior Eliminating Gami political advers taneously confus the system'.

15 NOVEMBER 1994
Ke Up
to this conflict. I ', but we have to ups together and will be talking to luding the LTTE. : I do not have a
e.
e process
rtant element in :ace was that the uth was becoming mong the masses lemocratic groups , publications and s. Traditional tions came under
Buddhist hierarred. Mrs Kumarattacked chauviduring her presgn. She accused em of wanting to uddhist youth on of the North-East lving the Sinhala
mil side there was praisal, nor was ment, even say at lectuals, clergy or
students, to discuss matters pertaining to peace. It was clear that the LTTE would not permit even a glimmer of democratisation. The message was given to the people in a number of ways that the peace talks publicly endorsed by the leader would be an expedient managed entirely by the LTTE.
Terror and dissimulation
Reactions of Sinhalese to the recent bomb blast gave us some insight into how polarised this country had become. But beyond that there was despair about the chances of peace. At the same time many of them continued to be open about what they felt. Among Tamils, reactions ranged from evasion to callousness showing also the atomisation ofTamil society. The first reaction in Jaffna to an incident such as the bomb blast is invariably one of fear and hopelessness.
These are reflections of a cultural transformation that has its origins in the legitimisation of a violent Tamil nationalism by the July 1983 holocaust and the use of the state terror against the community on the one hand, and the total control of the LTTE in the
the matter of modsignature. The high ve, mixed with steel y operated detonateadly mode of conyoung woman’s clohead of the suicide a considerable discadres inseparable ating weapon the he other unmistakthe Rajiv Gandhi
is the question of rtant to political a police investigasecret in Sri Lanka identified by the gonist, as a highly ader who stood in its d was close to India, rtained no illusion f the LTTE and its ran. Gamini was a ty LTTE target.... ni takes out a major ary while simulng and weakening
Commentators consider it significant that the LTTE leadership did not make an official denial of responsibility for the assassination although many had pointed their accusing finger at them. The normal practice of the LTTE in similar past instances is that a formal denial would be made by its London office or by its international spokesman based in Paris, Mr. Lawrence Thilakar. On this occasion, despite being approached by news agencies including the BBC, there was no disclaimer from either London or Paris.
An alleged report of the LTTE's denial of responsibility for the bomb attack attributed to the Reuter TV correspondent, Mr. Waruna Karunatilleke, who was present in Jaffna on the morning of 24 October along with 16 other journalists has been vigorously refuted by the correspondent himself. The alleged Reuter report broadcast over the Sri Lanka Broadcasting Corporation and picked up by many news agencies has been the subject of a formal complaint by the correspondent concerned to the Minister of Information and Broadcasting, Mr. Dharmasiri Senanayake.

Page 21
15 NOVEMBER 1994
North on the other. The LTTE offered the elite enough space to safeguard their personal and institutional interests provided they fell in line with its regime. The process of adjustment also left its imprint on character. Sections of the elite and Christian clergy while being compromised with the oppressive regime in the North through directly legitimising it or turning a blind eye to its violations against Tamil people themselves, received a new unprecedented importance in Colombo and the world. They came to be treated as spokesmen for the oppressed Tamil people - with the state allowed to be the sole oppressor.
Such phenomena contributed to the legitimisation of the LTTE among the Tamil diaspora and in Colombo. It helped the Tamil elite to feel good while sympathising with the LTTE without raising key questions about the nature of the LTTE, its history, what it was doing to the Tamil community and what it meant for their future.
The absence of political discussion
In this atmosphere it is hardly
surprising that there is no serious discussion of crucial issues. The leading Tamil parliamentary party, the TULF, is mostly inert. Prof. Suriyakumaran is an experienced civil servant closely involved in the negotiations on the ethnic issue between national leaders from the 50s. At a recent seminar he gave an account of his experiences, the constitutional issues and testifying to the earnestness with which S.W.R.D. Bandaranaike, Dudley Senayake, Sirimavo Bandaranaike had approached the problem. The blame for the failures he said was not unmixed.
President Premadasa had alked to the LTTE until June 1990 when the war resumed. Suriyakumaran testified to the gravity with which Premadasa nad addressed the vexed question of colonisation, even checking some leading military men who wanted to dodge the issue. Then asked what went wrong, Prof. Suriyakumaran reportedly admitred he was puzzled. Compared with his painstaking study of the
state and its Suriyakumaran done little hor LTTE.
Much of what opinion in the pl and at NGO spor ferences is just that plays safe w
One of the i issues was the ce the LTTE at the tions. The people had a traumatic the ceasefire whi 1990. For some in the LTTE ran t the army stayed manner in which incensed army massacring civili down even persor dealings with th clear that ceasefi full had to be ac process of demili resumption of inc activity with acci such could minin) of recurrence of v June 1990.
Apart from this remained to be a a ceasefire woul freedom and acco people in hitherto areas? How it w tions between Tal which were on going through a LTTE leaders' p recent BBC inte turn of Muslim Jaffna cannot be the Muslims as a tained that the M turn to Jaffna pr vacated the islan refugees are supp tion of Muslim h What would hav tion if the Sri Lar had expelled the ombo and maint cannot return houses were occu forced to leave Ja
What happene was that several spokesmen and newspapers bas echoed the LTTE fire without exam

TAM TIMES 21
workings, Prof. had evidently nework on the
passes for Tamil ress, at seminars nsored peace conplain posturing ith the LTTE. mportant recent easefire called by outset of negotiain the provinces experience with ch ended in June nonths until then hese areas while in camps. The it ended found an coming out and ans and hunting s with innocuous e LTTE. It was re to be meaningcompanied by a tarisation and a ormal democratic ountability. Only mise the prospect what happened in
s, other questions nswered: whether d entail greater untability for the army controlled Tould affect relamils and Muslims the mend after bad period? The osition during a rview on the res expelled from encouraging for whole. He mainMuslims could reovided the army nds, whose Tamil osedly in occupahouses in Jaffnal e been the posikan government Tamils from Colained that they because their pied by Sinhalese
ffna? ed in the event articulate Tamil popular Tamil ed in Colombo 's call for a ceasehining the issues.
In the provinces many were alarmed at the prospect of having to go through the same harrowing experiences again, but were in no position to voice their fears. Experienced Tamil leaders who privately expressed concern found it prudent to keep silent.
The LTTE: Some Salient aspects
A good deal of the recent history of the Tamils has been recorded. Moreover Sabaratnam Sabalingam and Rajini Thiranagama who were recording that history, paid with their lives. Why was this history sounpalatable to a “liberation group"? Despite these tell-tale signs people long concerned about the Tamil problem from the south and abroad have found it difficult to internalise the character of the LTTE and grasp its mindset. After every tragedy where the LTTE is accused of culpability, there is confusion. People repeatedly ask why should the LTTE do such a thing when it was neither in the interests of the Tamils nor in its own interests.
Those who best understand the LTTE are the Tamils and particularly the very ordinary people from its heartland. Not least among the reasons why they will not speak out is that few would believe them.
Whether it was the killing of Vilmaleswaran, Panchalingam, Amirthalingam, Rajini or Sabalingam, as soon as these people grasped what had happened, they had a clear idea about who was responsible. They were also closely attuned to the nuances of LTTE behaviour, which did nothing to shake their confidence in their conclusions. Even in the killings of Rajiv Gandhi in India, Sabalingam in Paris and of leaders in the South, there was much confusion worldwide about the LTTE's responsibility. But in Jaffna there was no confusion.
Such knowledge as in these instances could be termed organic. It may be falsifiable in the Popperian sense. But the event of such knowledge turning out to be false would be comparable with all human senses through which the world is
Continued on page 23

Page 22
22 TAMIL TIMES
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Continued from page 21 conceptualised failing simultaneously.
Because of their very gut feelings about the recent bomb explo
sion in Colombo, and the uncer
tainties of life in Colombo from several quarters, many Tamils there would argue for the culpability of some group other than the LTTE. In Jaffna there was little confusion among crowds awaiting the negotiating team from Colombo that fatal morning. As they quickly dispersed home in the expectation of aerial bombers, they were heard to remark, "These fellows (the LTTE) will never let us enjoy peace!'
Glorification of Suicide
A high rate of suicide has been known in Jaffna for sometime. The causes have ranged from a sense of failure in a very competitive society to seemingly trivial domestic reasons such as a harsh word carelessly uttered. Quite frequently the victim after swallowing poison had repented the action and tried to commiserate the family while life ebbed away. There was no attempt by any scholar to find causes in Sangam Tamil culture of 2000 years ago. They seemed too evident in very modern socio-economic conditions peculiar to Jaffna. But once the LTTE took over this tendency to suicide and gave it institutional form to serve its need, the disposition to historical romanticism appeared to become irresistible.
Often the decision to join the LTTE is itself an act of partial suicide. Once the decision is taken, it is generally too late for regrets unless the parents are well to do and influential. After being part of the group and imbibing its culture, many of the cadre would spontaneously volunteer for suicide operations. Like in a religious cult group the motivations are varied. Among members there would be some general tendencies, and yet some of the individuals exceptionally talented and steady in their motivation. The tasks too require varied skill. The more rare and exceptional ones may be required to operate alone for long periods and take decisions. The
more common ope of the kind wher has to get into an vehicle, press the hold the steering.
Can a Catastrop
An unfortunate rained habit of ligentsia, is to ex done by Tamils, xious, by a refere ror. Such are an surfacing in the media following sion. It may be sa correct, but utt maintain this pe has to be ignored characterised as manently demoni South trying to position of the Tai for its ameliorat devalued and mar happened for de that we could con the siren of Tami
The reality tod commendable wor in the South, an rant peace constit er had before. In that have seen past, Sinhalese some political gro out to express sh that such would n There is a govern influenced by th There are also openings to chall end to state ter politics has been destroy all this, cl and give initiati terror, chauvinisir both sides.
We cannot jus violence as acts viduals, militants are talking abou multinational in may be more el countries than t foreign service. It which can suppre Tamil society tha decent, while mob ing very efficient tion and everythi
We stand in dar opportunity and i

TAMIL TIMES 23
rations would be e the volunteer explosive laden accelerator and
he be averted?
, but deeply ingthe Tamil intelplain everything however obnonce to State ternong sentiments Tamil printed the bomb explofe and politically arly sterile. To osition diversity , and the South essentially perc. Those in the understand the mils and working ion need to be ginalised, as has cades, in order tinue to seek out
nationalism.
ay is that much k has been done d there is a vibuency as we nevprovincial towns violence in the people, not just pups, have come ame and pledge ot happen again. ment very much Lese sentiments.
unprecedented enge and put an ror. But Tamil moving so as to ose all the space fe over to state n and murder on
t look at Tamil of angry indior terrorists. We t a fully fledged stitution which fective in some he Sri Lankan is an institution ss everything in t is healthy and ilising and utilisy all the alienang that is base.
ger of losing this n turn triggering
off a virulence of the kind not witnessed before. A question many sensitive Tamils have asked since mid-1986 is whether a society can breed something like the LTTE within its womb and come out in one piece? Or, is it necessarily fated to destruction? Many of us, despite our thinning numbers, have continued to say, 'No, there is hope'. If that hope is to be realised, we need to open out, pose the necessary questions, and deprive the LTTE leadership of legitimacy for doing what it has done. Only the Tamils can do that, and the Tamils should wake up to fulfil their responsibility. (The writer is a member of the UTHR (Jaffna) and co-author of the “Broken Palmyra”).
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Page 24
24 TAMILTIMES
Bangalore, Uttarakhand, K
Violence Erupts in St
T.N. Gopalan
Even in the best of times the integrity of the Indian Union has been considered tenuous.
How long the unity would hold out in the face of fissiparous tendencies breaking out almost everywhere has remained a subject of animated, rather anxious and apprehensive debate.
The issue seemed to have acquired renewed urgency in October when two serious agitations broke out - one in the hill-districts of Uttar Pradesh in the north and in Bangalore in the south while the situation continued to deteriorate in Kashmir.
While the Uttarakhand (the hill region) and the Bangalore eruptions were qualitatively different in nature, each with its own set of players and issues at stake, there was nevertheless a common thread - the people losing confidence in the centre as an impartial administrator, taking it out on 'soft' targets while New Delhi itself could only look on helplessly.
The anti-Urdu agitation which rocked Bangalore, the capital of Karnataka, for nearly a week from October 3, was more insidious than the incidents in U.P. in that Hindu fundamentalism has now started sweeping across the south of the Vindhyas too and so also the persecution of Muslims.
Not that the South has exactly been a paradise for the minorities, but surely Muslims have been more integrated into the mainstream than elsewhere in the country, they have indeed played significant roles in local political mobilisation programmes, to wit the Dravidian movement and there is much less suspicion about their “bonafides’ than in the North.
Sociologists tirelessly point out, it is even a cliche here, since the impact of the Mughal invasion has been minimal apart from of course the Islamisation of a small section of society, the Hindu-Muslim relationship is relatively on an even keel. The partition holocaust left the South untouched, it may be recalled.
But then things do change. Pressures of continued economic underdevelopment or skewed development, expanding population and thoroughly incompetent governments have all contributed to tensions, frictions
and misdirec India too. Ad ing to minori eye on the vo tion of the N puram distric led governme the Middle E mix for comm
Ironically i population o majority of usually descr volatile and than their ot has become communal vi
While Hyd Andhra Prae another flas even a longe complex inter
the legacy of
lems there ge confined to th
On the ot tendencies sa firm root in in the last fe communal B. (BJP) has strong prese Karnataka in its hold varie to inconseque
Muslims co cent of the tot lack leaders o have mot dor thanks to so tioned earlie ga self-assert ities, the Mu venient whip had experien the Kannadi anti-cauvery years ago).
In Novem terests in th had orchestr; tion against leading Engli nataka since story allege sentiments.
Mohammec translated f lampoon all k but there wa disrespectful alleged.

15 NOVEMBER 1994
(ashmir. . .
ateS
ted violence in South i to this foolish panderty sentiments with an te-bank, witness creaMuslim-majority Malat in Kerala by Marxistnt and the oil boom in last - indeed a classic Lunal conflagrations.
t is Karnataka with a f around 1.5 crores, a them Kannadigas, ibed as a docile lot, less
less politically aware her neighbours, which the first victim to the
U.S.
erabad, the capital of desh, too has been h point, perhaps for er period because of a play of forces including a Muslim ruler, probnerally tend to remain he capital city. her hand anti-Muslim eem to have taken a the Kannadiga psyche w years. The blatantly haratiya Janata Party indeed established a nce here - and only the South, elsewhere s from being negligible ntial. nstitute hardly ten per cal population and they f stature. Though they Le well by themselves, me of the factors men', increasing Kannadion found in the minorslims especially, a conping boy. (Tamils too ced the bitter taste of ga wrath during the tribunal riots two
ber 1987 vested ine Muslim community ated a big demonstrathe Deccan Herald, a sh newspaper of Karit had carried a short dly hurting Muslim
l, the idiot, the story, rom Malayalam, did inds of religious beliefs Ls nothing specifically of the prophet as was
Any way mob hysteria was aroused, and the office of the newspaper laid siege to. The publisher. gave in abjectly and apologised un sack cloth and ashes. There was some stoning some tear-gassing, b . " there were no killings. However, the incident left a bad taste in the mouth - that some hoodlums cou. hold the press to ransom was to have some serious implications later on Incidentally, a Cong-I leader. allegedly a notorious smuggler, had led that demonstration. It should also be of interest to note that the Malayalam original had not created even a ripple in Kerala itself where Muslims are an important factor in the polity.
Three years later when the BJP leader, Mr L.K. Advani took out his famous rath yatra demanding ti - building of a temple for Lord Rama in Ayodhya after demolishing the Babri Masjid which had been bu . " there, riots broke out, of all places in the far away Karanataka.
Ram Jyoti processions, coinciding with the Dasara festival and deliberately routed through Muslim areas and streets in which mosques stor. inevitably gave rise to repeatec clashes, from near Bangalore to Mysore. More than 80 lives were lost. a majority of them Muslims.
The BJP did gain in the procees, polling 28.3 per cent in the Lo... . Sabha elections in 1991 and winning four seats. Having experienced the sweet taste of success, the Hinc - fundamentalists went on the offensive at every possible opportunity thereafter.
There were riots in the wake of the demolition of the Babri Masjid ir December 1992. Then there was th hullaballoo over the hoisting of the national flag in the Idgah Maidan in Hubli, where prayers are held only twice a year but whose legal status is under dispute.
When the BJP hoisted the flag at the Maidan amid some fuss by the police, who perhaps feared commurall clashes, Muslims reacted bac and fell victims to the BJP designs This year there was an encore and five BJP activists were killed in ti - police firing. But the party's political stocks went up - the only party standing up for patriotism in the face of unpatriotic minorities and a weak-kneed government and so on. This time round just the introduction of a 10-minute bulletin in Urdu. in order avowedly to bring the Urduspeaking Muslims into the national

Page 25
to NOVEMBER 1994
mainstream, sparked off a carnage claiming 25 lives and injuring 343 others besides of course destroying properties worth crores of rupees.
The ten-minute programme launched on Oct.2 and beamed by the Bangalore channel of the Doordarshan (as the India TV establishment is called) would cut into the Kannada programme and thus “affect the development of the language, it was feared, and even supposedly respectable organisations like the Kannada Sahitya Parishad demanded the withdrawal of the bulletin.
While the motive of the government of India (which has complete control over the TV network) was not above board, with elections in the state only a few months away, the Urdu bulletin is rightly seen as an attempt to mollify the minority vote bank, the Kannada reaction was ridiculous in the extreme, to put it mildly.
The Hindu fundamentalist organisations promptly stepped in and what started off as a Save Kannada campaign turned into a Destroy Muslims agitation. Of the 25 persons killed as many as 17 (most of them Muslims) were stabbed to death in various parts of Bangalore, an indication of the nature of the communal frenzy whipped up during the agitation.
Ultimately the bulletin was withdrawn. Even the Election Commission saw the introduction as an unfair electoral practice. The Muslim director of the Bangalore TV station was transferred out. Those behind the murderous campaign, many of them "eminent Kannada litterateurs”, remain unfazed. “If the agitation took a communal turn, we can't be held responsible, they say. "We are clear about our issue...'
The Cong-I is understandably nervous about the developments and only hope that the Muslim votebank would still remain with it. According to an opinion poll carried out in September, the Cong-I was still way ahead with the Janata Dal and the BJP running neck and neck. What will happen now is anybody's guess. Of greater concern are the fresh wounds inflicted on the Muslim community.
The agitation of the eight hill districts (out of a total of 65 districts in the entire state) is a different kettle of fish altogether, but there again the complete abdication of responsibility by both the central and the state government and the consequent alienation of the people
are striking and to the situation c taka.
The demand f comprising the b, a long-pending Uttar Pradesh unanimously a ing to the Centr such a state.
Even as the
dallying on the is Singh Yadav, the and projected as the Backward C hornets' nest by per cent reserva educational insti areas too.
The problem i plains the backy predominant sec reservation tremendous bac hill districts th form a mere two population.
Such an irrati as an attack on t to education.
"This will onl castemen comin occupying the a in the education the people.
But Mr. Yada would not back ( tottering govern fall, all the bette) a martyr behind the polls in the seats in the State come from the h: in the last elect Party of Mr. Ya seat in the area.
The man who 1 maverick Dalit le a junior partner and bends backw Minister Narash the continued sul refused to bow Uttarakhand agi
The anti-reser plea for a separa scoped into one b
Mr. Yadav un force on the activi More than 20 per police firing and in September la Gandhi Jayanthi Delhi-bound rall over 100 injured, sing in Muzaffarr were wild allega

TAMIL TIMES 25
akin in many ways obtaining in Karna
or a separate state ackward districts is one, and even the
Assembly passed resolution suggest'e the formation of
Centre was dillyissue, Mr. Mulayam UP Chief Minister the new Messiah of astes, stirred up a
extending the 27 ation (in jobs and tutions) to the hill
is that while in the ward castes are the tion and hence the for mula enjoys king there, in the e backward castes per cent of the total
onal formula is seen he hill peoples' right
y mean the GM's g to the hills and lready scarce seats al institutions, say
v was adamant. He lown. If his already ment was going to r - with the halo of him he could sweep plains; of the 425 Assembly, only 19 ill region, and even ions the Samjwadi dav won only one
trembles before the 2ader Kanshi Ram, in his government ard to please Prime ima Rao to ensure oport of the Cong-I, down before the tationists.
vation cry and the te state have teleig agitation now. leashed his police sts time and again. 'sons were killed in 200 others injured st. Again, on the day, at least 15 yists were killed, many others misLagar besides there tions of rape and
molestation of the women activists by the Provincial Armed Constabulary.
You had this gem from the District Magistrate - "You see, it is a human tendency. When a woman is seen at a lonely place in the jungle, any man will be inclined to rape her. . . "
Presently the administration has come to a standstill in the famous Dehra Dun and other areas. The centre would not give in to the demand for a separate state for fear of more such clamour elsewhere nor would it care to advise the Mulayam Singh government to be more sensible on the reservation issue in view of the realities in the hill district nor yet dare dismiss it for fear of incurring the wrath of the Backward Castes though the U.P. Cong-I unit's president and former Chief Minister N.D. Tiwari is demanding the dismissal.
When Uttarakhand will become Kashmir, only then the state of Uttarakhand would be conceded,” proclaims a banner of the rallyists in the districts - a pointer to the shape of things to come.
In Kashmir itself militants are stepping up the attacks, and the security forces had to lay a prolonged siege to apprehend just two militants holed up in a residential area and the government is not even able to publicly go through with the process of revising the electoral rolls what with the government officials refusing to cooperate and militants threatening all concerned with dire consequences.
Though the centre is constantly talking of holding elections, almost to a man all the Kashmiris are dead set against such a course of action without some commitment on the issue of autonomy.
Apparently the centre believes the Punjab model will work here - a low-voter-turn-out election there five years ago actually proved a turning point in the battle against the Khalistanis. But what the mandarins seem to fail to understand is that the separatist movement there was never a mass movement and hence quelling the rebellion, especially when the various outfits were engaging themselves in mindless terrorism, did become a feasible task.
But in the case of Kashmir right from the beginning the accession of the state to the Indian Union has
Continued on page 26

Page 26
26 AMIL TIMES
Was C.N. Annadurai a CA
by T.N. Gopalan
Was the historic anti-Hindi agitation in Tamil Nadu in 1965 CIAinspired? The irrepressible Chief Election Commissioner T.N. Seshan who was the Collector of Madurai district then seems to believe such indeed was the case and has said so to his biographer K.Govindan Kutty, predictably raising a lot of hackles.
Like a pack of wolves the Tamil Nadu politicians have pounced upon Mr. Seshan for making such a sacrilegious statement and demanded unconditional apology from him besides the deletion of the offending passages from the book titled "Seshan: An Intimate Story', to be brought out by the Konark Publishers.
Presently as many as four different High Court injunctions have been issued at Madras against the release of the controversial book on pleas from Chief Minister Jayalalitha, DMK president M. Karunanidhi, MDMK general secretary V. Gopalasamy and sons of Mr. Annadurai.
While Mr. Seshan himself, for a change, appears conciliatory, declaring his "unlimited respect' for the late DMK-founder and denying that he had at all made any insinuations of Mr. Annadurai's links with the CIA, the publishers are reported to have refused to remove the passages in question.
In fact despite the court injunction some copies of the book are said to be available for sale in some bookshops in New Delhi. The controversy is unlikely to die a natural death, and Mr. Seshan himself might be unable to set foot in Tamil Nadu yet again unless he obliges his critics by unconditionally withdrawing his remarks against Mr. Annadurai.
Continued from page 25
been a matter of dispute, and, misguided or otherwise, the Kashmiris are totally alienated. Any election now could spark off more killings, feel many well-meaning observers. Even the very loyal Farooq Abdullah is demanding a package before the elections are held.
All the same the Rao government is lumbering on, hoping for some straws or other to clutch at and swim ashore in the forthcoming nationwide elections. With what results, one has to wait and see.
It must be rer notwithstandin course of the D and almost the the Dravidian most certainly of ism of the kind p platforms of the between the for the anti-Hindi pl and more than gures like Periy durai are almost State.
To make even ments on Periya nothing but inv and vitriol from dian outfits the s
In fact referrin as anything brother) in publ venture, never tions to Tamil ments might be bious if any dispa undertaken.
A few years ag the state gover over the coals fol DMK's official o daring to refer ti merely as "Mr. as Anna. In th reverential appe though the Engli fer to use the fi much to the an like Mr. Karu only wring their this lack of res pioneer of the sel and the elitism press'.
It may be rer Mr. Karunani Annadurai as t. Tamil Nadu ( leaders like chezhian and K. was he who mac Annadurai, ere and so on, all proclaim his loy er and position ter's natural he
The matinee placed Karunal greater compu devotion to Mr. ty itself was ná leader.
Mr. Seshan,

15 NOVEMBER 1994
Agent?
embered here that g the chequered avidian movement total extinction of alues and beliefs, the Tamil nationalopounded from the
Dravidian parties ies and the sixties, ank is a potent one, that the father fiar and Mr. Annasacred cows in the
mildly critical comor Mr. Annadurai is iting the wrath of the myriad Dravitate is flooded with.
g to Mr. Annadurai but Anna (elder ic is itself a risky mind his contribusociety or achieve; found rather duissionate analysis is
to a senior official of nment was hauled days on end in the rgan, Murasoli, for o the DMK-founder Annadurai' and not e Tamil press the llation is the norm Ish newspapers preull name, of course noyance of leaders lanidhi who could hands helplessly at pect for the great f-respect movement
of the Brahmin
embered here that hi succeeded Mr. le Chief Minister of utsmarting senior Wr. V.R. NedunAnbazhagan, and it ea cult figure of Mr. ting statues for him in an attempt to alty to the late leadhimself as the lat
r. idol MGR who disidhi had even more sions to flaunt his Annadurai, his parmed after the great
n arrogant bureauc
rat who exults in bullying others and is generally portrayed as a crusader for probity in public life despite his shady past and many questionable and opportunist actions as the Chief Election Commissioner, unwittingly stepped on a mine-field when he told his biographer that the anti-Hindi agitation in Tamil Nadu had been inspired by the CIA and that Mr. Annadurai himself was part of the game.
The agitation itself had been sparked off by the then Lal Bahadur Shastri government's decision to make Hindi the sole official language of the nation in blatant violation of the assurance of Mr. Jawaharlal Nehru that English would be continued to be used as the official language so long as the non-Hindispeaking states so desired.
It was a spontaneous outburst, led primarily by the student community and, in a short time, the entire state was up in flames. Ultimately the centre had to give in. The North Indian leaders never again thought of taking even one step towards making Hindi the sole official language.
The agitation was indeed a watershed in the history of Tamil Nadu, perhaps of the Indian Union itself. But no political party including the DMK had anything to do with mobilising the people on the issue.
Perhaps all the bottled up Tamil nationalist feelings burst out in an almost volcanic eruption, for the first and last time in the recent history of Tamil Nadu.
DMK did of course support the agitation and subsequently cashed in on it too.
Thanks mainly to the inept handling of the agitation by the then Congress government in the state, the DMK was catapulted to power in the elections which followed two years later.
The Congress in the state never recovered from that blow and has been almost completely marginalised.
Be that as it may, the day the Indian Express carried a preview of the book, mentioning the remarks of Mr. Annadurai, all hell broke lose. Initially Mr. Seshan sat tight and even reportedly sought increased security during his future visits to Tamil Nadu.
On the eve of the formal release of the book at New Delhi, Ms. Jayalalitha in her capacity as general secretary of the AIADMK sought an

Page 27
15 NOVEMBER 1994
injunction since the book contained “blasphemous' and "defamatory' allegations against the late leader.
In viewing the urgency of the matter, a judge of the Madras High Court held a special sitting at his residence on Sunday and promptly granted the injunction.
Even as Ms. Jayalalitha was gloating in her 'victory' and scoffing at the DMK demonstrations and MDMK and book-burning in New Delhi, Mr. Seshan came out with his mollifying statement referred to earlier. Three more injunctions too have been granted. The book release has indeed been stalled - though some copies are in circulation - but the issue-starved Tamil Nadu politicians will now allow the controversy to die down and perhaps get the passages in question excised before it is sold legally.
Amid all the brouhaha no one seems to have remembered that there is something called freedom of expression - while describing the anti-Hindi agitations as CIAinspired or saying that Mr.Annadurai was, wittingly or unwittingly a pawn of the agency's hand, might sound ridiculous in the extreme or even perverse, still everyone is entitled to have his or her say in the matter. Creating Rushdies and Taslimas all round is not going to be conducive for a democratic society. But nothing of this sort was ever said in the media except for comments from the likes of Mr. Arun Shourie in New Delhi.
Even a person like Mr. B.S. Raghavan, a retired IAS official who had served in the central secretariat during the anti-Hindi agitation, gleefully jumped onto the bandwagon and lashed out at Mr. Seshan wondering how come a mere district collector sitting 2,000 miles away from the headquarters of intelligence bureaus could pronounce authoritatively on the information passed on to the government.
Even susbequently Mr. Seshan as Cabinet Secretary could not have come across any such information, he affirmed.
If a Chief Minister conveniently donning the role of a party functionary could warn the Court of 'serious problems of public order' from the agitated followers of the great leader if an injunction was not granted straightaway, a retired IAS official too could perhaps pillory Mr. Seshan after the latter sought to defuse the crisis through some placatory remarks.
“Annadurai per it, but he was bec plaything of the gence machinery said, persisted M. Mr. Seshan's hi tracking, and it Annadurai was allow himself to plaything, but ar that, and was witl other leaders of th ifying as CIA age anything more di paraging?” he crie
Continued from pa
The PA's origi cused on issues 1 reconciliation, co alleviation of sufi cally disadvantag with Mr. Dissana date, the arithr favour the PA. I. liamentary elect majority of less t PA's allies could tional 400,000 T. votes and thereb. ble Chandrika’s I
The new cand sanayake althou known as her hus less admired for dignity. She is a c who has been c. with Gamini in h issued a respon calling upon the restraint and to the aftermath of ing. Even if there public support, it would significant toral outcome. struggle has wea siveness of the Party and had it electoral campaig
The IPA has c that it intends to ecutive presidenc of about eight m committee of Parl constituted to un hensive reforms tures of the const if necessary the placement of the e tion. Amongst the select Committee the executive pre

laps did not know )ming an effective American's intelli...' the book has . Raghavan after lf-hearted backonly meant that lumb enough to ecome not just a effective one at ssly watching the e movement qualhts. ʻCan there be respectful or disout in anguish.
TAM TIMES 27
“And how dare Mr. Seshan describe the spontaneous near-revolt of the Tamils as "fits of fury” indulged in by "illiterate and semiliterate mobs"? What a monumental lack of sensitivity?
Sensitivity or otherwise, freedom of expression has received yet another rude jolt - perhaps the only matter of satisfaction for the discerning is that a bully has met with his match at last and it will be sometime before he regains his composure.
ge 14
nal campaign foelating to ethnic rruption and the ering of economiged groups. Even yake as a candinetic seemed to n the recent parions PA had a han 400,000. The mobilise an addiamil and Muslim y effectively doumajority. idate Srima Disgh not as well band is nonetheher grace and Kompetent lawyer losely associated is public life. She sible statement public to exercise avoid violence in this brutal killis some shift in is unlikely that it ly alter the elecThe leadership kened the coheUnited National is impact on the
learly indicated abolish the exy within a period ionths. A Select iament has been dertake compreof the basic feaitution including
repeal and rexisting constituissues that the will focus on are sidency, the de
volution of power, judicial review of legislation and fundamantal rights. Although Gamini Dissanayake was disappointed that the executive presidency was not abolished prior to the elections, he was nonetheless supportive of the appointment of a Select Committee and its broad terms of refer
ᎾInCᎾ.
The unending cycle of violence and the continuing civil war has had a demoralising impact on the Sri Lankan entrepreneurial and professional class. The new government has not been able to settle down and to charter an independent course. There are many critical areas of policy such as the future of the plantations, the privatisation of state enterprises, the reform of financial institutions and a reassessment of the role of labour in private sector development which call for urgent attention.
The acute polarisation of public opinion in the south needs to be overcome if bipartisan support is to be mobilised for the programme of political and economic reform. The mood in Colombo at present is bleak and there has been within a few days a loss of confidence within the political and professional elite. This downward trend needs to be reversed if Sri Lanka is to address its complex ethnic, political and economic problems with imagination and clarity of purpose. Decades of distrust, animosity and violence cannot be ended in a few days or weeks. The Presidential elections must represent an end to the internal struggle for power, and signal a new era of consensus building.

Page 28
28 TAMIL TIMES
Two Reviews of a Banne
REVIEW 1
by Sandip K. Dasverma
In a response to famous Bengali author Sunil Ganguly's assertion that Laja does not have lasting literary value, the Dr. Nasrin admitted that it was hurriedly written for the purpose of highlighting the plight of minorities. The novel has many inconsistencies. For example, it says Sudhamoy was an assistant professor in the medical college before retirement but decribes only his being a private practitioner. Sudhamoy is supposed to have resisted going to India until the end but on page 26 says he wanted Suranjan and Maya to go to Calcutta when Suranjan was a politically rising star as the j int secretary of the student union. It says they forced him to move to another city, Dhaka, without any reason or relevance to the story line.
However, anyone who has read the book has to admit that the purpose has been more than achieved. In fact, she has made a profound impact as the writer of a social-political novel. If not in the same class as her predecessor the late Sharat Chandra Chatterjee in literary value, she has excelled in social message and relevance. She has attacked the Jamaat, BJP and VHP practically in the same breath and with equal conviction. Reading the book gave me the feeling of being exposed to fresh air and compensated for the effort I made to get the book.
The mission of the book has been achieved and the evident empathy for the victims of religious bigotry is unique, considerinmg that the writer comes not from the persecuted but the persecuting community. One can realize her total identification with the victim from the statements made by Suranjan and his father. It is like an Israeli author writing a saga on the woes of the Palestinians, sympathetically and successfully. My hat is offto Dr. Taslima Nasrin for doing this wonderful job. I suspect her ability to empathize and appreciate the minority oversensitivity comes from her background as a feminist in a society as traditional and old fashioned as Bangladesh's.
I have not read a writings, but I am hard-hitting and picked up such a f faced such issues t are afraid to tac arena. No wonde Islami and its fell out for her bloo strategy to first c ning of Lajja and th it is religiously CauSe O One can tents. It is the resp lar-minded people this venomous prc Dr. Nasrin. The have already dem The challenge for prick the bloated damentalist lies.
There are also she is a BJP setu countering the arg leftist that he decl a true Hindu but a Taslima says th "There is no differ damentalist Hi damentalist Musli an BJP leaders a Jamaat leaders o both countries the are trying to grab promin ent Ja announced the oth meeting that Cong is responsible fortl in India. In my setup can write th a lot for the BJP t
Lastly, Dr. Na grounds. She chal way the seculari Pakistan to do th character in her pity that after 21 ence we have to pl amity, I as an hanging my head have to do the sar The plight of Musl. worse. They don "India' to escape t hated as Behari Pakistan denoun they have no plac
The challenge fo ans is to go beyon towards effective increase awarene higher illiteracy a
 

di Book
ny of her feminist old they are very bold. They have pllowing and surhat conservatives kle her in that r the Jamaat-i- ow travellers are d. It was their lemand the banlen to charge that plasphemous behow read its cononsibility of secuto nip in the bud paganda against
fundamentalists anded her death.
secularists is to
balloon of fun
rumours rife that p. On page 73, in uments of a fellow are himself as not half Mussalman, rough Suranjan: ence between funndus and fumms. See, the Indire friends of the f Bangladesh. In fundamentalists
power. Nijami, a ma at le a der, er day in a public ress, not the BJP, he communal riots opinion, if a BJP ese lines, there is o be upset about.
srin breaks new lenges in a subtle sts of India and eir jobs. When a book says, "It's a years of independead for communal Indian feel like in shame that we me after 47 years. ims in India is still 't even have an o. In Bangladesh, Muslims and in zed as Muhajirs, 2 to go. or all secular Indid mere symbolism action which will ss of facts like mong Indian Mus
15 NOVEMBER 1994
lims and abolish myths like the notions of higher birth-rate and polygamy among Muslims. It is said that the test of how civilized a nation is, is in how it treats its minorities. An ancient civilization and culture from which we claim our heritage should enable us to do better. Remembering the days of Netaji’s INA or the Tebhaga Andolan of Bengal or the Gandhian mainstream, we can draw a lot of inspiration. Recent Indian elections show we are moving in the right direction, but we still have a lot of ground to cover.
Our forefathers had said:
सर्वे भवन्तु सुखिनः सर्वे सन्तु निरामया
सर्वे पदाणि पश्यन्तु मा कश्चित् दुखभाग भवेत ।
(May all live happily, May all be healthy, May all see good, May there be nobody in misery.)
We can do better. We can create a society which does not discriminate on the basis of caste, religious community or language. Dr. Nasrin has shown us a new depth of empathy. Do we have the humane idealism and will to accept her challenge?
REVIEW 2
by Quazi Anwar Hussain
It came as a surprise to me that Laija had been banned in Bangladesh. I found the novel very timely, considering the communal atrocities that had recently been engulfing the Indian subcontinent (India, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Burma and Pakistan) and various other parts of the world (e.g. Bosnia, Azerbaijan, the Kurdish region, Sudan, Los Angeles, etc.).
As a Bangladeshi Muslim, I felt somewhat proud that the writer is from the majority Muslim community. Prior to that, when I had heard that some atrocities were being committed against Bangladeshi Hindus following the Babri Masjid incident in India, I felt ashamed. This was especially so because previously, while explaining the context of the overall religious and communal situation in the Indian subcontinent to some of my American colleagues, I was bragging a little bit that Bangladeshis are, in general, less communal and more secular

Page 29
NovisvisER rgga
minded. The banning of Laja shattered that image of mine about my own people.
Even though I am not a devout or practicing Muslim, I was born and raised in a religious family. I have profound respect for Islam, particularly in the thoughtfulness of its provisions relating to social, economic and family issues, and how Muhammad (peace be upon him) was so far ahead of his time in addressing the rights of women in society. Because of such respect for Islam, my Muslim sense of honour and fairness was deeply hurt at the news of Laja being banned. I immediately started wondering why it was banned. As I read the book, I did not find anything objectionable of a magnitude to justify such a response.
The present situation started with Taslima Nasrin receiving a prestigious Indian award for her muchacclaimed book Nirbachito Column (Selected Columns). In reading the book, I liked her writing style as direct (sometimes too direct for my taste), penetrating and powerful. I
also liked the ger ing the pitiful class women in B er, too frequently ed Islam in an in out, in my opini the complexities example, she O erroneous (even intentioned) pra pretations of Isl: the real ones.
Because of he wards the religi others, the genu she wanted to c assimilated by t most. Her insen ated not only th hungry politiciar section of Bangla lectuals who gem Muslims turn aw practices and p) ning of Lajija is a tion that confirr however sad it m I wish that Tas use her powerf sensitivity in the
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The most exclusive sarees (Banaras, Kanchipu. ilk, Japan Nylexand Cotton Sarees) dren wear and costume jewellery in UK. If you visit us for artistic collection in pure silk fabri
உங்கள் உள்ளத்தை மகிழ்விக்கும் ஜவுளி சமுத்திரம் வரொ சில் எங்களிடம் நீங்கள் விரும்பும் நவீன டிசைன்களில் ெ காஞ்சிபுரம் பட்டுப் புடவைகள், மைசூர் சில்க் சேலை சேலை கள், பிளவுஸ் துணிகள், றெடிமேட் பிளவுஸ்கள் பட்டுப் பாவாடைத் தாவணிகள், பரத நாட்டிய ககை லுங்கிகள் (கிப்ஸ், சங்கு மார்க் சாரங்கள்), குர்த்தா அனைத்துக்கும் ‘வஷ்ரா சில்க்'
சிறுவர் சிறுமியருக்கான நவீன றெடிமேட் ஆடை வகைகளுக்குட சிறுவர்களுக்கான புள் செட் ஆடைகளு வையகத்து மங்கையரின் வனப்பு மிகு தோற்றம் அது
நீங்கள் உங்கள் புடவை தேவைகளுக்கு ம வருக! வருக! வருக! என்று இ
 

Mrval IMES 29
heral theme, depictcondition of lower angladesh. Howevthe writer attacksensitive way withion, understanding of the issues. For ften equated the though often wellactices and interamic provisions as
er insensitivity toous sentiments of uine message that onvey may not be those who need it lsitivity has aliene malicious powerns, but also a good deshi Muslim inteluinely want to see ay from communal rejudice. The bansymptomatic reacms this alienation, light be. slima Nasrin would ul pen with more future. I also wish
that the government and people of Bangladesh would join the civilized communities of the world in permitting free publication and discussion of issues affecting the society, remembering that the Prophet Muhammad said that the differences of opinion among his followers were signs of strength and, hence, must not be curtailed.
One more appeal to Bangladeshi Muslims: The best service we can provide to Indian Muslims would be to treat the Hindu minority of Bangladesh with sensitivity, care and understanding. Islam requires us to do that. Lip service alone is not enough. We must genuinely understand that protecting the rights of minorities is not only a sacred duty of the majority community, but it is also essential for creating a just and orderly society. This will also improve regional peace and harmony, permit reduction of military expenditures, and free scant resources for essential development projects. A helpless Hindu minority must not be the scapegoat for Bangladesh's inability to get its act together.
t
(East Ham)
NI SUPER MARKET)
742 тапт, Mysoore Silk,
1 Gents wear, Chilare in London, do
cs and sarees. 战
D9.
பண்களுக்கான திருமண கூறைப் புடவைகள்,
பணாறஸ்,
கள், காஷ்மீர் சில்க் சேலைகள், ஜப்பான் கைலக்ஸ், நூல் ா, அழகு சாதனப் பொருட்கள், அலங்காரப் பொருட்கள், கள், ஆண்களுக்கான பட்டு வேட்டிகள், நூல் வேட்டிகள்,
ா செட், பேண்ட், சேட் டுக்கள், றெடிமேட் ஆடைகள்
ம், அமெரிக்காவில் இருந்து விஷேடமாக இறக்குமதி செய்யப்பட்ட க்கும் நாடவேண்டிய இடம் 'வஷ்ரா சில்க்'
'வஷ்ரா சில்க்' தரும் அழகுத் தோற்றம் 'வஷ்ரா சில்க்', றவாமல் காடவேண்டிய இடம் ‘வஷ்ரா சில்க்' }ரு கரம் கூப்பி வரவேற்கிறோம்.

Page 30
-a-
30 TAvil TIMES
Bo
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Parents seek suitable partner, professional in late thirties, for daughter, US resident. M 756 C/o Tamil Times.
Jaffna Hindu parents seek professional partner for daughter, 25, ACCA finalist. Send horoscope details. M 758 c/o Tamil Times.
Engineer, 41, seeks bride up to 40, any religion, widow or divorcee welcome. Companionship view to marriage. M 759 c/o Tanil Times.
OBITUARIES
Mrs. Thilagavathy Sripathy of V. M. Road, Point Pedro, Teacher at Ramanathan Hindu Ladies College, Bambalapitiya Distant Education Senior Tutor, National Institute of Education; beloved wife of Tampoe Sripathy (Moratuwa University, Katubedde), daughter of late R. Duraisingam (RVDB, Amparai) and Parvathy Duraisingam (Toronto); sister of Jeyasingam (Toronto), Dr. Gunavathy Vivekanandarajah (Batticaloa Hospital), Balasingam (UK), Selvavathy (Oman), Umavathy (UK), and Raajasingam (Toronto); sister-in-law of Stichadevi (Toronto), Dr. Vivekanandarajah (Batticaloa Hospital), Jagajanani (UK), Dr. Sri Vidyadharsan (Oman) and Padmasini (Toronto) passed away on 14. 10.94 and her funeral took place on 18.10.94 in Colombo14 Ewelme Close, Dursley, GL 11 4NE, U.K. Tel: 0453 5489:25.
CLASSIFIED ADS
First 20 words E10. Each additional word 60p. Charge for
(Wat AAA extra) Prepayment essentia The Advertisement Manager, Tamil Times Ltd, PO Box 121, Sutton, Surrey SM13TD is
Fax: 081-241 4557
Vigneshwary Ganesharatnam beloved wife of Rajaratnam Ganesharatnam; loving mother of Aruna and Urmila, daughter of late Mr. S.U. Somasegaram (Director of Education) and late Mrs. V. Somasegaram; sister of Mrs. R. Shanmugam (Jaffna) and Mrs. L. Swaminathan (Canada); sister-in-law of Mr. S. Shanmugam (Jaffna) and Mr.A. Swaminathan (Canada) passed away in Sydney on 20. 10.94 and was Crerated on 22.10.94 - 40 Dean Street, South Strathfield, NSMV 2136, Australia. Tel: O2 7425566.
Mrs. Muththammah Paramasamy (74), of Ariyalai, Jaffna, beloved wife of the late Mr. Muththucumarasamy Paramasamy (Alli Paramu), loving mother of Uma Mahalingam (UK), Gunalaxmi (Canada), Thanapalasingam, Padmanathan (both of UK), Yoganathan (Dubai), Vimala (Sri Lanka), Varatharajan (Germany), Kirupaharan (France); mother-in-law of Vimalavathy,
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

ikumaran, Calaranie, Ranamalar, lnthurmathi, Selvaratlm and Bavani passed away acefully in London on 11th ovember '94 and was created on 16th November. Her ildren and all members of her mily thank all relatives and sends who attended the funer
sent floral tributes and mesges of sympathy and sisted in various ways in the neral arrangements - 10 St. mes Gdins, Alperton, Wemb/ Middx. HAO 4L. Tel 08112 5384/690 1946/961 0671.
Mr. Kandasamy lindrakumar, youngest son of Mr. & Mrs. Kandasamy of Neeraviady, Jaffna, beloved husband of Anushia (Canada); loving father of Ramana; son-in-law of The late Nagendran and Mrs. Nagendran (Canada), brother of Sathiaseelan, Sathiamanthan (both of Canada) and Sriranjan Kenya); brother of the late Sakthivel passed away in Toronto, Canada on 17.9.94. friends and relatives, please accept this intimation.
IN MEMORAM
ln loving memory of Mrs. Gnanambikai Peruma Pillai On the first anniversary of her passing away on 12. 12.93.
Greatly loved, deeply missed and always remembered by her children Dr. Ravi Pillai, Usha, Jeeva and Ranjit; sons-in-law Desmond and Michael; daughters-in-law Shanthi and Vasuhi; grandchildren Rajesh, Shahila, Meera, Arun and Arjun.
In loving memory of Mrs. Annamah Rajasingam on the second anniversary of her passing away on 8th November 1992.
Sadly mised and fondly remembered by her children Dr. Катаgasingат, Кипasingат (both of UK), Poopalasingam (Brisbane, Australia), Jeyakumar (Norway) and Thanaluxmy (UK), daughters-in-law Saras, Ranee, Gowri and Saro, grandchildren Gowri, Ranjini, Mano, Jeya, Jeyanthi, Nirmala, Bhavani, Shanthi, Kumar, Sugu, Ravi, Brahma, Jano, Vasanthi, Baskaran, Mala, Lala, Priya, Vathana, Kanchana, Yamuna and Usha — 4 Southway, Raynes Park, London SW20 9JQ. Tel 081-5425803.
Richard Jeyarajasingam. Born 20.11.28 Called to Glory 27, 11.1990
How little we knew that evening, The sorrow that day would bring. The call was sudden, the shock SeVere, To part with the one we loved so dear. You left us we know not why But this we know you could not die. For you that path stood open To the realm of Heaven. Where the light shines through death's deep rift Eternal life is God's Own gift.
Fondly remembered by Ranee and Children.

Page 31
15 NOVEMBER 1994
FORTHCOMING EVENTS
November 26 9.30am Ramanathan College Old Girls' Association organises poojah to remember Sir P. Ramanathan at Archway Murugan Temple, 200a Archway Road, London N6 5BA and lunch afterwards. Old Girls, Staff and their families invited. Tel: 081-861 5332.
December 2.Amavasai.
Dec. 3 Feast of St. Francis Xavier.
Dec. 6 Sathurthi.
Dec. 8 Feast of the Immaculate Conception.
Dec. 10 Thiruvembavai starts: 7.00pm. S. C. O. T. PreChristmas Evening, Dance & Dinner, Live Music by Sunset at Wandsworth Town Hall, Wandsworth High Street, London SVV18. Tel 081-904 6472.
Dec. 13 Eekathasi. Dec. 15 PirathoSam.
Dec. 17 Fil Moor. Dec. 19 Thiruvernbavai ends. Dec. 25 Christmas.
Narthana Kalalaya Presents Suboshini
Waltham Forest Assembly Hall was filled to capacity on 27th August '94 for the debut in Kalashestra style of Suboshini, daughter of Mr. & Mrs. Kugaprasad and pupil of Smt Pathmini Gunaseelan. Pathmini is an exponent of repute not only in Natuwangam and Bharatha Natyam but also in Karnatic Music of which she is a Sangeeta Vidwan. She is a product of the prestigious Bharatha Soodamani and Madras Music Academy and these qualifications put her in good stead as a choreographer.
The performance commenced with Pushpanjali and Alarippu. Suboshini's eye movements along with mudra expressions gave advance notice of what the audience was about to see. In Jathiswaran which was set to Raga maliga, Suboshini danced
With the Confidence cer. Varnam was se and this was followe Maanam' and "Kaila was set to Kalyani R majestically by Sri Who had travelled f event. 'Chendaj" aC the Padam even m Nadarajah performs t ally to the accompani Suboshini's Thandav enjoyed by the ap Meera Bajan was s Gana Bhooshanam A and along with it the arrangement and natt enabled the dance to dard. The arangetram lana which kept the till the very end.
Sri Muthu Sivaraj Smit Kalaivani lindra percussionist Sri Sith Sri Thayaparan and damoorthy on the Tha the Success of the e
The guests of hor Shettatt, Dr. Yogach thyananthan. It is h continues to develop ancient art form and p
propagate it.
Dr. Ka
Tamil Cultu at Rea
There are around sixty in Berkshire County a on Sundays at Apollo to teach Tamil langu and dance. The sch wider geographical at fordshire and the othe To celebrate the thi establishment of the and the teacher Yoga nised a cultural ever, Church Hall, which wa inclusive of several n community. All of the time and the Kavadic itern.
Mr. N. Sithamparap ary of S.C.O.T. was t He spoke of the Tamil
 
 

TAM TIMES 31
Dec. 26 Boxing Day: Feast of Stephen: 7.00pm. League of the Friends of the University of Jaffna presents Annual Dinner & Dance at Harrow & Wembley Progressive Synagogue Hall, 326 Preston Road, Harrow, Middx. Tel: O923 225850.
Dec. 28 Eekathasi. Feast of the
W149HQ. Te: O71-381 3086/ 4608.
Dec. 2 7.00pm Bharatha Natyam recital by Anuradha Jagannathan. Dec. 77.00pm Sitar recital by Vijay Kumar Jagtap. Dec. 10 5.30pm Discourse on
Holy Innocents.
'Women in Mahabharata' by Sri MathOOr Krishnamurihi.
Dec. 30 Pirathosam: Feast of
the Holy Family.
At the Bhawan Centre, 4A Castletown Road, London
Dec. 19 7.45pm. Christmas at the Bhavan - Carols, Music, Dance & Refreshments. All Welcome
of a full fledged dant to Kambothi Raga d by Padams "Arabi rathan . The latter agam and was sung Pon Subaschandran om Norway for this companiment made ore enjoyable. Lord The Thandavann naturment of Chendai and am was immensely preciative audience. ung melodiously by mbika Thamotheram cymbal control, jathi uvangam of the guru attain a high stan| Concluded with Thillaudience spellbound
ah on Miruthangam, kumar On the violin, amparanathan, flutist Smit Thayalini Skanambora Contributed to fert.
Our were MS. Judith andran and Dr. Nithoped that Suboshini
her expertise in this erform, preserve and
nchana Sivalingam.
al Evening ding Tamil families living ld they run a school Centre, Silver Street age, music, drama ol also Caters to a 2a extending to Oxadjoining counties. danniversary of the School, the parents m Nagendran organg at St. Andrew's s very well attended enbers of the host n had an enjoyable ance was a popular
lai, General Secrete Guest of Honour. ultural heritage and
said that the splendid events that day were yet another assurance that it would flourish unblemished into the future.
Mr. Geoff Munday, Youth and Community Advisor, Berkshire Council was the Chief Guest.
Mr. S. Rajkumar, Chairman of the School Committee, thanked the Berkshire Council for their support.
Further information about the school could be obtained by telephoning 0734 66677.3/694375.
Bharatha Natya Arangetram of Jana and Dharini
Nupura Kendra's guru Shrimathi Subathra Sivadasan has produced yet another Arangetram. The Arangetram of Jana Kogulanathan and Dharini Jeganathan was held on Sunday, 25th September at the Ashcroft Theatre, Croydon.
The programme for the evening began with the usual Thodaya mangalam and Jatheeswaram. It was refreshing tr. watch the dancers perform the Begada Raga Jatiswaran set to five different thalas. One could see the dancers had been trained to be 'on their toes' and their stamina was tested in this dance.
The Varnam was set to a very rarely sung raga Vachaspathy. This beautiful Pirathimathima raga was a good choice for the Varnam “Velanidam poi cholladi. The Varnam was choreographed in such an interesting way that both the dancers took
Continued on page 32

Page 32
32 TAMIL TIMES
Continued from page 31
equal opportunity in presenting the Nritha and Abhiniya section of dance. This was a change from the normal path of performing the Varnam. Subathra had deliberately made this change to the Varnam in order to give the audience a new audio-visual experience.
it was pleasant to see a new item in the evening's repertoire - the Keerthanam. This raga maaligai Keerthanam Saarangan maruhane" was set to 16 ragas which was a feat for the singer Shrimathi Shivasakthi Sivanesan. There were 4 ragas each in the Pallavi and the Anu-pallavi and 8 ragas in the Charanam. The dance set to this keerthanam (by lnu vil Veeramani lyer) was as intricate as the song. The bhava and poses were excellent for this dance piece.
Dharani danced as child and adult Krishna in the next patham Krishna nee, a Tamil version of the Kannada original. She achieved the bhava which was important to this Padham. Jana danced a Shiva Thandawa for the next Raga maaligai Padham "Aahaasa Lingam'. Jathis were important to this dance and she danced different poses of Lord Shiva excellently to the percussive variation created by different drums. The finale for the evening was a fast and vibrant Hamsanandhi Thilana ably choreographed by the guru. Subathra has produced a new pair of dancers to the London Dance Circuit whose ability was seen and confirmed by their Arangetram that evening. I hope that the duo SubathraShivasakthy will give us another enjoyable performance soon. It would be wonderful to see Subathra yet again give us another dance of similar calibre. The evening's musical support was given by Sivasakthi Sivanesan and Shivashankar (vocal), Kirubaharan on Mirudhangam, Chandrashekar on Violin, Thayaparan on Flute and Sithamparanathan on Morsing. The performance was compered by the well known Vimal Sockanathan. Congratulations to Dharini and Jana and to their guru Subathra Sivadasan.
Dr. Ratnam Niththyananthan.
Kavin's Musical Coup
Saturday, 15 October was a red letter day for young Kavin. Selvan Kavin Satchithananthan, son of pious parents devoted to Karnatic culture, had his Mridangam Arangetram that day at Lewisham Theatre, London when he took on the daunting task of accompanying vocal music by Gayana Gandharva Sri T. V. Ramprasad from India, along with Dr. Lakshmi Jayan on violin, his Guru Sri Bangalore R.N. Prakash on Ghatam, Sri K. Sithamparanathan on Morsing (and Smt Kala Yogarajah on Tampura). As I was quite impressed with the standard of this youngster, I made it a point to attend the 'Samarpanam" which followed on 30 October at the London Sivan Kovil in Lewisham. My impression was confirmed when I heard his rhythmic variations at "Balanendru Thavi Azhaithen' of “Thaye Yasoda" song. The accompaniment was
apt for the main music with the most complex ‘Om Saravanabhava’’. nann which followed re' his rendering and it wa his interaction with h play, which is indeed tulations for the latter a P.P. Kanthan.
Stanley ( Old Students' A
Stanley College Old St (UK) had their second at St. Michael's Church Wembley on 1st Octob Commenced with the t the oil lamp by the Association, Mr. S. Yo an evening of enterta. Premasutha Thavana accompanied by Jasor rarajasingam on them. performance by Ruby a Bharatha Natyam Sivasubramaniam who below.
The evening drew to and a raffle draw. Mr. retired Principal of the were the Chief Guests
Skanda C Cente
Skantha Varodaya C Sri Lanka completes years of service to the Lankan government Special postage stan the occasion. The Ol tion (U.K. Branch) c Memorial Meeting, ra variety entertainmen, October 1994 at H School Hall, Sandal Surrey.
Mr. K. Sivapalan, TrinConnalee Hindu C
 

15 NOVEMBER 1994
, Kavin coping well Swaraprasthara for The Thani Avarthavealed the clarity of s a treat to listen to is Guru's Ghatam a matter of congrais well.
Sollege
nnual Dinner
udents’ASSOCiation annual get together 'Hall, Harrow Road, er 94. Proceedings raditional lighting of
President of the garajah. There was inment provided by han On the veena and Jonathan Paruthangam, a ballet legatheswaram and recital by Kavitha se picture appears
a close with dinner Sivasubramaniam, College and his wife
elebrates inary ‘ollege, Kanderodai, in 1994 a hundred community. The Sri proposes to issue a p to commemorate d Students Associaelebrated it with a 2union lunch and a on Sunday, 23rd oly Cross Convent Road, New Malden,
Emeritus Principal, ollege delivered the
Founder Memorial Address. He referred to the selfless service of the great Kandiah Upaththiyayar, who a hundred years ago met the great need for a school providing English education by establishing the Kanderodai English Institute to which students flocked in large numbers from all parts of the peninsula. It was renamed Skanda Varodaya College in later years and became a leading educational institution in the island under the principalship of Mr. C. Subramaniam (Orator). He wished the college many more years of service to the community.
A variety entertainment by (a) Arthi Yogendran, Sobitha Sathiananthan and Jananee Sivagnanasundaram on the Veena (b) Mrs. Saraswathy Nadarajah on the Veena and (c) Mr. K. Jananayagam on the Flute followed. Mas. Jonathan Pararajasingam ably provided Miruthangam accompaniment to all the above items which were greatly appreciated by the audience. The grand finale was the Bharatha Natyam performance by Kavitha Gunasunderam whose picture appears below.
The final item was the election of officebearers for the ensuing year. For membership and other information please contact Secretary, Mr. K.G. Elangovan, Tel: O81-881 6471 or Treasurer, Mr. R. Vimalendran, Tel: 081-681 2052.
Manual of Saivism & Saiva Siddantha
A book released by The World Saiva Council with Head Office in London, as the authorised Manual of Saivism & Saiva

Page 33
pa
15 NOVEMEBER 1994
Siddhanta conforming to the South Indian tradition, On 25th June 1994 at the International Saiva Conference held in Paris was reviewed by Dr. S. Gangadaran M.A., Ph.d., Professor & Head, Department of Saiva Siddantha, Madurai Kamraj University, Tamil Naadu. it is priced at £15/ US$25 plus 15% for postage. Contact telephone numbers are O81-531 6435/ 0277223981. The review appears below.
'Saivite Hinduism' is a manual prepared by the British Saiva Siddhanta Centre in consultation with other world Saiva scholars and was released by the World Saiva Council on 25th June, 1994 in Paris. This handbook conveys the essence and immense wealth that is Contained in thousands of books in Tamil, Sanskrit and other indian languages. It contains articles that seek to explain the essence of Saivism to the new Saivites, outside India, who have lost their own heritage and to others who may become interested in it.
This useful handbook of 300 pages contains three sections, preceded by Saivite Hinduism in a Nutshell' and succeeded by eight appendices dealing with tables and data on Thrumurai, Meikanda Sastras etc in comprehensive detail. Section deals with Hindu philosophic systems, along with the hymnal and philosophic literature of Saiva Siddhanta, followed by an in-depth treatment of the Tamil Saiva Bhakti Movement. Chapter I gives an exposition of Saiva Siddhanta philosophy and of some doctrines such as the Law of Karma and concepts such as Grace, and Pancha Kritiyam, the importance of Na-Ma-Si-Va-Ya, and Moksha or fulfilment as freedom and integration with Lord Siva. The remaining two chapters deal with the role of Saivism in the Bhakti Movement, followed by biographical and religious accounts of the four founders of Saivism : Sambanthar, Appar, Sundarar and Maanickavaacagar. Section l deals with practical aspects of Saivism with extensive guidelines on Siva-Yoga, Meditation, etc while Section ill gives the message of the Periapuranam, expounding its holy stories as practical illustrations of Saiva Bhakti-in-action.
The value of this Saiva handbook is enhanced by the addition of appendices on a range of topics including: Saiva Rituals, Bibliography, etc., which will prove useful to Saiva Tamils living abroad. Produced as an authorized manual of the World Saiva Council by its Board of Saiva Scholars headed by H.H. Swami Siva Nandhi Adikalaar, this handbook is a must for every Tamil Saivite, throughout the world.
CANADAN
: NEWS ETTER
The news of the suspension of the peace talks in Sri Lanka due to the killing of 53 persons including the opposition leader Gamini Dissanayake was received here with disappointment and disbelief. There is consensus among Tamil immigrants here that Chandrika will negotiate a settlement through a system of greater devolution and power sharing. It is the prayerful wish of the 100,000 Tamils here that the Chandri
ka - Prabakaran early.
The Tamils turneC natural habitat of the politically conscious of the past Sinhala le ing as a community i Toronto and Ontario time for Boards a Ontario. Two Tamil running. By the ne) years hence, every ified to vote and it is that at least 20 candi positions in School E ties.
The vast majority are concentrated in 90,000 now. Theref ses by without some was dominated by picnics and day tou Over 500 busineSS es looked after by a trac Canada-Ceylon Tan merce. The Annual was held on 17th S. Leacock Collegiate Municipal Affairs, Hic the chief guest. T together with SACEl Centre is presently v Community Loan Fl help establishments obtain Credit from re. tions. The Connur government sponsc 100% guarantee on to $15,000. It is exp will be in full operatic
The outstanding ev
A Rasika attending Shitar Day music Kalabhavanan on S the Willis Road mini. to remark "I feel as Sangeetha sabhas Nagar in Madras. feeling that nostalgia phere that evening v It was an achieve Kalabhavanam to ha same stage five se London - Srinathis: jah, Nageswari Br Sriskandarajah, Siv and Manorama Pras Choice kritis of Dik some Navavarana a with textual clarity an style.
 
 

alks should resume
hard working by the North-East and made by the barren policies iders are now emergbe reckoned with in This is local election nd Municipalities in andidates are in the t local election, four me here will be quala modest expectation dates will be vying for oards and Municipali
of Tamil immigrants and around Torontopre no weekend pasevent. The Summer Seniors' activities - rS. Toronto now has tablishments that are le Chamber Caled the il Chamber of ComTrade Fair this year 9ptember at Stephen with the Minister of in. Ed Philip, MPP as his Trade Chamber M and Senior Tamils' working to establish a nd (Credit Union) to that are unable to gular financial instituity Loan Fund is a pred project with a invested principal up ected that the project Din in 1995.
sent of the month here
TAMIL TIMES 33
was the dinner held on the 29th of October in aid of Tamil Rehabilitation. This was organised by the Federation of Associations of Canadian Tamils. Four Federal members of parliament headed by Dr.
Doug Peters MP and Secretary of State attended. A follow up memorandum urging Canadian intervention for a sustainable political solution for the ethnic problem in Sri Lanka was presented to the members of parliament to be delivered to the Hon.
Prime Minister of Canada. Mr. Derek Lee MP expressed the hope that the Sri Lankan conflict will be on their cabinet agenda
in 1995. Mr. Rajan Thangavelu of the World Tamil Movement presided.
Aloy Ratnasingham.
Sri Lanka Speaker Meets UK Tamils
During his recent visit to U. K. Mr. K. B. Ratnayake, Speaker of the Sri Lankan Parliament attended a meeting arranged by the Hartley College Past Pupil's Association at the Harrow Hotel, on 16th October '94. After meeting the invited guests and Hartleyites, Mr. Ratnayake addressed the gathering. He was introduced by the president of the association Dr. K. Sivakumaran and Mr. K. Pooranampillai, Emeritus Principal, Hartley College. Mr. Ratnayake reminisced on his days as a student at Hartley College during the late thirties and early forties, his early political life and referred to the present situation in the north. Although the meeting was not of a political nature, he impressed on those present that the Prime Minister Mrs. Chandrika Kumaratunge was making every possible effort to solve the situation in the North.
Kalabhavanam Scores Again
岳剑TU防
the Muthuswami Dikrecital conducted by unday October 30th at auditorium was heard if I am in One of the in Mylapore or T. He was not alone in . The musical atmosvas so exulting. ment on the part of ve got together on the 2aSOned VOCaliStS in Saraswathi Pakiaraahmananda, Mathini /asakthi Sivanesan, ad - to render some shitar (among them ind Nvagraha items) 'd flawless traditional
At the start of the programme Sri P.P. Kanthan, a well known Connoisseur of Carnatic music and singer, gave a short talk on the life of Dikshitar illustrated with Singing some passages. This was well appreciated by the audience. Accompaniments for the vocalists were provided on the violin by Dr. Lakshmi Jayan and Smt. G. Padmasikamani, and on the mridangam by Sri Bhavani Shankar and Sri Muthu Sivarajah. Bhavani's appearance on the Kalabhavanam stage was the first and it is hoped he would appear more often.
The Dikshitar Day programme was so impressive that many admirers wish many similar memorial programmes on Papanasam Sivan, Gopalakrishna Bharatiyar, Thyagarajar and other well known composers are followed.

Page 34
34 TAMIL TIMES
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