After I read the anonymous comment about smart Tamils living in Malaysia and Singapore on the blog post “How many of you out there support the LTTE” on Kalharie’s blog I thought I have to write this.
As Sinhalese do we introduce each other by the terms Colombo Sinhalese, Galle Sinhalese or Ampara Sinhalese? No. But the commentator is talking about ‘Jaffna Tamils’. Why don’t he/she use the word ‘tamils’ to tell about those smart people? Because tamils from Jaffna including Prabakaran think they are superior among the tamils on other areas.
According to Karuna that’s the reason he broke up with the LTTE. It may be true that many tamils from south and east are supporting the LTTE to fight for a separate country with the hope that all their problems will be solved in a tamil eelam. But I’m sure if there’s a tamil eelam their problems become more worse.
You may think how can someone tell like this after reading a comment on some blog post but this is only a single experience among thousands of the same kind. In my university everyday I witness how those ‘Jaffna tamils’ behave with other tamils. Honestly I don’t have close relationship with the tamils but I can see how they are separated.
So at the end I like to know your opinion specially from the tamils because they are the people who knows the reality.
Here’s the anonymous comment :
Tamils have been suffering under a racist and deliquent goverment. Worst things are about to come. The LTTE has also attacked a naval detachment. Hatered is one full circle. Nazis/Japanese tried it and got what they deserved in return. Likewise you will too.
The Tamils in the South fear to openly support the tamils but most in their heart do. They would opely support them if they had their sister raped or family killed or they themselves beaten.
If there is a tamil eelam then all the problems for the tamils will be solved but how about the sinhalese and rest. You need to go back to the muslims like in 1915 and burn and loot them.
Sri Lankan economy is failing. The country is on its knees for world aid.
The richest man in malaysia is a Jaffna Tamil. He is Ananda Krishnana who just bought telco shares in Sri Lanka. The Jaffna tamils are probabily the richest people in Malaysia per capita.
SIA- Singapore Airlines was build up by JYM Pillai a Jaffna tamil. Its the No 1 airline in terms of profit He was also behind Singapore stock exchange now and DBS - one of Asia’s largest bank.
Singapore Airport and Seaport is build up by Dr Vijayaretnam who is also a Jaffna tamil. Both are No 1 in the world.
Rajaretnam who was Singapore deputy prime minister was also a Jaffna Tamil. He made prima setup the only flour manufacturer in Sri Lanka. He was hounered with a state funeral which 2 former presidents of Singapore did not get.
Presently the Singapore PMs right hand man is tharman shamugaretnam and the man behind Singapore central bank which the pm heads.
Actually, Sinhalese have those distinctions too. I’m not saying it is as important or goes as deep as the Tamil distinctions (I really don’t know), but they exist.
The Kandyans and the southern born? Two examples. (Surely you must have heard at least one person say Api Nuwaren?). I’ve also heard people make much of being from Kurunegala. By the way, there are also some who are proud of being Colombo born.
Historically, where you are from mattered quite a bit - regardless of being Sinhalese or Tamil. In Sinhala lore, however - I think it is bound up much more closely with the caste to which you belonged.
That particular comment was posted on several Sri Lankan blogs when the roots of the conflict were being discussed.
I am Tamil and before answering your question, I’ll echo the sentiments of Random Anonymous above me; it’s not just the Tamils who have that mentality, it is very much evident among the Sinhalese as well.
I remember a friend telling me that her father and her mother’s parents never got along because she (her mum) was of Kandyan origin and he was from Matara; apparently Kandyan Sinhalese don’t like the folks near the coast. Again, this purely hearsay and I am not touting it as fact.
As for your question, I believe there is a difference in caste which causes the superiority complex. My family has its roots in Jaffna and I’ve heard several family members look down on Tamils from the Eastern coast, even going to the extent of insulting extended family members from those areas.
Again, you’d well to read up on this than take my comment for fact. Hopefully, some of the Tamil bloggers/commentators - Aacharaya or Aadhavan for instance - can shed some light.
Hey bro how can you blame the whole Jaffna Tamils. I did see the same problem among Sinhalese aswell.
You said Jaffna Tamils treating other Tamils in a bad way, Im a born Jaffna Tamil but I was brought up in Trinco, I have never ever seen a problem between those two ends. Only bcos you have some problem with the comment.
Im a University student and Im moving with lots of Tamils even from Up country. You people try to find some facts against Tamils; dont be an average typical person.
My post seems to have roused the interest of a lot of people!
All the tamils from Sri Lanka in Malaysia and Singapore are from Jaffna. Recently some easterners have come but they are few. The british brought the Jaffna tamils to the region to run the federated malay railways, and the lower rungs of the goverment service. This is because the locals who were malays were not suited by the british. Often the Jaffna tamils compare the malays to the sinhalese. Indian labourers were brought from South India to work in the plantations just like in Sri Lanka. Malaylees were brought in to malayasia to be the supervisors in the estates, just like in Sri Lanka. Before synthetic rubber Malaysia produced a third of the worlds rubber and tin.
The intial areas where the railway and government offices were set up was tropical jungle. The jaffna tamils were often regarded as hardworking and loyal and well regarded by the british superiors. The chinese came to grow crops like gambier and were involved in tin mining. The chinese were only intrested in bussiness.
Malaya got independent in 1957. Singapore joined in 1963 and got kicked out in 1965. This was followed by many race riots between the malays and chinese. By the 1930s the jaffna tamils both from Sri Lanka and Malaya born were becoming lawyers,doctors, railway station masters,postmasters. However a substantial number were still in clerical positions and other lower levels. However by 1965 some started to distinguish themselves.
The first naval chief of Malaysia like Sri Lanka was a Jaffna tamil. Singapore’s first acting police commisioner was a Jaffna tamil. His daugther is an mp now. Singapore’s first foriegn minister and later deputy prime minister was rajaretnam. The chief opposition in malaya was Jaffna tamil brothers called the seenivasegams. They were voted in by the chinese. The first asian head of raffless instituion was a jaffna tamil. Its still the premier school which produced the first 2 singapore prime ministers.
Dr vijayaretnam was brought by his uncle to the public works department when he was young. He noticed that all the engineers were all white. He decided that he wanted to become an engineer. He left his pregnant wife and went to do engineering in england and came back. It was extremely prestiges at that time to be a engineer in this region. The new singapore government was pouring cement for the port. He realised that the port was only designed to hold one container. He took the risk to stop construction and redesgned the port to hold 5 containers one ontop another.
Lee kuan Yew the first prime minister is not an easy person to please. The PM got him to work on the new changi airpot. Now he is old but still manages container port developments in china for the singapore government. In 1950s when the PM went to Sri lanka and say that he wanted Singapore to be like Sri lanka because of the jaffna tamil influence. Later JRW said he wanted it to be like Singapore. That shows the drastic decline.
In talking of Sri Lanka, this is what Lee Kuan Yew says: -
“We have got to live with the consequences of our actions and we are responsible for our own people and we take the right decisions for them. You look at the old Philippines. The old Ceylon. The old East Pakistan and several others. I have been to these countries and places. When I went to Colombo for the first time in 1956 it was a better city than Singapore because Singapore had three and a half years of Japanese occupation and Colombo was the centre or HQ of Mountbatten’s Southeast Asia command.
And they had sterling reserves. They had two Universities. Before the war, a thick layer of educated talent So if you believe what American liberals or British liberals used to say, then it ought to have flourished. But it didn’t.
One-man one-vote led to the domination of the Sinhalese majority over the minority Tamils who were the active and intelligent fellows who worked hard and got themselves penalised. And English was out. They were educated in English. Sinhalese was in. They got quotas in two universities and now they have become fanatical Tigers. And the country will never be put together again.
Somebody should have told them - change the system, loosen up, or break off. And looking back, I think the Tunku was wise. (The reference is to Tunku Abdul Rahman the Malaysian Prime Minister under whose rule Singapore separated from Malaysia). I offered a loosening up of the system. He said: “Clean cut, go your way”. Had we stayed in, and I look at Colombo and Ceylon, I mean changing names, sometimes maybe you deceive the gods, but I don’t think you are deceiving the people who live in them. It makes no great difference to the tragedy that is being enacted. They failed because they had weak or wrong leaders “.
The common Sinhalese, Tamils etc are all good people. The problem in Sri Lanka starts from the fake leaders who are malayalee like Mahina, CBK,SWRD and Tamil mudali chetty from India like Ranil, JWRD. Mahinda hides his Christian name Percy. Solomon Wesley Ridgeway Dias is no Sinhala name who introduced the Sinhala only act.
The fake leaders wanted power. They and their forefathers were Christians so that they would benefit. Why did SWRD not give away his 1200 hectares of estate before he joined politics. How did such wealth come to them.
The Tamils Hindus worked hard and they did use the advantage they got from English education to rise up the ladder. However English is not the mother tongue of the Tamils. Hence when they took it up and succeeded, don’t blame them. The fake Sinhalese leaders who prostituted themselves could not bear this and use the ignorance of the Sinhalese masses to benefit and they are still looting Sri Lanka.
In Malaysia, before the British left, most Jaffna Tamils used to dominate the government service. Top officials to the kings were also Jaffna Tamils. Fake Malays who were Indian Muslim, Indonesian like Bugis lied and brought Malay as the official language. The Chinese who were businessmen did not have a good grasp of English during colonial times. However when Malay was adopted as the official language, they started do better then the Malays in Malay. This forced the government to have 2 grading curves for Malays and Non-Malays and they introduced standardization. Malaysia have a 1983 style riot in 1969 between the Malays and Chinese.
The removal of Jaffna Tamils who were mostly government servants resulted in them moving to the private sector. This resulted in some becoming businessmen. The richest person in Malaysia and the builder of the tallest building in the world at one time is Ananda Krishnan. He is the son of Jaffna Tamils. Its called PETRONAS Towers because the Malay government took a share as they did not want a significant icon like that to be having a Non-Malay name. Today Ananda Krishnan is buying Sri Lankan Telecoms and Power.
In Singapore Tamil is one of the Official Languages. So Tamil is in all forms like Malay, Chinese and English. When Singapore’s first Prime Minister visited Sri Lanka, he wanted Singapore to be like Sri Lanka. 25 years later Jayewardene wanted Sri Lanka to be like Singapore. This shows the decline.
The Jaffna Tamils dominated the government and government services in Singapore. Rajaretnam was the country first Foreign minister and the PM’s right hand man. After the first riots between the Chinese and Malays, he wrote a pledge. It reads as
We the citizens of Singapore,
Pledge ourselves as one united people,
Regardless of Race, Language or Religion,
To build a democratic society,
Based on Justice and Equality,
So as to achieve peace prosperity and Happiness.
All students in Singapore need to recite this everyday. He was also responsible for bringing Prima which is the sole supplier of Flour in Sri Lanka today.
JYM Plllai is the man behind Singapore Airline, the number one in the world. Concurrently he was the head of the Development Bank of Singapore (one of Asia’s largest today). Now he is the chairman of Singapore Stock Exchange which is aiming to be Asia’s best.
Dr Vijayretnam is the man behind Singapore Airport and Seaport which both were at many times number 1 in the world.
SS Retnam who studied in Hartley and whose grandfather set up the Hindu college was the first to do Sex change and Test tube baby procedures in Asia.
The first Acting commissioner of police, High commissioners to Malaysia and Britain, Speaker of House, Election Commissioner, Top lawyers, Judges, Doctors, Engineers and many others were Jaffna Tamils. The first opposition MP after independence was a Jaffna Tamil. His son today is the youngest president of the law society (a society dominated by Chinese lawyers today and the post is by elections)
The Chinese who were also not fluent in English before independence, picked it up and hold most of the senior post. However Jaffna Tamils due to their hard work still hold top positions like the present prime ministers right hand man Tharman is a Jaffna Tamil. He acts on behalf of the PM as the defacto central banker.
Intelligence has nothing to do with race. It has all to do with hard work. The Chinese is Singapore have no special mark scheme to go into University or racial Quotas. The fields once dominated by Jaffna Tamils and other Indians today are held by Chinese. They came up because of working hard. Thats how you come up in life. Thats how Japan recovered after the First World War and how Singapore overtook Sri Lanka.
Hello to Everyone,
What kind of Tamil are you?
What is the question.? “What Kind?”. First, Tamil is a language same as English, Sinhale etc… BUT you do have different folk language and accent within the same language for example: British English, American English, and Latin English etc. and these accents give away the part of the world that you come from.
As a human in this globalization we cherish where we come from. I will tell you a story which happened to me five years ago. One of my professors (He is a Chinese) asked me that am I from India. And I said no I am from SL. Then he said Oh isnt it the same? I was annoyed and looked at him and thought what kind of education am I going to get from this man, LOL. Living in a foreign country I face this problem everyday. Now, when I say I am a Sri Lankan you must be prepare to answer at least two or three questions. One, are you a Sinhalese or Tamil? and the next question will be which part of SL are you from? because they are aware that North part of SL is in the civil war.
There are other Nation Tamils too such as Indian Tamils who are different from Sri Lankan Tamils. How are they different? IF any of you have a chance to meet a Jaffna Tamil in a foreign country, you could see the pain, suffer, sorrow in their eyes. I am a Colombo Tamil and had a much better life than the Jaffna Tamils and I am ashamed of that because they did not even have a peaceful life in their own Mother Land.
I would like to inform who ever raise this question that Jaffna Tamils are everywhere, actually they are all over the World scattered seeking for an identity which they still did not get from their own native Land. When they establish themselves in a foreign country, they are proud and wanted to tell other Eelam (Jaffna) Tamils around the World who have lost their family, land etc. that they are not alone and if I can establish so can you. This is not a “kind of Tamil”, “Eelam Tamils” is an energy and motivation phrase to other Eelam Tamils around the World who suffered and lost their land, family and alienated from their own life style.
who this bloody donkey talking about tamils, during my unversity there are big gap between from Kandy and other area sinhalees, in behaviour also kandy ppls little superior, i am sure. i need to accept the fact that tamil ppl doesnt have social harmoney only.other than that they are very superior in all the terms. since earliey onwards, all the foreigners know very well about tamil’s capacity and sinhlees capacity. and Jaffan tamils speak what ever they write thats why they are called pure tamil. even though i am from Batticalao, never speak good tamil and i am shame on that too. sinhalese lanquage is only came from mixer of tamil, Hindi, Sanscript and english. it is not own delevloped lanquage. and religion also is praying man, so its a path not religion. and only in Sri lanka the sinalese exist, but tamils, Sri Lanka, india, malasiya, sinapore, africa,burma and many. only thing the conflict started due to blooldy sinhala govenrments action and they eran lot of money and vanish one by one but only suprpire is that even the educated sinahalese still dont understand their goevrment and believe whatever they say, and goverment keeps war as something and tells lot of lie and cheating ppls. i am sure that non of sinhala goverment will solve our problem other that foreign direct involvement or thorugh war. what we need to to is to gettogether sinahal and tamil ppls and sort it out our prblem by oue self, we dont need goverment and LTTE. for example, take a tamil person national ID and sinhala person National ID and see how they write differently in the ID even and none of sinhala person knows s single word of tamil, but most of the tamils know sinhala. where ever tamil ppls goes ebery where all the acitivity purely in sinhala, it is really bad, even the officer never know english, go post office, osusala, police station and mijistrate court…….every where fully in sinhala, then tamills need to fight to get basic rights. but if these small probelms can be solved over the night and after that here wont be any problem between the races. so without doing these kind nonsence things, pls think deeply on how our conflict can be sloved and remove the goverment. and dont do these thing in future ” what kind of tamil”……..then we also will start “what kind of sinhala” we have sooooooooooooo many things to write about sinahala
Actually as some of you have mentioned here the same problem was there with the sinhalese sometime back as udarata and pahatharata. But according to my experience that doesn’t exist anymore badly and there is no gap between kandy students and the others in the university as Gajan says. But I accept the fact there’s a little difference in the sub-culture and the language in kandy and southern areas.
The caste chauvinism is another problem as random anonymous and Theena said but I’m not going to talk about that deeply now.
I think Anu’s explanation is the best one here which explains in another point of view why they want to tell they are Jaffna Tamils. You are welcome Anu!
Anyway I don’t like the way Gajan uses his freedom to reply with some bad words like ‘bloody donkey’ to introduce me. I don’t like to delete or edit those comments so please if you want to share your thoughts express it in decent manner. I’m a Sri Lankan and I like if all the ethnic groups can live in harmony regardless of their ethnicity and I like to treat tamils as my brothers and sisters. So why can’t I talk about them? I clearly stated in the article that tamils are the people who knows reality on this problem and I asked your opinion because I’m interested to know. And it’ll be important to other sinhalese as well.
So you believe that we need to get together sinahala and tamil people and sort out our problem by our selves without the government and LTTE. I like the idea and you can use this page to discuss anything regarding this matter.
Hey “Gajan” you have done a very big mistake!.I’m a kandyan in the faculty which you talk about.There is no difference between with kandyans and other students.You may think a group which consists few peoples who ignored by many students in the university.
Keep you mind those peoples don’t know to live with friends.Many of those students are selfish.
Keep you mind Sri lanka is not behalf of one ethnic group.Every people live in sri lanka should have the same human rights.Everyone know there are many big mistakes from all of us in the past.Now we can rebuild our country.
Well, the Sri Lankan Tamils are now an insignificant minority in Malaysia. Initially, they have been more successful than Indian Tamils, only because only the best and the brightest from Jaffna were chosen to go there - not that Sri Lankan Tamils were any better than their Indian brethren. Having lived in Malaysia, I can safely say that Tamils have a very sour deal in that country. They are the poorest of the poor and many Ceylonese Tamils have emigrated to Australia, and the rest have been assimilated into the wider Tamil community.
JustMal stop talking rubbish. How many jaffna tamils do you know in Malaysia. The jaffna tamils were forced out of the government service by the malays. Today its failed state organ. The malysian police beat up a group of indian IT professionals from because they thought they were illegal immigrants. They even mistreat american blacks thinking they are illegals.
Many jaffna tamils went into businees and private practice. Today many are extremely sucessful. Even the MIC which is a indian party puts the only ceylonese they have like datuk mahalingam as a minister.
Many ceylonese (as the jaffna tamils are known in malaysia and singapore) still live in malaysia. You only leave when you are middle class and going nowhere. They are still doing well. Many have also come to Singapore where the Jaffna tamils have significant influence in the government and politics.
The poorest estate(upcountry in sri lanka terms) people are in a cycle of family violence, alcholism and now severe gangsetrism is affliciated the country tamils. The recent screw up of the sivaji picture screening caused riots in cinemas in malaysia. Australia has the aborogines to do this. Hence they will not accept these estate indians. Even the city deweling indians look down on their poorer cousins.
The jaffna tamils in Singapore and Malaysia do not consider the sinhalese the same as them. There is no sri lanka feeling. The sinhalese is listed as a race. Ceylonese which refers to the jaffna tamils is another race. This is how they are classified in census and in their identification cards. In singapore and malaysia for example the sinhalese learn malay while the tamils learn tamil. They seldom interact and there is no friction between them. Most do not bother if Sri Lanka sinks to the ground.
The sinhalese in SIngapore for example pity their relatives often taking their own nieces (cousins daughters etc) as maids. They look down on the people from Sri Lanka unless they are extremely well to do. Often they feel that their sri lankan relatives are like parasites comming to visit them because of their wealth. However the Jaffna tamil decendants are not far of from this aspect. Only they do not take their own relatives as maids. Maybe because their relatives will also not come as that.
Tamils in Sri lanka have left to Australia but they are still one of the richest groups in the country.
Punjabis or the sikhs are not the richest though they are a beter off community. The problem with the chinese is that they appear to be rich but the wealthy often are too extravagnt is showing the wealth. This has been determintal to the community as the malays state this to continue their discrimination. However alot of them are still stuck in villages and are poor.
All the jaffna tamils are city dewellers. The indian tamils are the pitiful lot. They like the upcountry tamils are with idiotic leaders like in sri lanka. Though the ones who were not brought in as labourers like the chettiars were once the richest people in Asia. Their wealth got dwindled when the british left. Their crooked ways unlike in sri lanka were not tolerated. they also never managed to fake themselves as malays like ranil and family as sinhalese.
The jaffna tamils are listed as ceylonese and are considered a minority. Hence by qouta system they ave to fight with other minorities. The indians never fill their quota and are absent from many feilds like engineering and medicine. The malaylees have benifited from this.
Some malaylees due to marriage like mahathir have become malay and ruled malaysia. In sri lanka the fake sinhalese malaylees like mahinda,cbk and swrd still rule sri lanka.
Had there been a no sinhala only policy many jaffna tamils would have returned. Most bought land in jaffna. They have now given it to their relatives who are much poorer. Hence jaffna tamils will definely invest and develop eelam. Jaffna tamils have married other indians but its not as significant.
Ananda krishnan for example married a thai princess. he is richest man in malaysia and one of the richest in asia. He being the only non chinese to do so in about 50 years. Many jaffna tamils are very conservative of their display of wealth due to kidnappings etc (sounds familiar). Hence their wealth never seems obivious till you really know them. Some stay in reality simple houses but own more then 20 houses,shares etc. A chinese of similar nature would live in a 5 house type bungalow structure and invest the rest in bussinees. Often when there is a economic downturn you cannot find them and they become bankrupt.
The sikhs or punjabis also do the same as the ceylonese but are smaller in number and wealth.
Malaysia has had race riots and implemented a malay only and islam policy. Yet it did not turn into sri lanka. During the worst riots in malaysia, a malay general shot a malay man who was trying to rape a chinese lady. In sri lanka the military joined in the mayhem.
Ironically when malay was introduced, chinese students were still doing very well although their parents were not very eduxated/fluent in malay.This shocked the malay politicians. They then started seperate grading curves and qoutas which resulted in the chinese leaving to singapore and australia.
The reason malaysia did not become a sri lanka was becuase of oil and a sensible leadership. Malays by nature are good people though not industrious. Fake leaders claiming to be malays were the reasons for many of the problems. This is like sri lanka a pattern repeated through the respective histories.
Ceylonese Tamils made up an overwhelming majority in the civil service of British Malaya and Singapore prior to independence. It was in Malaysia and Singapore, that the term Ceylonese and Jaffnese were popularly used by the Sri Lankan Tamils to differentiate themselves from the larger Malaysian Indian population who were predominantly of Tamil origin.
Many of the first Asian and non-white doctors and engineers in Malaya and Singapore were of Sri Lankan Tamil descent. The world’s first Asian surgeon was Dr. S.S.Thiruchelvam, a Malayan of Ceylonese Tamil origin.
Former Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew once said, In terms of numbers, the Ceylonese, like the Eurasians, are among the smallest of our various communities. Yet in terms of achievements and contributions to the growth and development of the modern Singapore and Malaysia they have done more than warranted by their numbers. In the early days of Malaysias and Singapores history the civil service and the professions were manned by a good number of Ceylonese. Even today the Ceylonese community continues to play a prominent role in these and other fields of civil life. For example in Singapore, today, the Speaker of Parliament is a Ceylonese. So is our High Commissioner in Great Britain. So is our Foreign Minister. In the Judiciary, in the civil service, in the university, in the medical Service and in the professions they continue to make substantial contributions out of all proportion to their numbers. They are there not because they are members of a minority community but on the basis of merit. The point is that the Ceylonese are holding their own in open competition with communities far larger than them. They have asked for no special favour or consideration as a minority. What they have asked for and quite rightly is that they should be judged on their merits and that they be allowed to compete with all other citizens fairly and without discrimination. This, as far as the Singapore government is concerned, is what is best for all of us. I believe that the future belongs to that society which acknowledges and rewards ability, drive and high performance without regard to race, language or religion.
The Ceylonese community established many schools, banks, cultural societies, cooperatives and temples in Malaysia and Singapore. Some good examples would be the Vivekananda Tamil Primary School, the Jaffnese Cooperative Society and the Sri Kandaswamy Temple in Brickfields, Kuala Lumpur.
Many Ceylonese were also involved in the independence movements in Malaya and Singapore. In Singapore, there are many current and past ministers who are of Ceylonese Tamil in origin and Tamil is a national language. Sinnathamby Rajaratnam was the former foreign minister and deputy prime minister of Singapore and regarded as one of the founding fathers of Singapore. His death in 2006 was marked with a state funeral by the government of Singapore. The Singapore flag was flown at half mast at all public buildings and former Prime Minister and friend Lee Kuan Yew cried when giving his eulogy.
Even today, the Sri Lankan community in Malaysia and Singapore is an upwardly mobile community taking up many professional and government posts. One of Malaysia’s and South East Asia’s richest men is billionaire Tan Sri Ananda Krishnan, who regularly makes it to Forbes magazine’s billionaire list.
Dear JustMal:
I could see your sourgrape story from the way you are expressing your inability compete against Tamils. Like you said, the Ceylon Tamils could be minority but that doesn’t mean they are doing blue-collar work in Singapore or Malaysia. It is a well known fact that they are hightly educated and quite competent against other communities. Please don’t expose your half-cooked brain in this forum.
It is also true that many are migrating to Australia and UK mainly because of the discrimination against them in Malaysia but not because they are poor. From what I know most of those who are migrating are Doctors and Engineers. Not construction workers like Chinese and Malays.
Wherever Tamils go, they only live with pride and not like you…
Dear Folks,
Cool it folks. Everybody take a chill pill.
Before I go further thank you Yasaruwan, I feel welcomed.
Different people have different opinion about many things and that is why everybody is different from everyone BUT the question is ARE WE MATURED ENOUGH TO APPRECIATE EACH OTHERS OPINION? Being a Sri Lankan Canadian I see this very well because I have lived and living in a multicultural country. I think we need to conclude this whole conversation since we all taking a nasty path. As you can see there is another mini war is going on this web-site which was raised by Kalharie.
I would like to inform all the participants on this site. Smarten up. We have one civil war separated every Sri Lankan from each other and dont start another one on this site. Kalharie, you may be laughing at this but there is nothing to laugh but to cry. If WE, the younger generation cant stand others opinion then when are we going to live in PEACE (not even on OUR dreams)
Grow up. Think big, only one life you have. Live happily, peacefully, helpfully.
I miss my Country, I miss my friends, I miss my life, I miss . million things.which I cant get it back. May be PAST cant be changed BUT the FUTURE IS IN OUR HAND. Make a good use of it NOT LIKE THIS.
Black July emblematic of Sinhala rule - paper
[TamilNet, Monday, 23 July 2007, 05:38 GMT]
In nearly a quarter century of conflict since the state-sponsored anti-Tamil riots of July 1983, despite the tens of thousands of lives that have been lost in the conflict, there has not been an iota of change in the Sinhala leaderships thinking nor, for that matter, in the sentiments of the international community [on the ethnic question], the Tamil Guardian newspaper argued in its editorial this week. Comparing the regimes of Presidents Junius Jayawardene, Chandrika Kumaratunga and Mahinda Rajapakse, the paper contends: Black July is not just a historical event. Rather, it is an emblematic act of Sinhala rule.”
The full text of the Tamil Guardian editorial titled Emblematic Act: The lessons of July 1983 follows:
Twenty four years ago this month the Tamils of Sri Lanka suffered the worst racist rioting in the islands post colonial history. The massacre, which has infamously been referred to since as Black July (and occasionally as the Tamils Holocaust), was not merely an eruption of mob violence, but a systemic and violent cleansing of Tamils from Colombo and much of the south by the Sinhala-dominated state. Over three thousand Tamils perished as our people were driven first into refugee camps and then dispatched by ship to the north. In one week almost all Tamil homes and businesses in the south had been looted and burnt. The armed struggle that escalated amid the resultant Tamil grief and anger has since evolved into what is today a substantive state-building project.
However, in the near quarter century since Black July, despite the tens of thousands of lives that have been lost in the conflict, there has not been an iota of change in the Sinhala leaderships thinking nor, for that matter, in the sentiments of the international community. The military campaign now being waged by President Mahinda Rajapakse is underpinned by the same racial superiority and exclusive, even annihilatory logic as that of President Junius Jayawardene in the eighties and President Chandrika Kumaratungas war for peace in the nineties; namely that Sri Lanka is a majoritarian (Sinhala) state in which Tamils would be tolerated provided they accept their secondary minority status and abandon their demands that political power be shared.
For well over a year now, President Rajapakse has openly waged a brutal war against the Tamils. We say Tamils, rather than Tigers, firstly because the Sri Lankan strategy is directed primarily at raising popular (i.e. civilian) suffering to undermine support for the LTTEs armed struggle and, secondly, the calculated purpose of this suffering is force the Tamils to lower, if not entirely abandon, their demand that the Sinhalese share power. Collective punishment was also President Jayawardenes logic in 1983 when he unleashed the murderous Sinhala mobs, assisted by the security forces and armed with voters lists: to teach the rebellious Tamil the price of defying Sinhala rule. Last month President Rajapakse forcibly expelled hundreds of Tamils from Colombo, deeming them a security threat. The move was halted amid international protests, but the point had been made: the Tamils had better know their place in Sri Lanka. Now, as three decades ago, state terror remains the primary method of governing the Tamils - though the violence of the Sinhala mob has been replaced by that of the Armys multi-barrel rocket launcher.
President Rajapakses battlefield strategy, as executed during the past year in Sampur, southern Trincomalee and especially Vaharai, is identical to that of President Jayawardenes twenty years earlier: militarily seal off and starve the population while subjecting it to relentless bombardment and air strikes. Jayawardene blockaded the Jaffna peninsula for months, relentlessly blasting the northern peninsula from land, sea and air. His siege was famously broken by the Indian airdrop which presaged the induction of the Indian Peace Keeping Force in 1987. President Kumaratungas strategy was the identical during her subsequent efforts to destroy the LTTE. For six years (1995-2001) the Vanni was subject to the same draconian embargo which blocked food and medicine from the residents as Jayawardene imposed on the northern Jaffna and Rajapakse on the eastern Tamil areas.
The point is that throughout the conflict, every Sinhala leadership has readily inflicted widespread suffering amongst the hundreds of thousands of ordinary Tamils, as part of its bid to crush the Tamil liberation movement - which every government has always paradoxically insisted was numerically insignificant and on the verge of defeat. Like a mantra President Rajapakse, just like Kumaratunga and Jayawardene before him, repeatedly assures the Sinhalese and the rest of the world of the Tamil struggles imminent military destruction.
And just like Jayawardene and Kumaratunga, Rajapakse also inflicts this suffering in the name of the Tamils themselves. Every Sinhala leader has declared his or her vicious violence as necessary to liberate the Tamils from the Tigers (though it is underpinned by barely disguised notions of Sinhala racial superiority in Defence of the Dharma - as much as raison detat). Jayawardenes merciless onslaught on the Tamil militant controlled Jaffna peninsula (exactly 20 years ago) was mockingly codenamed Operation Liberation. Kumaratunga declared her self-styled war-for-peace (waged a decade ago) was to liberate the Tamils from the fascist LTTE. And now President Rajapakse is terrorizing the Tamils to free them from Tiger rule and provide them with democracy.
Amid reprehensibly weak international pressure for them to solve the ethnic conflict, all these Sinhala leaders have sought to delay and prevaricate on sharing power with the Tamils until the sole reason for that need to compromise the Tamil armed struggle has been destroyed. Rajapakses All Party Representative Council (APRC) has the same dissembling logic as Jayawardenes All Party Council (APC). (And in another farcical parallel just as the SLFP walked out of the UNPs sham APC, the UNP has today quit the SLFPs APRC charade). President Kumaratunga unveiled her much-vaunted Devolution Package in 1995 just as she unleashed her unrestrained assault against the Tamils of the Jaffna peninsula. In the wake of subsequent successes against the LTTE, the Package was watered down until it was utterly meaningless, (even disillusioning the Tamils who collaborated in drafting what was arguably nothing more than a tool in the states counter-insurgency campaign).
Nevertheless, the international community has supported each of these leaders in their pernicious efforts to break Tamil defiance. Each of these leaders has received near absolute military, financial and political support from the international community. (Yes, we know there are subtle variations amongst the positions of countries involved, but collectively it matters little in the killing fields of the Northeast.) For decades our people suffered and died in their thousands as the Sinhala military, unrestrained by law or morals, laid waste to our homeland. But it was our efforts to resist this genocidal violence that has been condemned by the international community as unacceptable, as terrorism. The Sinhala state was instead hailed as a struggling democracy and strengthened anew.
Black July is thus not just a historical event. Rather, it is an emblematic act of Sinhala rule. In remembering Black July, we not only commemorate the thousands of Tamils who perished in the state-sponsored Holocaust of 1983, but we also remember the tens of thousands who were slaughtered before and since in the states internationally backed pursuit of Sinhala hegemony. Thus we also remember at the same time why the Tamil liberation struggle began, why it changed from ahimsa to arms, why it necessarily continues today. We remember that we are a nation resisting oppression.
Hola mardena!
falikotrepat
Interesting article!
Where can I find more on this theme?