Indian Apathy Towards Tamil Eelam and Tamils of Eelam

As a nation subject to a protracted genocide, the Eelam Tamils’ dignity and freedom can be guaranteed only under a free Tamil Eelam.

(LONDON) - It is high time that the Tamils in India and elsewhere accepted that the formation of Tamil Eelam as the only way forward and actively supported its formation. Simply crying foul over the socio-political plight of Eelam Tamils won't do and will not bring about any positive outcome.

Politics of Tamil Nadu cannot be separated from the Tamil nationalist and linguistic identity. The Sri Lankan Tamil issue is a core agenda for all the parities, even though they do not stand on the same platform. Further, the entire world is now convinced of the genuineness and the righteousness of the LTTE’s liberation struggle.

Though India is duty-bound to raise the issue of war crimes pertaining to killing of Sri Lankan Tamils, the Central government from the beginning, out of compulsion is protecting Sri Lanka at the expense of its fame and prestige. Sri Lanka with its image tattered by its massacres and interning of hundreds of thousands behind barb wire fence is confident that if required it could implicate Delhi at any time, as its willing partner in these genocidal crimes.

After the genocide there was no question of 'sharing the spoil' between the key perpetrators of the Tamil Genocide, India and Sri Lanka. It became simply a diplomatic tussle of 'calling the shots', and cheating the world, the axiom being mutual accommodation and never resorting so far, to 'partner blaming'.

One can easily notice that there is always a practice of dismissing the genocide of the Eelam Tamils carried out by the government of Sri Lanka covertly and overtly managed by the Delhi Sonia Congress government, as Sri Lanka ethnic conflict, Tamil's genuine grievances and the like, bluffs.

Fundamentally it is not an ethnic problem between Tamil speaking people and the Sinhalese. The core issue is the East and the North part of the Island which have been historically and traditionally occupied and owned by the Tamil speaking people. There is enough supporting evidences to show that Tamils are the very original people. So obviously what the international community or the UN should do first is to appoint a neutral and independent body to investigate and establish the above truth. This will expose the open agenda of the Sinhalese government's attempt to nullify this truth. Sri Lanka lives with lies, deceptions and bullying.

It is very unfortunate that India utterly failed to act fairly. India never gave the due respect to the Eelam Tamils. Even after completing the genocide the Indian South block VVIPs and the Sonia – Pranab Mukargee and their clique, tried to silence the the Eelam Tamils by providing food parcels, a canvas tent make shift hospital, and aluminium sheets to the surviving Eelam Tamils. When the truth was out aluminium sheets became 50 000 houses and India started helping Sri Lanka government in its sinister schemes of well planned development projects also needed badly by the occupying military forces and to easily mislead the International Community.

India really started to interfere in Sri Lanka affairs only after the “Black July 1983”.Then there was an attempts to rationalise the July 1983 anti-Tamil violence, as a “Sinhala backlash to 13 Soldiers being killed by Tamil Tigers”, evidence uncovered during the past years have proved conclusively that “Black July” 1983 was a well planned pogrom to kill Tamils and to destroy Indian business establishments.

The Indian Overseas Bank, the principal bank for Sri Lankan's of Indian Origin in Colombo was also set on fire. Textile mills, garments factories, rubber-goods factories and coconut processing factories were burnt. Naturally for India the main concern was the protection of hundreds of industrialists, businessmen and traders from India and their wealth. The then Indian business community included a substantial number of North Indian merchants.

Our Tamils living in the up-countries also get India's guardianship. It is a reality that the upcountry Tamils will not show lot of enthusiasm for Eelam. Their weak footing make them support their leaders who prefer joining the governments simply to get favours and survive.

This simply explains why India sticks to the repeated short sighted policy of Tamils Rights in a Unitary State and the talk of the ignored 13th amendment, New Delhi government has being dangling this for the last 25 years. What a shame!

Prabhakaran and LTTE knew these truths very well and still did a lot to accommodate the Indian government. It is dam worth recalling the following incidents.

“There is a plan to have me(Prabakaran) killed in Madras or New Delhi. The danger will remain as long as I remain here. Our struggle will intensify if I return to Eelam.” [Ref: Narayan Swamy’s book, Tigers of Lanka, 2nd edition, 1996, p.223]

“By the end of 1986, Prabhakaran was disillusioned with his Indian connection. The pressure generated on the LTTE after the Bangalore SAARC Summit made him decide that he must shift his base to Sri Lanka for a long struggle. His judgement has been proved correct with the passage of time.” [Dixit, in his book, Assignment Colombo, 1998, p.81]

The recent extension of the ban of LTTE by India and then faithfully followed by the USA tells us all. Even at the height of power the LTTE never posed as a threat to Indians or the sovereignty and territorial integrity of India Now what is going to happen. Naturally Tamils look up to the government of the USA and its moves. Let us give some thought to some encouraging recent statements made by two distinguished American leaders.

On the 15th anniversary of Srebrenica massacre, President Obama has led the way in reminding the world that the lessons of Srebrenica must continue to guide our moral compass. He has reminded us that "the name Srebrenica has since served as a stark reminder of the need for the world to respond resolutely in the face of evil." But more so, he has reminded us that after great atrocities, “We still have a great duty to foster peace and reconciliation. No place can the duty to help pursue justice and build peace be greater than in a fractured Sri Lanka struggling to recover from war.”

Further, the Secretary of State of USA, Hillary Clinton made some no-nonsense remarks at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum,Washington DC, on 24th, July 2012.

(Quote) “We are enhancing our civilian surge capacity. We already have personnel trained to analyse conflicts and defuse potentially violent situations. Now we will be using those personnel to focus on atrocity prevention. We have deployed our Civilian Response Corps to countries such as South Sudan, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Sri Lanka, and Kyrgyzstan. We hope to train new teams to assess conditions on the ground, work with local governments to detect signs of impending atrocities, work with the local civil society and others who are representing populations at risk, and make recommendations to American officials on what we can do to prevent conflicts”

“.....Well, genocides and mass atrocities don’t just happen spontaneously. They are always planned. Genocides are preceded by organized, targeted propaganda campaigns carried out by those in power. Extremist leaders spread messages of hate often disguised as something else – a song on the radio, a nursery rhyme, or a picture book. The messages filter down. Those in power begin to dehumanize particular groups or scapegoat them for their country’s problems. Hatred not only becomes acceptable; it is even encouraged. It’s like stacking dry firewood before striking the match. Then there is a moment of ignition. The permission to hate becomes permission to kill.”(Unquote)

Will Washington and New Delhi dare to refuse our rights? They very well know that the LTTE's struggle is a struggle for justice. The emancipation comes when you realise that rights cannot be won by the mercy of others. Independence is achieved through uprising of people and their resolve. The unity of Tamil Nadu, Eelam Tamils and the diaspora holds the key. The next phase is to evolve joint action based on mass struggle from the three dimensions. Mullivaaykkaal has brought a historic task on to World Tamils.

As a nation subject to a protracted genocide, the Eelam Tamils’ dignity and freedom can be guaranteed only under a free Tamil Eelam and to ensure this, we call for the international community to recognize the creation of Tamil Eelam through an internationally monitored referendum among Eelam Tamils.

America, which today calls the shots within the international community, would soon or later undergo a ‘change of heart’ and would be fair by the Tamils of Eelam and other civilized nations hopefully would follow suit!

Note: People's Front of Liberation Tigers (PFLT-UK) is registered as a Political Party in the UK.

Based in London, Nadarajah 'Bala' Balasubramaniam is a Salem-News.com contributing writer who also serves as Chairman / Leader of People's Front of Liberation Tigers.

His life as a journalist begins with the Sri Lanka Tamil Diaspora. This event which began shortly after WWII and heated up violently in the 1970's and 80's, has caused a 20% decline in the population of the Tamil Sri Lanka culture in the last 30 years alone. Born in Jaffna, Bala also spent part of his life working in Colombo, but like so many, he lost his house and escaped from the 1983 pogrom, the year remembered for a murderous event against Tamils known as 'Black July' which left thousands dead.

When Mr. Balasubramaniam left Sri Lanka with his wife and three sons and went to work in the Middle-east, where he worked as a telecom engineer. In 1989 he moved to the UK mainly because of his children's education. Nadarajah Balasubramaniam has been associated with the liberation struggle of Tamil Eelam since 1972.