Now that Silan Kadirgamar has revealed that I am oppposed to the narrow and shortsighted politics of Tamil ‘nationalism’ I am obliged to reveal that I am also irrevocably opposed to the neo-fsascist politics of Sinhala “nationalism” particularly the paranoid versions of it that see Tamil conspiracies behind every bush and a Damila yakko on every tree!

Dear Nithy,

Earlier you had corrected a mistake I made when I mistyped “Banda and Chelva” instead of “Banda and Dudley.” I haven’t heard from you since.

“Yet, very often you are observed as exhaling hot & inhaling cold air.”

What exactly am I exhaling hot? Could you kindly be more specific (and I’ll try not to exhale in your face)? And what does it mean to inhale cold air?

“We owe so much to our brethren for been alerted our awareness, at different intervals after 1948, about the consequences of inter-social disparity in our backyard and gradually abolished such evil customs, norms and barriers and eventually brought the Tamil Community together under one banner ‘Ceylon Tamils’.”

Are the Tamils really under one banner? Is Mr Devananda part of that banner?

I came to Jaffna College as a 12 year old from Malaysia knowing nothing about caste in Jaffna. Jaffna College in 1947 had several students from the ‘lowest’ of castes some of whom were free boarders – a policy of ‘affirmative action’ initiated by the College. We lived in the same hostels, shared the same rooms and sat together for all our meals. It never occurred to me until much later in life that some of these boys belonged to certain castes.

The Roman Catholic schools obviously broke the caste taboo first. But I have two major noteworthy events to relate. In 1916 the immensely popular and great liberal, Principal John Bicknell decided to take in a student from one of the Dalit castes into the then fully residential Jaffna College. All the other students quit. Bicknell made the famous announcement that he will go on with the College with just one student. One by one the rest of boys returned.

The other was related by my father to us when we were children. Henry Peto another one of the outstanding educators of that era was principal of St.John’s College about the same time as Bicknell. Gordon Kadirgamar was cricket captain. St. John’s for the first time in 1916 had a boy from the Dalit caste in the team. They were to play Jaffna Hindu College. There was a great deal of tension in Jaffna town. Peto and Gordon with this boy seated in the middle rode by horse carriage to the Jaffna Hindu grounds. St.John’s won the toss and batted first. When this boy went in to bat the Jaffna Hindu team walked out of the grounds. The umpires declared the match won by St.Johns. The boys of St.John’s returned marching triumphantly through the streets of Jaffna town singing with much jubilation. Some of the outstanding cricketers and football players some captaining teams in Jaffna schools came from these castes as early as in the 1940s.
I may add that the Jaffna Youth Congress campaigned for and broke barriers of caste pertaining to inter-dining in public places and equal seating in schools in the 1920s. The latter was opposed by Sir Ponnambalam Ramanathan, much venerated by Sinhalese leaders. There were from the early decades of the 20th century radical movements and later left parties that challenged caste hegemony.

Going by Trotsky’s dictum that “war is the locomotive of history’ the rise of Tamil youth militancy had to some extent a leveling effect. Noteworthy changes have taken place in the patterns of house ownership and residential land in the Jaffna Municipal area. The much needed empirical research pertaining to patterns of land ownership, especially agricultural land in the Peninsula has not been done. For that to happen Jaffna has to be a free society and is unlikely to be one in the foreseeable future, until the security forces are at least confined to barracks. The least that Sinhalese commentators can do at this juncture is to refrain from Tamil bashing using the caste issue. They had better address their energies to good governance and the pressing problems that the Sinhalese people face in spite of 63 years of self-government.

Caste System – it was originally a system of social stratificationegregated by rank inherited by chivalrous qualities, conduct and behavior based on his/her moral principles – graceful in manner and free from vulgarity that’s appropriate to his/her gentle birth and so on…sanctioned by customary norms and laws guided by one’s environment of upbringing and religion. Throughout the passage of yester-millennia such social system has morphed and degraded itself into a disastrous evil classification – simply revolving around greed to power and wealth – thus over-powering the values of being righteous, genteel and noble by seemingly superior evil forces. This phenomenon is evident in our part of the subcontinent – India in particular. Until 1972, still further down till 1983, Ceylon Tamils had been so ignorant about the magnitude of impending disaster and what’s stored in the storage for them. We owe so much to our brethren for been alerted our awareness, at different intervals after 1948, about the consequences of inter-social disparity in our backyard and gradually abolished such evil customs, norms and barriers and eventually brought the Tamil Community together under one banner ‘Ceylon Tamils’.

@ wijayapala: I appreciate the essence of the matter that you said to Mr. Robert highlighted in bold. Yet, very often you are observed as exhaling hot & inhaling cold air.

After all, I find it as an outstanding literally explicative exposition, a catalytic need of the hour by Mr. Perinbanayagam, rebuffing the newly evolving jingoistic mindset of some section of our Sinhalese Brethren. Thanks! Nithy!

The “Tamil” “Sinhala” differentiation appears to have emerged in the past 200 years and appears to make no sense to me other than in linguistic terms as culturally (even down to caste) there appears to have been very little difference. It also does not make sense to differentiate the two languages as belonging to different groups. Modern Indian research appears to be undermining the 19th century European prejudice which led to Aryan-Dravidian divide.

The characterisation of the so-called “Tamils” as foreigners by the “Sinhalese” appears to be entirely an accident of history because they happen to be an identified majority and expropriated the ancient identity of the island as well. If you do genetic analysis, I am willing to bet that it would be difficult to tell different groups of Tamils and Sinhalas in comparison to say a control group of North Indians.

The Tamil Eelam project aiming to identify an even more mythical separate state has only served to alienate Tamil speakers from ownership of the island’s history which they should claim as a whole along with the Sinhalas. Unfortunately, the ethnic group identifications (Tamil and Sinhala) appear to be here to stay. It is therefore best to treat them as two linguistic groups having a common heritage. I wonder if there should be promotion of research into the common heritage of both languages as well. There should also be revision of history which labels Cholas solely as plunderers. Their contribution to the culture of the island in the Polonnaruwa period and their service to Tamil literature and Buddhist philosophy should be honoured. I say this because, for no real good reason the Cholas ( a dynasty) is somehow identified with the Tamils of Sri Lanka. The Tiger emblem of the Cholas expropriated by the LTTE did not help either. In fact as I understand, some of the so-called Tamil castes in the 19th century had the Lion as an emblem!

Process of reconciliation should include such processes examining the reality of Tamil-Sinhala identities including their origin as ethnic groups in the 19th century. Prior to that it should be recognised that both groups had a common origin as citizens of Sinhale which was a Feudal state with very complex arrays of kinship and loyalty patterns. It should be recognised that these kinship patterns were region and caste based and that there were no racial divides recognised by these citizens themselves. This is not to say that Europeans such as Knox did not recognise “Malabars” (from the coast of Kerala). Clearly, Knox had considered those of Jaffna different to the Kandyans based on the use of language. I am aware that historians talk about complex migration patterns at Mannar for many centuries. However, does a 2nd generation Australian have any less claim to be an Australian than a 5th generation one? Same should apply to Sri Lanka.

I would invide Mr Berindanayagam, just out of interest, replace the words Karayas with Tamils and Vellas with Sinhala. Many people would argue that despite war, much of the discrimination that Tamil people were subjected have reduced over time. Many tamil youth have plenty of opportunities in education, in jobs and in business. Experiences in poverty of Tamil people are no different to those of empowerished Sinhala people of Sri Lanka.

Robert,

Which was worse- how the Sinhalese have treated the Tamils in the past 50 years, or how higher castes have treated lower castes for the past several centuries? Please do not interpret this as Tamil-bashing; personally I believe casteism in Sinhala society is far worse and hypocritical for the simple reason that our religion forbids it (among other things, like killing).

I totally agree with you that Sinhala racism never distinguished between castes (nor region, nor religion). All Tamils were treated equally bad, although the poor had it worse because they had no connections nor wealth to bribe their way out of persecution. Tamil nationalism in this sense most certainly was created by the Sinhalese, not so much by the Tamils themselves.

If this is true, though, then what does that say about Tamil nationalism? Is it really a solution to anything, or merely a symptom of an underlying problem?

http://www.srilankademocracy.org/?page=dissenting