It is not a thread that I really want any part of, but some fallacies are flying around and should be brought down to earth.
This is intended for KS, Sashan and Ashokdeiva.
It is difficult to support the legitimate demand of the Jaffna Tamils for human rights, removal of bigoted anti-Tamil laws and the oppression of the Sinhala majority, all of which are cold, hard, documented facts, against the background of the criminal conduct of the LTTE. Unfortunately, the LTTE lasted as a potentially harmful entity as late as the sea beach massacres perpetrated by the Sri Lankans, so it is not as if there was a period when there was no LTTE and there was Tamil oppression. Only now, once there is no visible sign of the LTTE, can we begin to ask the Sri Lankans about justice for the Tamils.
As part of this issue, Indian Tamils need to answer several questions that their consciences should be asking of them.
Why is it that Indian Tamil support of Jaffna Tamils is legitimate and Muslim support of Rohingyas is wrong? I am ashamed and angry at the behaviour of the mob in Bombay, but not about Indian citizens protesting against ill-treatment of Rohingyas. If the very act of protesting is illegitimate, then so is Indian Tamil protesting against the Sri Lankans brutality. If Indian Tamil protests are legitimate, then so are protests against the oppression of Rohingyas.
Second, on the voices raised by several members against the ordeals faced by Indian Tamil fishermen, these ordeals are largely phony, and are concocted by the rich members of the fishing community to cover their own depredations. It isn't about poor fishermen, it's about ecological devastation, and the existence of the poorer fishermen being at stake.
Some facts,gathered from personal experience and investigation :
The Sri Lankans fishermen objecting to the poaching of Indian fishermen are Jaffna Tamils, not Sri Lankans. What on earth are you protesting?
The Sri Lankans and a remaining poorer section of Indian fishermen, all Tamils to a man, use unpowered or outboard-powered boats for fishing in the shallows, which, for Sri Lankan fishermen, includes the waters around Kachchateevu. Their fishing is in danger.
The culprits, who are funding agitations by politicians for their own gains, are rich fishermen, actually traders who have integrated backwards, and whose mechanized trawlers cause ecological devastation. Their boats, and methods, lead to drastic over-fishing and irreversible damage to fish stocks in the Kachchateevu waters (shoal waters off Rameswaram are already depleted).
Vaiko should have been executed ten years earlier as an anti-national traitor.
Not really. They are merely remnants of Tamil invasions from South India. Many Jaffna Tamils will even proudly proclaim their "Chola ancestry"
The fact that they are relatively recent arrivals is born out of the fact that they are (1) still Tamil (2) still speak Tamil (2) are concentrated in northern Sri Lanka when other ethnic groups like the Malayalis who originated from Tamils themselves have developed their own language and own ethnicity despite sharing a land border with Tamil Nadu.
The Tamil Homeland of the Tamil people as an ethnicity is Tamil Nadu (literally "Country of Tamils.") They have no right to claim any parts of Punjab, Gujarat, Bengal, Orissa, Karnataka or Andhra pradesh - or Sri Lanka - as their additional homeland. You may have different views.
This is not correct. The Chola invasions did not establish a Tamil presence, it only reinforced the Tamil presence
On the other hand, the Sri Lankan foundation myth itself talks about their migration from eastern India's coastal regions. Add to that the isolated character of Sinhala language, speaking an Indo-Aryan language in the deep south with the next member of the group in Maharashtra and in Odisha, and the picture becomes clear.
