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[Monday, February 18, 2008 - 05.40 GMT]
If historically, the LTTE demand for a separate state is a downright fabrication, what is the case they can make to justify a separate state? The claim of discrimination is made in relation to language, standardization in education, justice, etc., for Tamils. Standardization or statistical weighting was designed to help disadvantaged students from rural districts irrespective of their race and was never designed to discriminate against Tamils. Such positive discrimination exists in other countries too, to grant relief to the underprivileged. Thus, rural Tamils along with others, benefited from standardization, which is not what the Tigers would have you believe. Consequently, the urban students, with access to better educational facilities, were disadvantaged through standardization, among whom were Sinhalese and Tamils. Full text of the article Tamil homeland fantasy The conflict in Sri Lanka is inextricably linked with the demand for secession, deceptively designed to wrench the sympathy of the international community. Last month, the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), urged the United Nations to recognize "Tamil sovereignty" and end the conflict in Sri Lanka. The international community must be told that, beneath a plausible veneer, the demand for a separate state for Tamils of Sri Lanka is rooted in fiction. There never was at any time in Sri Lankan history "a traditional Tamil homeland" in the north and east of Sri Lanka, as claimed by the LTTE. If historically, the LTTE demand for a separate state is a downright fabrication, what is the case they can make to justify a separate state? The claim of discrimination is made in relation to language, standardization in education, justice, etc., for Tamils. Standardization or statistical weighting was designed to help disadvantaged students from rural districts irrespective of their race and was never designed to discriminate against Tamils. Such positive discrimination exists in other countries too, to grant relief to the underprivileged. Thus, rural Tamils along with others, benefited from standardization, which is not what the Tigers would have you believe. Consequently, the urban students, with access to better educational facilities, were disadvantaged through standardization, among whom were Sinhalese and Tamils. Sinhala and Tamil are official languages today and English is a link language. One cannot fault the administration, which came to office in 1956 with an election pledge to make Sinhala, spoken by nearly 70 percent of the population, the official language. The mistake, one can argue, was not to have the foresight to recognize Tamil as an official language as well. Remember, in 1950, the Indian Constitution declared Hindi the official language of the union and think of the ethnic diversity of India. If anyone says that Tamils cannot seek justice through courts, it is a downright fabrication. Take the landmark Supreme Court judgment in June 2007 on eviction of Tamil lodgers from Colombo. Many are the examples in which Tamils have vindicated their rights guaranteed under the constitution. Other examples are the case of Ramupillai v. Ministry of Public Administration (1991) and Vinyagamoorthy v. Army Commander (1997). True, the majority of today's Sinhala community comprising 74.5 percent, is Buddhist. However, the multiethnic, multireligious tapestry of Sri Lankan society, older than 2,500 years, has been enriched by the threads of racial amity and tolerance. The Sinhalese, Tamils, Muslims, Burghers, Malays and others share a strong sense of harmony unique to Sri Lanka.
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The
international community must be told that, beneath a plausible veneer,
the demand for a separate state for Tamils of Sri Lanka is rooted in
fiction. There never was at any time in Sri Lankan history "a
traditional Tamil homeland" in the north and east of Sri Lanka, as
claimed by the LTTE, 
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