Shenali D Waduge ශාසනාභිමානි-දිරියවනිත-දේශශක්ති

Location. Location. Location is reason why Sri Lanka is being earmarked to end in pieces on the guise of peace. Unfortunately, we have not had astute leaders or advisors to sail Sri Lanka out of muddy waters. Instead we are kept eternally firefighting with politicians happy to survive on petty political gains. We proved we can fight wars with terrorists but we have failed to identify the enemies bearing gifts in the form of cultural-diplomatic-relations-economic pacts etc as well as the enemies within. We have failed to see the larger geopolitical terrain to understand the bigger objectives at play. As the world’s power players compete to acquire resources & gain geopolitical control of choke points that control the land, seas & air, we have failed to take advantage of their aspirations to fulfill our national goals.

A noteworthy aspect of every terrorist movement is the underlying religious element to it. All of the global jihadi terrorists sustain their base using religion warped to manipulate the followers. LTTE had the Church, religious NGOs backing it though the majority of its combatants were Hindu. The ceremonial aspects, their burials, rituals etc were all non-Hindu. At no point did India come forward to save the Hindus from becoming victims of Church-led LTTE manipulations, when it could have. Why did India not show concern for Hindus then? 

This was the scenario pre-LTTE defeat. Post-LTTE, India is playing a bigger role across Sri Lanka, while US & allies are making more strategic advances using the UN apparatus to subtly change Sri Lanka’s state administrative apparatus with politicians & policy advisors simply looking on. So the challenges Sri Lanka face are many confounded by the dummy attitude & actions of Sri Lanka’s leaders including the State admin apparatus.

The new religious aspect to the scenario emerging in North & East of Sri Lanka should be a cause for concern in particular how key departmental heads frequently visiting India are permitting a new form of history to be re-written & agreeing to a mythical Ramayana trail as well as the placement of the Siva Lingam across all 25 districts of Sri Lanka. These developments tie to Panikkar’s Doctrine (the Bible of Indian Foreign Policy). The Panikkar doctrine follows the naval doctrine combined with Kautilya’s Arthashashtra & Mandal theory ‘your neighbor is your natural enemy’. Indira Gandhi did what Kautilya did – craftily creating a war”. Kautilya in Patiliputra & Indira Gandhi in Sri Lanka.

According to Native Indians the white man spoke with a forked tongue, implying that they meant they did not say & they said what they did not mean. We get the same mixed signals from Indian politicians & their policies. On the one hand, speeches & overtures of friendships & historical links abound but Sri Lanka experiences no shortage of political landmines, the result of which leads to Sri Lankans distrusting Indian policies.

At no point since Independence has Sri Lanka by its policies put India’s national security under threat. In fact, if India looks back, it is Indian policies that have made India’s borders vulnerable. All of the Western poodles that came to help LTTE are now subtly spreading wings to Tamil Nadu & influencing geopolitics as part of Western agenda to eventually balkanize India. Is this why India is in a hurry to annex Sri Lanka to prevent being balkanized?

While different schools of thought assume India was manipulated to train Tamil militancy, what cannot be denied is how India took advantage to draft the Indo-Lanka Accord to its advantage & the clauses clearly point out to securing advantage to India & not the Eelam cause. When LTTE killed an Indian Prime Minister, we expected India to eliminate the LTTE, but that didn’t happen, instead India helped draft the 2002 infamous ceasefire agreement & courted the TNA that LTTE created. India did not object when TNA manifestos of 2001 & 2004 openly declared LTTE to be the sole representative of the Tamils. Ironically, India claims to be the godparents of Tamils while LTTE became their sole representative. Political correctness practiced only by our politicians stopped asking the questions that would have put an end to the charade behind bogus Tamil Nation & Homeland as well as the fictitious genocide & war crimes claims. By India’s silence on TNA, it only showcased India was not on the side of truth but was playing politics to wrest bigger control pretending to be savior of Tamils & riding on the TNA bogey. How can India ask Sri Lanka to devolve powers to Tamils so they could live with ‘respect & dignity” & then vote against Sri Lanka at UNHRC? Sri Lanka defeated terrorists & we do not need to beg for applauses by those that stood in the way of victory.

Though Buddha was born in now Nepal, we are made to feel indebted to India, in fact Prime Minister Modi recently held an International Buddhist summit & takes pains to present the notion that he upholds the teachings of Buddha. That maybe, but does he know elements of Indian intel & elements from radical Hindu sects are aligning with separatist Tamil politicians in Sri Lanka to target Buddhist heritage & archaeological sites & forcibly take them over influencing even law & order & legal apparatus. We can recall how Indian intel sided with LTTE against its own Indian army resulting in scores of Indian army deaths at the hands of the LTTE. The memoirs of former IPKF heads clearly shows this duplicity. Therefore, if PM Modi is sincere about Buddhism, he must take immediate action against these elements who are now going overboard in their actions using Hindu faith to start a new religious terror. We have had all forms of terror, we do not wish to have a new religious form of terror among two communities that have lived in harmony for centuries. This message must be clearly articulated by Sri Lankan Buddhists & Sri Lankan Hindus to PM Modi & the Indian Hindu elements at play in Sri Lanka. The current incursions violate the Shared-Buddhist Heritage” agreement signed by India in 2020.

Kautilya or Chanakya was the advisor to King Chandragupta. His book Arthasastra” advocated a 6-fold crafty policy to interact with neighbors. The Panikkar Doctrine propagated by Indian diplomat K M Panikkar forms the basis of Indian diplomacy & Indian Foreign Service. Panikkar wanted Sri Lanka to become an integral part of India’s defense structure. How many in Sri Lanka’s Govt, foreign service or advisors know of this? What is the doctrine the Sri Lankan diplomats & politicians follow to safeguard Sri Lanka? We could have picked from Kautilya’s own words Your neighbor is your natural enemy and the neighbor’s neighbor is your friend”– but have we? Where are our alternate alliances?

Prime Minister Modi is weathering India well, balancing being part of US-led QUAD while also cementing strong bonds with BRICS nations aligned with China, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Brazil etc that would change the course of geopolitics in time to come. Sri Lanka is behaving like the proverbial ostrich!.

Shenali D Waduge

ශාසනාභිමානි-දිරියවනිත-දේශශක්ති