Please excuse any spelling/typing mistakes as i typed my comment in haste.

Thanks.

Not to worry.Its your thoughts that matter and they are wonderful…………DBSJ

Mr. M.Sekaram, thank you for the wonderful article. It reflects your sincere sentiments from the core of your heart.
I totally agree with you and believe EGALITARIANISM MUST be inculcated/instilled in one and all I mean all Srilankans irrespective of Sinhala, Tamil, Muslim or to what ever community they/we belong to. If not you cannot uproot the mentality that prevail in most of the people of our country.
Further, i believe that this is the grim result of the colonnial era politics that stemmed down ethnic conflict – first within the parliament and then among the people. This was the ulterior motive of the british to gun down a nation that was uprising against their rule. so they thought it best if they could bring in racial conflict (donnomore and soulberry constitutions)through a constitutional system. unfortunately our leaders fell prey to their tactics and the whole nation suffered.
Yes, we must now forget what happened in the past as the saying goes- let things by gone , be gone. And we must look forward to the future with a positive, optimistic outlook treating each and everyone equally contrary to what was/is prevalent
I am a Sinhala budhist married to a Tamil and we have children. our children were sent to International schools simply because we felt that they will find it untenable to be in Sinhal medium classes with a tamil surname. (This is because I do not know tamil and the point was that i could not have been able to help them with thier studies if they were in the tamil stream. For that matter, even my husband is not fluent in his tamil as he too has studied in the sinhala medium- result of 1958 riots when his parents decided to educate them in sinhala) I must say there is so much discrimination that has to be wiped out from the grass root level.
Anyway, i feel , at least now, that there will be peace and harmony in this beautiful island and our children will have a better standing in their motherland where they will be treated with equality. Many a times we planned to migrate but dropped the idea as the case will be the same elsewhere as we will be second class citizens in that part of the world. won’t we?

Finally , may i thank Mr. Sekaram for his wonderful article that i beileve poured out his genuine and innate feelings, and MR. Jeyaraj for posting on this blog so that we were able to read and comment.
I hope and pray that all who read this article will think in the same wave lengths of Mr. Sekaram.

Thank you

You have a point when you say reconciliation is not possible when the state is in a huge hurry to establish the sinhala budhist writ all over the island. So, I think what tamils should focus on two strategies now. One at a collective level and the other at a personal level.

1. Let’s keep this dialogue going and construct a “critical mass” someday in the future, based on ahimsa, righteousness, and mantaining a moral high gorund. The objective will be to engage with the powerful players such as the GOSL, IC (who have yet to prove thier potency), the emerging tamil leadership etc, to push for basic human rights of all tamils.

2. Simultaneously we need to strengthen our personal network of Tamil/Sinhala/muslim/burgher friends and contacts, and endeavour to work of reconciliation at a personal level.

Mohan’ s article has got us going. Let’s continue the Journey.

Would love to hear your comments.

I am not against what Mohan said. Infact I meet couple of my sinhala friends and having drinks with them almost every week. (I am in australia) This untrust was started by Sinhala / Tamil politicians. They want to devide us for their own benefit for their survival. To me more than 70% of Tamil or Sinhalese never meet each other in their life time. Their votes goes to these politicians. Our personal friendships will not help to stop any sinhala politicians discriminating us. I agree that at individual level lot of Sinhala friends will help more than what our Tamil friends do. But can these sinhala friends be able to stop colonisation or change tamil home land names? Definitely not. A good example is first lady of Sri Lanka went with Bo branch to Jaffna immediately after the war ends. If she want reconciliation atleast she should visit to a hindu temple in Jaffna. In summary individual friendship will not stop systamatic erasing of our homeland (north & east).

I am one of the eye witness of 1983 Tamil Genocide and I have been hearing from my parents and grand parents , how many times they have been going through mental torture if they didn’t experience the real genocide happening in front of their eyes. As I have been an eye witness of many atrocities on the 25th of that Black july 1983,disguising myself as a Muslim to escape, escaping from a Sinhalese thugs coming after to snatch my jewels , dodging the thugs to capture me by hiding myself between the floor of the CTB bus and seats; how would those people and their relatives who got tortured and murdered by putting burning tyers around their neck and by massacring with chemical weapons feel about todays situation. Wound of Tamilians have not even been cured yet, you are aiming arrows on the wounds of Tamils.

There will be no reconciliation between Tamils and Sinhalese till Tamils get their own land and kingdom. That is for sure. We need our share of power. Only Tamils who go behind the government’s backs are people paid by government of bribes or they are threatened by defense secretary.

Tamils are at the very moment mentally tortured, defenseless and no freedom to speak about their own feelings in Sri Lanka. There is no democracy, It’s dictatorship of Rajapakse brothers. If Gothapaya orders to massacre the surrendering LTTE and bulldoze the injured and dead and bury civilians alive how can you reconcile with Sinhalese.

Why Universities are closing one by one? Don’t you get the 1983 smell of riots in Sri Lanka at present, don’t you remember fellow students killed Tamil undergraduates? Censorship and dictatorship go together , but not Ahimsa and dharma.

Thanks for your informative post and it is especially relieving to know of good people in the SL army such as the Brigadier Larry Wijeratne you mention.

However unfortunately there are the likes of Palitha Kohona.
A ‘Ceylon’ may be possible but only if Palitha Kohona and his likes are put away in mental asylums.

I take this opportunity to thank all those “Noble” present and the past human beings of Sri-Lanka for their assistance in “Peace building and reconciliation”.

Let me mention one of them, only one, otherwise my comment will be too long and I have to write other things as well:

Brigadier Larry Wijeratne -

The one and the only “Sinhalese high ranking Army officer ” ever to enjoy tremendous support and respect from the northern Tamils, especially of Point Pedro area for his Noble service.

He was indeed “Gem of a man”, who won Tamil’s “Hearts and minds” with his services.

For peace to succeed in Sri-Lanka and for Tamils to feel equal citizens, the government should immediately work on following issues:

1) The easing of the restrictions imposed on IDP camps. This will enable relief agencies as well as any one wish to help, to provide assistance to the dire needy.

2) Release the elderly, sick and women and children immediately so they can go on with their lives. When asked Dr. Kohona, he gave this answer.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/8083505.stm

3)Induct Tamils in to the armed forces and the police. Diluting the armed forces will prevent them from perpetrating atrocities against the Tamil civilians and also will enable local communities to communicate effectively in their own language.

Here is an example of Navy’s brutality in Mannar in 2006

This was published in the June 14th, 2006 Morning Leader newspaper..
http://transcurrents.com/tamiliana/archives/180

As for police, it’s imperative that Tamils and Muslims should be recruited immediately. There are almost none exist in the North and the east while the majority of the population is Tamil speaking.

4)Stop the witch hunt and lets forgive and forget the past and march forward.

5)Provide incentives for the displaced persons to get back to their original places and dismantle the High Security Zones. This will not only make people to get back their lost houses in these area and also will bring back our Colombo “Fort area back to life”.

Hope to see Sri-Lanka get back to the “Glorious Ceylon” era in very near future. The “Ceylon” era was the shining moment of our country’s history. There was ethnic harmony, people were selected on merit, rupee was almost at par with the sterling pound, we were envy of our neighbours due to our high standards of living and to top it all, Ceylon gave aid to United Kingdom after WW 11!

Peace on earth!

Here is the problem displayed by Janesh in public for all to see: abject ignorance!

For these ignorant Sinhala-Buddhist patriots the whole issue is about Tamils being against ‘Buddhism’ while the Sinhalese (as Sinhala-Buddhists) are the protectors of ‘Buddhism’ meaning SInhala-Buddhism.

And it is highly telling that Mahinda Rajapakse accepted that he is the protector of the Sinhalese and it was the Sinhala-Buddhists monks who ‘honoured’ him as such. This is in the same vein of ignorance displayed by Janesh.

These ignoramuses do not know that if not for the Tamil and other South Indian Buddhists there would be no Buddhism in Lanka.
And indeed Buddhism and Hinduism are quite compatible. In fact Radhakrishnan (ex-prime minister of India) considered the Buddha to be a good Hindu!
Tamils have absolutely no problem with Buddhism.
The problem is the Sinhala-Buddhist mentality displayed here and elsewhere that victimises Tamils on the basis of ignorance.

Lots of people do want to get on in peace but how do we get over this major obstacle (as displayed by Janesh, Sinhala-Buddhist monks and the person who sees himself as the President and protector of the Sinhala-Buddhist)??

We have experienced the bitterness of this war for 3 decades n now its over…Now its time for both of us, tamils n sinhalese, to get together (as Mohan rightly say) n develop trust n harmony, further more for the betterment of the sri lankan nation………. For a start,
lets get together n make sure that we can give the tamil brothers n sisters, displaced in the north ,a better future!!!!!
bless u all sri lankans..!