Readers may wonder how the South Block dominated Delhi reacts to the sharp and intuitive Tamil Nadu’s (TN) CM Jaylalitha’s statement on the SL air force personnel training in Chennai will depend on the degree of sensitivity Delhi has for the hurt feelings of TN Tamilians over the Eelam Tamils in SL. Is Delhi still indifferent or changing for the better ‘Ms. Jayalalithaa said that at a time when the demand for restoration of the rights of displaced Tamils in Sri Lanka was finding resonance around the globe, and pressure was building on Sri Lanka to .., the training of members of the Sri Lankan Air Force at the Tambaram Air Force base was akin to “thrusting a spear in the hearts of people of Tamil Nadu.”’ Hindu 5 July.
The immediate South Block explanation was that it was a ‘routine’ exercise; a pedantry overused excuse that ignores the reality of TN Tamils anger. For the first Delhi was forced to override South Block’s ‘routinely’ excuse when Delhi voted against SL at the March UNHRC sessions.
TN CM’s also refers to ‘the demand for action against violators of international law during the conflict in Sri Lanka was getting stronger. In this backdrop, training members of that country’s Air Force was not only improper but also an act against Tamils. “The Union government should immediately withdraw this action and send back the Air Force members to Sri Lanka,”. Delhi, SL’s captive ‘..had remained silent over the resolution adopted by the State Assembly that economic sanctions be imposed on Sri Lanka till the Tamils, who were languishing in camps in Sri Lanka, returned home and got equal rights, was insulting the Tamil people by its action,’. Such bitterness never before expressed over Delhi’s conduct was a TN first; indicative of the long overdue need for change in TN/Indian politics.
The anti-Tamil South Block in Delhi engineers sinister actions to bring a restless TN state to toe the line of the Centre. In 2009 following the embarrassing pecuniary 2G scam the South Block flaunted CBI arrests of members of the ex-CM’s family to buy his silence when the UPA observed stilled silence and showed callous indifference to SL’s atrocities. UPA trouble shooter Pranab Mukerjee flew down to confront the ex-CM-TN in person to deliver the ultimatum; keep silent over the SL genocide/massacres of Eelam Tamils to save his family’s pecuniary interests and stall CBI action against them. The consequence, the TN Tamils voted the ex-CM out of power for collaborating with Delhi/SL ‘in the loop’ actions/massacres to defeat the Eelam Tamils. Though the Pranab/UPA’s ultimatum legacy still hangs over the ex-CM’s head; his reaction to the atrocities continuing in SL is subdued and votes to elect Pranab as India’s President had to be given on a platter.
The rising TN Tamil anger caused Delhi most reluctantly to vote for the first time against SL on the US sponsored resolution in March 2012. SL showed its displeasure over Delhi’s vote in many strange ways; though Delhi continues its over appeasement of SL and observes stilled silence as it did when Eelam Tamils were/are massacred in tens of thousands in Mullivaykkal. PM Manmohan and SM Krishna go further to profusely lavish praise for the friendly Indo-SL (a UPA era) ties despite the constant stream of SL’s rebukes.
When the TN ex-CM called for a Tamil Eelam in SL to end SL’s atrocities Gothabhaya’s stinging rebuttal was ‘Karunanithi ..can have Eelam in Tamil Nadu’. Creating Eelam in TN/India carried serious sovereignty implications for India; yet Delhi for strange reasons made no comments on Gota’s preposterous game plan to effectively ship out Eelam Tamils to TN in preparation for reneging on SL’s promises to implement Rajiv’s/Delhi’s 13 Amendment plus solution. Likewise nearly one million up country Tamils as guest workers were disenfranchised and deported to TN earlier in 1949 a year after Ceylon’s (SL) independence. Now the Eelam Tamils are targeted for return to TN as descendents of the TN Chola/Pandyan armies that conquered and ruled SL between the 4th and 14th centuries. Delhi’s silence on this Gota’s gameplan instigated by the anti-Tamil South Block in Delhi effectively is an anti-Tamil act giving TN a step child/state status within the Indian Union. This encourages Champika’s a senior SL minister to threaten ‘a hundred more Mullivaykal (massacres)..(for) the Eelam Tamils’ supporting the 13 Amendment plus that Delhi appears to be pressing for. The threat impliedly is directed at Delhi as well but the meek Delhi PM claims belatedly that he conveyed his displeasure over the minister’s threat to the SL President in private only in far away Rio. No apologies from SL yet- another snub.
SL’s snub of Delhi/India is the order of the day since the UPA rule began. The most embarrassing was SL reneging on the 1987 Indo-SL Accord/13 Amendment, and opting for a phony ‘home grown’ solution. Gotabhaya apologists challenge the 13 Amendment with a litany of grievances SL has against the Tamils and India. Sonali Waduge in ‘How India And Sri Lanka Handle The Headache Of Tamil Eelam’ in the Eurasia Review June 30, claims ‘No country treats the natives of another (TN/India)country (Eelam Tamils are descendents of the Chola/Pandya armies who conquered and ruled SL for over a thousand years in the past) that ..invaded as equals’. More insulting is trivializing Delhi’s support ‘If India claims to have chipped in to help in the final stages of the war in 2009..the plan has everything to do with choking the Sinhalese leadership into eventually annexing SL on the pretext of looking after the welfare of Tamils.’ How very friendly Indo-SL ties are?
Readers are urged to read Senali’s piece in full to remove the delusion the South Block planted using PM Manmohan/S M Krishna stories of a friendly SL towards Delhi/India. Earlier the SL tirade was against the West, now it is Delhi. A few snippets (given below) show SL’s disdain for India. Senali and especially ex-RAW Raman (all ‘friends of the Rajapakses’) accused in May 2009 ‘the West of attempting to embarrass the SL government ..(to) put its senior officers in the dock by disseminating unauthenticated high figures of civilian casualties in the North..(in an) anti-Colombo campaign mounted in the West..’. According to ‘tom tom’ Raman, people in TN would have come to know of the alleged massacres long before anybody else..’ Despite what is in the public domain in SL’s versions of SL’s war without witnesses for Raman/Sonali anything goes. They do not mention that satellites above that were minutely capturing pictures of every crime SL was committing.
That Delhi’s arms, intelligence and personnel won SL’s war against the LTTE is widely accepted. Delhi volunteered SL the level support required to win the war supposedly against the LTTE, but the South Block ganged up with the Rajapakses to extend it into a war against the Tamils. However Delhi obtained repeated commitments from Colombo to implement the 13 Amendment though it contained only a substance less devolution to the Eelam Tamils. The South Block traded through Sonia/Pranab to buy ex- TN CM’s support for the SL military action against the Tamils though the Delhi leadership knew well enough that the Rajapakses/Sinhala congenital trait to renege on agreements or commitments. Rajiv’s killing served as South Block blown up excuse to collaborate with SL in finishing off the Tamils in SL. SL’s phony commitment on the 13 Amendment was a big ‘win win’ for the Rajapakses; it meant support to defeat the formidable LTTE and cause sufficient strain in TN/Centre relations to keep Delhi pre-occupied with handling the damaging divisiveness within the Indian Union and reducing Delhi’s pressure on SL over the 13 Amendment. Hence the nightmarish predicament for Delhi; an unapologetic creation of the South Block.
Once SL won the war against the Eelam Tamils, SL totally committed itself to ‘winner takes all’ (Palitha Kohona) dictum reneging on its 13 Amendment commitment to cause Delhi’s deep predicament in meeting its own commitment to TN, a win for SL. That SL could act on this without any hesitation was the South Block’s support for SL on the Eelam Tamil issue. The South Block under the UPA went overboard ‘in the loop’ role to become deeply involved in the Mullivaykal massacres and the smarter Gothabhaya used that as a leverage to dilute SL’s accountability for the massacres by cunningly parceling off to Delhi a role in the massacres. This SL weapon still hanging over Delhi’s head explains Delhi’s softly softly approach without requiring SL to reciprocate Delhi for its foolhardy support for SL. Though details of the Narayanan/Menon role in the planning the final phase of the war is a closed book, an ICC investigation is sure to shed light on what roles the SL side and the ‘in the loop’ Delhi side actually played. Since SL is playing hardball readers could presume that Delhi’s position is weak. Delhi is thus unable, unlikely and unwilling to press SL hard on the devolution issue; thanks to the South Block bungle.
As long as the captive UPA Delhi is kept busy discussing indefinitely the 13 Amendment SL buys time to complete the ethnic cleansing of the North of Tamils demographically erasing the Tamil homeland myth to make the 13 Amendment irrelevant to the Tamil Eelam debate. These appear to be part of the joint Delhi/Colombo (Narayanan/Menon) strategy that led to the May 2009 Mullivaykal massacres. Menon’s recent SL visits is most feared as a possible repeat for more sneaky schemes to totally destroy the Eelam Tamils in preparation to ship out Eelam Tamils to TN. The South Block’s ‘in the loop’ teams secretive visits promise one thing just to calm the restlessness of TN Tamils but continue with the more sinister SL’s genocide schemes to destroy the Tamils totally. Tamils are thus most apprehensive of Menon’s one to one commitments to the Rajapakses in the context of his recent SL visit; to ready plans to ship out the rest of the Tamils to TN. Hence Gota’s Tamil Eelam in TN theme constantly pops up and that there is no reaction from Delhi is most disturbing; is Delhi an accessory of Gota’s gameplan.
PM Manmohan’s friendly SL apologists ‘So eelam has ..a perfect ploy for India to subtly take over Sri Lanka as is currently taking place – their cheap drugs now hitting the pharmacies..put(ing) Sri Lankans health at risk…The 50 000 is nothing other than houses built for illegal immigrants that have been streadily coming over the years from Tamil Nadu…Hypocrisy is such that the world speaks about a fictitious unverified number (40 000) massacred totally ignoring how the Sri Lankan armed forces saved close to 300 000 Tamil civilians. ..Had India been concerned about the Sri Lankan Tamils would India not been looking after the Sri Lankan Tamil refugees in Tamil Nadu better..So …totally flouting the sovereignty under Indian rule and hegemony. Is this what freedom from LTTE..equate(s) to? This South Block coached Manmohan /Krishna praise for Indo-SL friendship is hollow is vouched by SL apologists closer to the ground viewing it differently. After dropping the ‘big brother’ bullying taunts the South Block bureaucrats are working on a ’ magic wand solution to the Eelam issue supporting SL to fully ethnic cleanse and export Eelam Tamils to TN to resolve the Eelam issue once and for all.