{"id":106837,"date":"2020-09-20T15:28:40","date_gmt":"2020-09-20T22:28:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=106837"},"modified":"2020-09-20T15:28:40","modified_gmt":"2020-09-20T22:28:40","slug":"wigneswaran-a-serious-threat-to-peace-and-reconciliation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2020\/09\/20\/wigneswaran-a-serious-threat-to-peace-and-reconciliation\/","title":{"rendered":"Wigneswaran a serious threat to peace and reconciliation"},"content":{"rendered":"

H. L. D. Mahindapala<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n

Needling the South with provocative\nanti-Sinhala-Buddhist hate speech led the North all the way to Nandikadal. So\nwhy is C. V. Wigneswaran going down the same old path of divisive and \ndestructive politics? What does he hope to gain when the mightiest collective\nforces of the Jaffna Tamils failed to divide the nation under various\nconstitutional formulas by basing their strategy on anti-Sinhala-Buddhist\nextremism? Besides, his hate speech is  loaded with toxic distortions of\nknown realities which stand in the way of future reconciliation and \npeaceful co-existence. It is apparent that he is merely re-enacting the\ninflammatory role of Hanuman who, in the Mahabaratha, <\/em><\/strong>set\nfire to the nation by gradually extending his flaming tail each time it ran out\nof fuel.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But Wigneswaran is not alone in propagating\nanti-Sinhala-Buddhist hate speech. He is, in fact, the latest avatar of a\nJaffna-centric ideology that began  with G. G. Ponnamabalam, the father of\nthe anti-Sihala-Buddhist ideology, who first lit the fires of communal\npassions  with his provocative attack on the Mahavamsa<\/em><\/strong> and\nthe Sinhala-Buddhist history. It happened in June 1939 in Navalapitiya and\ncommunal riots spread quickly to the neighbouring towns. Since then the\nanti-Sinhala-Buddhist ideology used to sustain the mono-ethnic extremism of the\nNorth has never ceased. Projecting the image of the Sinhalese as the bogey\nman  threatening  the existence of Tamils has been an essential\ningredient for the perpetuation and promotion of mono-ethnic extremism in the\nNorth. It has dominated the post-colonial period and dragged the nation through\nhell fires of death and destruction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ponnambalam\u2019s anti-Sinhala-Buddhist ideology\ngathered momentum incrementally over the years and exploded in its most\nvirulent form when the Tamil leadership officially declared war on May 14, 1976\nat Vadukoddai and urged the Tamil to take up arms and never cease until they\nachieve Eelam. What the Vellala elite who held the reins of power from feudal\ntimes did not realise was that they were handing over power for the first time\nto untried and untested youth who went berserk with the gun. Velupillai\nPrabhakaran was the first-born child of the Vadukoddai Resolution. He is the\nultimate manifestation of the anti-Sinhala-Buddhist ideology bred by\nPonnambalam. It was his ideology that led to the longest war with disastrous\nconsequences, particularly to the Tamils.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tamil leaders never deviated from the\nanti-Sinhala-Buddhist ideology that sustained them in competitive electoral\npolitics. They had nothing else to offer their electorate. They never offered\nalternative ideologies like socialism, liberalism, democratic humanism,\npluralism etc. The rainbow colours of a multi-cultural and pluralistic society\nnever arched over the skies of Jaffna. From  one end  of the\npolitical spectrum to the other Tamil leadership competed with each other\npromising to deliver more and more of mono-ethnic  extremism demonising\nthe Sinhala-Buddhists and nothing else. The Tamils who lived by the sword of\nanti-Sinhala-Buddhist ideology also died by it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was constructed, defined and set in \nmotion  when Ponnambalam began his campaign demanding 50% of power to be\nthe equal of the majority Sinhala-Buddhists. Of course, he knew that there was\nno rational basis on which he could convince the British that a minority of 12%\ncould demand 50% of  power. He had to construct a rationale to justify his\ndisproportionate claim. So, he opted for the strategy of proving that the\nTamils were equal, if not superior to the Sinhalese. Mark you, it was also a\ntime when the British  surveyors, archaeologists, and civil servants were\ndigging  into the past and discovering  the glories of the\nancient  and medieval Sinhala-Buddhist history. The unearthed discoveries\nwere showering the Sinhalese with an aura of greatness. The grandeur emerging\nfrom the buried past was making the Sinhalese look like giants of a great civilisation.\nThe political implication was clear : if they could have built and governed a\ncivilisation of such magnitude then they could easily govern Sri Lankan without\nthe British. The politics of Sinhala nationalism was resting on monumental\nhistory.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This placed the Tamils in a virtual vacuum.\nThey had no history of comparable magnitude to base their arguments for such a\ngrossly exaggerated claim of 50% of power to a minority of 12%. In making his\nover-blown demand, totally out of proportion,  Ponnambalam had to fight\nnot only the political realities of the day but also the overwhelming presence\nof a past casting long shadows over the national scene. History was not on the\nside of the Tamils. Ever since then the Tamils have been labouring \nto  rewrite history to fill in the blanks and deny the horrors\nstaring  in their face.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Ponnambalam\u2019s time, the biggest icon in\ntheir history that began in the 10th<\/sup> century was Sankilli \u2013 a\npathological killer of the Tamils and the first recorded ethnic cleanser of Muslims\nand Sinhalese from Jaffna. On the Christmas eve 1544 he marched down to Mannar\nand massacred 600 Tamil Catholics, including pregnant women and children, who\nrefused to recognise him as the sole representatives of the Tamils\u201d. The Tamil\nCatholics owed allegiance to the King of Portugal. Since then the intolerant\nand inhuman Sankili culture of Tamils killing Tamils became a permanent feature\nin peninsular  politics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Prabhakaran emerged as Sankili\u2019s avatar in\nthe 20th<\/sup> century. History didn\u2019t repeat itself as a farce the\nsecond  time in Jaffna. Prabhakaran went all out to outdo Sankili. To\ndrive the Muslims out of Jaffna Sankili threw pig\u2019s head into Muslim wells.\nPrabhakaran, on the contrary, forced them out with a gun pointed to their\nheads. His megalomania drove him to crush any form of dissent. He  feared\nhis  own people. He slaughtered Neelan Tiruchelvam, Amirthalingam, Uma\nMaheswaran etc., etc., the cream of Tamil leadership, all because he feared\nthem. S. C. Chandrahasan, son of the father of separatism, S. J. V.\nChelvanayakam, and V. Anandasangaree, the President of TULF, are on record\nsaying that Prabhakaran had killed more Tamils than others put together. With a\nmonstrous history of a bloody past, where the Tamils were  deprived of\ntheir basic human rights under the Vellalas, the Tamils were desperately in\nneed of a face-lift to make them look good, a defence that would make them look\nrespectable in the eyes of the world. Not having one, Ponnambalam in his time\ndiscovered that attack is the best form of defence. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was in this setting that Ponnambalam came\nout swinging against the Mahavamsa<\/em><\/strong> and the history of\nthe Sinhala-Buddhists. His strategy was to downgrade Sinhala-Buddhist history\nin order to prove the superiority of Tamil history. The most popular phrase was\nto condemn the Sinhala-Buddhists as racist bigots  obsessed with the Mahavamsa<\/em><\/strong> mentality\u201d.\nIt became the pop phrase even among the anti-Sinhala-Buddhist Sinhala\nintellectuals to denigrate those who defended the historical heritage that made\nSri Lanka great.  The Mahavamsa<\/em><\/strong> mentality\u201d was a\nphrase used frequently to demean anything and everything that restored to the\nSinhala people the heritage they lost under nearly 500 years of colonialism.\nThe Mahavamsa <\/em><\/strong>mentality\u201d was also blamed for resisting the\ndivisive politics of the Tamils claiming 50% for just 12%. But none of the\nintellectuals dared to speak of Jaffna jingoism\u201d leaping from one\nextremism  to another until it pushed the Tamil people like lemmings over\nthe cliff to their self-destruction. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ponnamabalam\u2019s strategy was to attack the\npast and the present of the Sinhalese for him to advance his claim of 50-50\u201d \u2013\na mathematical formula that runs counter to all known democratic principles\nof  governance. Except in authoritarian regimes all institutions \u2013\nfrom  the state to non-governmental institutions — are run on\nmajoritarian consensus with, of course, guarantees to minority rights. But\nPonnambalam could not wage a frontal attack on the established and universally\naccepted principles of democracy. So, he resorted to two deviant tactics: 1. he\nattacked the past of the Sinhalese to downgrade its value as a legitimate force\nto inherit power. 2. downgrade the Sinhalese as a majority that discriminates\nagainst the minority. The Soulbury Commissioners listened to him on this issue\nof discrimination and dismissed it as hogwash. The attack on Sinhala-Buddhism\nwas not an issue canvassed at the Commission. However, it became the main \npolitical tool used by the Tamil extremists in the public domain to make the\nSinhalese the bogeyman \u2013 the cause of all evils of the Tamils. It  still\nrides  in peninsula politics bedevilling national politics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From the time of G. G. Ponnambalam in the\nthirties to  C. V. Wigneswaran, this has been the consistent theme propagated\nto downgrade not only the Sinhalese, their main target, but also the low-caste\nTamils of Jaffna, regional Tamils in Batticoloa and the Indian coolies\u201d in the\ncentral hills and even the Tamil-speaking Muslims. Jaffna-centric arrogance and\nintransigence have been two of the perverse strands that runs through\npeninsular politics. It is most regrettable that Wigneswaran continues  to\nharp on the racial superiority of the Tamils in the post-Nazi era. He knows\nthat it  has bred and continues to breed racial hatred with all its tragic\nconsequences. Of course, he  has right to praise his language and culture.\nWhat  is unacceptable is when he uses it to devalue Sinhala-Buddhism. His\nattempt to place Jaffna Tamils at a level far superior to Sinhalese by condemning\ntheir history is not  only unhistorical but also provocative playing into\nthe hands of extremists on both sides. It is also counter-productive and it has\nnot led them anywhere except to Nandikdal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What is worse, it is a hollow claim not \nworthy of a man who sat as a judge in the Supreme Court. He repeats that the\nTamils (meaning, of course, the high-caste Vellalas) are great because he\nspeaks Tamil, the  oldest language in the  world. His other tack is\nto denigrate the Mahavamsa<\/em><\/strong> and Sinhala-Buddhist \nhistory because it  is the Ponnambalam-Wigneswaran way of making Tamils\nlook superior to the Sinhalese. But both are cheap political tactics that had\nworsened the North -South inter-ethnic relations. Take, for instance, his claim\nto be superior because he speaks Tamil, the oldest language in the  world,\nas opposed to the Sinhala language which he says came into being around 5th<\/sup> century.\nBut this is a silly boast of a vacant mind. No one  denies the antiquity\nand the  greatness of the Tamil language and its culture. But how can he\nclaim to be great by parroting a language created by another country, another\nnation? The greatness belongs to the Tamils of S. India who created it and\ninvested it with all its richness. Wigneswaran, or any Tamil in Jaffna, has nothing\nto do with it. The Wigneswarans are nothing but mediocre  parrots trained\nto repeat the language that came out of the creative genius of Tamils of S.\nIndia. The imitative Jaffna mediocrities had not contributed anything great\nto  the glory of the Tamil language or its culture. So, when Wigneswaran\ntalks of his greatness because  he  speaks the Tamil language he is\nfooling himself and not  impressing the  world. Everyone knows that\nhe  is trying to shine in borrowed feathers. Wigneswaran and his anti-Sinhala-Buddhist\nextremists are pretending that they are the Einsteinian giants of Tamil\nculture. The more he opens his  mouth to boast about his greatness because\nhe speaks Tamil the more he exposes his mediocrity. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Sinhalese, on the  other hand, minted\na new language of their own rejecting the dominant classical languages of their\ntime. Sanskrit, Pali and Tamil were already established vehicles for all\nreligious, social and  intellectual uses. The strength  of the\nSinhala language is that it never surrendered to these overwhelming linguistic\nforces of its  time. Rejecting all these languages the Sinhalese created\ntheir own linguistic medium for inter-personal communication and expression of\ntheir spiritual and philosophical thoughts. If the Tamils came first, and if\ntheir language was superior, and if they were the geniuses they claim to be how\ncome they failed to make their language the lingua franca of the nation? Why\ndid the Sinhala language and the Sinhalese triumph over the Tamil geniuses? How\ndid the young Sinhalese beat the old Tamil settlers? Repeating ad\nnauseam<\/em><\/strong> that Tamil language is great because it is one of the\noldest doesn\u2019t make it great because of its age. Languages that came later have\ndelivered greater achievements for the  advancement  of mankind.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Sinhalese, for their part, have proved\nthat it is their language that has served them more than any other language\nthat came with the migrants. Besides, if Wigneswaran wants to prove that his\nJaffna culture is great then he  has to match it with the achievements of\nthe Sinhalese and not  bask in the glory of S. India. It is because he\ncan\u2019t that he keeps on attacking  the Mahavamsa<\/em><\/strong> \u2013\na classic that is the envy of the culturally bankrupt Tamils of Jaffna.\nIncidentally, if he rejects the Mahavamsa <\/em><\/strong>then he has\nto reject the Tamil historical record, Yalpana Vaipava Malai<\/em><\/strong>,\nwritten by poet Mylvakanam, in 1736 for the benefit of the Dutch Governor, Jan\nMaccaras. In his own twisted way, Mylvakanam acknowledges Vijaya and his\nSinhala followers as one of the original founders of the nation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As I know it, Wigneswaran is a clueless\npolitical speculator who is hanging on to his obsessions with Tamil greatness\nmainly because he has no other viable political ideology to make his mark in\npolitics. Sometime back when he was challenging  everyone to debate with\nhim on this issue I accepted his challenge. Then he backtracked. He asked me to\npresent to him my arguments for him to check with academic authorities before\nagreeing to debate. I asked him whether he, as a prosecuting lawyer, went to\ncourt and asked the defence lawyer to reveal his case to him before going to\ntrial. That is Wigneswaran, the great defender of Tamils who does not know\nwhether  he is coming or going. Obviously, he is not sure of his case. Now\nhe is asking for a commission to investigate and adjudicate on what happened in\nhistory. He does not know his own Tamil history. He is still learning. In the\nmeantime, he  is playing the Tamil card purely to score points over his\npolitical competitors in Jaffna.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He relies entirely on one argument: he is\ngreat, the Tamils of Jaffna are great \u2013 nay superior to the Sinhalese! \u2013\nbecause of the Tamil language. If Wigneswaran claims greatness on a borrowed\nlanguage shouldn\u2019t the Sinhalese be placed on a far superior scale of greatness\nfor having created a new language and  with it given the world a new\nculture and a  new civilisation? What have the Jaffna Tamils done in their\nsterile settlement since the 10th<\/sup> century that can match the\nachievements of the Sinhalese?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What is more, the Tamils who boast of their\ngreat history is yet to produce an authoritative history of Jaffna. The first\ntask of Jaffna University, established in 1972, should have been to produce a\nscholarly study of its past. More so, because history  has been abused to\nmislead people into Nandikadal. But it has not done so to this day. Giants of\nhistoriography with the stature of Prof. Kingsley de Silva have not yet graced\nthe halls of learning in the Jaffna University.  K. Indrapala, the first professor\nof history of Jaffna, had to  leave the University in a hurry because\nhis  original thesis on which he obtained his doctorate, was rejected by\nthe politically hostile forces that proclaimed the Tamils were the original\nsettlers from the dawn of time\u201d. Indrapala said that the Malabaris who\nmigrated from S. India decided to remain as permanent settlers only in the 10th<\/sup> century.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The intellectual level of Wigneswaran makes\nit obvious that the future of reconciliation and even peace is at great risk. If\nthe political thinking of the Tamils is to remain at Wigneswaran\u2019s level we can\ncertainly look forward to another bloody Nandikadal. If Wigneswaran thinking\ncame from a cheap politician trying to win the most number of preferential\nvotes one could turn a blind eye, though repugnant. But when Wigneswaran \nfails to distinguish between fact and fiction a serious question arises: How on\nearth did he pass judgment, fairly and objectively, in the Supreme Court of Sri\nLanka? Considering the way he is handling the available evidence before us all\nshouldn\u2019t there be a commission appointed to review his judgments?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

H. L. D. Mahindapala Needling the South with provocative anti-Sinhala-Buddhist hate speech led the North all the way to Nandikadal. So why is C. V. Wigneswaran going down the same old path of divisive and  destructive politics? What does he hope to gain when the mightiest collective forces of the Jaffna Tamils failed to divide […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-106837","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-h-l-d-mahindapala"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106837","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=106837"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106837\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=106837"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=106837"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=106837"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}