The year was 1987; I was in JNU. Early on the breakfast table there used to be quite heated discussion on the Sri Lankan issue. My friends from Tamil Nadu use to provide perspective to the Sri Lankan problem,
The only thing we knew by then was there were communal riots in Colombo in 1983 between Sinhalese and Tamils and that had triggered the Tamil secessionist movement in Sri Lanka.
It was during one of those discussions on the breakfast table that some of my Tamil friends told me that entire top brass of the LTTE including its leader Velupillai Prabhkaran was in New Delhi. They said they were planning to meet them and invited me, if I was interested to come to the Samarat hotel where the LTTE leadership was put up.
Frankly, at that time I had little knowledge about the Sri Lanka and its problems. Sri Lanka is far off from New Delhi, and north Indians, as they say are sea blind. So I had little clue of the problems across the Gulf of Mannar.
I asked my friend who was Prabhakran, what does he stands for? Why he was called in New Delhi and who has called him? My friend told me to join them in the bus # 615 and would explain me the details about the LTTE and its chief on the way.
I was told how daringly Prabhakaran had led the secessionist movement in Sri Lanka and has emerged as the undisputed leader of the Tamils there. It’s because of this the LTTE chief was flown from Jaffna to New Delhi for an important meeting with the Indian leadership. They LTTE then was the state guest of India.
I learnt quite a few lessons on Sri Lanka during the bus ride from the University to Chaknaykypuri and then a short walk to hotel Samarat. We entered the hotel premises with security forces watching us. I realize they had little knowledge about the Sri Lankan developments and were doing their duty.
We showed our students ID card and were let into the main entrance hall of the newly built hotel. We sat in the lobby, waiting for the LTTE leaders to descend from some where so that we can catch their glimpse and say Hello.
We had no other access to the visitors and did not know what to do next; we just talked about the LTTE as we waited. I asked my friends, besides Prabhakran who else are there how to recognize them. One of my friend said, they all will be wearing cyanide capsule on their neck and will be speaking Tamil.
This was turning out to be an encounter of a rare kind. I became curious to know more about all these characters and decided to stay on for some time there. The wait become longer then desired, besides no one turned up that looked liked LTTE. I realized quite late that none of my friends knew any one among the LTTE and were just there to catch a glimpse. As the outing turning out to be a bit boring, I got myself excused, leaving some diehard fans still waiting there.
Later, I learnt that the then Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi and LTTE chief Velupillai Prabhakaran had one to one meeting. In that meeting the LTTE supermo had agreed to surrender arms in lieu of a greater share in administration in north and east provinces of Sri Lanka. New Delhi had then agreed financially support the LTTE. After this agreement, New Delhi flew the LTTE entourage back to Jaffna.
It was only after the assurance from the LTTE India on 4 June 1987 conducted Operation Poomalai or Eagle Mission 4 and its Air Force airdropped supplies to the Tamils besieged in town of Jaffna and deterred the Sri Lankan army not to advance any further.
The Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi then went ahead to sign the Indian- Sri Lankan peace accord with Sri Lakan President JR Jayawardene. Even as the ink on the accord was to dry and Indian Prime Minister was receiving the guard of honor, a Sri Lankan guard menacingly pounced on him with his rifle butt. Rajiv Gandhi was lucky to escape that murderous assault. The incident however reflected the Sinhalese resentment against Indian intervention in Sri Lanka.
As part of the India Sri Lanka peace accord Indian Peace Keeping Force (IPKF) that was sent to Sri Lanka to protect the Tamils and to help them create their homeland. The IPKF was baffled to find that those whom they had come to protect has become its adversaries and did not wanted them at all.
It took a while for India to realize that the LTTE chief Velupillai Prabhkaran had backtracked from his promises made in New Delhi and had preferred the friendship of Sinhalese leadership then to India. All this added salt to the injuries to the Indian involvement in Sri Lanka.
The LTTE’s resentment against India did not stop with the withdrawal of the IPKF from Sri Lanka. They went ahead to assassinate the Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi. They never came up with an explanation why they did so? Did Rajiv Gandhi not honor the commitment made to LTTE in New Delhi? So far no one had made any allegations against him and now no one is there to open up this chapter again.
The concluding days of Elam war IV, in mid May 2009, was one of the greatest drama that unfolded in South Asia ever since operation Blue Star in 1984 conducted by the Indian army at the Golden Temple in Amritsar, Punjab.
Keeping all this in mind one wonders, whether the LTTE leadership, on its last leg, while holed up in the narrow coastal strip of Mullaithevu district, keeping lakhs of Tamil people hostage on gun point and using them as cover, wanted Indian to intervene in Sri Lanka again?
Well in Tamil Nadu there were no stones left unturned for this to happen once again, but alas, there is none left among the LTTE to tell about the remains of other day. What a pathetic end to the Tigers that once commanded awe and admiration for their brutal ways and means.
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Syed Ali Mujtaba is a journalist based in Chennai. He can be contacted at syedalimujtaba@yahoo.com