H. L. D. Mahindapala.
The note below deals with the refusal of Justice C. V. Wigneswaran to debate with Mr. H. L. D. Mahindapala.
When Mr. Mahindapala accepted the challenge of Justice Wigneswaran to a debate Mr. Ranjith Soysa of the Society for Peace, Unity and Human Rights (SPUR) offered to facilitate the debate.
In reply to this offer Justice Wigneswaran has refused to join in a debate. He replied to Mr. Soysa in the following e-mail :
——– Forwarded Message ——–
Saw this only now.We are at the tail end of our term of office. Hence quite busy.I had given five matters to be considered.Please let me know what your views are re- same. We can go from there.When we are trying to find out the truth we must be certain as to what our individual thoughts are.Then we could discuss matters. Please set out the five points and give your views re each of them. If for example you do not accept Sinhala Language came into existence only around 6th or 7th Century AD then state your views and the basis of your view.For example such and such inscription refers to the Sinhalese or Sinhala language in 3rd century BC etc. Then I shall check the verasity of your statement and come back to you. We are not here to check on our oratorical skills. You can get a Historian or Archaeologist to answer my questions or my views and come out with his or her views.Thanks. Sorry for the delay in responding. The communication was in the sent mail.W
This reply indicates that Justice Wigneswaran is reluctant to debate with Mr. Mahindapala. As Mr. Soysa was not involved in the debate he forwarded Justice Wigneswaran’s reply to Mr. Mahindapala who initially accepted the challenge to debate with him. The following is Mr. Mahindapala’s reply sent to Mr. Soysa which was forwarded to Justice Wigneswaran with a covering letter. This reply contains some additional material to the reply sent to Justice Wigneswaran.
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Justice C. V. Wigneswaran
Chief Minister
Northern Province
Jaffna
Dear Sir,
I wish to forward the following response I received from Mr.. H. L. D. Mahindapala to the e-mail you sent me.
I forwarded it to him as he was the first to accept your challenge to debate the issues raised by you.
I stepped in to merely facilitate the debate and not as a participant in the debate.
His response is self-explanatory.
I trust you will send your response as stated in your e-mail to me..
Wishing you all the best.
Ranjith Soysa
SPUR
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Dear Ranjith,
Justice C. V. Wigneswaran, Chief Minister of Northern Province, is running away from a public debate
Thank you for forwarding the e-mail sent by Justice C. V. Wigneswaran in reply to your offer to provide the logistics for a debate with me on the various issues raised by him. I am very disappointed to note that he had turned down the offer to debate the issues he has raised selectively. In the past he has been vociferously challenging the Sinhalese to debate with him on some of the critical issues of Sri Lankan history. In issuing several challenges to debate with him he was posing as the great Tamil hero ready to vanquish the Sinhala enemies. But now when he is requested to take up the challenge he seems to have lost his early enthusiasm for a debate.
He has back-pedalled saying that debates are to test the oratorical skills” and not exercises to seek the truth. If this is true I wonder why he threw challenges to debate the issues identified by him, in the first place. Besides, he should know that there are many ways of finding the truth. It is well known that some of the controversial issues of science, religion, politics, history etc have been debated in leading universities and other public fora as a means of testing the validity of the competing arguments. Whether it is the Panadura Wadaya, or the historic Huxley-Wilberforce debate on Darwinism, (1860 at Oxford University) public debates have contributed significantly to raise awareness and increase the knowledge bank. It has helped the general public to find answers to their questions and to discover what they consider to be the truth which can be both provisional and/or relative.. Since he is convinced that the facts of history, archaeology, numismatics, inscriptions etc., are on his side he need not be scared to debate. It is somewhat puzzling, to say the least, as to why he has decided to run on reverse gear at this stage, after issuing public challenges with gusty bravado initially.
He is now asking you to send your points of view on the issues raised by him. After that he promises to check your points of view and send his replies. This approach, you will remember, is what we did at school: the school master corrected our copy and we had to accept his verdict. This schoolmasterish attitude is not what is expected by the Tamils, Sinhalese, Muslims etc., to sort out the ideological issues bedevilling the nation. He knows that the issues raised by him are of immense interest to the public. We live in an age where the public has a right to know the pros and cons of the issues that face them. Why is he reluctant to argue his case in public now? He is also trained as a lawyer to argue his cases in public. So why is he running away from the challenges he had thrown at the Sinhalese frequently?
I think this is his way of dodging the debate for reasons best known to him. This is further confirmed by asking you to respond instead of asking me to respond to the issues selected by him. It is absolutely silly of him to ask you to respond when you had neither raised the issues with him, nor had the intention of debating with him. He knew that the challenge to debate with him was accepted by me and not by you. As stated in your e-mail to him you only offered to facilitate the debate without burdening him with costs and other pressures related to organising a public debate. So why is he asking you to respond when you had nothing to do with the debate?
Consider also the absurdity of the exercise he had set for you. He says: If for example you do not accept Sinhala Language came into existence only around 6th or 7th Century AD then state your views and the basis of your view. For example such and such inscription refers to the Sinhalese or Sinhala language in 3rd century BC etc. Then I shall check the verasity (sic) of your statement and come back to you. We are not here to check on our oratorical skills. You can get a Historian or Archaeologist to answer my questions or my views and come out with his or her views.”
Since it is not your responsibility to reply please let me handle it my way. Please ask him to check it and send his response to you. I am sorry to make you the post box but since he has raised it with you (unwarrantedly) please bear with me.
Here’s my response to the issue of the Sinhala language raised by him :
As in all other issues raised by Justice Wigneswaran there is a hidden political motive in raising this issue. He wants you to acknowledge that the Sinhala Language came into existence only around 6th or 7th Century AD” in order to boast that the Tamil language is an ancient language that dates back to the pre-Christian era. He also wants you to acknowledge that the Sinhala Language is made up of Tamil, Pali and other dialects of that time.” (See the letter he sent to Mr. Gallege Punyawardana.) This is typical of the kind of boasts trumpeted by Tamil ideologues to make-believe that they are superior to the Sinhalese. Only a warped mind obsessed with imagined greatness can indulge in childish stupidities like this.
I am prepared to concede that the Tamil language is a rich language that predates the Sinhala language. But all that belongs to S. India. Jaffna Tamils are not entitled to claim the greatness of the Tamil language which was created in Tamil Nadu. If the Jaffna Tamils are great, as they think they are, they should have, like the Sinhalese, created a new language and contributed to the grandeur of the global culture. But they failed to achieve such greatness. When the Jaffna Tamils claim the greatness of the Tamil language they are not establishing the greatness of their ancestors or contemporaries. They are only paying homage to the creative and pioneering genius of the Tamils of S. India. Tamils of Jaffna have nothing to show in terms of their greatness. Can they, for instance, compare their anthills with the monumental achievements of the Tamils of S. India or the Sinhalese of Sri Lanka? At best they have been mediocre imitators basking in the glory of the splendid culture of S. India.
Each nation is entitled to claim the greatness created by their ancestors with their blood, sweat and tears on the native soil into which they were born. Since the Jaffna Tamils consider themselves to be a nation” on Sri Lankan soil they must prove their greatness by revealing their achievements on Sri Lankan soil. They lose their legitimacy to be a nation” on Sri Lankan soil if they claim the achievements of Tamil Nadu, which is another nation”. The Sinhalese, on the other hand, can be proud of the Sinhala language because it was a unique language that was made by the Sinhala people, with the genius of the Sinhala people, for the Sinhala people who made history on Sri Lankan soil. The Tamils are claiming greatness and glory of a language made by Dravidians of the S. India. It did not come out of the greatness of the Tamils of Sri Lanka. Sinhala, on the contrary, came out of the greatness of the Sinhala people. The Tamils of the north never contributed a new language to the global, national or even the Dravidian culture.
The Tamils of Sri Lanka were good mimics who could parrot the S. Indian language. There is no greatness in that. When the Jaffna Tamils talk of greatness they invariably get mixed up with the greatness of Dravidian culture of S. India. They think they are great because they can imitate the original culture of S. India. The Sinhalese, on the contrary, are great because their genius produced an original culture, original civilisation and an original language. The Americans, for instance, do not go around crowing that they are great because they came from the great English culture. It is their creativity, energy and genius that made America great. Even the English language acquired a new vibrancy in their tongues. In fact, Winston Churchill said that America and Britain are two nations divided by one language, implying that though they borrowed heavily from the mother country the Americans invigorated the language with a distinct accent, idiom, flavour and meanings. With their Nobel Prize winning poets, novelists and dramatists the Americans made their own contributions to the enrichment of the English language. Where are the Jaffna Tamil poets, novelists and dramatist who shone brighter than the S. Indian creative artists?
So what have the Tamils to crow about? Where, O where, can one find the greatness of the Jaffna Tamils? Justice Wigneswaran attempts to laugh at Sinhala language by dating it to the 6th or 7th” centuries.. Scholars trace its origins to Prakrit which dates back to 3rd B.C. As it evolved it picked up words from Tamil, Pali, Sanskrit etc., by inter-acting with other languages. This is a common trend found in all other cultured languages. For instance, there are over 1,000 Indian words (pariah, catamaran, mulligatawny etc) in the English language. All languages and cultures were enriched by borrowings. Justice Wigneswaran wants to slight the Sinhalese for borrowing from the Tamils as if the Sinhala language could not have emerged in the 6th century without it. It is apparent that the general thrust of his argument is to promote the myth that Sinhalese owes everything to the superior Tamils who were the great founders and architects of the nation.
Besides, in assessing the greatness of the Sinhala language it must be noted that it not only flourished but also refused to go under the pressures of Tamil, Pali, Sanskrit languages competing to reign supreme in Sri Lankan soil. If, for instance, the Tamil language was so great and powerful no other language could have had a chance of survival. The fact that the Sinhala language triumphed over the other languages and retained its identity speaks volumes of the greatness, the power and the creative energy of the Sinhala people and their language.
Tamil ideologues tend to brag about their past as if there is sanctity in their antiquity. Consequently, in their eyes, the Sinhala language flowering in the 6th century lacks the superiority of ancient Tamil language. But this twisted dating system of assessing the greatness of language, culture, history etc., on antiquity invalidates the monumental achievements of civilisations that came later. For instance, when the Sinhala language began to flower in ,the 6th century neither the English nation nor the language, as we know it now, existed. The Father of the English language, Geoffrey Chaucer, wrote his masterpiece, Canterbury Tales, in 1386 and that too in Middle English. During that time the language of the English court was French and not English. Tamil ideologues do not downgrade English because it flowered about eight centuries after the emergence of Sinhalese, do they?
In comparing the value of a language it is futile to grade it on the date on which it emerged as a full blown flower. As pointed out in the previous paragraph, the English language emerged about eight centuries after the Sinhala language. Yet the English language has attained a status higher than that of Sinhalese or Tamil because of its growth with the developments of the times and its utility value. So does anyone care whether Tamil or Sinhalese existed before English or after the birth of English? In Sri Lanka the value of the Sinhala language too has risen to indelible heights because it has defined and shaped the nation’s identity as that of the Sinhalese. Its utility value too has risen to a new level because the Tamil and Muslim elite / leaders speak fluent Sinhala in pursuing their professional goals, inter-actions with the majority Sinhalese and, most of all, in playing politics.
The day that I knew that the Sinhala language had reached the indispensable level was the day I saw Kumar Ponnambalam, the son of G. G. Ponnambalam who was the bitter political opponent of S. W. R. D. Bandaranaike, address the court in impeccable Sinhala. Outside, in the political arena, he would excoriate Bandaranaike and downgrade Sinhala as being inferior to Tamil. But inside the court he would bend in two when addressing the court in Sinhala. I am equally impressed with Justice Wigneswaran and Mr. M. Sumanthiran when they address media conferences in Sinhala Though it is not politically correct for them to acknowledge it officially, they acknowledge in performing their public duties the value and even the supremacy of the Sinhala language. The Tamils have come a long way from the time that S. J. V. Chelvanaykam, the political father of Prabhakaran, went from kachcheri to kachcheri urging the Tamil public servants not to learn Sinhala.
The strength and the power of the Sinhala language was derived from the resistance it put up to overcome the high-powered pressures of Pali, Sanskrit and Tamil languages. The pressures of the Tamil language would have been the greatest, particularly with the state patronage of the colonial Dravidian rulers. The survival, growth and the triumph of the Sinhala language over all the competitors proves the cohesive power of the historical forces that engendered and energised it to define and preserve its identity amidst all adversities. The Sinhalese left their mark by defeating all the alien forces that came to conquer them with notions of superiority. The latest was Velupillai Prabhakaran, the putative saviour of the Tamils backed by the entire Tamil elite, both at home and abroad. They did not last long because neither the forces that came down from the North nor the West arrived here to protect nor foster the deep-rooted Sinhala-Buddhist culture. They invaded the nation at various times to ram their anti-national culture down the throat of the Sinhala-Buddhists. However, the overwhelming and unmistakable narrative of history that survives defines the triumphant trajectory of the Sinhala-Buddhists rising steadily above the alien and inimical forces to save their identity, their culture, their history and, above all, their primary political objective of making this island a fit-dwelling place for men.” (Mahavamsa – 1: 44).
It is unlikely that archaeological excavations could discover a great Tamil civilisation of ancient or medieval times in Sri Lanka. If at all, only a study of the Tamil settlements that began in the 13th century could reveal the achievements of the S. Indian migrants, particularly that of the iron-fisted Vellalar casteists and their slaves also imported from S. India. Judging by the anthills left behind by the Tamil chakravartis” and their Vellalar subalterns, or even by those who lived” before, it is unlikely that they could match the achievements of the Sinhalese.
The task before the Jaffna Tamils in proving their superiority is simple. All what they have to do is to provide evidence of their greatness left behind by the post-13th century settlers in the North. Can the new archaeological excavations reveal some hidden glory of the Tamils who had established a brand new civilisation, a new culture, a new language and other monumental achievements, comparable to that of either the Dravidians of S. India or the Sinhalese of Sri Lanka? There is absolutely no greatness in Justice Wigneswaran crowing about the Tamil language created and nurtured in S.. India, however old it is. Since Justice Wigneswaran is attempting to show the superiority of the Tamils of Jaffna he must provide historical proof from the Jaffna soil and not from S. India. I hope he will remember that we are talking about the history of the peoples of Sri Lanka and not S. India.
If he is intends proving that the Tamils of Jaffna are cultural giants, far superior to the Sinhalese, he will have to show their monumental contributions to the culture of mankind. Can he at least name the great poets, novelists and dramatists that enriched the ancient Tamil language with their creative genius? Forget the Sinhalese, for the moment. Not even in a thousand life cycles can the Jaffna Tamils reach the heights of the magnificent achievements of their only homeland in S. India. The richness and the magnificence of Tamil S. Indian culture cannot be matched easily. Many and variegated are the contributions of the Tamils of South India to the treasures of human civilisation. The early classical love and war poetry, the architecture of the Pallavas, the deservedly famous South Indian bronzes of the Chola period, the intricate school of vocal and instrumental music known as the Carnatic system, the well-known Bharata Natyam dance, the philosophy of Saiva Siddhanta, the magnificent temples of the South – for more than two thousand years have the Tamils been contributing to Indian culture and taking part in shaping and moulding the great Indian synthesis,” wrote Prof. Kamil V. Zvelebil, the distinguished Indologist in his introduction to The Poets of Powers . His discovery of the Tamil Siddha poets is an intriguing saga in itself. His unearthing of the lost Siddah texts and the spiritual revelations of Siddha thoughts are dazzling gems that are as brilliant as some of the Western literary giants like T. S. Eliot, Gerald Manley Hopkins etc.
Compared to the these attainments what have the Jaffna Tamils produced to make them great? According to some accounts, even the Nallur Temple was built by the Sinhala rulers of Jaffna. It is obvious that the peddling of anti-Sinhala racism is not going to make the Jaffna Tamils great. Justice Wigneswaran has been indulging in beating the anti-Sinhala-Buddhist drum to make him look like the latest avatar of Prabhakaran.
How far will this anti-Sinhala-Buddhist mantra take him? It hasn’t taken him to any great lengths so far. So far he has gone only to the extent of making Tamils, like him, look like hollow men, their headpiece filled with straws of imagined greatness.”
Yours sincerely
H. L. D. Mahindapala
PS: Ranjith, I wish to thank you and SPUR for offering to facilitate the debate.
