{"id":41693,"date":"2015-02-21T09:19:18","date_gmt":"2015-02-21T15:19:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=41693"},"modified":"2015-02-20T13:05:57","modified_gmt":"2015-02-20T20:05:57","slug":"the-north-and-the-east-is-not-a-tamil-homeland-but-the-homeland-of-all-the-inhabitants-of-sri-lanka","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2015\/02\/21\/the-north-and-the-east-is-not-a-tamil-homeland-but-the-homeland-of-all-the-inhabitants-of-sri-lanka\/","title":{"rendered":"The North and the East is not a \u2018Tamil Homeland\u2019 but the Homeland of \u2018all the Inhabitants of Sri Lanka\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

‘Sri Lanka Patriot’ <\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n

The North and the East is not the exclusive homeland of the Tamil speaking people as very incorrectly written in the 13th<\/sup> amendment to the constitution. It is actually the historical homeland of all the inhabitants of Sri Lanka. Therefore, this clause should be deleted from the constitution and replaced by \u2018the North and the East is the historical homeland of all the inhabitants of Sri Lanka\u2019 immediately by the Government. Also, the TNA should be told these facts in no uncertain terms immediately. The US, EU, UK, Canada, India and all other Eelamists should also be informed immediately about this. The US,EU,UK, Canada, India should be told once and for all not to interfere in any way in Sri Lanka by the Government. However, no one in this Government has the backbone to do so. Are we backboneless invertebrates? It seems so, sadly.<\/p>\n

The archaeological records show that until the 14th<\/sup> century, the North and the East was a part of the Rajarata as attested by all the Buddhist archaeological sites found all over the North and the East. In fact, tanks such as Kanthale Tank were built by the Sinhala Kings as were many other tanks in the North and the East. This shows irrefutably that the North and the East was inhabited by the Sinhalese until the 14th<\/sup> century. Since the 14th<\/sup> century or later centuries, there has been migration from South India, mainly to\u00a0the North of Sri Lanka.<\/p>\n

If looking at the island\u2019s history, even prior to 600 BC or so when the Sinhala people came into being, there were tribal people living in the island, and who has been living in this island even 10,000 years ago as attested by the many pre-historic caves found all over the island. The archaeological record shows that around 600 BC there was an Indian migration and along with mainly the indigenous tribes, the getting together of both the tribal peoples and the Indian migrants formed the Sinhalese people. This is irrefutably proven by the archaeological record. Therefore, the ancestors of the Sinhalese people i.e. the tribal people have been living in this island for more than 10,000 years. Even today, the Veddhas are the remnants of those tribal people. That the Sinhalese is a combination of mainly the earlier tribal people and the Indian migration is clear by even our features which are very indigenous such as flat noses and many other indigenous features (maha kalu Sinhalaya come to mind). Although we adopted an Indo-Aryan language due to the few Indian migrant\u2019s influence and cross cultural combination, we are mainly descendants of those tribal peoples as even cultural traits such as devil worshipping suggests. The adoption of Buddhism also suggests our independence.<\/p>\n

Since the 14th<\/sup> century or so, as I have stated above, there were migrations of other peoples from South India such as today\u2019s Sri Lankan Tamils. As a result, today Sri Lanka is a multi cultural country. Today Sri Lanka comprises of Sinhala, Catholics, Sri Lankan Tamils, Indian Tamils, Muslims, Malays, Burghers, Veddhas and others. So today Sri Lanka is a multi cultural, multi religious and multi ethnic country.<\/p>\n

Therefore looking at the archaeological record, how can anyone say that the North and the East is the \u2018exclusive homeland of the tamil speaking people\u2019?\u00a0It is definitely not the case when looking at the archaeology and the history of the island. Therefore, what is written in the 13th<\/sup> amendment to the constitution is a blatant lie. It should be changed immediately and state that \u2018the North and the East is the historical homeland of all the inhabitants of Sri Lanka\u2019.<\/p>\n

Even looking at the present situation since the 14th<\/sup> century, with the many migrations and Sri Lanka becoming a multi cultural, multi religious and multi ethnic country, how can the TNA racists demand the North and the East as some exclusive tamil speaking people\u2019s homeland? This is a blatant violation of the rights of all the other inhabitants of Sri Lanka apart from the Sri Lankan Tamils.<\/p>\n

Therefore I suggest that the Government immediately repeal what is written in the 13th<\/sup> amendment to the constitution i.e. that \u2018the North and the East is an exclusive homeland of the tamil speaking people\u2019 and replace it with \u2018the North and the East is the homeland of all the inhabitants of Sri Lanka\u2019.<\/p>\n

Also immediately repeal the clause which says that the North and the East somehow has some exclusive right to a referendum to merge. This cannot be since the provinces of the country have been formed for administrative purposes only and not for the racist TNA to form illegal separate homelands or states. If the provincial system, formed for inclusive purposes is misused as a stepping stone to claim illegal Eelams, the Government should take action against such persons such as the TNA.<\/p>\n

The Government should safeguard the fundamental rights of all the inhabitants of Sri Lanka to call this entire island their home, to live where they wish in peace in any part of the island and not let racists such as the TNA illegally claim exclusive rights to\u00a0large swaths of the island which even goes again the archaeological records.<\/p>\n

The Government should also immediately demand that the TNA stop once and for all any talk of Sinhala people in particular and all other peoples such as Catholics, Malays, Muslims, Veddhas or any other group of people not being able to live in the North. If the Government deems that the North has more than sufficient land for landless people living in other parts of the Island, the Government should have the right to decide to provide such land to any group of landless people. It is a human right of all peoples of Sri Lanka to land to cultivate for example, if they don\u2019t have land to do so. Also it is the right of all the inhabitants of Sri Lanka to use the coastal resources of the island. The same goes for the exclusive economic zone around the island. Also land and police powers should never, ever be given to these racists such as the TNA as they do not respect the fundamental rights of all the inhabitants of Sri Lanka to call all parts of this island our home.<\/p>\n

The Government should safeguard the fundamental rights of all the inhabitants of Sri Lanka i.e. the Sinhala, Catholics, Sri Lankan Tamils, Indian Tamils, Muslims, Malays, Burghers, Veddhas and not the rights of racists such as the TNA. This is one of the basic obligations of any Government. Also, due to this erroneous demands by the TNA and the LTTE, look at the destruction wrought on Sri Lanka in terms of loss of life, damage to the economy, loss of development opportunities for over thirty years. It is high time that the TNA respects the fundamental rights of all the inhabitants of Sri Lanka.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

‘Sri Lanka Patriot’ The North and the East is not the exclusive homeland of the Tamil speaking people as very incorrectly written in the 13th amendment to the constitution. It is actually the historical homeland of all the inhabitants of Sri Lanka. Therefore, this clause should be deleted from the constitution and replaced by \u2018the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-41693","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-forum"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41693","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=41693"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41693\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41693"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=41693"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41693"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}