Shenali Waduge

Trust is like a piece of paper, once itƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ¢-¾‚¢s crumpled it loses its originality. Several dates in history reveal the real nature of the conflict that has prevailed in Sri Lanka and it has nothing to do with any ethnic strife existing between the Sinhalese and Tamils and everything to do with how India has been manipulating a sovereign nation and its people who have been made to suffer so that India can remain undivided and maintain its stature as a regional power.

A bid for self-determination did not start with the LTTE or Prabakaran. It started with the Federal Party in 1949 carrying sentiments of separatism that was rising in IndiaƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ¢-¾‚¢s Tamil Nadu. India wanted to hide how its Hindi North were treating the rest of IndiaƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ¢-¾‚¢s citizenry. Calling youth to take arms were the Tamil elders rallying round the Vaddukoddai Resolution. With IndiaƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ¢-¾‚¢s Tamil Nadu attempting to separate and Sri LankaƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ¢-¾‚¢s Tamils carrying similar sentiments with calls to take up arms, India needed to take action.

ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ Sri LankaƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ¢-¾‚¢s military carried out a brave offensive on 26 May 1987 with the second stage launched on 3 June 1987 to capture Jaffna. It was here that Prabakaran was cornered in Vadamarachchi. The very next day India violated Sri LankaƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ¢-¾‚¢s airspace using its airforce to drop food over the Jaffna peninsula.

ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ What needs to be reminded is that whilst Prabakaran launched his movement to create ƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ…-EelaamƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ”š‚ he was based in Tamil Nadu in the suburb of Thiruvaanmiyoor from July 1983 to late 1986. He returned to Jaffna having realized that staying in India would mean he would have to function to IndiaƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ¢-¾‚¢s dictates and make compromises he was not ready to commit to.

ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ From the ƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ…-interventionƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ”š‚ by India on 4 June 1987 to July 29 1987 several significant events took place.

• On July 23, 1987 Prabakaran was invited to Delhi to meet the Indian Prime MinisterƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚  Rajiv Gandhi.
• Between 23-25 July 1987, Prabakaran was given a draft of the Indo-Lanka Peace Accord by Head of Intelligence Bureau M. K. Narayan later National Security Advisor but the LTTE supremo was not agreeable with its contents.
• On 28 July 1987 Rajiv Gandhi met Prabakaran. This was just the day before Rajiv Gandhi flew to Colombo to sign the Indo-Lanka Peace Agreement with President J R Jayawardena of Sri Lanka.

Obviously, India did not draft the Indo-Lanka Peace Accord with requirements for constitutional amendments to Sri LankaƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ¢-¾‚¢s constitution, establishment of Provincial Council systems and the merger of the North and East provinces over night. Every aspect would have been carefully thought out and planned. That is very clear.

Having destabilized Sri Lanka economically through training and arming several Tamil armed groups and plotting them against each other, India was now ready to democratically forward its plans to further strangulate a sovereign government.

What India did not contend with was the charismatic nature of Prabakaran and his megalomanic ideology that enabled him to turn his terror outfit into a cult terrorist group.

A mistake all democratic governments flirting with terrorists make is to think that they can always be bought over.

Little known and rarely given publicity is the pact that India made with LTTE during the 28 July meetingƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚  with Rajiv Gandhi.

We are all aware that the LTTE takes significant amount of money from its own people in terms of taxes despite its ability to generate funds illegally. Since the Indo-Lanka Accord necessitated that the LTTE disarm and since LTTE was concerned that it would be loosing out on a large chunk of money made through taxing Tamils, the Indian Government had even agreed to give LTTE Rs.5million per month to fund LTTEƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ¢-¾‚¢s administration. India had also agreed to an LTTE-run interim administration in Tamil-dominated Sri Lanka comprising the northern and eastern parts of the country. Does this not echo what eventually happened through the Cease Fire Agreement of 2001?

Though Prabakaran wanted the pact to be made public India declined as the funds would have to be given through black money and asked him to treat it like a gentlemenƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ¢-¾‚¢s agreement.

Despite giving his own bullet-proof vest Rajiv GandhiƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ¢-¾‚¢s death attributed to the LTTE and Prabakaran highlights the dangers of intelligence services overstepping their orders and proves how similar catastrophes have taken place in other parts of the world as well. All groups armed have no allegiance except to promote its own interest and they are no gentlemen.

What Rajiv Gandhi is said to have told Prrabakaraan was : “You need not accept the agreement; what we are suggesting is that you shouldn’t oppose it.” ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ – which obviously means that India cared little of what Prabakaran thought of the Accord, India was only interested in getting Sri Lanka to commit to constitutional changes.

In all probability Prabakaran was in Delhi while the Indo-Lanka Peace Accord was being signed on 29 July 1987 despite LTTEƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ¢-¾‚¢s symbolic gesture of handing over sets of decrepit arms to the IPKF on August 5 1987.

It is very clear that India having armed terrorist groups would have decided to unarm them realizing the dangers to IndiaƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ¢-¾‚¢s overall plans. India had no intention of maintaining a terrorist organization long term and the assistance given to several Tamil militant groups was with the plan to eventually unarm them. How many countries have succeeded in this quest is another question and asks why governments continue to make the mistake of arming rebels unless to purposely leave those nations in peril. ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ 

Thus, Prabakaran was saved on 3 June 1987 simply to fool him into placing trust in India so that India could thrust upon the Sri Lankan state the Accord that would be the first step towards annexing Sri Lanka democratically.

In the Time Magazine interview with Prabkaran in the jungles of Mullaitivu by Anita Pratap (April 8 1990) Prabakaran says ƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ…-India claimed to have intervened in Sri Lanka to secure Tamil interests. In actual fact, India came to secure its own interests. There was never any genuine attempt to understand and solve our problems. India deliberately aggravated Sri LankaƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ¢-¾‚¢s ethnic crisis. It destabilized Sri Lanka [by training and arming Tamil militants, including the Tigers] so that it could play a dominant role in bringing Sri Lanka within its sphere of influence.ƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ”š‚ ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ 

This shows that Prabakaran had read IndiaƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ¢-¾‚¢s plans clearly. While Prabakaran himself can never boast of his own concern for Tamils in the light of killing over 200 Tamil intellectuals, moderate politicians, academics and Government servants plus subjecting thousands of TamilƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚  youth and children to blindly following his cult, he was clear that India did not have any interest in the Sri Lankan Tamil people and he was also aware that some of his own deputies had been bought over by Indian intelligence.

This understanding is important in the light of the 80,000 Indian peace keepers that were deployed in Sri LankaƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ¢-¾‚¢s North. The peace keeping honeymoon lasted barely 2 months since the IPKF landed in Sri Lanka on 29 July 1987. From keeping peace the IPKF was given orders to go out to eliminate the LTTE on 8 October 1987.

Now the importance of this order is significant for several reasons and most important is the fact that India did not intend to allow LTTE to prevail at all. It was having greater dealings with other Tamil groups all of whom Prabakaran eliminated. However, the overall plan appears to have been to after signing the accord and making the Sri Lankan Government agree to the constitutional changes to use its army to wipe out the LTTE.

This is probably why it took hardly two months for India to order the IPKF to eliminate the LTTE and for Dixit to order the IPKF head to shoot Prabakaran.

Since India continues to shamelessly play the record of its concern for Tamils it is important to remind the Sri Lankan Tamils that the behavior of the IPKF was so intolerable that Defence Minister K C Pant had to forward a report to the Indian Lok Sabha in late 1987 on the sexual abuses committed by the IPKF on unarmed Tamil civilians. We remind of just 2 incidents that resulted in the massacre of 50 Tamils between 2-4 August 1989 by the IPKF in Vellvettiturai as well as the Jaffna Teaching Hospital massacre on October 22, 1987 where IPKF had entered the hospital premises and massacred over 70 civilians who included patients, doctors and nurses.

Can Sri Lankan Tamils finally realize that India has no concern for its welfare. The simple logic to this is why would Tamil Nadu Tamils want to separate from India if India had been looking after their welfare?

Arming Tamil groups, using the ƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ…-ethnicƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ”š‚ tag to force upon an Accord, forcing changes to Sri LankaƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ¢-¾‚¢s constitution are all tactics that India has been using to eventually entice Sri Lanka to its periphery.

The question remains ƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ¢¢”š¬…” are Sri Lankans (especially the Sri Lankan Tamils) ready to become another state of India?