CLASSIFIED | POLITICS | TERRORISM | OPINION | VIEWS

Narayanan’s arrogance

Courtesy The Island 04-06-2007

A concerned citizen

I write with reference to your editorial and the letter captioned ‘OM NARAYAN’ in The Island of Saturday. Narayanan’s haughty, arrogant presumptuous and overbearing statement, that we should not seek military assistance from China or Pakistan is insufferable. This is no doubt the reason for the angry reaction there has been to Narayan’s statement. This statement smacks of the hegemonist policies pursued by the Congress government of Indira Gandhi. We were under the impression that India had learnt its lessons from imposing itself and intervening in the domestic affairs of its neighbours, but apparently not.

In any event if, I repeat if we had sought military assistance from India then all I can say is "Parripu illagagana kewa thamii" –( we have asked for Parippu, the most common of foods and have been given it). Why should we have asked for military assistance from India for we are aware that the present Congress government, which is entirely dependent on the DMK, would not be able to give us even ‘blanks’. Which brings me to another point – why do our politicians keep running at the drop of a hat to India? None of the leaders of other small or for that matter relatively economically weak countries of South Asia demean themselves and their countries in this manner and who was it that gave a rope to the government that KC Pant is a big player and would be the next PM of India? Somewhat similar to expecting Britain to replace Norway and become the ‘facilitator’!

It would be recalled that in the period between 1980 and ’87 India intimidated and bullied this country into submission. From Narayanan’s statement it appears that India has gone back to that period when she destabilized this country to achieve her own ends. Let us, for the record, recall how Indira Gandhi, after she returned to power and, because of her intense hatred of President JRJ, who had broken away from staying within the parameters of Indian regional and foreign policy and begun to support the west to obtain much needed foreign investment, (unfortunately ten years before the end of the Cold War and before India herself opened her economy) destabilized this country by arming and training Tamil militants. However that maybe, Indira Gandhi found in this situation the ideal opportunity to bring the neighbour to acknowledging Indian suzerainty in the region. The Tamil issue was used by Indira Gandhi. There was in fact very little interest in Tamil Nadu and among the Dravidian parties in the conflict in Sri Lanka – Dravidian concern was a self serving myth created by Delhi in order to cover-up their real intentions. It must be remembered that Indian interest in the Sri Lanka problem lay more in securing her geo-political interests, establishing the Pannikar doctrine, than in any concern for the plight of the Tamils of Sri Lanka.

What is the price that India and this country have paid as a result of India’s intervention? Indira Gandhi’s transformation of a low intensity ethnic conflict into a horrendous war to stake India’s claim to being the hegemon in the region, has to date claimed over 80,000 lives since 1983 including over 1200 Indian lives with thousands more injured and incapacitated and, decimated the unfortunate Tamil people, a million of whom today live abroad, outside their homeland. Indira Gandhi and India has as much blood on their hands as our politicians, monks such as Mapitigama Buddharakiththa, Talpavila Seelavanse, Baddegama Wimalawanse and chauvinists such as KMP Rajaratne, FR Jayasuriya, Cyril Matthew and others who opposed a just settlement and sabotaged the B-C Pact, and the Dudley–Chelvanayagam Pact, amongst other initiatives. Tamil militancy was in many respects a response to the rise of Sinhala-Buddhist nationalism that was majoritarian and chauvinistic but it was the Indian intervention that exacerbated the problem.

The role of the Congress Party of India in our conflict over the years is shameful; when the party was elected to power under the leadership of Rajiv Gandhi’s widow, at the last general election, we mistakenly thought that the policy with regard to the conflict and towards Sri Lanka itself would have changed, but we now realize that we were and are, mistaken. "Rajiv is long dead, let us forget him and move on, it is more important to stay in power," appears to be the policy of the government which is a prisoner of the DMK; even the widow does not seem to have any anti-LTTE sentiment left. The DMK is using the Sri Lanka conflict once again for its own political purposes, forgetting what happened to, and in, Tamil Nadu as a result of allowing Tamil militants to operate out of their state. They also forget the fact that when the IPKF was said to be killing hundreds of Tamils in three years of war with the LTTE in Sri Lanka, they raised not a whimper of protest, not even Nedumaran and Vaiko. Further, during the period of the Janatha government and that of the BJP, the DMK and the AIDMK stayed within the parameters of central government policy but today the tail appears to be wagging the dog and the ‘dog’ is going along purely to stay in power and persons such as Narayan are playing their game by seeking to lay down their law to us.

The LTTE ‘s commitment to Eelam is non-negotiable and sooner India realizes this and decides to go back to the policy of Prime Minister VP Singh and External Affairs Minister Gujral, after the withdrawal of the IPKF in 1990, the better it would be for both our countries. Sri Lanka no doubt realizes that it cannot resort to a full scale military option, without giving rise to Indian and international concern and that concern could be played out in many ways; but for the present let us deal with our internal problem within the ambit of international law and without unnecessary threats by interfering Indians and others, whoever they maybe. As for Indo-Lanka relations, the Indo-Lanka Agreement and the letters exchanged are now obsolete, so let the two governments work out a new agreement which would address the concerns of both our countries.

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