Posts filed under 'Current affairs'
By D.B.S. Jeyaraj
(CONTINUED FROM LAST WEEK)
QUESTION: Thank you for relating these details about these important events of the recent past. Your input provides fresh insight into these matters. But now I want to ask you about the present.
Gotabhaya Rajapakse ~ pic courtesy: businesstoday.lk
Let me start with your relationship with this government particularly the Defence secretary Gotabhaya Rajapakse.
Continue Reading August 27th, 2010
By D.B.S. Jeyaraj
(CONTINUED FROM LAST WEEK)
Question: What happened finally to your plan of rescuing Prabhakaran and his family by helicopter? Why did the plan not take off?
Answer:
It’s a very sad story………
After Prabhakaran’s son Charles Anthony asked me to rescue his family members by air I devised a plan and made preliminary arrangements. I arranged for a ship to be kept waiting at a far –off port beyond the reach of the Sri Lanka navy. I also made arrangements to buy a second-hand helicopter from an Ukrainian contact.
Continue Reading August 20th, 2010
by D.B.S. Jeyaraj
(continued from last week)
Question: So how did the return occur? How and why did you re-join the movement?What was your role during the last days of the war?
Answer: That’s another long story.
I was now out of the movement and leading a quiet life in Thailand with my family.I had no idea of returning to the movement though my wife felt that I would always go back if asked by Prabhakaran himself.
Continue Reading August 13th, 2010
By D.B.S. Jeyaraj
It was one year ago on August 5th 2009 that Thambiaiya Selvarasa Pathmanathan alias “KP” was taken into custody in Kuala Lumpur at First Tune Hotel on 316 Jalan Tuanku Abdul Rahman road.The former chief arms procurer of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam(LTTE) was brought to Colombo the following day.
Continue Reading August 6th, 2010
by D.B.S. Jeyaraj
The Conclusion of the long drawn out war against the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) organization has been welcomed by all sections of Sri Lankan society in particular and the international community in general.
Even as war ravaged Sri Lankans breathe a collective sigh of relief and attempt to get on with their lives in a post – war scenario ,it is important to note that the armed conflict’s end does not necessarily mean the national question generally referred to as the “Tamil problem” has been satisfactorily resolved.
Continue Reading July 30th, 2010
by D.B.S. Jeyaraj
The South Indian state of Tamil Nadu has a robust Film industry. From it’s nascent stages ,film- making in the state has been inclusive in nature. Artistes and technicians from various parts of India have worked and continue to work in Tamil films. Many non –Tamils employed in the film sector have chosen to live in Chennai.
Asin Thottumkal looks up during a news conference, about her new film “Ready” which is being shot in Sri Lanka, in Colombo June 30, 2010.~ Reuters pic
Sri Lanka’s film industry too has had historical links with Tamil Nadu. The first Sinhala film produced by SM Nayagam a Tamil was shot in Madras as Chennai was known earlier. Several other Sinhala films in the forties and fifties were made in India.
Continue Reading July 16th, 2010
By D.B.S. Jeyaraj
The tiger, they say , does not change its stripes. The leopard too wont change its spots. This inability or refusal to change is certainly true of the four –legged felines.
There are some – perpetually paranoid- who would say this is applicable to the near extinct two –legged tiger in Sri Lanka too. “Once a tiger always a tiger”. In fact there is a proverbial saying in Tamil “Puli Pasithalum Pullai Thinnaathu”(even when hungry the tiger will not eat grass).
Whatever truth these sayings may seek to convey, the reality in Sri Lanka is that of many members and ex-members of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) changing their stripes. Ferocious felines are transformed from carnivores into herbivores. The most famous examples of this successful transition were until recently Vinayagamurthy Muraleetharan alias Karuna and Sivanesathurai Chandrakanthan alias Pillaiyan. The former is a Parliamentarian and Deputy Minister while the latter is Chief Minister of the Eastern Provincial Council.
There are also innumerable instances of nondescript tiger cadres dropping out of the movement and embarking on a new, violence free family life. Thousands of former tigers have sought refuge in foreign countries. Most of them lead quiet, dignified lives contributing immensely to society at large.
Yesteryears: LTTE leader Prabhakaran, ‘KP’, Anton Balasingham and ‘Col.’ Sankar
Continue Reading July 9th, 2010
By D.B.S. Jeyaraj
The term “Intermestic” was first used by Henry Kissinger to explain international issues having domestic economic implications like for instance the middle-eastern situation abroad impacting on the price of gas in the US. The term coined by Kissinger took the “inter” from International and “mestic” from Domestic.
It was however veteran Journalist Mervyn de Silva who popularised the term in Sri Lanka. Mervyn who was then editing the “Lanka Guardian” fortnightly and writing a weekly column for “Sunday Island” applied the term to all issues crossing the boundaries between the International and the domestic and belonged to both spheres thereby necessitating this sub- category.
Continue Reading June 4th, 2010
By D.B.S.Jeyaraj
A significant event in Tamil transnational politics occurred a fortnight ago in historic Philadelphia city in the US state of Pennsylvania. About 70 -75 persons gathered on Monday May 17th for a three-day conclave. The venue was the National Convention Center situated on Philadelphia’s Independence Mall at 525 Arch Street.
TGTE Representatives in Philadelphia
Continue Reading May 28th, 2010
By D.B.S. Jeyaraj
Whenever demands or proposals are put forward to devolve more powers so that the Tamil and Muslim people of the Northern and Eastern Provinces could have a greater role in administering their areas of historic habitation one of the standard responses is to point out that more Tamils and Muslims live outside those two provinces.
It is also an incontrovertible fact that the greater part of Tamils of recent Indian origin described generally as Up Country Tamils or Plantation Tamils or Hill Country Tamils reside in the seven Sinhala majority provinces.
Continue Reading April 23rd, 2010
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