Reinventing The Wheel? by Austin Fernando, Colombo Telegraph, January 12, 2025 Last week, news appeared titled ‘Inter-linked mechanism mooted for lands.’ The Deputy Minister of Lands and Irrigation Dr. Susil Ranasinghe was quoted in it. Ranasinghe rightly lamented the absence of a proper land policy that creates disorganization of institutions involved in land use, i.e.,… Read more »
MGR Remembered – Part 79
Acts of Compromise in Principles by Sachi Sri Kantha, January 14, 2025 Fellow MGR biographer R. Kannan’s thoughts about the contents in Part 78 of this series (received on Nov 10), were as follows: “ Part 78 of the MGR series Sachi, which I read with interest. I want to respond to the questions you pose in… Read more »
‘July and Everything After’
by Allie Nava, published September 2024 Maya’s Journey From America to Her Birth Country Was Meant to Be a Nostalgic Visit. Instead, It Became a Fight for Survival. Fans of Paolo Coelho, Amy Tan, Vaddey Ratner, and Khaled Hosseini will be captivated by July and Everything After, a modern tale of resilience and transformation against extraordinary… Read more »
No, Sri Lanka’s Tamil Question Has Not Been Resolved
by Mario Arulthas, AlJazeera, Qatar, January 9, 2025 “They’re trampling on our graves with their boots,” said Kavitha, a Tamil woman, as the torrential rain lashing our faces washed away her tears. Standing barefoot and ankle-deep in mud at the site of a former cemetery in Visuvamadu, Sri Lanka, she was lamenting the adjacent military… Read more »
All Roads Run through Tamil Eelam
New Delhi must remember that any form of connectivity with Sri Lanka inherently involves the Tamil North-East. Tamil Guardian editorial, December 21, 2024 Sri Lankan president Anura Kumara Dissanayake’s visit to India saw him receive the grandest of receptions, in a sign that New Delhi is firmly pressing ahead with its plans to increase its footprint… Read more »
Tamil Survivors of Sri Lanka’s Brutal Civil War Live in Fear
— and disempowerment, 15 years on by Krishnan Francis, Associated Press, New York, May 31, 2024 MULLAITIVU, Sri Lanka (AP) — At the site of a bloody battlefield that marked the end of Sri Lanka’s civil war, Singaram Soosaimuthu fishes every day with his son, casting nets and reeling them in. It is a skill… Read more »
Dead or Alive?
Parents of children gone in Sri Lanka’s civil war have spent 15 years seeking answers By Krishnan Francis, Associated Press, May 18, 2024 MULLAITIVU, Sri Lanka (AP) — For 15 years, Rasalingam Thilakawathi has been trying to find out what happened to her daughter at the end of Sri Lanka’s bloody civil war. Or… Read more »
Prabhakaran at 70 – A Tribute by Sachi Sri Kantha
November 23, 2024 Had he been living, Velupillai Prabhakaran would have reached 70, on November 26th. In my still continuing ‘From Sachi’s Files’ series, posted four years ago I had collected 90 of my published letters on Sri Lanka and Eelam in Chapter 14. Quite many among these published letters (I’d say, mangled items from… Read more »
Locating Sri Lanka in Biden’s Indo-Pacific Strategy 2023
by Aditya Gowdara Shivamurthy, Observer Research Foundation, New Delhi, August 14, 2023 Introduction Since the establishment of their diplomatic relations in 1948,[1] Sri Lanka and the United States (US) have had a tumultuous relationship broadly spanning the following phases: From the 1950s to 1970s, the US viewed Sri Lanka through the lens of the Cold War;… Read more »
A Magic Wand
by Tisaranee Gunasekara, Colombo Telegraph, November 17, 2024 “Wishes come true, Not free.” Stephen Sondheim – In to the Woods The Grimm version is known wider but the Turkish one cuts deeper. In both tales, the boy goes in search of fear and finds a crown. In the Grimm version, fear comes when a pail of cold… Read more »
AKD’s Resolve To Mend Ethnic Fault-lines Laudable
But Challenges Abound! by Mohamed Harees, Colombo Telegraph, November 12, 2024 Lukman Harees The largest lie of all—that the country depended on the elite rulers, benefits from their rule, and owes them silent loyalty entirely collapsed. The historic election of Anura Kumara Dissanayake as the President of Sri Lanka on September 21st was indeed the beginning of… Read more »
The Will to Freedom
An Inside View of Tamil Resistance by Adele Balasingham, London, October 6, 2001 Front Cover Maps Photos Introduction 1 New Horizons 2 Inside The Tigers’ Den 3 Turbulent Times in India 4 The Indo LTTE War 5 Hunted By The Indian Army 6 Premadasa – LTTE Talks 7 Living amid War in Jaffna 8 Tribulations in Vanni Post Script Annexure Abbreviations Back Cover… Read more »
On the Garbled View of Bhagavad Gita Lines (Sloga) 4:13
by Sachi Sri Kantha, November 10, 2024 Prelude Early this month, I read the opinion of my long time intellectual adversary Prof. Ratnajeevan Hoole on whom Eelam Tamils should vote for the forthcoming parliamentary elections of Nov 14th, in the Colombo Telegraph (Nov. 1st) [https://www.colombotelegraph.com/index.php/a-north-east-caste-perspective-promoting-an-npp-federal-party-coalition/ ] Of course, he is entitled for his view. But,… Read more »
North East Sri Lanka 2024 Parliamentary Votes
NE Nov 2024 parliamentary votes [PDF], source unknown Graphics below by: By Furfur – Presidential election 2024, election.adaderana.lk, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=152985447
The Tamil Nadu Model of Doing Business
From EVs to gorilla glass, the southern state bags marquee investments by Menaka Doshi, Bloomberg News India Edition Newsletter, October 3, 2024 This week: The Gujarat model may soon be replaced by Tamil Nadu, an excellent monsoon and Bengaluru’s new neighbor. Tamil Nadu vs. Vietnam It’s raining investments in Tamil Nadu, as the state nets… Read more »
MGR Remembered – Part 78
Indira’s Chikmagalur and Thanjavur Imbroglio by Sachi Sri Kantha, November 4, 2024 Chronological record of political activities by Indira Gandhi MGR Karunanadhi 1977-1979 Fellow MGR biographer R. Kannan’s thoughts about the contents in Part 77 of this series (received on Sept 14), were as follows: “ I enjoyed reading part 77 of the MGR series,… Read more »
SLCPJ: A New Era?
An Analysis of the Sri Lankan Elections and the Implications for Truth and Justice by Sri Lanka Campaign for Peace and Justice, London, October 27, 2024 The 2024 Sri Lankan presidential election marked a pivotal moment in the country’s political landscape and in geopolitics, with Anura Kumara Dissanayake of the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) / National People’s… Read more »
SLCPJ: Thirty Years of Failure
Sri Lanka’s Domestic Accountability and Human Rights Processes by Sri Lanka Campaign for Peace & Justice, London, December 2022 SLCPJ 2022-Dec-Failure-of-Domestic-Accountability-Mechanisms A brief overview of Sri Lanka’s history of domestic accountability and human rights processes, from 1989 to the present day. Introduction Whenever the possibility of an international investigation of human rights violations is raised,… Read more »
Out with the Old, In with the New – for Tamils Too
Sri Lanka elections by Mario Arulthas, Tamil Guardian, London, October 28, 2024 Sri Lanka’s so-called “political earthquake” saw the election of a president from outside the traditional political elites for the first time. Anura Kumara Dissanayake’s election, while an obvious upset and challenge to the ruling elite, promises to maintain some of the more embedded, structural… Read more »
Marco Polo and the Puzzle of a Point Pedro Port Landing
by Sachi Sri Kantha, October 30, 2024 Prelude Previously I had presented my view on Venician explorer Marco Polo’s (1254-1324) visit to medieval Eelam. [https://sangam.org/marco-polos-visit-to-medieval-eelam/]. This is a first sequel, to commemorate Marco Polo’s 700th death anniversary, which passed by on January 9th this year. Where did Marco Polo and his party land in ‘Seilan’? First… Read more »