Jay Pathbey USA

I live in the USA and read the Lankaweb, Lankapage, Expressbuzz, Sunday Times, Sunday Leader, Daily Mirror, Island, Daily News, Sunday Observer and whole lot of other E-newspapers includng Oh Yes! the Tamilnet, almost religiously, to learn about what is happening back home..

It is very interesting to read these newspapers and to disseminate how oftentimes the same news is reported in various newspapers. We expatriates are greedy for news about our little Sri Lanka, and we in the West over a period of time have learnt to respect press freedom, fair reporting, accurate reporting and unbiased reporting. In this aspect, in this day and age of fair and accurate reporting one paper stands out. The Tamilet. All the other newspapers report what ever news that is available about Sri Lanka, the world, opinions, politics, and so forth. Tamilnet on the otherhand is unique.

ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ For example, the arrest of Raj Rajarathnam, the President of the Galeon Group – a Hedgefund, that was caught red-handed for insider trading and for making very large sums of money illegally. This man, a TAMIL, who is alleged to have been quite influential in Washington inside-circles was a very rich man. He is known to be the 262nd richest man in the USA. He has been supporting the LTTE, The Democrats, Hilary Clinton, Obama and who knows who else during the last US presidential election.

ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ In short he is alleged to have made a lot of money by unfair means and he is also is a very strong LTTE man. Then he had the gumption to pledge a large sum of money (one million dollars) to the Sri Lanka Governments effort to rehabilitate the LTTE fighters not to mention that he is alleged to have paid one million US dollars to Mr. Ravi Karunanayaka. One million dollars for a man who is worth a seven billion dollars is like one rupee to a man with 7,000 rupees.

When one adds the list of criminals almost all of them tamils, who came out of Sri Lanka, the drug dealers, arms dealers, human smugglers, conmen, thieves, murderers, suicide bombers, kidnappers, mass murderers, pimps, who have made headlines allover the world in the recent past, it is obvious that a kingpin like Raj Rajaratnam who supported the LTTEƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ¢-¾‚¢s terror campaignƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚  as anyone of the above types of criminals who contributed and caused the violence in Sri Lanka that left more than 70,000 people dead.

ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ Still not one word about Raj Rajaratnam and Tamilnet keeps mum. Does Raj owns Tamilnet.

ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ When one reads the news items in Tamilnet it appears that Mr. Raj Rajaratnam’s arrest is less important than a tamil man looking for his wife who was airlifted to Anuradhapura for medical treatment. In fact the way this news item is reported makes one feel that the soldiers abducted this injured woman for fun. On the other hand Raj Rajarathnam is head lines in all the US newspapers, the Bloomburg news, the CNBS and the MSNBC as well as in Wall Street Journal, Financial Times , BBC news, Strait Times, CNN and Fox News, etc. to mention a few.

ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ Every effort by rational people like us to make a comment or to post an opinion in the Tamilnet is ignored. The magic word for Tamilnet’s reporting is “Our source in Colombo”.This E-newspaper, probably composed by a disgruntled individual (obviously a Tamil Tiger living in Canada or somewhere in the West) is the most vile and disgusting piece of NEWSRAG that I have come across in the media. Whatever happened to the educated Tamils. Are they not educated anymore. Trash is Trash. The Tamilnet looks like a prostitute in the civilized world of newsreporting. Selling something sacred for a cheap buck.