Shenali D Waduge

PM Modi is due in Sri Lanka on 5^th April, the 44^th anniversary of the JVP 1^strebellion. JVP will be celebrating its 50^thanniversary which commenced against Indian expansionist agenda & unlikely to proceed to its 100^th year on the same theme. Unfortunately, that rebellion & thereafter the one opposed to the Indo-Lanka Accord in 1987 sacrificed thousands of young patriotic lives. Nonetheless, the Tamil militancy that India armed, trained & funded was defeated in May 2009 though its separatist ideology lives on. This is evident in the takeover of a Buddhist vihara destroyed by the Colonial Portuguese & on top of which a kovil has been built. Using constitutional amendments, what LTTE could not achieve by gun, separatists attempt to achieve politically to which the present Government is seen blindly appeasing to.

Prime Minister Modi knows too well how he ascended to power on the backdrop of a dispute regarding an ancient Hindu kovil & a Muslim mosque. In Sri Lanka, we have shown greater restraint amidst the plethora of animosities against Buddhists.

Let us remind PM Modi that the Gokanna Viharaya was destroyed in 1622 by the Portuguese. This is clearly written by the Portuguese historian Queyroz in his Book, The Temporal & Spiritual Conquest of Ceylon (page 66, 67).

Constantino de sa de Noronha dismantled these Pagodes making use of their stones to build a fortalice to close the harbor to the Chinhala; The event of the destruction of this Pagode was found engraved on a stone and being attested by the Ovuidor of Ceylon after it was translated by those most learned in the ancient characters of the Sinhalas it was sent his Majasty ran as follows (manua Raja Emperor of this Lankave, erected this pagoda to the god Vidia Malmanda in era …” (according to the computation it comes to 1300 years before coming of Christ There will come a nation called Francos who will demolish it and there will be no king in this island to rebuilt it anew) This stone was placed on the gate of the fortalice, there is no doubt that translator, meant the Portuguese.

The Trincomalee stone is also referred to by Valentyn in his XVI Chapter. A copy of the inscription was sent by the Dutch to the Sinhalese court to be translated. Queyroz mention that alleged conversion by Xavier of the chief priest of Trincomalee. He says of the place that it was the Rome of the East, attracted more worship than Ramanco, Xilavarao, Canjavaro, Tripli, Tremel, Jagarnati, Vixanati. He adds that the Temple had 30,000 amunams of paddy yielding two crops a year amounting to 4000 moyos. The chief priest at the temple is spoken as Turunanse.

The grate Bay of Trincomalee has made the place famous throughout modern world in the same way as its temple had spread its renown through ancient East. It was among the marines that the shrine commanded the great veneration, and it could be seen for many miles out at sea.

To expand its naval presence the colonial British eyed Trincomalee. Distortion of history was a key part of their divide & rule policy. Thus, in a gazette issued in 1831 1.CLR 63 a letter was published falsely claiming Gokanna Temple was a Hindu kovil.

The letter is presented below:

To the Editor of the Ceylon Government Gazette.

Sir, 

Among the various monuments of Hindu antiquity found in Ceylon and which induced the late and learned Sir Willliam Jones to express an opinion that the island was peopled time out of memory Hindu race”. The temple which was stood at Trincomalee is not to be forgotten, it would have remain the present day as a venerable relic, had not misguided religious Zeal of the Portuguese razed in to the ground in 1622 to supply materials for their fortifications.

Some time ago throughout the kindness of a friend of mine, I was obligingly put in possession of a small manuscript poem composed in Tamul by a Kaviraja vorothayen (a celebrated hard among the anceiant inhabitants of the Ceylon) which though enveloped in a cloud of fabe gives and account of the origin of the origin & history of this sacred edifice. I was consequently induced to translate it, have now the pleasure of the laying the same before the public for their information.”

The main objective to the British distorting history was to distance Sinhala Buddhists from Trincomalee so they could gain greater access to Trincomalee as they identified that only Sinhala Buddhists would defend their nation & territory & all that the nation stood for. The Portuguese demolished Buddhist sacred sites & also forced Sinhalese to leave areas where these Buddhist sites were situation. Thereafter, the lands were taken by the colonials & colonial settlement of South Indian Hindus began. That Sinhalese were systematically forced to leave lands in North & East is clearly stated in colonial British administrative policies.

Thus, Portuguese, Dutch & Colonial Britain have much to account & compensate the Sinhala Buddhists who had been originally living in the North & East.

In 1806 Governor Maitland did a tour of Trincomalee’s ancient artefacts along the coastal belt with then chief justice Alexander Johnston & decided to bring South Indian Hindus & settle them in North & East areas where the Sinhalese Buddhists had been chased out. Governor Maitland considered Trincomalee the Key to Asia and that the British held the key.

Alexander Johnston was renowned for establishing the Royal Asiatic Society in England & Ireland & while in Sri Lanka, establishing the Ceylon Council & becoming its President before becoming Chief Justice. Nevertheless, he intentionally ignored mentioning the stone inscriptions in Trincomalee that Portuguese used for their fortification.

However, Paul E Pieris, civil servant & historian is on record to state that the British destroyed the stone inscriptions in Trincomalee

As per Paul E Pieris,, the Chief Priest of the Gokanna Temple & several other theros who were residing at the Temple were forcibly converted by Father Xavier. On 18 July 1827 Alexander Johnston became the Vice President of the Royal Asiatic Society & wrote An Account of an inscription found in Trincomalee, in the Island of Ceylon” and gave a detailed account of Trincomalee but chose not to recount the stone inscriptions found & completely ignoring their actions against the Sinhala Buddhists who were living in the North & East prior to colonial alien settlements.

Eventually, with the blessings of India, in 1956 the Government of Sri Lanka took the Trincomalee Port from Britain while the present kovil was quickly established by ITAK through the Municipal Council without returning it to Gokanna Buddhist Temple. R. Sambanthan played a lead role in this & the distortion of history.

Thus, when Prime Minister Modi decides to hold a Hindu meditation at this site that was forcibly taken from the Sinhala Buddhists & promoted using false history & distortion of facts, it only shows to us, that the same expansionist & divisive policies carried out by the 3 colonial rulers are being continued by India. It also nullifies the claim presented to the world by PM Modi of his great respect & veneration to Buddha & Buddhist philosophy.

Even the Great Ruvanweliseya Buddhist Temple that PM Modi is scheduled to visit was also threatened by colonial British rule. The Colbrook Commission that divided Sri Lanka to 5 provinces gave Anuradhapura to Northern administrative rule and Polonnaruwa to Eastern administrative rule.

As per Cleghorn minute, Anuradhapura, Polonnaruwa was to be also included as Malabar homeland.

Thus, the threats to Kurundi Buddhist temple is nothing but another attempt to take over Buddhist sacred sites & turn them into Hindu kovils.

The British began changing their policy after the famous Panadura debates and renamed Nuwara Kalawiya as a new province. These examples require India to treat Sri Lanka as a sovereign state & not follow the same template as the colonial invaders.

When Cleghorn claimed North & East belonged to Malabars (who were from South India & brought as coolies to work in Sri Lanka by colonial rulers, & settled under colonial settlement scheme) Governor North realizing Cleghorn was writing nonsense sacked him & packed him back to England.

On 5 March 1799 Governor Sir Frederick North sent a letter to England (British East India Company Head Office 7/1/409 page)

Malabars are the inhabitants of the northern half of our territories, they are also divided in to the same as Singalese, the present disgrace of that nation at the Court of Candy, has depressed it even here, and from what I have seen, I am sure that it will be difficult, if not impossible to separate the politics of the inhabitants of these settlements, from those of the great Court as it here called”.

Is there any better explanation than the national unity that existed in then Ceylon at that time?

The Indian Economic & Social History Review 26.02.1989 magazine page 235 Prof Dagmar Helimann-Rajanayagam’s letter stated thus:

in the first year of the British rule in Ceylon, 300 temples were newly built in Jaffna”.

Journal of the Bishop of Colombo’s first visitation of Northern & eastern province of his diocese 1846”, Jaffna had only 159 villages, to erect 300 kovils was with the intent to transport Tamil Hindus from South India.

If not for Arumugam Navalar there would have been no hindu kovils with the conversions taking place. To secure Trincomalee Port, and use North as a listening post against India, Britain required to secure both North & East. The legacy of these divisive actions is what Sri Lanka is now reaping.

However, the rule of compassion that prevails yet in Sri Lanka cannot be defeated. It has survived the turmoils. The resilience remains. There is no Sinhala Tamil problem. It was only created for political gains. If at all you decide to defy the historical facts of Gokanna being a Buddhist temple & hold a Hindu meditation at least remember the factual history of the site.

History has a way of remind us the truth at one time or another. Truth will always win in the end.

Shenali D Waduge