Unity in Diversity

Honest Husband

2011-07-29T08:35:00.000-07:00

Jack wakes up with a huge hangover after attending his company’s Christmas Party. Jack is not normally a drinker, but the drinks didn’t taste like alcohol at all. He didn’t even remember how he got home from the party. As bad as he was feeling, he wondered if he did something wrong.

Jack had to force himself to open his eyes and the first thing he sees is a couple of aspirins next to a glass of water on the side table. And, next to them, a single red rose! Jack sits up and sees his clothing in front of him, all clean and pressed.

He looks around the room and sees that it is in perfect order, spotlessly clean. So is the rest of the house. He takes the aspirins, cringes when he sees a huge black eye staring back at him in the bathroom mirror. Then he notices a note hanging on the corner of the mirror written in red with little hearts on it and a kiss mark from his wife in Lipstick:

“Honey, breakfast is on the stove, I left early to get groceries to make you your favorite dinner tonight. I love you, darling! Love, Jillian”

He stumbles to the kitchen and sure enough, there is hot breakfast, steaming hot coffee and the morning newspaper. His son is also at the table, eating. Jack asks, “Son… What happened last night?”

“Well, you came home after 3 A.M., drunk and out of your mind. You fell over the coffee table and broke it, and then you puked in the hallway, and got that black eye when you ran into the door.

Confused, he asked his son, “So, why is everything in such perfect order and so clean? I have a rose, and breakfast is on the table waiting for me??”

His son replies, “Oh THAT! Mom dragged you to the bedroom, and when she tried to take your pants off, you screamed, “Leave me alone, I’m married!!”

Broken Coffee Table: $239.99. Hot Breakfast: $4.20. Two Aspirins: $.38. Saying the right thing, at the right time. . . PRICELESS!!!

Feeling tat I left alone!

2011-06-27T05:23:00.000-07:00

Show me the meaning of being lonely
So many words for the broken heart
It's hard to see in a crimson love
So hard to breathe
Walk with me, and maybe
Nights of light so soon become
Wild and free I could feel the sun
Your every wish will be done
They tell me!

Loneliness!

2011-05-21T01:50:00.000-07:00

For the last couple of years I was under a impression, My heart became solid & My mind is stable. But 2day I donno suddenly I am feeling d loneliness & vacuum.. Yenna Vazhkai'da ithu!!

Jai Hind!!

2011-01-15T00:58:00.001-08:00

A brave salute to our fallen soldiers who stood by the word "Safety, Honour & Welfare of my country comes first" on this 63rd army day!! Jai Hind!!

Marriage

2011-01-02T10:18:00.001-08:00

Marriage is the process of finding out what kind of man your wife would have preferred!!

Another Hykoo from Sethu

2010-10-15T00:21:00.000-07:00

இதுதான் என் தேசத்து திருவிழா ...
பூ மிதித்தல் - உன் கால் தடத்தில் என் கால் வைத்து நடத்தல் ...
அலகு குத்துதல் - நீ கண்ணடிக்கும் தருணம் ....
பூஜை செய்தல் - உன் புகைப்படத்திற்கு முத்தமிடுதல் ....
ஊர்வலம் - உன்னுடன் சேர்ந்து நடக்கும் ஒவ்வொரு அடியும் ...
வான வேடிக்கை - தூரத்தில் நீ வருகின்ற அழகை ரசித்தல் ....
இசை கச்சேரி - உன் வளையொலியும் , கொலுசொலியும் ....

Sethu

How India is undoing China's string of pearls

2010-10-07T23:33:00.000-07:00

New Delhi's defence establishment has quietly put in place India's own counter-measures to woo and bolster China's neighbours as a long-term strategy, says Nitin Gokhale

One of the least understood and less scrutinised facets of India's diplomacy is perhaps New Delhi's 'Look East' policy, now nearly two decades old.

Launched during Prime Minister P V Narasimha Rao's regime primarily to try and integrate India's newly liberalising economy with that of the Asian 'tigers', that policy is now quietly evolving into a more robust military-to-military partnership with important nations in that region.

Over the past three months alone, top Indian military leadership has made important trips to key nations in South-East and East Asia -- Vietnam, South Korea, Japan [ Images ], Philippines, Indonesia, Thailand and Singapore.

Indian Army chief General V K Singh was in Vietnam in July, furthering an already strong strategic relationship. General Singh's visit was the first in a decade by an Indian army chief.

Apart from meeting his Vietnamese counterpart, Deputy Chief of General Staff Pham Hong Loi, the Indian army chief discussed with Vietnam's National Defence Minister Phung Quang Thanh, the road map to implement the 2009 memorandum of understanding between the two ministries of defence.

Two areas where India and Vietnam will focus their immediate attention were training of military personnel and dialogue between experts on strategic affairs on both sides.

General Singh's visit will be followed by Defence Minister A K Antony's mid-October trip to Hanoi when he will participate in the first-ever regional meeting of political leaders in the defence field.

As the current chair of ASEAN, Vietnam has invited India to the ASEAN+8 defence ministers meeting. The 10-member ASEAN will be joined by Australia, China, India, Japan, New Zealand, Russia, South Korea, and the United States at that important conclave.

Although Indo-Vietnam political and diplomatic ties can be traced back to Jawaharlal Nehru's time, it was only in the post 1990s that the two nations decided to build and strengthen military-to-military relationship.

This development was a result of two main reasons -- one historical, the other contemporary.

To begin with, both India and Vietnam had borne the brunt of Chinese aggression -- India in 1962 and Vietnam in 1979.

And two, the collapse of the Soviet Union, for long a security guarantor for both India and Vietnam in Asia, left New Delhi and Hanoi without an all-weather, all-powerful friend.

Both India and Vietnam, who have long-pending territorial disputes with China thus decided to unite against their common adversary. Located on the edges of South-East Asia, Vietnam is ideally placed to prevent China's expansion into the South China Sea.

So, for over a decade now, India has been providing Vietnam with assistance in beefing up its naval and air capabilities in an attempt to deny China total supremacy in the South China Sea.

Both New Delhi and Hanoi traditionally sourced majority of their military hardware from the erstwhile Soviet Union. That commonality has meant that both can share expertise and resources available with their respective armed forces in terms of handling and maintaining the Soviet-era weaponry.

India, for instance, has repaired and upgraded over 100 MiG 21 planes of the Vietnamese Air Force and supplied them with enhanced avionics and radar systems. Indian Air Force pilots have also been training their Vietnamese counterparts.

The Indian Navy, by far larger than the Vietnamese navy, has been supplying critical spares to Hanoi for its Russian origin ships and missile boats.

After Antony's 2007 visit to Vietnam, the Indian and Vietnamese coast guards have engaged in joint patrols, and both navies participated in a joint exercise in 2007.

But Vietnam is not the only nation India is inching closer to in China's immediate neighbourhood.

Antony, who is fast emerging as a quiet but effective player in India's military diplomacy, in early September became the first Indian defence minister ever to visit South Korea, a pro-US, anti-China nation in the vicinity.

He led a top-notch team of military and civil officials like Defence Secretary Pradeep Kumar, Vice-Admiral RK Dhowan, Lieutenant General K T Parnaik, DRDA Chief Controller C K Prahlada, and Sundaram Krishna, special adviser to the defence minister.

The visit was a follow-up on the declaration issued by both countries during President Lee Myung-bak's state visit to New Delhi in January, when it was decided to elevate bilateral relationship to a 'strategic partnership'.

Although nowhere near the level of Indo-Vietnam defence cooperation, the newly evolving India-South Korea partnership is being seen as a vital component of India's game plan to counter China's increasing footprint in the subcontinent.

Seoul is a perfect counter balance to the China-North Korea-Myanmar-Pakistan axis that New Delhi and US regard as a major irritant in the Asia-Pacific region.

Moving eastward, India is actively pursuing deeper defence cooperation with Japan. Last week, for the first time, India is expanding its defence ties with Japan, a newfound strategic partner in the region.

Air Chief Marshal P V Naik, chairman of India's Chiefs of Staff Committee, the senior-most Indian military officer, led an Indian delegation to Japan on September 28 to participate in the first military-to-military talks between the two countries.

Naik's visit comes just weeks ahead of a trip by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to Tokyo in late October.

Naik's visit is a follow-up to Antony's discussions in Japan last year, when the two countries expressed their commitment to contribute to bilateral and regional cooperation, which in other words is an effort to build regional partnerships to counter the growing influence of China.

High level visits apart, the Indian Navy has been quite active in its friendly forays into the Pacific. A flotilla of Indian warships is about to complete a month-long deployment to the Pacific that included visits to Australia, Indonesia, Singapore and Vietnam.

So while Indian strategic thinkers have been busy sounding frequent alarms over China's increasing forays into the Indian Ocean and have often overstated the fears of Beijing's 'String of Pearls' around India, New Delhi's defence establishment has quietly put in place India's own counter measures to woo and bolster China's neighbours as a long-term strategy.

Whatever the consequences of this strategy and counter-strategy, one thing is sure: The Indian Ocean and its periphery are poised to become the new playground for the 21st century version of the Great Game in the years to come.

Nitin Gokhale is Defence Editor, NDTV.

Inspiring simplicity

2010-09-24T01:54:00.000-07:00

Multi-billionaire Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg likes to wear worn jeans, cheap T-shirts and lives in a rented house. To relax, he likes drinking beer and eating fast food with workmates, it was reported here on Friday.

The man responsible for connecting over 500 million people across the world through social networking site Facebook could easily pass off as an ordinary 26-year-old.

Facebook founder donates $100 mn to Newark schools

The Sun on Friday reported that Zuckerberg, who is said to be worth 4.3 million pounds, he wears jeans, cheap T-shirt and flip-flops.

In fact, he does not own the four-bedroom house where he lives in Palo Alto, California. He pays a relatively modest 3,500 pounds a month as rent. He doesn't even have a posh sports car, instead driving a Japanese saloon.

Zuckerberg prefers to unwind after work by heading to a bar to have beer and eat fast food with workmates.

He also likes going out with his 25-year-old girlfriend Priscilla Chan to a cheap yet cheerful meal at a Mexican restaurant.

'It's amazing - Mark doesn't seem at all bothered about fancy cars and expensive possessions. He's still living like a college kid.

'He will eat lunch in the canteen with the other workers. A lot of the employees actually have nicer cars than his,' a Facebook source was quoted as saying.

The web entrepreneur and reluctant celebrity was born in the New York suburb of Dobbs Ferry on May 14, 1984. His dad was a dentist and mum a psychiatrist, the media report said.

In 2004 he launched Facebook and moved to Palo Alto in northern California. Since then he has been in his rented home a short walk from Facebook headquarters.

His neighbours don't earn six-figure salaries.

A local resident said: 'We are just regular working folks round here. It's cool to have a billionaire living on the street but he does not stand out.

200 million Facebook users play games every month

'He mostly keeps himself to himself and doesn't have wild parties or anything like that. He'll often walk to work. He seems happy with his lifestyle for now.'

When Zuckerberg has his evenings off, he and his girlfriend enjoy dinner at local Mexican Cafe del Sol. On one visit the couple queued on the street for a table for 10 minutes with the rest.

A local at the bar frequented by the billionaire said: 'He just blends in with the other customers. He could be any other office worker enjoying a few beers. He doesn't flash his cash around.'

Zuckerberg is down-to-earth, but is always glued to his iPhone.

An eyewitness who saw him at a ceremony at California's Stanford Business School said: 'He was sat at the back, tapping away on his phone the whole time. There was a funny moment when one of the speakers on stage mentioned Facebook.

'One of his friends nudged him and they laughed.'

A beautiful Assignment-Beautifully Done

2010-09-15T23:49:00.000-07:00

Once up on a Valentines Day...

[Anonymous kid] Daddy Daddy...

[Anonymous Dad] Yes Timmy !

[Ano...eh... Timmy] Daddy, I've got an assignment to write for school. Will you help me? Pleaseeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

[Dad] Oh ! Okay !! What's yr assignment on?

[Timmy] Love !

[Dad] Wow ! You have an assignment on it ? In my days, the teachers were against our er... assignments ;)

[Timmy] No Dad, we are supposed to write something on the meaning of love...its Valentines day, na !

[Dad] Love...hmm lemme see !

[Timmy] wait..wait... Lemme write it down... :)

[Dad] Love... Love is about Lies !

[Timmy] Lies ???

[Dad] You see, Timmy... All my life, i have said lies in love & i've found it to be the best gift you can give a person.

[Timmy] How, Dad?

[Dad] Well, the first time i met yr was for a Valentines day 7 yrs ago. She was not the hottest of chicks in college, if you know wt i mean...

[Timmy] Hot chick ?

[Dad] You get it in due time, son... ;)
Anyways... i saw this cute girl standing at a corner of the dance floor. I heard one of my friends say that she couldn't get any date for the party.
So here i was, cursing my luck as my date's grandmom expired n that left me in the same predicament ?

[Timmy] Pedica ??

[Dad] Predicament...means..eh, problem !

[Timmy] Oh...

[Dad] So i went upto yr Mom n told her.."Hey, How come such a beautiful lady like you does not have all the guys crooning over you?"
Now, i knew very well that even i wouldn't have asked her to dance if i had a choice, but it was that one little lie that got us together !

[Timmy] But Dad, aint it bad to lie ?

[Dad] Son, sometimes you have to lie to make the ppl you love happy !
Every Valentines day after that, i used to tell yr mom that she was the most beautiful girl in the whole world.
Now yes, i think she's cute & pretty in a special kind of way, but you tell me...Do you think she has the legs of Sharon Stone and the figure of Alicia Silverstone ?

[Timmy] Eh... I dont know any of these stones, dad !

[Dad] Hmm.. ok...Lets just say that yr mom was just an ordinary Wilma from the Flintstones !

[Timmy] I know Wilma ! I know Wilma !!

[Dad] Hehe... & then again...
When yr mom was pregnant with you... she used to ask me every day how she looked ? Did she look fat ?
Now frankly, she had gained about 30-40 pounds... & was always in one of her moods..
But i'd tell her.."Nooooooooooooo Honey, you are glowing ! You look fabulous !!
Now if i told her she looked like a fat cow, it would have hurt her !

[Timmy] Ya...

[Dad] So you see son...Love is when you say those little lies to keep someone happy !
ok... i've gotta go now... All the best with yr assignment...

[Timmy] Bye Dad !

............................

[Timmy] Love means lying ??? Maybe i'll ask Mom
Mommyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy...

[Timmy] Mom..Mom... i have an assignment for school...you will help me, na !

[Mom] Timmy, you know i'v to go out with daddy in another 1/2 hr

[Timmy] Pleaseeeeeeeee Mommy !

[Mom] ok...Timmy. wts the topic ?

[Timmy] Eh... Love !

[Mom] Love...Love is about knowing the goodness of a person's heart, honey !

[Timmy] Goodness of heart ? huh ?

[Mom] Its like this...
When i was in college, yr Dad used to tell me i should be in hollywood. Now i knew he was just lying, but i also knew that he dint want me in hollywood, but rt next to him!
& when i was pregnant, i used to look so fat i looked like Santa Claus ! But yr Dad would say i was looked weak n would feed me everything he could find !
His lies were so dumb, i even thought i had married a stupid...but the truth is that this stupid cared enough to lie...just to make me happy !

[Timmy] But... he was lying, rt ?

[Mom] Well honey...he was just being a guy !
& i knew everytime that he was lying to me... but every single time, i also knew that he said those lies coz he loved me !

[Timmy] Hmm...

[Mom] Ok honey... i'v to go get ready now. byeeeee

........................

Assignment
Topic : Love
Author : Timmy

Love... When someone lies to you n you smile... coz you know the person cares enough for yr happyness to lie to you !!!

The End

The 7 Habits of Highly Unhappy People!

2010-09-14T02:35:00.000-07:00

It’s only when we realise and acknowledge that we are each 100% responsible for our happiness that we start to ‘notice’ the things that we do that creates our unhappiness. Only when we fully accept responsibility for our own happiness will we start to eliminate the habits that sabotage our contentment and joy. They are habits that many of us have learned to justify (a habit in itself!) as we often don’t want to see and accept that they are the cause of our unhappiness. They are also habits that we sometimes want to see as ‘natural’ as they ‘seem’ to form the very fabric of our day-to-day relationships. They are the 7 habits of highly unhappy people.

Judging
Have you noticed when you judge another you lose your inner peace? And inner peace is the primary ingredient of authentic happiness. Not only do we learn to judge but close on the mental heals of our judgements often comes the sentence and the punishment! All together (judgment, sentence and punishment) they make up the package called ‘condemnation’ which is guaranteed happiness killer!

Criticising
When we criticise it means we are attacking and somewhere ‘in there’ is usually anger albeit in a milder form. And when you are angry you cannot be happy. Yes some of us do attempt to justify our attack by calling it ‘constructive criticism’ but if there is any anger present it’s more often revenge or punishment in disguise! Definitely not a happy habit but a common one all the same.

Complaining
It seems to be endemic in some cultures to complain. Complaining signals the presence of upsetness and therefore the absence of happiness. Whereas in ‘giving feedback’ and ‘making a request’ ensures there is no discontentment. Easy theory, but hard to practice, especially if we have been playing that old ‘complaining record’ all our life.

Blaming
Projecting blame onto someone else is not only a happiness killer but usually a strategy to avoid responsibility. It’s driven by the perfect combination of anger and fear and is therefore a painful cry that sounds like, “It’s all your fault”, but which, when decoded, really means, “I have just made my self very unhappy”!

Arguing
Trying to prove we are right, or attempting to make the other as right as us, is usually both a tense and grumpy affair. Neither side is happy in the process, and even if it seems one side has won, any happiness is short lived until the next opportunity to ‘be right’ is craved for and invoked! To argue is to tell the world that we prefer misery to merriment!

Competing
It’s not so easy to see why the habit of competing is an unhappy pastime. Most of us have assimilated the belief that competition is good, fun and even joyful.
But all we have to do is glance at the faces of long distance runners, tennis players and even snooker players and we will see 99% of the game is played in a state of abject suffering. Occasionally, in the middle of the game or the match, someone will let a little joy slip out, but it doesn’t last long. All competition contains fear by definition, which along with anger, are the sworn enemies of happiness.

Controlling
Attempting to make others dance to our tune is always an impossible task. Expecting the world to be and do as we would wish is an expectation too far. Both are demonstrations that we still believe others are responsible for our happiness. It is a belief by which the world runs. If the truth were realise and lived i.e. that we are each responsible for our own happiness, the world would be a very different planet on which to live. One day perhaps!

So there you have it. Only seven of many habits that we activate sometimes several times a day. In so doing we block the light of the sun of happiness from shinning through our life. Each habit is embedded in a culture in which it has become socially acceptable to think and act in such ways. And so it is that we unknowingly collude with each other to sustain our unhappiness. And as we do we gift the 7 habits of highly unhappy people to the next generation

Words are important

2010-09-12T23:06:00.000-07:00

There were 4 guys Rahul, Ajay, Manav and Vijay were strolling down the road when they found a small bottle of wine. When they rubbed the bottle, a genie appeared. Thankful that they had released him , the genie said, “Next to you all are 4 swimming pools, I will give each of you a wish. When you run towards the pool and jump, you shout what you want the pool of water to become, and then your wish will come true.”

Rahul ran towards the pool, jumped and shouted “Wine”. The pool immediately changed into a pool of wine. Rahul was ecstatic.

Next came Ajay. He did the same and shouted, “Vodka” and immersed himself into a pool of vodka.

Manav jumped and shouted, “Beer”.

The last of them was Vijay. He was running towards the pool when suddenly he stepped on a banana peel. He slipped towards the pool and shouted,

“Shit!!!!!!!………”

விமர்சிக்கும் உலகம் இது

2010-09-09T06:17:00.000-07:00

பட்டினத்தார் எத்தனை பெரிய துறவி? கோடிக்கணக்கான சொத்தை அப்படியே விட்டுவிட்டுக் கோவணத்துடன் வெளியேறிய கடுந்துறவி. சோற்றாசை கூட இல்லாத சந்யாஸி. கையில் ஓடு வைத்திருந்த பத்திரிகிரியாரைத் சொத்து வைத்திருக்கும் குடும்பஸ்தன் என்று கிண்டலடித்த அப்பழுக்கற்ற துறவி. அவரையே உலகம் என்ன பாடுபடுத்தியது தெரியுமா?

நடந்த களைப்பால் வயலில் படுத்திருந்தார் பட்டினத்தார். அறுவடை நடந்திருந்த வயல் அது. குச்சி குச்சியாய்ப் பூமியில் இருந்து கிளம்பி அறுபடாதிருந்த வைக்கோல் அவர் உடம்பில் குத்திக் கொண்டிருந்தது. அதைச் சட்டை செய்யாமல் (சட்டை இல்லாமல்) படுத்துக் கிடந்தார். இருக்கும் போதே இறந்து போன மாதிரி இருந்தார்.

அந்த வழியாகப் போன இரண்டு பெண்கள் வரப்பு வழியாக நடந்து போக முடியாதபடி பட்டினத்தார் வரப்பு மீது தலைவைத்துப் படுத்திருந்தார். ஒரு பெண்மணி, “யாரோ மகானா!” என்று அவரை வணங்கி வரப்பிலிருந்து இறங்கி நடந்தார். மற்றொரு பெண்மணியோ, “ஆமாம்… ஆமாம்… இவரு பெரிய சாமியாராக்கும்… தலையணை வைச்சுத் தூங்கறான் பாரு… ஆசை பிடிச்சவன்” என்று கடுஞ்சொல் வீசினார். அவர்கள் அங்கிருந்து போனதும் எழுந்து உட்கார்ந்த பட்டினத்தார், “ஆஹா… நமக்கு இந்த அறிவு இது நாள் வரை இல்லையே” என்று வருந்தி வரப்பிலிருந்து தலையைக் கீழே வைத்துப் படுத்தார்.

சற்று நேரத்தில் அந்த இரண்டு பெண்களும் அதே வழியாகத் திரும்பி வந்தனர். வரப்பிலிருந்து தலையை இறக்கிக் கீழே வைத்திருந்த பட்டினத்தாரைப் பார்த்து முதல் பெண் பரிதாபப்பட்டு, “பார்த்தாயா… நீ சொன்னதைக் கேட்டு உடனே கீழே இறங்கிப் படுத்துட்டாரூ… இப்பவாவது ஒத்துக்கோ… இவரு மகான்தானே…! என்றார். அந்த பெண்மணியோ, தனக்கே உரித்த பாணியில் “அடி போடி… இவனெல்லாம் ஒரு சாமியாரா? தன்னைப் பத்தி யார் யாரு என்ன என்ன பேசுறாங்கன்னு ஒட்டுக் கேட்கிறான்… அதைப் பத்திக் கவலைப்படறான். இவனெல்லாம் ஒரு சாமியாரா?” என்று ஒரு வெட்டு வெட்டினாள். பட்டினத்தாருக்குத் தலை சுற்றியது.

எப்படி இருந்தாலும் உலகம் நம்மை விமர்சிக்கும். இது பேருண்மை. தரமானவர்களின் தரமான விமர்சனத்தை மதிக்க வேண்டும். விமர்சிக்க வேண்டும் என்கிற வெறியுடன் விமர்சிக்கிறவர்கள் விமர்சனத்தைப் புறக்கணியுங்கள்!!!

Happy Independence day!!

2010-08-12T02:52:00.000-07:00

கோடிகளில் மட்டும் வாழும் ஏழைத் தலைவர்கள்... காசுக்கு வோட்டு போடும் பணக்கார மக்கள்... தன் நாட்டிற்க்கே குழி பறிக்கும் போலி ராஜாக்கள்... விளையாட்டு போட்டிற்கு முன்பே பணத்தில் விளையாடும் வீரர்கள்... - இது போன்ற புனித மனிதர்கள் வாழ இந்நாட்டிற்கு சுதந்திரம் கிடைக்கப் போராடிய அனைத்துத் தியாகிகளுக்கும் 64 வது ஆழ்ந்த சுதந்திரதின அனுதாபங்கள்..

Sethu

சொந்த ஊர்!!!!!

2010-08-02T05:29:00.000-07:00

வயல்வெளி பார்த்து
வறட்டி தட்டி
ஓணாண் பிடித்து
ஓடையில் குளித்து
எதிர்வீட்டில் விளையாடி
எப்படியோ படித்த நான்
ஏறிவந்தேன் நகரத்துக்கு !

சிறு அறையில் குறுகிப் படுத்து
சில மாதம் போர்தொடுத்து
வாங்கிவிட்ட வேலையோடு
வாழுகிறேன் கணிப்பொறியோடு !

சிறிதாய்த் தூங்கி
கனவு தொலைத்து
காலை உணவு மறந்து
நெரிசலில் சிக்கி
கடமை அழைக்க
காற்றோடு செல்கிறேன்
காசு பார்க்க !

மனசு தொட்டு
வாழும் வாழ்க்கை
மாறிப் போகுமோ ?

மௌசு தொட்டு
வாழும் வாழ்க்கை
பழகிப் போகுமோ ?

வால்பேப்பர் மாற்றியே
வாழ்க்கை
தொலைந்து போகுமோ ?

சொந்த பந்த
உறவுகளெல்லாம்
ஷிப் பைலாய்
சுருங்கிப் போகுமோ?

வாழ்க்கை
தொலைந்து போகுமோ
மொத்தமும்!
புரியாது
புலம்புகிறேன்
நித்தமும்!

தாய் மடியில் தலைவைத்து
நிலவு முகம் நான் ரசித்து
கதைகள் பேசி
கவலைகள் மறந்த காலம்
இனிதான் வருமா ?

இதயம் நனைத்த
இந்த வாழ்வு
இளைய தலைமுறைக்காவது
இனி கிடைக்குமா ?

சொந்த மண்ணில்
சொந்தங்களோடு
சோறு திண்பவன்
யாரடா ?
இருந்தால் அவனே
சொர்க்கம் கண்டவனடா!

A great wish!!

2010-07-19T00:25:00.000-07:00

தேடிச் சோறுநிதந் தின்று - பல
சின்னஞ் சிறுகதைகள் பேசி - மனம்
வாடித் துன்பமிக உழன்று - பிறர்
வாடப் பலசெயல்கள் செய்து - நரை
கூடிக் கிழப்பருவ மெய்தி - கொடுங்
கூற்றுக் கிரையெனப்பின் மாயும் - பல
வேடிக்கை மனிதரைப் போலே - நான்
வீழ்வே னென்று நினைத் தாயோ?
நின்னைச் சிலவரங்கள் கேட்பேன் - அவை
நேரே இன்றெனக்குத் தருவாய் - என்றன்
முன்னைத் தீயவினைப் பயன்கள் - இன்னும்
மூளா தழிந்திடுதல் வேண்டும் - இனி
என்னைப் புதியவுயி ராக்கி - எனக்
கேதுங் கவலையறச் செய்து - மதி
தன்னை மிகத்தெளிவு செய்து - என்றும்
சந்தோஷங் கொண்டிருக்கச் செய்வாய்.
- பாரதியார்

"We were being slowly killed by our own people"-- the destruction of the CRPF's 'A' company in Dantewada

2010-04-21T03:57:00.000-07:00

An exclusive account of the final moments of the CRPF’s A and G companies which were wiped out by Maoists in Dantewada on April 6, 2010. Based on detailed interviews of three of the seven survivors currently in a hospital in Raipur.

Dawn had just begun breaking over the cool dry jungle
of Dantewada when the column of 81 CRPF men along
with one local head constable was walking in a single file over a hillock and towards a one hectare fallow field, lined with bunds and trees. The troopers were wearing camouflage
fatigues and, strangely,white sneakers bought in Raipur because the regular CRPF issue boots were unfit for long marches. The men had established a base camp three km away from Chintalnar village and had begun ‘area domination’ patrols
in the Mukrana forest. They had two night halts where they cooked a dal and rice khichdi for themselves.
It was their second day in the Maoist stronghold but the enemy
was elusive. The villagers that they came across didn’t tell them anything useful. It didn’t matter even if they did. The troopers did not understand the Gondi dialect spoken by the tribals; they left that to their local liaison, Head Constable Sushil Kumar Deepak. Ramesh Kumar Singh, part of the column’s Quick
Reaction Team (QRT) comprising of 12 men, cradled his INSASrifle and pulled out his mobile phone. There
was no signal so he was using it as a clock. It was 5.50 a.m. They had been marching for nearly three hours. For some reason the QRT,supposed to be at the head of the column acting as scouts, had fallen behind. “I’m going to the front to get our orders,” Assistant Commandant B.L. Meena said and walked ahead to the head of the column where the leader,
Deputy Commandant Satyawan Singh, was. Meena had gone just 20 metres when the first pft pft pft bursts of fire came directly from the front. “Take positions, take posi-
tions,” Satyawan Singh’s voice rang out. The company broke up and split into small groups and fanned out to left and right, rifles pointing towards their assailants.
“It’s a hit-and-run. They will go away. It happened like this in
Kashmir,” thought Biplab Malakar,a lanky first division fast bowler from Barrackpore in West Bengal, as he took position behind a 2-ft high bund around the field. Five years ago,militants in Jammu and Kashmir had shot and killed his friend, another constable, Pradeep Sikdar. It occurred to Biplab that the Naxals were using INSAS rifles—the very rifles the CRPF troopers were using to desperately defend themselves—to
shoot at him. Biplab had a deeper as- sociation—he used to make these weapons during a two-month long
summer job at the Rifle Factory in Ishapore a decade ago.
Soon the fire began from the flanks, and seemingly from above.
The black uniform-clad Maoists were firing from behind the dark- ened silhouettes of the trees. Bullets rang over their heads with a crack as they broke the sound barrier. Biplab was huddled near the bund with a fellow policemen H.K. Malik when a grenade flew in and exploded, blowing Malik’s leg away. Five bullets hit Biplab on the back and blood
poured out soaking his battle fatigues. He passed out.
Arvind Kumar, meanwhile, went down on the ground, fired
his AK-47 and crawled—the standard drill to evade bullets. But
the ground offered no cover. The men were being scythed down
in groups as they lay prone. It soon became clear why. “Ped se fire aa rahi hain(they are firing from the trees),” Havaldar Major Ram Kumar Meena screamed as two Maoist light machine guns began thumping deadly fire from atop trees over 100 metres away.
Explosions from IEDs rent the air and smoke wafted across the field. Arvind’s AK-47 ran out of ammunition.
“Take my magazines. I can’t fire,” a dying Sub-Inspector B.K. Sharma offered him two AK-47 magazines. As the battle raged, the Maoists were shouting tactical instructions to each other. “Deepak, idhar se ghero, (surround them from here).” It was a sight that was both terrifying and surreal. There were hundreds of tribal villagers around the field. They were screaming in Gondi, waving sticks and spears. It was like a royal shikaar which had converged onto a single killing field. It seemed like over a thousand people were firing though the Maoists claim they were only 300. “If I’m going to die, I’m going to try and take as many of them,” Arvind thought as he and a few others began blasting away at the trees. He saw at least one of the Maoists falling off.
Then the firing came in from a small hillock towards the rear of the company. Arvind had attracted the deadly attention of
their ambushers. A second grenade was flung towards him and it exploded near him. Three bullets hit him on the back. He
collapsed on his rifle. It was like the Maoists anticipated how the CRPF would react when ambushed. The field had
turned into a killing box ringed with automatic weapons. It was a Roman colosseum. There was no retreat for these dying gladiators. In the firefight, which lasted for over three hours, the CRPF men were clinically finished off. And all that happened right in front of their own ‘countrymen’. The last thing the survivors remember is seeing sari-clad tribal women moving in
and stripping the bodies of their fallen comrades of their weapons. Only seven men survived to tell this tale, one that would haunt them for the rest of their lives.

--Sandeep Unnithan (India Today, April 26, 2010)

The 'Metro Man's' journey

2010-03-24T04:38:00.000-07:00

Stories of extreme hardship, braving impossible odds and innumerable sacrifices, abound in the lives of nearly 90 per cent of the students in the country. But among them, some perform exceptionally well. Their academic laurels are so brilliant, that at times their CV looks intimidating. And each one acknowledges that it's the right education that made them what they are today. Careers360 identified 40-odd brilliant students of this country. Most of them came from very dire conditions.

Here, in today's feature we look at Elattuvalapil Sreedharan's journey.

Men sporting bright yellow safety helmets and fluorescent jackets and digging up busy roads is a common sight in
Delhi these days. The Delhi NCR region is connected like never before, and the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) project continues, full throttle. And the force behind this venture is Indian-born and educated Elattuvalapil Sreedharan.

Hailed as 'The Metro Man', ES, now 77, stumbled upon the job of Metro Chief, by chance. He was part of a search
committee launched by the state government to locate a suitable person to head The Delhi Metro Rail Corporation, as
its managing director. The search did not yield even one suitable candidate, so the government insisted he take up the position. ES very hesitatingly agreed stating that he was not interested in salary or perks, but he needed a set-up free of
political and bureaucratic interference to work. The government agreed.

Thus started a journey, sans any frills and fanfare. He had no office, and not even a chair or phone to use. He worked
out of a make-shift office room with a few of his close associates, who came with him from his earlier workplace, the
Konkan Railway. The Metro Rail team built up gradually; general consultants were added, contractors engaged along
the way and site workers, hired.

The youngest of eight children, ES got very little parental care. But his only sister, now aged 101 and his elder brothers made up for it with their love and attention. Born in a remote village in the Palakkad district of Kerala, ES attended an ordinary school. He walked a long distance to reach it every day.

As a student, he was bright and always topped his class. He also enjoyed building mud houses, bridges and roadways in the compound, an early expression of his engineering instincts. He went on to join Victoria College in Palghat and then graduated as an engineer from the Government Engineering College, Kakinada, Andhra Pradesh. He briefly taught civil engineering at the Government Polytechnic, Kozhikode, apprenticed with Bombay Port Trust for a year and later joined Indian Railways.

The 760-km long Konkan Railway Project was not only an engineering challenge as it involved construction of a bridges and tunnels over a rough terrain but a financial one as well. But under his guidance, the project was completed well in time and without cost overruns.

The Konkan Railway project put him in the spotlight, but one of his biggest challenges was the restoration of the Pamban Railway Bridge linking Mandapam and Rameshwaram in Tamil Nadu. In 1963, 126 of the bridge's 146 spans (distance between two supports of a bridge) were washed away by a tidal wave. He restored the bridge in 46 days against the target of six months by the government.

A stickler for punctuality, he starts his day early; mediates and reads the Bhagvad Gita, a two-hour daily ritual which he has been following for years. At work, he doesn't stay back after 6 pm, and doesn't subscribe to late working hours. Every new employee of DMRC is gifted a copy of the Bhagwad Gita, regarded by the corporation as a self-management book and not a religious text.

He also understands the value of time; the Delhi Metro is 99.9 per cent punctual. Detailed planning and analysis of the situation, followed by practical solution is his strategy for effective functioning.

Simple living and high thinking
For a man who takes on high-tech complex projects, his lifestyle has always remained simple A vegetarian, he is a frugal eater. He doesn't consume milk products, but relishes bananas.

Academics

* BE (JNTU)

Honours

* Padma Shri
* One of Asia's Heroes by TIME
* Degree of Doctor of Science (Honoris causa) from IIT Delhi
* Knight of the Legion of Honour by the French government
* Padma Vibhushan

Did you know?

* He has adopted children, donates award money to charity, and under his aegis, the DMRC has recently opened a shelter-cum-protection home for children in Delhi.
* He has denied authorised biographies on him.
* He was the captain of his college football team.

பழைய பேப்பரை விற்று 6 வயது சிறுமிக்கு உயிர் கொடுத்த மாணவர்கள்

2009-10-28T22:30:00.000-07:00

மதுரை : மதுரை வடமலையான் மருத்துவமனையின் "ஊர் கூடி உதவுவோம்' என்ற திட்டத்தின்கீழ், பழைய பேப்பரை சேகரித்து விற்று, அதில் கிடைத்த தொகையை 6 வயது சிறுமியின் ஆப்பரேஷனுக்கு கொடுத்து உயிரை காப்பாற்றினர் பள்ளி மாணவர்கள் மற்றும் பொதுமக்கள்.

பொதுமக்களிடம் பழைய நாளிதழ்களை நன்கொடையாக பெற்று, அதில் கிடைக்கும் பணத்தை ஏழை குழந்தைகளின் மருத்துவச் செலவுக்கு பயன்படுத்துவதே இத்திட்டத்தின் நோக்கம். இதுகுறித்து மாணவர்கள், பொதுமக்களிடம் விழிப்புணர்வு ஏற்படுத்தப்பட்டது. இதன் பயனாக, மதுரை டால்பின் மெட்ரிக். பள்ளி மாணவர்கள் 11 ஆயிரம் பழைய நாளிதழ்களை விற்று 47 ஆயிரம் ரூபாயும், பொதுமக்கள் 4,658 ரூபாயும் நன்கொடையாக அளித்தனர். இதைக் கொண்டு, பிறவியிலேயே இருதயத்தில் ஓட்டை இருந்த திண்டுக்கல் சிறுமி சித்ராவுக்கு அறுவை சிகிச்சையின்றி, கேத்லாப் முறை மூலம் இருதய ஓட்டை அடைக்கப்பட்டது. மொத்த செலவு 1.10 லட்சம் ரூபாயில், நன்கொடை போக, மீதமுள்ள தொகையை மருத்துவமனை நிர்வாகமே ஏற்றுக்கொண்டது.

ஆப்பரேஷன் செய்த டாக்டர் கண்ணனும் கட்டணம் பெறவில்லை. நிர்வாக இயக்குநர் டாக்டர் புகழகிரி கூறுகையில், ""ஒவ்வொரு துளி நீரும் சேர்ந்துதான் சமுத்திரத்தை உருவாக்குகிறது. அதுபோல் அனைவரும் இத்திட்டத்தில் பங்கேற்று இதனை வெற்றி பெற செய்ய வேண்டும்'' என்றார்.திட்டமேலாளர் ஹேமலட்சுமி, ரேடியோ மிர்ச்சி நிலைய இயக்குனர் தினேஷ், நிகழ்ச்சி இயக்குனர் ராதா உடனிருந்தனர்.

Do not turn your back on the needy

2009-08-05T04:50:00.001-07:00

One stormy night many years ago, an elderly man and his wife entered the lobby of a small hotel in Philadelphia. Trying to get out of the rain, the couple approached the front desk hoping to get some shelter for the night.

“Could you possibly give us a room here?” the husband asked. The clerk, a friendly man with a winning smile, looked at the couple and explained that there were three conventions in town.

“All of our rooms are taken,” the clerk said. “But I can’t send a nice couple like you out into the rain at one o’clock in the morning. Would you perhaps be willing to sleep in my room? It’s not exactly a suite, but it will be good enough to make you folks comfortable for the night.”

When the couple declined, the young man pressed on. “Don’t worry about me; I’ll make out just fine,” the clerk told them. So the couple agreed.

As he paid his bill the next morning, the elderly man said to the clerk, “You are the kind of manager who should be the boss of the best hotel in the United States. Maybe someday I’ll build one for you.”

The clerk looked at them and smiled. The three of them had a good laugh.

As they drove away, the elderly couple agreed that the helpful clerk was indeed exceptional, as finding people who are both friendly and helpful isn’t easy.

Two years passed. The clerk had almost forgotten the incident when he received a letter from the old man. It recalled that stormy night and enclosed a round-trip ticket to New York, asking the young man to pay them a visit.

The old man met him in New York, and led him to the corner of Fifth Avenue and 34th Street. He then pointed to a great new building there, a palace of reddish stone, with turrets and watchtowers thrusting up to the sky.

“That,” said the older man, “is the hotel I have just built for you to manage.”

“You must be joking,” the young man said.

“I can assure you I am not,” said the older man, a sly smile playing around his mouth.

The older man’s name was William Waldorf Astor, and the magnificent structure was the original Waldorf-Astoria Hotel.

The young clerk who became its first manager was George C. Bold. This young clerk never foresaw the turn of events that would lead him to become the manager of one of the world’s most glamorous hotels.

The Bible says that we are not to turn our backs on those who are in need, for we might be entertaining angels. Life is more accurately measured by the lives you touch than the things you acquire…

Knowing Mumbai's new top cop better

2009-06-21T22:40:00.000-07:00

Knowing Mumbai's new top cop better
Shyamal Majumdar in New Delhi

If you haven't met Dhanushyakodi Sivanandan, you could ask for a CD of Ram Gopal Varma's [Images] film -- Company -- and watch Mohanlal. Mumbai's [Images] new police commissioner was the inspiration behind the Malayalam superstar's role of a top cop in the film.

The character in the film called Srinivasan speaks Hindi with a heavy South Indian accent, looks like a professor and uses his iron fist with good effect to deal with the Mumbai underworld. The reel and the real lives couldn't have been more similar.

The Tamil Nadu-born Sivanandan taught economics for three years and shot to fame -- almost literally -- during his momentous tenure as head of the Mumbai Crime Branch during the late nineties. During his two-year stint as joint commissioner (crime), over 250 members of the Dawood Ibrahim [Images] and Chhota Rajan gangs were shot dead in police encounters.

Old-timers also recall how, as the police commissioner of Thane, Sivanandan set up a special squad of 40 commandos who were always ready on their motorbikes with machine guns. It was this ability to deal with the underworld with an iron hand that saw this 1976-batch IPS officer get the job, the principal mandate of which is to protect Mumbai from terrorists.

It wasn't the Mumbai mafia alone that Sivanandan fought successfully. He battled the Maoists as well when he was posted in Nagpur and headed anti-Naxalite operations. He was also part of the team that probed the 1993 serial blasts in the city and exposed the Mumbai link with the Kandahar plane hijack episode by arresting a terrorist who had close links with the hijackers.

But the image of an encounter specialist alone wouldn't have been enough to make Sivanandan the boss of what is one of the important police forces in the country. Sivanandan has also cultivated, rather carefully, his image of an HR manager par excellence. Sample this: He is known to hold daily meetings (called Darbars) with his men just to understand their problems and take corrective action. So when he saw one of his constables at Thane having lunch sitting on the office floor, he made sure that a cafeteria with basic amenities was in place.

Sivanandan has attributed this concern for his people to his middle-class background and to the hardship he himself had to go through after his father died when he was just 15.

Training is something Sivanandan is passionate about and he often dons the hat of a teacher in these sessions. The training (he set up the first fully air-conditioned police training centre in the state) ranges from combat-preparedness to self-development in softer skills. The basic idea is to keep pace with time. So when police constable Sunil More was arrested on rape charges, Sivanandan started gender-bias training courses.

However, it has certainly not been roses all the way. Sivanandan has had his share of setbacks as well. For example, it was under him that the crime branch made the sensational arrest of Sessions Court Judge J W Singh under the dreaded Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act ( MCOCA). The judge was later acquitted by the court.

He also hogged the limelight when he arrested diamond merchant and film financier Bharat Shah for his alleged links with the underworld, but the courts acquitted Shah. In 2001, he had to face censure from the state government after a mob killed a rapist in Nagpur. Then, as the police commissioner in Thane, he faced the ire of the Muslim community when the police fired at a mob in Bhiwandi, killing two people.
Despite all this, his well-wishers say, Sivanandan should have got the job long ago. He was ignored twice earlier, but the third time proved to be lucky for Mumbai's 34th police commissioner.

Prabhakaran: Powerful symbol of Tamil armed struggle

2009-05-29T22:28:00.000-07:00

May 29th, 2009

by D.B.S. Jeyaraj

The evolution and growth of the armed struggle for the goal of Tamil Eelam saw many Tamil militant groups emerge across the politico-military horizon. There was a time when nearly 34 outfits-big and small-existed.

Among all these, the single organization that kept the Tamil armed struggle alive was none other than the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) led by its charismatic leader Thiruvengadam Velupillai Prabhakaran.

From its de-jure birth on May 5th 1976 to its de-facto death on May 18th the LTTE under Prabhakaran fought on relentlessly towards its avowed objective of a separate Tamil state until the very last.

During the emergency period of 1975-77 , Indira Gandhi the Prime Minister of India was praised to the skies by sycophantic partymen. The Congress president of the time DK Baruah publicly proclaimed “Indira is India, India is Indira”.

Likewise the same could be said of Prabhakaran and the LTTE too. “The LTTE is /was Prabhakaran, Prabhakaran is/was LTTE”. The LTTE leader in a way personified the Liberation tigers. In the process he became a powerful, vibrant symbol of the Tamil armed struggle.

Family

Prabhakaran was born on November 26th 1954. He was the youngest in a family of four children. There were two boys and two girls. One of his sisters is in Canada. The other two siblings are in Denmark. His parents who lived in the northern mainland, Wanni, are now displaced and in Vavuniya. They are under protective custody.

His father is Veerasamy Thiruvengadam Velupillai. Prabhakaran’s mother’s name is Paarvathipillai. Her maiden name was also Velupillai. She suffered a stroke recently resulting in an arm and hand being paralysed.

Prabhakaran’s family hailed from the coastal town of Valvettithurai referred to generally as VVT. His father joined the Government clerical service and eventually became a district lands officer. I think he retired from Govt service when the late Gamini Dissanayake was Lands minister.

Prabhakaran’s family was of respected lineage in VVT. They were known as belonging to the “Thirumeni kudumbam” or Thirumeni family. Prabhakaran’s ancestors constructed the famous Sivan temple of VVT. His father should have been the chief trustee but declined to be so as he was in govt service.

The LTTE leader’s father was a duty conscientious mild-mannered gentleman well respected and well-liked. People of VVT used to say that even the grass wouldn’t get crushed when Mr. Velupillai treads on it. Later many comparisons were made about father and younger son. In fact the father disapproved of the son’s path and was not on speaking terms with Prabhakaran for years and years.

Karikalan

The name Prabhakaran denotes the Sun or Sooriyan. Later his acolytes began calling him “Sooriyathevan” or “Sun God”. Being the youngest in the family he was called “Thambi” or younger brother. This pet name continued to be in vogue when he entered militant ranks as he was then perhaps the youngest of all.

Prabhakaran also adopted various names like Mani, Manivannan, Maniam and Karikaalan. It was the latter nom de guerre that he used mostly during the early days. Karikaalan refers to Thirumaavalavan of the Chola dynasty that flew the “Vengai” or Cheeta flag.

Colleagues of an earlier vintage referred to him as “maniyathhar”. Contemporaries continued calling him “thamby”. In later years young tigers used to call him “Annai” or elder brother. After a while it became “Thalaiver” or leader. Formally it was “Thesiya thalaiver” or “national leader”. Colloquially he would be called “perisu” or the big one.

Prabhakaran studied at different schools in Jaffna, Vavuniya and Batticaloa because his father was constantly transferred. The schools he studied for many years were Government College (Now Mahajana) B’caloa and Chidampara College, VVT. He was not a model student and did not even pass his GCE O’levels.

This does not mean that he was unintelligent or did not possess a thirst for knowledge. It was due to Prabhakaran being interested in other things rather than in formal education.

History

He had a photogenic memory and was an avid reader. He was particularly fond of reading history-about historical battles and historical figures.

Some of his famous historical figures were Napoleon and Alexander. The Indian freedom struggle fascinated him. He read the Tamil version of Mahatma Gandhi’s autobiography “Satya Sodhanai” in his early teens but was not enamoured of it greatly.

His ideal and idol was Netaji or Subash Chandra Bose. Netaji had ideological differences with the Mahatma about the mode of struggle for independence. At one stage he disapporoved of Gandhi’s “non-violence” and went on to form the Indian National Army (INA) to launch an armed struggle against the British.

Subsequently Chandra Bose joined forces with the Germans and Japanese to fight the British. He died in a mysterious aeroplane accident. Netaji’s famous pronouncement was “I shall fight for the freedom of my land until I shed my last drop of blood”. Prabhakaran subscribed to these sentiments whole-heartedly.

Apart from Netaji , Prabhakaran was also impressed by the Sikh freedom fighter Bhagat Singh who was sentenced to the gallows by the British rulers.Two freedom fighters from Tamil Nadu also made an impact on young Prabhakaran.

One was Vaanchinaatha Iyer who shot the Tirunelvely district collector Ashe dead at the Maniaachchi railway station. When chased by the Police Vaanchinaathan shot himself. The other was Thiruppoor Kumaran who withstood heavy beating by the Police but would not let go of the Bharatmatha flag. He was hailed as “Kodi Kaatha Kumaran” (Kumaran who saved the flag).

Hard as it may be for many to believe there was a quiet, spiritual aspect also to Prabhakaran. The “Ithihasam” (epic) Mahabharatham enthralled him. The characters he identified with were Bheema and Karna.

Prabhakaran also read the Tamil translations of Swami Vivekananda’s writings and speeches avidly. Another spiritual person he looked up to was Thirumuga Kirupananda Vaariyaar popularly called “vaariyaar”.

Gita

It is the Mahabharatha that relates the tale of Lord Krishna advising the wavering Arjuna on the battlefield “kurushetra”. The Pandavas and Gouravas (cousins) had assembled to do battle but Arjuna hesitates to fight against his kith and kin and lets slip his bow “Kaandeepam”.

Lord Krishna then tenders advice to him that each person is destined to fulfill his or her duty. It was the warrior’s duty to kill his adversary regardless of kinship. Killing the “body” of the enemy was part of heroic valour. The essence of Lord Krishna’s lecture is the “Bhagavat Gita”.

Maranathai Enni Kalangidum Vijaya-Seerkali Govindarajan-Tamil Song mp3]

Prabhakaran was greatly enamoured of principles enunciated in the Gita. In the Tamil film “Karnan” based on the Mahabharatha Lord Krishna is played by NT Rama Rao and Arjuna by Mutturaman. The Gita episode is picturised as a song Maranathai Enni Kalangidum Vijaya.” This was one of Prabhakaran’s favourite songs. It’s sung by Seerkali Govindarajan.

One person who opined that Prabhakaran had inculcated the philosophy of the Gita was former Indian High Commissioner to Sri Lanka Jyotindra Nath Dixit. This was during the time when LTTE was fighting the Indian Army. I could see that Dixit meant it as a “compliment” when he said this.

On an earlier occasion Dixit told me that of all the top Tamil militant leaders only Prabhakaran had “fire” in him. This was after Dixit met for the first time all leaders of the five big groups. Umamaheswaran-PLOTE, Sri Sabaratnam-TELO, Padmanabha-EPRLF, Balakumar-EROS and of course Prabhakaran-LTTE.

I also recall a conversation in early 1985 with former national security minister Lalith Athulathmudali. Long before the Indo-Lanka accord of 1987, Athulathmudali predicted that all the Tamil groups will give up the struggle and fall in line. But not Prabhakaran, said Lalith then. “He will never compromise and will die fighting to the last” he said. How True!

Reading

Prabhakaran was also fond of reading Tamil novels particularly those with a historical background. His favourite apparently was “Ponniyin Selvan” the magnum opus of “Kalki” (R. Krishnamoorthy). This is about Prince Arulmolivarman who evolved into the great Chola emperor Raja Raja Cholan.

He also liked the historical novels of Akhilan and Chandilyan.

[Venkayin Mainthan-by Akhilan-pic:Chandrachoodan Gopalakrishnan]

“Venkayin Mainthan” and “Kayal Vizhi” by Akhilan and “Yavana Raani”, “Kadal Puraa” and “Jalatheepam” by Chandilyan were his favourites by these two. When the LTTE bought its first maritime vessel it was named “Kadal Puraa” (sea dove) after Chandilyan’s novel.

Yet, the Tamil novel read again and again by Prabhakaran was “Kallukkul Eeram” (moisture in a stone) by RS Nallaperumaal. It is set against the backdrop of Indiaâ€™s freedom struggle against the British.

The chief protagonist Rangamani is one who does not believe in Gandhi’s “ahimsa” mode of struggle and espouses violence as the appropriate method to liberate India. No wonder then that Praba loved this novel. But there is a change of heart in the end but for the real life protagonist there was no moisture in the stone.

Prabhakaran was very much interested in contemporary affairs and international politics. A former comrade at arms of Prabhakaran, Thalayasingham Sivakumar alias Anton Master told me how the LTTE subscribed to “Time” and “Newsweek” those days. Praba would ask friends knowledgeable in English to translate and explain articles.

In later years when the LTTE developed into a full-fledged outfit, important articles from magazines and newspapers were translated into Tamil for Prabakharan’s consumption. Also many books on military affairs and warfare were translated into Tamil.

Puritan

As a schoolboy, Prabhakaran like most youngsters of his age was fond of cycling and playing volley ball and soccer. But he was no sportsman and preferred to read or watch action films.

He has been ridiculed often for telling an American journalist that he learnt his fighting techniques from Clint Eastwood movies. But what happened really was that the US scribe was questioning him whether he had been trained in Cuba. It was as a joke that Prabha responded citing Eastwood.

Another pursuit in boyhood was the targeting of squirrels, lizards. Chameleons and small birds with a catapult. As a kid Praba would prowl about areas of dense vegetation searching for his quarry.

His memory power was legendary. Prabhakaran would remember faces, names and the last time he had seen someone years ago. His eyes were always sharp and roving taking in the surrounding area and ever on the alert. His eyes were large and striking and was teased as “muliyan” (goggle-eye)

Prabhakaran was also a “puritan” in many ways. He neither drank nor smoked and even advocated sexual abstinence for all in the early days of the movement. Order and cleanliness was almost an obsession. He was a stickler for discipline.

Cook

He was always neatly dressed preferring “bush shirts” and short-sleeved shirts. The bush shirt was helpful as it covered hidden firearms. It is said that even during the early stages of militancy when there was an acute shortage of funds, Prabhakaran would wash and iron his few clothes regularly and always maintain a dapper appearance.

He was a good cook and also fond of good food. He relished Chinese cuisine. Prabhakaran was also fond of Pittu, coconut sambol and Fried shrimp. He also liked Iguana and tortoise flesh. He liked fruits and natural bee’s honey.

Usually LTTE cadres under punishment are assigned duties in the kitchen. Prabhakaran would encourage cadres to cook saying “only a good cook can be a good guerilla”.

He would often cook or help out in the kitchen when at home. A close relative who visited him once was flummoxed to see the feared guerilla leader busily scraping coconuts in the kitchen.

Prabhakaran’s attitude and political thinking was shaped by contemporary events and environment. The gruesome tales he heard as a four year old child about the 1958 anti-Tamil violence impacted greatly.

One day Prabhakaran’s home had a woman visitor whose legs were scarred by burns. Upon inquiring the little boy was told that the womanâ€™s home had been set on fire by a “Sinhala” mob. She had escaped with burns.

Valvettithurai

Young Praba also heard the famous story of the Brahmin priest in Panadura being burnt to death in a bonfire and also about the infant thrown into a tar barrel. All these tales made an indelible impression.

Being a native of Valvettithurai was another factor in making a militant out of Prabhakaran. VVT had acquired a reputation for smuggling and had a sub-culture of its own. “Operation Monty” was launched by the armed forces in post-independence Sri Lanka to check and counter illicit immigration and smuggling.

This necessitated the setting up of security camps in VVT from the early fifties of the last century. There was much friction as a result of this hostile, “alien” presence.This in turn led to a confrontational mood prevailing between the people and armed forces long before the political crisis escalated in the seventies.

It was in this environment that Prabhakaran and a host of other VVT youth grew up. As Sathasivampillai Krishnakumar alias Kittu and Gopalswamy Mahendrarajah alias Mahathaya explained to me on different occasions, many youths of their generation grew up in VVT with anger and resentment towards the armed forces and by extension the government in Colombo held responsible.

Prabhakaran growing up in this atmosphere got politically motivated in the late sixties and early seventies of the previous century. This was when former Kayts MP. V. Navaratnam roke away from the Ilankai Thamil Arasu Katchi (ITAK) known as Federal Party (FP) in English.

Navaratnam

Navaratnam once described as the “golden brain” of the FP formed the “Thamilar Suyaatchi Kazhagham” or Tamil Self-Rule party in 1968. Navaratnam abandoned the federal demand as being too little and too late and instead opted for “suyaatchi” or “self-rule” a euphemism of sorts for a separate state.

There was a pedagogue named Venugopal master for whom Prabhakaran had great regard and respect. Venugopal master became an active supporter of Navaratnam. Several students including Prabhakaran became his followers and turned into ardent devotees of Tamil self-rule.

The Suyaatchi Kazhagham also started a newspaper “Viduthalai” (Liberation/Freedom). Navaratnam himself translated and serialized “Exodus” the famous novel written by Leon Uris. It was named “Namakkendroru Naadu” (A Country of our own) Young Prabhakaran eagerly devoured it and became hooked on the dream of a country for Tamils.

The Tamil self-rule party was defeated in the 1970 polls. No candidate including Navaratnam won. But the seeds of self-rule sowed in the campaign had taken firm root in the heart and mind of “Thamby” Prabhakaran.

Radicalised

With the introduction of standardization in 1970 the student population of Jaffna began getting radicalized. The Tamil Maanavar Peravai (Tamil students federation) and Tamil Ilaingar Peravai (Tamil youth federation) were formed. A series of meetings , processions and rallies were held.

Prabhakaran himself began participating in some of these activities. His first experience of a protest demonstration was in 1971 when former Posts and Telecommunications minister Chelliah Kumarasuriar visited Velanai to open a new post office.Tamil youths staged a black flag demonstration.

Prabhakaran also attended most of the Tamil student and youth activist meetings. Soon “thamby” began losing interest in meetings and non-violent agitation.These were too tame for him. Greatly inspired by tales of Israel’s Hagannah and Irgun, Prabhakaran became firmly convinced that Sri Lankan state oppression could be resisted only through force.

It was then that Prabhakaran wanted to buy a gun and practise shooting. There was a notorious “chandiyan” (thug) then in Point Pedro called Sambandan. He sold guns illegally. When Prabhakaran approached him for one, Sambandan priced an old pistol at 150 rupees.

Prabhakaran and some like-minded youths pooled their resources and came up with the princely sum of 40 rupees. Undeterred Prabhakaran sold his gold ring. This had been given him by his elder brother in law.

As was the custom the younger brother of the bride, Prabhakaran ,poured water on the bridegroom’s feet when he entered the brideâ€™s house and got rewarded. This was how he acquired his first firearm.

Prabhakaran began training clandestinely. A retired soldier helped him. By now the youth was beginning to attract the attention of the Police. When the police started making inquiries about a “mani” Prabha knew what was in store.

Photograph

He left home one day to embark on his avowed vocation. Anticipating future problems Prabhakaran removed and destroyed every single photograph in the house with his picture.

When the Police caught up with him they could not get a proper picture of him and had to use only the postal identity card used by Prabhakaran to sit for examinations.

In 1982 May, Prabhakaran alias Karikalan and Sivakumar alias Raghavan of the LTTE had a shoot-out with Umamaheswaran alias Muhunthan and Jotheeswaran alias Kannan at Pondy Bazaar in Chennai. Prabhakaran was arrested and photographed and it was only then that Colombo got an up to date photo of him.

Prabhakaran teamed up with some others and formed the Tamil New Tigers. Apparently some of the old timers like Rajaratnam of Nunaavil had formed a Tiger group to fight for Tamil rights in the early sixties. This never got off the ground.

Tamil New Tigers

Prabhakaran had begun interacting with Rajaratnam and felt the new movement should be a “revival” of sorts. Hence Tamil new tigers (TNT). The acronym TNT was also applicable for the explosive compound “Trinitrotoluene”.

The TNT was led by Thanabalasingham alias Chetty of Kalviyankaadu. When the Police cracked down and began arresting prominent youth activists, Prabhakaran gave the slip and crossed over by sea to Tamil Nadu. He was to shuttle back and forth frequently in the seventies.Prabhakaran was never arrested.

Several other youth groups also emerged and engaged in acts of violence. The TNT made its mark in July 1975 with the assassination of former Jaffna MP and Mayor Alfred Durayappah as he was going to worship at the Ponnaalai Varatharajapperumaal (Vishnu) temple. Four youths including Prabhakaran were involved in the murder. Later Prabhakaran went on record that this killing was his “first military action”.

Tigers

The TNT metamorphosed into the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) on May 5th 1976. The Tamil United Front (TUF) held its famous Vaddukkoddai Convention nine days later on May 14th 976. It was then that the TUF became TULF (Tamil United Liberation Front) and adopted the Tamil Eelam demand formally.

The TULF contested on the separatist platform in July 1977. It won 18 of 19 Tamil seats in the North-East and claimed it had a mandate for Tamil Eelam. Years later the LTTE was to say it was acting in terms of the TULF mandate.

When Prabhakaran was in the JSC (Grade eight) class one of his textbooks was “Thirumavalavan”. This was about the Chola emperor Karikalan under whose rule the “pulikkodi” (tiger flag) had supposedly fluttered proudly from “Imayam muthal Kumari” (Himalayas to Cape Comorin) . Thus Prabhakaran was fascinated by Karikalan and the tiger flag.

“puli” in Tamil denotes the tiger but the tiger on the Chola flag was the “Vengai” or cheetah. It is a far cry from the Bengal tiger on the LTTE flag now. In any case there are no tigers in Sri Lanka. We have only the leopard here. But then we have no lions but our national flag has one. In a sense the rifle-crossed tiger flag was a direct response to the sword-bearing lion.

Prabhakaran known as Mani and Maniam earlier soon took the nom de guerre Karikalan . When arrested in Pondy bazaar it was that name on police records. Later Prabhakaran’s wireless codename was HA or Hotel Alpha. This was derived from Karikalan where Kari became Hari and then HA.

The Chola emperor got the name Karikalan because he was caught in a fire and had his legs burnt. Karikalan means “dark or black legs”. Prabhakaran too had a similar experience while experimenting with explosives. There was an explosion and his legs were burnt. The skin was dark for years. Thus “karikalan” suited him appropriately.

When the LTTE was formed in 1976 Prabhakaran was only its military commander. The leader and chairman of the five-member central committee of the LTTE was Umamaheswaran. Praba was also a CC member.

Cupid

The LTTE fragmented in 1980 and Umamaheswaran formed the PLOTE. The LTTE under Prabhakaran had a working relationship with the TELO led by Thangathurai and Kuttimani. In 1981 the LTTE re-grouped under the absolute leadership of Prabhakaran. Thereafter it was a virtual one-man dictatorship.

Cupid or “Manmathan” struck Prabhakaran with his arrows in 1983-84.

Some displaced undergraduates were on a death fast at the Jaffna university premises in 1983 september. When the condition of some girls deteriorated the LTTE broke the fast and abducted those fasting. They were brought to Tamil Nadu.

At one stage four of the abducted girls stayed at the residence of Anton and Adele Balasingham and used to accompany them to the LTTE office in Indranagar. The fairest and prettiest of them all was Madhivadhani Erambu. Her father Erambu was a schoolmaster from Pungudutheevu in Jaffna.

During the Indian “Holi” festival people spray coloured powder and coloured water on each other. Madhivadhani held a bet with her friends and boldly drenched Prabhakaran with turmeric dissolved water. Praba was furious and berated her. Madhi started sobbing.

Hours later when the tiger supremo was leaving the office , he found her in a corner weeping.He went up to her and spoke softly asking her not to cry. Madhivathani looked up at him with tear-filled eyes. Praba’s heart was pierced.

[..They married in 1984]

Thereafter Prabhakaran began visiting the Balasingham’s frequently. He brought flowers and sweets for Madhi. Prabhakaran had been a shy, introverted person and had never mingled with girls outside his family. This was a new experience. Anton Balasingham encouraged the romance. They married in 1984.

Children

There was a hitch. The LTTE code of conduct tabooed marriage. So the top commanders were summoned to Tamil Nadu and a Central committee meeting convened.

There a new regulation was introduced enabling those with five years experience to marry. The Madhi-Praba marriage took place in a temple with senior tiger commanders including KP in attendance.

They had three children. The eldest was named Charles Anthony born in 1985. He was named after Praba’s best friend and military commander Charles Anthony alias Seelan who died in Meesalai, Chavakachcheri.

The next was Duvaraga the daughter born in 1986. She was named after a favourite bodyguard Mayooran whose real name was Duvaaragan. The third was a son born in 1997. He was named Balachandran after Madhivathani’s own brother who also joined the LTTE and died in combat.

[In Jaffna, 1987]

The demise of Prabhakaran along with family members and senior commanders marks the end of an eventful chapter in the long drawn out struggle of the Tamil people to achieve equal rights in the Island of Sri Lanka.

D.B.S.Jeyaraj can be reached at djeyaraj2005@yahoo.com

Observations on the LTTE from a Kurdish Nationalist Comrade

2009-05-28T22:49:00.000-07:00

As readers would have noticed the piece “last days of Thiruvengadam Velupillai Prabhakaran” has attracted many readers and comments. Among these comments was one by A kurdish nationalist , Shexmus Amed. It was a detailed in depth comment and obviously heartfelt but well thought-out.

I feel that these observations deserve to be read widely. So I’ve posted it on my blog this time and hope many will read and digest what is said.

Regardless of whether one agrees or disagrees with some of the points it would be good for all of us to know how another observer from a “transnational Nation” struggling for a homeland of its own perceives the LTTE led armed struggle.

As for me it was quite refreshing to see a totally different perspective from that of myriad western and Indian journalist views of recent developments.

To strike a personal note I could not but help noticing the many similarities between this opinion and that of mine about how the LTTE had conducted itself in the past.

I would like to offer my deep condolences to the people of Tamil Eelam for their immense losses in recent months.

As a Kurd, I have followed the liberation struggle of Tamils in Sri Lanka-along with my own people’s fight for an independent state-since mid-1980s, when I first saw the pictures of uniformed female cadres of the LTTE in Jaffna and fell in love with them. The LTTE, in my view, is the gold-standard for all national liberation struggles despite its defeat. And what a glorious defeat it was! My people suffered many defeats too; in 1925, 1938, 1946, 1975, 1988, 1991 and 1999. None could match the glory of LTTE’s fight to the death. This was a struggle against overwhelming odds that ended in martyrdom for your leaders, but their memories and their struggle will live in songs and stories of all Tamil people for a thousand years to come.

That the LTTE managed to keep its leader and senior cadres alive right down to the last day and the last fire-fight before they too succumbed to the vastly superior man and fire power of the SLA is a testament to the intelligence, strength, discipline and dedication of the organisation. V. Prabhakaran and his senior commanders could have ordered the rank and file LTTE personnel to lay down their arms, before fleeing the island for a third country. The fact that they -as well as their families-did not flee the conflict zone nor surrendered, but chose to fight to the death like tens of thousands of other LTTE cadres that preceded them is a lesson to all leaders who ask others to sacrifice their lives for a cause. I doubt many insurgent leaders, Kurds included, would show as much courage and offer as much personal sacrifice in similar circumstances.

Compared to armed Kurdish movements, the LTTE had many strengths and weaknesses. Its strengths were too numerous to count. Its weaknesses and mistakes were few but deadly in the long run. In my view, there are two generalised, structural weaknesses of the LTTE, followed by a few specific mistakes they made.

Firstly, the LTTE was extremely inflexible in its political expectations. In the absence of international support for an independent homeland, an autonomy agreement for a federal Tamil state in Sri Lanka was the most realistic outcome for the LTTE. It was the responsibility of a new generation of Tamils to take the struggle to its next stage, if Sri Lankan state continued to be ill-disposed towards Tamil people. By then, of course, the federal Tamil state would have gained some international recognition for the status quo and thus would have been far less isolated as a ‘terrorist’ outfit. That V. Prabakharan instructed his bodyguards to shoot him if he deviated from the demand for independence is a clear sign of the inflexibility of the LTTE leadership.

Secondly, the LTTE put unnecessary emphasis on revenge and retaliation. As Clausewitz famously said, “war is politics by other means”. In politics,-as in war-revenge and retaliation is always secondary to the main objective. Every political act must be judged by its consequences; that is, whether it helps bring the main objective closer to reality, not whether it satisfies primitive urges for some injustice done in the past. The assassination of Rajiv Gandhi and many attacks on Sinhala leadership, some of whom were useful and could have been of further use to Tamil struggle in time, are cases in point.

In more specific mistakes, the LTTE should have pushed on to re-capture Jaffna at all costs after liberating the Elephant Pass in 1999, even if this meant losing ground elsewhere. The cost could have been very high with tens of thousands of SLA soldiers still occupying the peninsula but the SL political and military forces were in complete disarray. Unfortunately, the window of opportunity was lost and the LTTE eventually found itself fighting on more than one front.

The ceasefire agreement of 2002, following the 9/11 events, was correct; perhaps inevitable. However, the Indian Ocean Tsunami of late 2004 and its devastating effect on Tamil territory should have humbled Prabakharan and the LTTE into seeking a genuine half-way compromise with the SL government. It should be noted that the Tsunami and its effects ended the Aceh independence movement and it should have played a role in LTTE’s political calculation as well.

Another grave error was the boycotting of elections in 2005 that brought hardliners to government in Sri Lanka. As a general rule, people should never ever be asked to refrain from voting in an election under any circumstances. The benefits of election boycotts, such as refreshing community spirit and as gestures of dissatisfaction, are small and ephemeral. They are far outweighed by the dangers as well as the real and lasting costs of handing the power to a less amenable adversary.

Karuna’s rebellion should also have been foreseen and dealt with quite early and sincerely. As a faraway, non-Tamil observer, nothing disappointed me in LTTE as much as the Tiger vs Tiger violence. I can imagine its demoralising effect on all Tamils. As a Kurd, I am not unfamiliar with infighting among our people and between many of our political parties, but never has a single, Kurdish military outfit turned its guns on to itself. Perhaps, Karuna was also motivated by Prabhakaran’s inflexibility, the effects of the Tsunami and the result of election boycott of 2005.

If, as was charged, Prabhakaran committed the grave error of ‘narrow regionalism’ in LTTE, then Karuna could have only compounded the error with his rebellion. (â€™Narrow regionalismâ€™, that is, giving preferential treatment to people of certain regions, is considered a great sin among Kurdish movements. Still, it’s inevitable and widespread) But more likely, being the supremo of the Eastern Tamils must have gotten to Karuna’s head, and he must have considered himself a better leader for the entire LTTE than Prabhakaran.

History will never forgive Karuna for betraying his commitment and turning his guns on his leader and comrades no matter what the real reasons for his defection might be. The best and most honourable action for Karuna, as well as for his movement and for his people, was to either resign altogether from all his functions and duties within the LTTE -after voicing his grievances in private, even if it meant death for him-or seek a less active role in the movement.

He did neither, preferring to be an active turncoat. Beloved, respected and trusted neither by Tamils nor Sinhalese, Karuna will surely meet a violent end, with each side crediting the other for it, and with very few people shedding tears for his demise.

People of Tamil Eelam are smart, talented and resourceful. You shall rise again from your ashes. By ballots or bullets, Tamil Eelam shall become a reality so long as you keep up your hopes and dreams alive. - Shexmus Amed

Sisters in arms in doomed fight

2009-05-22T23:33:00.000-07:00

Niromi de Soyza | May 23, 2009
Article from: The Australian

DECEMBER 23, 1987, was a warm, clear day, and I was hiding under a lantana bush with eight of my comrades in a village north of Jaffna. With our rifles cocked and our cyanide capsules clenched between our teeth, we awaited the soldiers who had been scouring the area for us for several hours.

Our orders were to empty our magazines into them before biting into the glass capsules we called "kuppies" that hung on a thread around our necks. As a Tamil Tiger guerilla, there was no honour in being caught alive. There had been 22 of us that morning: nine boys and 13 girls, aged 15 to 26. (I was 17.)

Now, four of my comrades were missing, two were wounded. Ten were dead. At dawn that day Indian soldiers had surrounded our hideout, an abandoned house in Urumpiraay, a village in Sri Lanka's far north. As the war had intensified, our units were being squeezed out of Jaffna peninsula. We slept in different places each night, in open fields or houses taken by force.

Our sentry had spotted the enemy soldiers beyond a distant line of trees to the south and Muralie, our unit's second in command, decided we should flee north across an arterial road. The morning chill was still in the air and the dew dripped from banana leaves as we ran through fields and approached the road. As we attempted to cross it, we were ambushed from both sides in a barrage of automatic gunfire, grenades and mortars. "Get on the ground!" Muralie commanded. "Fire and break through!" Everyone was screaming.

We crashed to the earth as the gunfire grew heavier, now coming from behind as well. A helicopter gunship hovered above, strafing. We were surrounded. There was no cover other than a few palmyra and banana trees that dotted the landscape.

Lying on my stomach, I shuffled forward, following another girl, Ajanthi. My heart was pounding and thick smoke stung my eyes. In a state of panic, a few of my comrades attempted to cross the road. One by one, they fell. One was on her back, screaming, "My leg, someone help me!" A grenade flew over from my left. As I scrambled to my hands and knees, I realised Gandhi, our area leader, was in its path. "Gandhi anna, duck!" I screamed. The grenade hit his head and exploded, ripping his skull apart and covering me with blood.

Ajanthi got to her knees, ready to dash across the road, then abruptly fell backwards, her arms and legs splayed awkwardly. Blood spurted from the centre of her forehead, soaking her auburn hair. In shock, the air left my lungs and I could not inhale it back.

Ajanthi had been my friend since primary school and we had joined the Tigers together. She had been hit by a sniper. I crawled forward holding my AK47 with both hands, desperate to reach Ajanthi and drag her to safety. To my right, two comrades were trying to drag Muralie, who had also been hit, through the wet grass. His blood-soaked body kept slipping through their hands.

As I reached Ajanthi our unit commander, Sudharshan, yanked me by the collar, dragging me with him. "But Sudharshan anna," I said, stumbling to my feet. "We have to get Ajanthi, Muralie and the others."

"They will follow us," he said. We ran through the fields and scrambled over a concrete parapet as rifle rounds flew from behind us, gouging holes in the wall. On the other side, we kept running and found five comrades. Seeing no means of escape, we took shelter under a large lantana bush.

At sunset, confident that the soldiers had moved on, we set out through fields, supporting the injured, eventually reaching a gathering of huts on a narrow lane.

News of our arrival spread quickly and a curious crowd assembled along the sides of the lane. Most had never seen female Tigers before. An old woman flung her bony arms around me: "Ayyo, my poor child! Wouldn't your mother's heart break if she saw you like this?" I didn't realise then how I must have looked: a starved teenage girl with torn clothes, caked in blood, barefoot and carrying an automatic rifle.

Most villagers wanted us gone. If the enemy soldiers knew we were still around, they were sure to attack the village.

On Christmas Day we arrived at a hideout occupied by another Tigers unit. I sat outside on the mud veranda, thinking about the ambush. Since joining the Tigers, Ajanthi and I - and another girl, Akila - had been inseparable. The last time I had seen Akila she had been firing her M16 rifle from behind a water tank during the ambush. Sengamalam, one of the boys, told me that more than 2000 soldiers had been involved in the round-up of our 22-strong unit and had dumped the bodies of those who died in the open air. My mind swum with images of Ajanthi and Muralie, their bodies being scavenged by dogs.

I heard footsteps and looked up to see the silhouette of three figures approaching our hut. I recognised the tall Akila, her hair in plaits, and ran towards her. As we embraced she told me that, after the ambush, she had survived by hiding in the water tank for two days. "I wish I was dead, like Ajanthi," I spluttered. "How will I face her family again?" "We have to keep their dream of Tamil Eelam alive," Akila said.

For me, the dream felt far from reach. I was born in 1969 in Kandy, a Sinhala-majority town in Sri Lanka's hill country, where I spent the first seven years of my childhood.

Although I had Tamil ancestry - Tamils make up 18 per cent of Sri Lanka's population - my extended family included Sinhalese, Sri Lanka's main ethnic group. In 1978 I was packed off to the northern Tamil city of Jaffna to live with my grandmother, whom I hardly knew. "So that you can become a doctor like your aunts and uncles," my father reasoned. "Education in Jaffna is far superior."

I was a confident, independent girl and my parents believed that I would cope well in a new environment without them. Though I was unsure about becoming a doctor, life in Jaffna was idyllic. Not knowing when I would see my family again, I began to distance myself from them and focused on shaping my own life, making new friends and working hard at school. My weekends were busy with music, art and drama lessons.

Soon after, my father, an engineer, went to work in Dubai. (It was becoming difficult for Tamils to get good jobs at home.) My mother, a teacher, and sister, who was three years my junior, joined me in Jaffna. I had been oblivious to the deep-rooted tensions that were simmering between the Tamils and Sinhalese, and knew nothing of the anti-Tamil riots that had killed more than 250 Tamils in the country the year before. But before long the growing unrest outside my sheltered world was hard to ignore. Tamil pressure groups were becoming more vocal in their calls for equal rights between Tamils and Sinhalese, and an end to what many Tamils felt were the Government's discriminatory policies. Meanwhile, Sinhala extremism in the south was growing. There were boycotts, strikes and skirmishes. There were reports of Tamil politicians being shot dead, Tamil students being kidnapped. The quest for equality had spawned several militant groups, including the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, known as Tamil Tigers outside Sri Lanka.

In the late 1970s they had taken up an armed struggle for an autonomous Tamil homeland - Tamil Eelam - in the north and northeast of the country. To begin with, they carried out minor attacks on government targets, but on July 23, 1983, when I was 14, they ambushed an army patrol in Jaffna, putting them into the national spotlight.

Thirteen soldiers died that day but about 1000 Tamils were said to have lost their lives in an anti-Tamil pogrom in the south that followed. Large numbers of Tamil men, mostly teenagers, reacted to what they saw as the Sri Lankan government's indiscriminate persecution of innocent Tamils and joined the insurgency, which was rapidly gathering support. By 1985 the situation had escalated into full-scale war in the north and east, with the government launching a military offensive on Jaffna to wipe out the rebellion.

From a normal happy upbringing, I found myself living in constant fear. Jaffna's library, where I spent much of my free time, was burned down by government forces. We lived under indiscriminate aerial bombing and artillery shelling, day and night; our movements were restricted by long curfews. We spent many days in our home-built bunker where I studied, listening to gunshots and explosions, still hopeful that my exams would go ahead as scheduled.

The Tigers' television station broadcast images of war: militant training camps, dead bodies, Tamil funerals. The images began to haunt me and I felt outraged that no one was being held to account and that the outside world was doing nothing.

The government launched further offensives and air raids became commonplace. Bodies were sometimes strewn by the roadside on my way to school, or hanging from lampposts. I was dismayed by the attitude of family and friends who believed that they had no power to change the situation, but didn't support the militant groups either.
"These movements are run mostly by uneducated, low-caste youth," they said. "They are not capable of solving the Tamil problem." But at least they were trying, I thought. The more I listened to the militants, the more I sympathised with the idea of an armed struggle, the more it seemed like the only response.

There had never been any military connections in my family but I felt that if we were going to be killed or driven from our homes, then shouldn't we at least put up a fight? With friends, I talked about joining the insurgency, though few felt the same, believing that such actions would bring disgrace to our families. Middle-class girls didn't do such things.

In May 1987, when I was 17, the Sinhala government launched Operation Liberation, declaring all-out war against the Tamil militants on the Jaffna peninsula. By now, the Tigers had gained administrative control of the region, restricting government forces to their barracks. My mother decided that we would return to Kandy until the war was over.

As we prepared to leave, I made up my mind to run away to join the Tigers. I told my mother that I was going to Ajanthi's to say goodbye. After I told Ajanthi my plans, she said, "I'll come with you for moral support", and we set off together for the office of the Student Organisation of Liberation Tigers, a large house near Jaffna University.

We were interviewed. They were hesitant about recruiting middle-class girls but finally relented. Ajanthi said she would miss me too much if I left without her and enlisted too.

"The life of a freedom fighter is harder than you think," Thileepan, the leader of the Tigers' political wing, warned us, adjusting his spectacles. "We gamble with our own lives and bury our friends. There'll be none of the comforts you are used to. I'm not convinced that you are suited to this lifestyle, but no one here is held against their will." Knowing my mother and sister were out, I went home and wrote them a note explaining that I had joined the Tigers. The following morning, naturally, my mother and sister and Ajanthi's family came to the Tigers' camp to plead with us to return home. "You are about to ruin your life. This is not for you," my mother said, grasping my hands, her eyes filled with tears. Ajanthi's father said we had been brainwashed. Thileepan sent us to work with members of the Tigers' female political wing, the Freedom Birds, contributing articles to their magazine.

At their headquarters we met Akila, who at 17 was already an active member. We immediately became friends. A few weeks later, Ajanthi and I were selected by Thileepan for military training and sent to an all-girls' camp in an outer suburb of Jaffna.

As we were the first group of female fighters to receive military training in Sri Lanka (at this point there were fewer than 80 female Tigers), the LTTE's enigmatic leader, Velupillai Prabhakaran, wanted to talk to us personally. Prabhakaran was seated behind a table in his office as I entered. The flame from a hurricane lamp cast shadows across his round face and his large brown eyes glistened. Although he did not ask many questions, it felt like he knew everything about me. "There's hardly anyone in our movement from your suburb," he said. "Most girls here come from rural areas. They are used to hard work, pounding rice and chopping firewood. Be in no doubt: training is going to be harder for you."

Training, in a village south of Jaffna, was indeed gruelling. The days began with a two-hour exercise regime, followed by commando training. In the afternoons we had firing practice and lessons in explosives and camouflage. Prabhakaran would visit often and one afternoon expressed his desire to recruit us into the newly formed Black Tigers, the organisation's suicide bomber wing. Only a week earlier the first of the Tigers' suicide bombers, known as Captain Miller, had driven a lorry packed with explosives into an army barracks. Prabhakaran wanted to give women the same opportunity, he said. I knew I could never do such a thing because I didn't have the courage. As the war escalated, civilians were being drawn into the conflict and a humanitarian crisis was developing.

Eventually, the Indian government intervened. It was no secret that India had been fostering Tamil militants and providing them with training and ammunition, and the relationship between the Indian and Sri Lankan governments was strained. Then the peacekeeping forces arrived, a ceasefire came into effect and a peace accord was implemented on July 29, 1987. The war-weary Tamils welcomed the Indian Peace Keeping Forces with open arms and our training came to an abrupt halt. But Prabhakaran informed us that our services would be required in a month or two; he was sure that hostilities would resume by then. Like the Sri Lankan government, he did not appreciate the foreign intrusion. So it came to pass.

In September 1987, while other Tamil militant organisations engaged in the political process, Thileepan went on a hunger strike at the Nallur Hindu Temple near Jaffna in protest against aspects of the peace deal.

Mass rallies were organised by pro-Tiger Tamils in Jaffna and by Sinhala extremists in the south, both believing the IPKF's intervention served only to assert India's supremacy in the region. Fourteen days later, Thileepan died. The Tigers blamed the Indian government for his death and for standing aside while Sinhalese forces violated the peace deal by arresting prominent Tigers despite the amnesty provisions and organising Sinhala settlement programs in Tamil areas.

The war resumed, just as Prabhakaran had predicted, though now we were fighting not only the government troops but the peacekeepers, too. A few thousand youths suited only for guerilla warfare, we were no match for the world's second largest army.

Fighting the Indians made no sense to me. I had joined the Tigers to make a stand against my country's oppressive government but found myself at war with those who had come to maintain peace. It seemed that we might be destroying our only chance of resolving the situation peacefully.

I expressed my doubts to Akila. Fiercely loyal and single-minded, she argued that, as foot soldiers, we were unaware of the complex politics of the situation and that our leaders knew exactly what they were doing. "Believe that Anna Prabhakaran is always right," she told me. I decided to ignore the growing disquiet inside me and joined the war.

In October 1987 I was sent to the battle front north of Jaffna where, by coincidence, Akila and Ajanthi joined me in a unit of 30 cadres. The first female Tiger had died only a few days earlier, confirming that women were now firmly engaged in frontline fighting. During battles we fired in the general direction of the enemy, not at individual targets, and I am not sure whether any of my bullets hit anyone. I'm glad I don't know. I once asked the more experienced Muralie how he had coped with the knowledge that he had shot people. "After your second victim," he said, "you learn to live with it." The Tigers had no chance of overpowering the Indian army.

Jaffna and many surrounding areas were under their total control. We were being ambushed on an almost daily basis, becoming accustomed to life on the run. Support among Tamil civilians was waning, too. Whenever we encountered them, they pleaded with us to stop this futile war. By early 1988 self-preservation was our main strategy.

Forced out of the Jaffna peninsula by the IPKF and following an overnight boat trip, we found ourselves in the jungles of the Vanni in the Northeastern Province, where it was easier to lie low. I was part of a large unit of nearly 45 girls, with Sengamalam, one of only two boys, in charge. We moved around the jungle constantly, enduring primitive living conditions, while 130,000 Indian troops searched for some 2000 Tigers on foot and by air.

After five months in the jungle, I contracted malaria; many others were ill with dysentery and typhoid.

Akila stayed by my side, taking care of me, bringing medication and rice water in a rusty tin. I felt broken, physically and emotionally, constantly questioning the purpose of a war that could clearly never be won. I had believed the militant propaganda, convinced that Tamil Eelam could be achieved within a year or two, but it was clear that an armed conflict would resolve nothing. "You are free to go home any time," Thileepan had told me. It was time to walk away while I still could. One morning in June 1988, at a house near the forest where we had taken shelter following an attack on our hideout, I approached Sengamalam as he washed at a well.

"I want to resign." He stopped drying his face with a sarong and looked at me with alarm. "Is someone giving you grief?" "I just can't cope any more," I said. "I am tired of this war. I'm weak." Calmly, he said that he was sorry, that he was surprised I had lasted so long. "I must warn you, your life will be in grave danger from the Sri Lankan army, Indian forces, even rival organisations," he said. "Your name is on their wanted lists."

I didn't care. Surrendering my rifle and kuppie, I severed all ties with the Tigers, unsure of what the future held or whether my family would take me back. Before I left, I went to say goodbye to Akila. When she saw me wearing a dress, her jaw dropped.

"What's going on? You're leaving?" Consumed with shame, I could hardly speak.

"I can't believe you're leaving me," she sobbed. "We have so much to achieve." Before I could answer, Sengamalam hurried Akila into the forest and I watched her fade into the bright sun. I never saw her again. Sengamalam organised for a local boy to take me to an old woman's hut in the nearby town of Kilinochchi. For the next seven days, the old woman and I did not exchange a word or a smile. One afternoon, while I helped herd her cattle into the shed, I saw my mother running towards me down the dirt lane. The mayor of Kilinochchi, a distant relative of ours, had bumped into the Tamil boy who had taken me to the old woman's hut.

The mayor was carrying a photograph of me that my mother had sent him and asked the boy if he had seen me. Once I had been identified, the mayor fetched my mother. The only emotion I felt was relief, as if I was no longer capable of experiencing happiness or sadness. My mother embraced me and sobbed while I stood numb. "I thought you might have disowned me," I said, finally. "You're my daughter," she replied. "I'd never give up on you."

Within two months of being reunited with my family, during which time we never discussed my experiences with the Tigers, I was sent to a boarding school in India, where I completed my studies. Although now in the country whose army I had fought only months before, I was determined to move on and make the best of the second chance I had been given.

On the surface, normality had returned. My fellow students were girls from affluent families who liked talking about boys, movie stars and make-up. When the lights in our dormitory were turned off at night, I cried myself to sleep. In 1990, with help from a relative, I moved to Sydney (my family later moved here, too) and went to university.

After my departure from the Tigers and with a new life opening up to me, I blocked out any news of Sri Lanka as best I could. These days, of course, that is impossible. The two-year war between the Tigers and the Indian forces came to an end in July 1989, with changes of government in both countries.

But the fighting between the Tigers and Sri Lankan government forces continued. The primitive but effective guerilla organisation I left behind grew into a sophisticated and formidable fighting force.

As its methods became more extreme, the LTTE's notoriety increased, not just within Sri Lanka but across the world. (In late 2001 it was classified as a terrorist organisation by many countries, including Britain.)

The Tigers have carried out hundreds of suicide attacks during the past two decades -- more than all other radical organisations in the world combined -- notably the assassination of former Indian prime minister Rajiv Gandhi in 1991 and Sri Lankan president Ranasinghe Premadasa in 1993.

The guiding principle of the Tigers, which is so difficult for outsiders to understand, is that the greater the sacrifice, the higher the honour. There are no bravery medals or pompous ceremonies for living Tigers. They are recognised for their efforts and awarded a rank only posthumously.

The past decade has seen several attempts to form a lasting peace agreement between the Tigers and the government, all unsuccessful, with the most recent deal being torn up in early 2008. Since 2006 the LTTE's numbers have fallen sharply, funding from the Tamil diaspora has dwindled while government forces stepped up their campaign. At the beginning of this year, crucial Tiger strongholds were recaptured and the government was confident it would annihilate the remaining 1000 or so Tigers within months. After three decades, the civil war -- which has claimed more than 80,000 lives, including at least 23,000 Tigers -- appears to have reached its endgame.

But the scars of this war will remain and until a political solution that recognises and respects the rights of the Tamil people is reached, I am certain that the Tamil fight will continue in one form or another. In this age of terrorism it is easy to dismiss all rebel groups as evil extremists, without considering the desperate circumstances that drive people to align themselves to such organisations.

The only reason I joined the war was to defend my people, because I felt there was no other choice. I was not coerced to join the insurgency. As an idealistic 17-year-old, I believed in the power of the individual to make a difference. Naively, I had not anticipated how much my family would suffer as a consequence of my actions and for that, above all else, I am deeply sorry. I hope that my own children will grow up with firm, positive views, but without the blind idealism I had all those years ago. I will try to teach them tolerance and empathy, that the end doesn't always justify the means, and that violence always breeds more violence. I learned that lesson the hard way. Sadly, I don't think Sri Lanka has learned it at all.

The Daily Telegraph
*Niromi de Soyza is a pseudonym.

Prabhakaran shot dead, sat Sri Lankan army

2009-05-19T03:33:00.000-07:00

The news of Prabhakaran's death saddens me the most.

Yes he was brutal, but the Sri Lankan army has proved to be hundred times more brutal.

Yes he was a maniac, but he was a maniac who stood up against Sinhala chauvinism. He never compromised on the Tamil cause. He stood for the right principle, maybe his method and attitude were wrong, but his stand was right and he stood up against a powerful enemy.

Barking & back biting after his demise is a cowardice act.. Let's look into the feature & make a peaceful & beautiful feature..

May his soul rest in peace.

Joke: Example of Bravery

2009-05-10T06:29:00.000-07:00

A Spanish Naval captain was walking leisurely on his battleship when a subordinate rushes over to him and says "Sir, an enemy battleship is fast approaching us. We should be ready."

The captain replies coolly "Go. Get my Red shirt." The subordinate rushes over and gets the Shirt for his captain. The captain wears the red shirt.

After some time, the enemy battleship comes in range. Consequently heavy rounds of fire are exchanged between the two battleships. After much effort, the Spanish win.

The subordinate approaches his boss, "Congratulations for the victory sir, but why did you require the red shirt in the first place?"

The captain replies "Because, during the war if I got injured then my blood should not have been seen as I did not want my men to lose hope and to Fight with the same ferocity."

Just then another subordinate rushes over. "Sir, we just spotted another 20 enemy battleships heading in our direction."

The captain replies coolly “Go. Get my yellow trousers.”

Why LTTE failed

2009-05-05T22:55:00.000-07:00

Why LTTE failed

- R. HARIHARAN

Its performance in Eelam War IV glaringly displayed Prabakaran’s limitations in mastering the art of conventional warfare.

SRI LANKA’S security forces appear to have redeemed their professional reputation with their resounding success in the fourth edition of the Eelam War, which has been going on since 2006 against the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), popularly known as the Tamil Tigers. They were not able to achieve decisive results against the LTTE in their three earlier outings.

The United States Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) had rated the Tamil Tigers as “among the most dangerous and deadly extremists in the world”. The FBI said the LTTE’s “ruthless tactics have inspired terrorist networks worldwide, including Al Qaeda in Iraq”. So, the security forces’ success against the LTTE should not be underestimated, particularly when similar wars against insurgents and terrorists in other countries, including Afghanistan, have been dragging on.

The LTTE, over the past 25 years, has built a 15,000-strong force that innovatively adapted its suicide war tactics to both land and naval warfare with deadly results. It mastered the use of terror tactics as a force multiplier. The LTTE’s charismatic and ruthless leader, Velupillai Prabakaran, built a loyal network of cadre – the Black Tigers – whose deadly suicide terror attacks changed the course of political history in Sri Lanka and to a certain extent in India also. Now the insurgents stand reduced to a few hundreds and have lost their entire territory of over 15,000 square kilometres and their equipment, weapons, armament and infrastructure so essential for survival as a viable entity.

The LTTE demonstrated its prowess with a daring suicide attack on Colombo’s Katunayake international airport, destroying 26 military and civil aircraft, in July 2001, just four months before Al Qaeda’s dramatic 9/11 attacks in New York. It sent a strong message to Sri Lanka and the world at large that the LTTE was a formidable force not be trifled with. But the consequences of the 9/11 attack on the global attitude to terrorism was far-reaching. The U.S. marshalled forces for a global war on terror to destroy Al Qaeda and its roots in Islamist terror. And the LTTE was already listed in the U.S. as a foreign terrorist organisation.

The late Anton Balasingham, a close confidant of Prabakaran’s and the political adviser to the LTTE, apparently understood the need to modify the LTTE strategy in the face of the rising tide against terrorism. He persuaded a reluctant Prabakaran to agree to take part in a Norwegian-mediated peace process, deferring the idea of an independent Eelam in favour of finding a solution to accommodate Tamil aspirations within a federal structure. That was how the 2002 peace process came into being.

The LTTE signed the Cease Fire Agreement (CFA) with Sri Lanka in 2002 as part of the peace process from a position of political and military strength, having weathered four wars – three against Sri Lankan security forces and one against Indian forces. It was at the pinnacle of its power at that time. To a certain extent, this enabled the Tamil Tigers to dictate the terms of the peace process, which recognised it as the sole representative of the Tamil minority, a status denied to it earlier. Thus, the peace process accorded parity of status to the LTTE at the negotiating table in its equation with the elected government of Sri Lanka.

By then, the repeated stories of LTTE successes, propagated by its well-oiled propaganda machine that glossed over its significant failures (for example, the retaking of control of Jaffna by the Sri Lanka Army), reinforced the popular belief of Prabakaran’s invincibility in war. It also generated great political expectations among the Tamil population of his ability to satisfy their long-standing aspirations through the peace process although he had dropped the demand for an independent Tamil Eelam. All that has been proved wrong now.

Winston Churchill once remarked, “Those who can win a war well can rarely make a good peace and those who could make a good peace would never have won the war.” This is very true in the case of Prabakaran’s handling of events leading up to the war. His monolithic and egocentric leadership style does not encourage the free exchange of ideas except with his trusted childhood friends. This has been the big roadblock in his strategic decision-making process. Prabakaran failed to use fruitfully the political talent at his disposal, among the seasoned members of the Tamil National Alliance (TNA), in handling complex political issues during the period of peace. Their advice was neither sought nor paid heed to in taking decisions on key issues. The LTTE’s handling of the presidential poll of 2005 is one such instance when their plea for his support to elect Ranil Wickremesinghe, an architect of the peace process, went unheeded.

Wickremesinghe’s rival, Mahinda Rajapaksa, had promised, in his election manifesto, to eliminate LTTE terrorism. Prabakaran not only ignored this but, on the basis of some convoluted reasoning, enforced a boycott of the presidential poll in areas under LTTE control. This action prevented a bulk of the Tamils from voting for Wickremesinghe. This enabled Rajapaksa’s victory with a wafer-thin majority through southern Sinhala votes. And the newly elected President went about systematically dismantling the LTTE.

Similarly, Prabakaran’s handling of the international community lacked coherence. Apparently, he misunderstood the international involvement in the 2002 peace process and thought it was a vindication of the LTTE’s methods. Perhaps this made him complacent when it came to observing the ceasefire in spirit. The LTTE’s conduct, which was in utter disregard of international norms on human rights and humanitarian laws during the entire period of the ceasefire, came under severe criticism from international watchdog bodies and the United Nations. These related to a large number of issues, including the recruitment of child soldiers, illegal arrests and kidnapping apart from the assassinations and suicide bombings. This made the LTTE’s rhetoric on human rights hollow.

While the co-chairs were sympathetic to the Tamil struggle for equity, they were wary of the LTTE’s tactics and covert operations in their own countries. And the LTTE’s indifference to their counsel during the peace process eroded its credibility. Things came to a boil with the assassination of Sri Lankan Foreign Minister Lakshman Kadirgamar in August 2005. This wanton act compelled the European Union and Canada to ban the LTTE. Thus, the LTTE shot itself in the foot as it was banned in 32 countries. The ban also coincided with the introduction of strong international protocols in shipping and against money laundering to prevent the international operations of terrorists.

Prabakaran probably failed to appreciate the implications of these developments when he gave the government a legitimate excuse to abandon the peace process after the LTTE made an abortive suicide attack in April 2006 on Lieutenant General Sarath Fonseka, the Army chief. It also enabled Rajapaksa to persuade the international community to crack down on the LTTE’s support network and front organisations in their midst. International cooperation was further enlarged in scope to intelligence sharing and economic aid, which indirectly underwrote Sri Lanka’s mounting burden of war.

Similarly, Prabakaran never made any effort before the war to redeem the LTTE’s relations with India. He failed to tap the fund of sympathy for the Tamil cause that exists in India even among large sections of the non-Tamil population. Presumably, his dubious role in Rajiv Gandhi’s assassination prevented him from dispassionately examining the positive contribution India could have made in pushing the Tamil cause at the negotiating table. Apparently, he put his faith in the international community rather than in India to bail him out when the Sri Lankan government decided to go to war. This showed a lack of understanding of the complexities of international relations. On the other hand, successive Sri Lankan Presidents went out of their way to keep India in good humour and that helped the country politically and militarily in its war with the LTTE. In Eelam War III (1995-2002), the performance of the Sri Lankan security forces was far from satisfactory. By then, the LTTE had developed the Sea Tiger wing – a daring guerilla navy that played havoc with the Sri Lanka Navy. The Sri Lanka Army had suffered heavy casualties in defending Mullaithivu and suffered a huge setback in Elephant Pass despite its superior strength and firepower. In that operation, the LTTE acquired its modern artillery, armour and high-tech communication systems apart from capturing equipment.

At the start of the peace process, the security forces were a demoralised lot. The terms of the peace process further added to their misery as it prevented them from retaliating when the LTTE’s pistol groups systematically eliminated the forces’ intelligence operatives and killed even military commanders during the first three years of peace. In this backdrop, no one was sure of the ability of Sri Lanka’s forces to sustain an offensive against the LTTE when Eelam War IV started in 2006.

Even after the LTTE defeat in Mavil Aru in the Eastern Province in July 2006, the security forces were cautious in their optimism. However, the LTTE belied the defence analysts’ expectations when it floundered in the Eastern Province, offering stiff resistance only in patches. Perhaps, it was at this time that Rajapaksa and Fonseka made up their minds to go the whole hog against the LTTE in the north.

Although Prabakaran has demonstrated strategic military capability in the past, he appears to have failed to draw two obvious strategic deductions in the developing war scenario, which put the LTTE at a disadvantage. The first was not factoring the impact of the defection of Karuna, his able military commander from Batticaloa, on the LTTE’s overall military capability. The second was in underestimating the determination of Sri Lanka’s political and military leadership to turn Rajapaksa’s promise to eliminate the LTTE into a reality.Prabakaran never made any effort to patch up with Karuna, who had grievances with respect to the poor representation of easterners in the leadership although they provided the bulk of the LTTE cadre. Instead, he dispatched killers to eliminate Karuna. The rebel leader commanded wide support among cadre in the east, particularly around LTTE strongholds in Batticaloa. A direct consequence of his defection was the disbanding of a bulk of LTTE cadre, other than Karuna’s core supporters. It also drove Karuna into the arms of the Sri Lanka Army for protection. So when the war started in the east, the LTTE’s strength as well as its manoeuvring space was reduced.

In the course of time, recruitment from the east to augment LTTE strength petered out. Ultimately, when the security forces launched their offensive in the north with huge numerical superiority, the LTTE did not have the essential strength to face the onslaught. It was clear that the LTTE would not be able halt the security forces by conventional warfare.

However, somehow Prabakaran failed to use his superior insurgency tactics to overcome his limitations in conventional warfare. Instead, the LTTE adopted a passive defensive strategy with a line of bunds that reduced the natural advantage of guerilla mobility enjoyed by the cadre. The bunds imposed a limited delay as they required heavy firepower to break up the offensive. This was a luxury that the LTTE did not enjoy.

The second aspect was the LTTE leader’s failure to read the mind of Rajapaksa. In his first two years in office, the President had oriented his entire policy framework towards the goal of eliminating the LTTE. His strong support to the operations of the security forces, regardless of national and international compulsions, enabled the Army chief to plan and execute his offensive.

SENA VIDANAGAMA/AFP

Karuna (right) speaking to women LTTE fighters in Batticaloa district on Women’s Day in March 2004. Prabakaran failed to take into account the impact of Karuna’s defection from the LTTE on its overall military capability.

His strategic direction of war, operational planning and neat execution undoubtedly paved the way for success. In the words of Lieutenant General Satish Nambiar, the distinguished Indian Army officer, Fonseka “displayed the qualities of a great military leader nations are blessed with from time to time”. In short, under Fonseka’s leadership, the demoralised armed forces reinvented themselves to become a well-knit and highly motivated force.

As a result, when the security forces went to war in 2006, they were well-trained and enjoyed superiority in firepower and mobility. Learning from the past, they built up force levels on land, in the air and at sea to ensure success against the Tamil Tigers. The Sri Lanka Army went on a recruiting spree. For instance, in the year 2008 alone 40,000 troops were added, to raise 47 infantry battalions, 13 brigades, four task force contingents and two divisions. The Army now has 13 divisions, three task forces and one armoured brigade. Evidently, Prabakaran failed to read the sea change taking place in the capabilities of the security forces and adapt his tactics. Instead, he stuck to a conventional warfare mode that was doomed to fail although it inflicted casualties on the advancing troops.

Fonseka adopted a multi-pronged strategy to split the defending Tamil Tiger ranks and keep them guessing. It aimed at pinning down the LTTE at the forward-defended localities astride the Kandy-Jaffna A-9 road in the north from Kilali-Muhamalai-Nagarkovil and in the south along the Palamoddai-Omanthai line. This prevented the LTTE from thinning out the troops to reinforce its defences along other axes.

Offensives along two broad axes were launched: along the Mannar-Pooneryn/Jaffna A-32 road on the west coast to block LTTE access to Tamil Nadu through the Mannar Sea and along the Welioya-Mullaithivu-Puthukudiyiruppu line on the east coast. Operations on these axes progressively cut off the external supply of military equipment and essential goods to the LTTE by sea. In tandem with ground operations, the Sri Lanka Navy progressively curtailed the freedom of movement of Sea Tiger boats and prevented LTTE shipments from reaching the Sri Lanka coast. In well-planned raids in international waters, the Navy destroyed eight ships of the LTTE’s tramp supply shipping fleet in 2006-07.

Despite faltering steps at times, the security forces maintained the momentum of their offensive in the north from the second half of 2007, which culminated in the dramatic capture in January 2009 of Kilinochchi, the so-called administrative capital of the LTTE. This capture contributed largely to the rapid advance of the security forces in areas east of the A-9 axis, which never gave the withdrawing LTTE a respite or permitted it to deliver a strong counterstroke.

In the present Eelam war, except for a short-lived surprise offensive in the Jaffna peninsula in the early stages of the confrontation in the north, the LTTE was never able to launch proactively a major offensive or a sizable counteroffensive against the security forces that would have turned the course of the war.

The LTTE strategy of carting off all the civilians from captured areas to areas under its control after the fall of Kilinochchi is questionable. This reactive defence strategy affected the mobility of cadre, pinning them down to static defences rather than allowing them to adopt a resilient mobile withdrawal strategy. This strategy neither prevented the security forces from using their heavy weapons or air force nor vindicated the LTTE’s use of civilians as human shields. It only generated adverse publicity, and that the security forces were also blamed for the same callousness in dealing with ordinary people is no consolation as they have emerged as victors.

The performance of the LTTE in Eelam War IV glaringly displayed Prabakaran’s limitations in mastering the art of conventional warfare. As he is an astute military leader, if he survives the current ordeal, he will put on his thinking cap to reinvent the LTTE, just as Fonseka reinvented the security forces when he took on the monumental task of reviving them and leading them to war.•

Colonel R. Hariharan is a retired Military Intelligence specialist on South Asia and served as the head of intelligence of the Indian Peace Keeping Force in Sri Lanka 1987-90.

E-mail: colhari@yahoo.com

Srilankan Conflict

2009-04-24T09:32:00.000-07:00

The legendry poet Bharathi told "Imayathil oruvan iruminal , kumariyil irunthu oruvan Marunthu kondu sella vendum endru".. In that day itself he had broad vision of helping other people instead of races..
But today our own people are killed by bullets & bombs of srilankan army people.. I remembering Bharathi's lines
"நெஞ்சு பொறுக்குதில்லையே
நெஞ்சு பொறுக்குதில்லையே - இந்த
நிலைகெட்ட மனிதரை நினைந்துவிட்டால்
கொஞ்சமோ பிரிவினைகள் - ஒரு
கோடியென் றாலது பெரிதாமோ ?

அஞ்சுதலைப் பாம்பென்பான் - அப்பன்
ஆறுதலை யென்றுமகன் சொல்லிவிட்டால்
நெஞ்சு பிரிந்து விடுவார் - பின்பு
நெடுநா ளிருவரும் பகைத்திருப்பார் (நெஞ்சு)சாத்திரங்க ளொன்றும் காணார் - பொய்ச்

சாத்திரப் பேய்கள்சொலும் வார்த்தைநம்பியே
கோத்திரமொன் யிருந்தாலும் - ஒரு
கொள்கையிற் பிரிந்தவனைக் குலைத்திகழ்வார்
தோத்திரங்கள் சொல்லியவர்தாம் - தமைச்
சூதுசெயு நீசர்களைப் பணிந்திடுவார் - ஆனால்
ஆத்திரங் கொண்டே யிவன் சைவன் - இவன்
அரிபக்த னென்றுபெருஞ் சண்டையிடுவார் (நெஞ்சு) எண்ணிலா நோயுடையார் - இவர்

எழுந்து நடப்பதற்கும் வலிமையிலார்
கண்ணிலாக் குழந்தைகள்போல் - பிறர்
காட்டிய வழியிற் சென்று மாட்டிக் கொள்வார்
நண்ணிய பெருங்கலைகள் - பத்து
நாலாயிரங் கோடி நயந்து நின்ற
புண்ணிய நாட்டினிலே - இவர்
பொறியற்ற விலங்குகள் போல வாழ்வார் (நெஞ்சு) "

We are silent watchers of this mass genocide.. This political people are playing the game for their own benefits.. Is this cowardice gene we inherited from our ancient Tamils? Where are we? When we are going to unite for our cause?
Andru "Mullaiukku ther kudutha.. " Pari vallal indru irunthirunthal.. em makkaluku oru nal vazhvai kuduthirupan..
Ippothu Nadalbavarkalo "spectrum oozhal, black money.. swiz bank.. Posts for family members" endru busy'aga ullanar.
Tamil mannan Cholanin kodi parantha rajiyathil.. indru Tamilanin kuruthi neethikaagavum.. uravukaagavum.. yengi kondirikirathu..
What kind of justice we can tell to our died brothers & sisters as a silent watchers? Atleast we will unite here after & give our shoulders for surviving people..
" Vallamai tharayo parasakthi .. "

NDA buddies remember Sandeep Unnikrishnan

2008-12-05T00:57:00.000-08:00

When the name Sandeep Unnikrishnan was mentioned among the NSG casualties on Friday, there was a sinking feeling in my gut. Was it our
Unni? But then, in the forces, you cannot even pray that it is "some other Unni". Within minutes, confirmation came. An old buddy called up to say, "Yaar, Sandeep is no more."
Unni had died a hero. And those of us who had seen him and trained alongside him at the National Defence Academy (NDA) had a rush of old memories - of a buddy who would stick with you no matter what, of a top-class sportsman, of nostalgic songs and imaginary girlfriends and of a soldier's soldier who was always aware that the uniform came with great responsibility.
In 1995, we were a bunch of gangly 18-year-olds, wondering what the hell we were doing climbing up Sinhgad fort on a miserable, rainy day, when I first met Unni. He was an ikki, a first termer, bone-weary, but always gung-ho. When we made it to the top, the first stop was for a fill of water. Soggy, bushed and thirsty, we ran to the natural spring that has been feeding soldiers since the days of Chhatrapati Shivaji. Unni was the first to reach and started drawing water from the well. We lined up with our canteens, but a tourist first held out her water bottle. Unni filled it. Then, another. Unni filled that too.

Within seconds, there was a long line of tourists waiting for water. Without a word - and with a smile to us - Unni dutifully doled out his generosity. He never got to us. He himself never got a sip. The order came to move on.
It was a small, selfless act. Who knew that 13 years on, he would make the ultimate sacrifice - lead from the front and die saving a fellow commando? He lived up to the "Olympian" spirit (as NDA Oscar Squadron cadets call themselves), striving to go "faster, higher, and stronger".
"He was not meant to be in the Mumbai operation. He was an instructor at the NSG training centre in Manesar. But because he was an old hand at this, and one of the best, he was sent as part of the first reaction team," said Major Sushil, one his coursemates. I couldn't imagine the rather skinny Unni in the NSG. But just as his happy-go-lucky face masked a ruthless and determined soldier, so did his thin physique hide a tough, never-give-up spirit.
"It showed itself during Camps Greenhorn and Rovers (said to be the toughest for the age group) at NDA. He never knew the word 'quit'. He just kept going," recalled one of his buddies now in the Special Forces. "During the 15-km cross-country races at NDA, there would be shouts of 'Unni, Unni' in the last 500 metres. Most of us were dead by then. But he would tuck his head into his chest, close his eyes and run for his life, for his squadron."

It was this ruggedness - and a great sense of humour - that helped him survive three tours of Kashmir, two stints in Siachen and the tough NSG training.
"The army was his life. In his room in Bangalore, he had a collage of photographs of each of his coursemates and from life in the NDA. He took it everywhere with him," said major S Kaul. "He was always very calm and composed. We ex-NDAs have a short fuse but I never saw Unni angry."
"He was a total movie maniac. In civvies, he didn't look a commando. Whenever anyone asked him what his profession was, he would say, 'non-productive human resources'. He could speak five languages and he just loved to give gaali in all five," recalled major Naren C.
"We always ribbed him about his nonexistent, rippling biceps. But he surprised us all by joining the NSG. He was always a fighter. I cannot believe that he is no more. Only a few weeks ago, he had joked, 'Finally, I am putting on some weight'."

Why did NSG take 9 hrs to get there?

2008-11-29T22:40:00.000-08:00

The terrorists strike Mumbai at 9.30pm. Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh is in Kerala. He is briefed about the attack on the city’s
prime locations. By the time Deshmukh grasps the enormity of the situation, 90 minutes have gone by.

He rings Union home minister Shivraj Patil at 11pm and asks for NSG commandos. "How many men?" Patil asks. "200," says the CM. Patil calls NSG chief J K Dutt and tells him to send 200 battle-ready commandos to Mumbai.

When NSG Men ready for their game, it is discovered that the only plane that can take 200 men, the IL 76, is not in Delhi but Chandigarh. Precious minutes are ticking by.

The IL 76 pilot is woken, the plane refuelled. It reaches Delhi at 2am. By the time the commandos get in and the plane takes off, four-and-a-half hours have elapsed. Experts say that unless a response is mounted within 30 minutes of an attack, the enemy can assume key defensive positions.

It takes the aircraft almost three hours to land at Mumbai airport. Unlike the Boeing and Airbus, IL 76 is a slow plane. By the time the NSG commandos board the waiting buses it is 5.25am.

The buses take another 40 minutes to reach the designated place in south Mumbai where the commandos are briefed, divided into different groups and sent out on their mission.

By the time they start their operation, it is 7am — in other words, nine-and-a-half hours after the terror strike.

Many lives might have been saved had this delay not happened. The obvious question is why is the NSG stationed only in Delhi. When Indian cities are vulnerable to terror attacks, why is there no commando force like the NSG, or its units, in other region commands?

My Hero

2008-11-29T22:20:00.000-08:00

Our Real Heroes

Deadly delay in calling the marine commandos

2008-11-29T21:44:00.000-08:00

A disturbing truth is emanating from the 60-hour terror ordeal that left Mumbai angry and a nation stunned. The word is out that the marine commandos, better known as the Marcos, could have been called much earlier.

Indecision on the part of the state authorities delayed the operation of the naval special forces, according to official sources familiar with the situation.

A senior state police official called the Naval headquarters at Mumbai, asking for help, about an hour after the first round of gunfire. But it is believed that there was no formal request made for bringing in the Marcos. In fact, sources said, the concerned police official had initially told the Naval authorities, “We may need your help.” Only the state chief secretary has the formal authority to call in the Marcos.

What transpired between the police and the state administration is not known but by the time a formal request was put in, it was close to 2 am, according to these sources.

To make matters worse, when the Marcos reached the Taj there was no one to brief them. “They entered the Taj with absolutely no co-ordinates, no layout plan of the building, no briefing from any high ranking police official. The Taj is definitely not a place that jawans or officers visit on a daily basis. The could not afford to delay either since they could not afford to lose any more time in bringing the situation under control,” said sources on conditions of anonymity.

While the state had made the decision to call in the Army on late Wednesday evening, after the magnitude of the situation became clearer, implementation was slow. The National Security Guard (NSG) commandos had to be flown in from Delhi and were deployed on Thursday morning around 7 AM on Thursday morning. There have also been questions over what seems to be delays in the deployment of the NSG. But in case of NSG, they had to be flown in from Delhi.

In contrast the Marcos are located close to Mumbai, at Karanja, near Alibaug, and could have been deployed earlier, sources said.

No one knows how many more lives could have been saved if the Marcos had been called in immediately. On Saturday evening, the official toll released by the home ministry stood at 183-141 Indian civilians, 22 foreigners and 20 security personnel. The number though is expected to rise above 200 as the search is still on for some missing guests.

It’s also now surfaced that the terrorists were planning to kill thousands in Mumbai.

The terrorists had stockpiled enough ammunition for the task, including eight kilos of extremely potent RDX. At some point towards the end of the NSG operation, the terrorists lost their nerve and began arguing amongst themselves.

According to security sources, one of them was willing to surrender, while the other two were bent on a fight to the death. One of the terrorists even tried to negotiate his way to surrender. “But that was quite a risk. From earlier experiences we knew it could have been a trap,” said a security officer.

All the four terrorists in the Taj were eventually killed by the NSG in Operation Cyclone which ended around 8am on Saturday morning. The sources said all the four terrorists had posted themselves at important check points on different floors. They were keeping in touch through intercom and cell phones belonging to the hostages.

Two terrorists were gunned down by the NSG commandos on Friday while one was killed on Saturday morning around 3 am. The last of the terrorists was finally felled around 8am.

The bodies of the terrorists have been sent to the JJ Hospital for autopsy.

Highly trained and motivated

2008-11-29T21:40:00.000-08:00

NSG and marine commandos (marcos) involved in the operations at the Taj and the Oberoi-Trident hotels described the terrorists as well trained in military and commando methods and very familiar with the layouts of the two hotels.

“They were more sophisticated than militants encountered even in Jammu & Kashmir,” an NSG commando who took part in the operation at the Taj told DNA. “Initially we could not comprehend whether we were up against a bunch of motivated terrorists or trained commandos of another army,” another NSG commando told DNA. “The extent of ammunition carried by the terrorists initially overwhelmed us,” the commando from Haryana, who spoke to DNA on condition of anonymity, said.

According to him, the terrorists did not act like a bunch of desperate fidayeen, but gave every indication of having undergone intensive commando training.

The officer, who returned to the Taj early on Friday morning, spoke to DNA a little after 2am. His motivation was to highlight the challenges being faced by the security forces.

A marco also described the terrorists as determined to spread terror, without any sign of remorse. “The manner in which they would throw grenades and fire from different locations at the hotels showed their familiarity with the layout. They must have carried out a survey earlier,” said the masked commando of MARCOS, India’s lethal Marine Commando Force. “The terrorists were equipped with 7 fully loaded ammunition magazines plus 400 spare rounds of bullets. Not everyone can operate such a sophisticated AK series.”

The first commando gave other indicators of the sophistication of the terrorists. “Their style of operation did not correspond to our existing knowledge of terrorist operations in any part of India, including Jammu and Kashmir. Unlike ultras who tend to get desperate with receding ammunition, the firing pattern of the terrorists showed a well-thought- out strategy,” he said.

“The NSG’s strategy was to tire out the militants before sleep deprivation crept in,” the commando said. Unfortunately, this was another aspect of a commando operation that the militants seemed well acquainted with.

“Sleep deprivation training is sophisticated. Commandos are taught the art of keeping their eyes open for as long as a week without any visible signs of mental fatigue. These militants appeared well-trained in mental exercises to ward off sleepiness and also carried specific drugs that help,” the commando said.

The commando also pointed out that while they had gone into the operation with the knowledge that the enemy knew its way around the hotel, the extent of this knowledge only became apparent later. “Even if they had a map or had visited the hotel some time earlier, the way they were operating meant they had memorised everything. It is difficult to imagine militants being trained to such levels.”

The marine commandos, who were the first to enter the hotels, were also hampered by the risk of injuring the many guests trapped inside. “The men had to literally feel their way through the pitch dark hotel corridors and rooms,” said the marine commando, who gave the first account of the operation to the media on Friday.

When they arrived at the Taj hotel, the terrorists lobbed grenades from the seventh or eighth floor. “We thereafter heard gunshots on the second floor and we rushed (there). We found 12 to 15 bodies there. At that point of time, we also came under fire. When we retaliated, the terrorists hurled grenades at us.

Fortunately, we could take cover and were unhurt,” the commando said. “Once the firing stopped, we found the terrorists had vanished and gone elsewhere, which showed they knew the hotel layout well.”

Two commandos were injured, one of them seriously, in this encounter. In addition to ammunition, the commandos recovered a Mauritius national’s identity card and Chinese-made hand grenades, seven credit cards of different banks, dry rations and $1,200 and Rs6,840 from the rucksack of a terrorist.

Security officials said the men, described by eyewitnesses as “just like boys dressed in cargo pants and T-shirts with rucksacks across their shoulders”, were a highly motivated and determined group. Split into small groups, they created panic by first attacking crowded locations before focusing their assault on the two five-star hotels and an office-cum-residential building housing a Jewish centre.

How poor we are!!

2008-09-25T07:06:00.000-07:00

One day, the father of a very wealthy family took his son on a trip to the country with the express purpose of showing him how poor people live.

They spent a couple of days and nights on the farm of what would be considered a very poor family.

On their return from their trip, the father asked his son, 'How was the
trip?'

'It was great, Dad.'

'Did you see how poor people live?' the father asked.

'Oh yeah,' said the son.
'So, tell me, what did you learn from the trip?' asked the father

The son answered:
I saw that we have one dog and they had four.

We have a pool that reaches to the middle of our garden and they have a creek that has no end.

We have imported lanterns in our garden and they have the stars at night.

Our patio reaches to the front yard and they have the whole horizon.

We have a small piece of land to live on and they have fields that go beyond our sight.

We have servants who serve us, but they serve others.

We buy our food, but they grow theirs.

We have walls around our property to protect us, they have friends to protect them.'

The boy's father was speechless.

Then his son added, 'Thanks Dad for showing me how poor we are.'

Isn't perspective a wonderful thing?

Makes you wonder what would happen if we all gave thanks for everything we have, instead of worrying about what we don't have.

Gud one..

2008-08-27T00:52:00.000-07:00

I came across this lines from one of my friend's profile.. Nice one..
1)
உன் முகம் இன்னுமோர் இந்தியா ... ஒவ்வொரு பகுதியும் ஒவ்வொரு மொழி பேசுகிறதே ...

2)
DIAMOND is just another piece of COAL that did well under PRESSURE

The great betrayal, but in the good books of the USA

2008-07-15T00:44:00.000-07:00

Historically, the Congress party has betrayed the nation. In 1947, it agreed to the Partition after initially refusing to allow any division of the country. Mahatma Gandhi, who had declared that the country would be ‘divided over his dead body’, didn’t raise a finger when the ‘surgery’ was done – with extensive bloodshed that marked the beginning of a catastrophe.
In 1948, the Congress government led by Nehru stopped our gallant forces from recovering lost territory in Kashmir, once again causing permanent damage to the country. In 1962, he befriended China and was taken for a ride by Chou En-lai with consequences known to every Indian.
Again in 1971 Indira Gandhi declared a unilateral ceasefire and ordered the winning forces to retreat when our army had almost approached Lahore. She also decided to cede the territory that was won by our army to Pakistan. What a betrayal !
Now in 2008, the Congress is ready to sell off the country to the USA by signing the agreement with the International Atomic Energy Agency, exposing our nuclear research to inspection. This will infringe on our sovereignty. A pat on the back by George W. Bush means so much to Dr. Manmohan Singh, to the extent that he is ready to lead the country to dig its own grave.
Let us briefly consider a few points of the agreement. That it “ensures an uninterrupted fuel supply for our reactors” is a lie. A nuclear test will end the fuel supply under the Hyde Act.
The agreement envisages that India will have to identify and separate its civilian and military nuclear facilities. This is not possible precisely because our nuclear reactors are geared to serve a dual purpose. It implies that all our nuclear facilities will be considered “civilian” and will be under the IAEA scanner. Research on nuclear weapons will stop totally; or else, IAEA (read USA) will harass India in the manner suffered by Iraq, Iran and North Korea.
To stop nuclear research for defence (for example, the fast-breeder reactor in Kalapakkam) will increase the comparative strength of our not-so-friendly neighbours.
The fact of the matter is that the deal will lead to only a minimal increase in our energy-capability. But we will be in the good books of the USA and rest of the G-8.

The Golden Eagle

2008-07-09T10:59:00.000-07:00

A man found an eagle's egg and placed it under a brooding hen. The egglet hatched with the chickens and grew to be like them. He clucked and cackled; scratched the earth for worms; flapped his wings and managed to fly a few feet in the air.

Years passed. One day, the eagle, now grown old, saw a magnificent bird above him in the sky. It glided in graceful majesty against the powerful wind, with scarcely a movement of its golden wings.

Spellbound, the eagle asked, “who's that?”

“That's the king of birds, the eagle.” Said his neighbour. “ he belongs in the sky. We belong to earth – we're chickens.”

So the eagle lived and died a chicken for that's what he thought he was.
So Don't restrict urself.. Come out of the shell.. Life'z urs! Cheers!!!

Gone are the days

2008-06-18T00:50:00.000-07:00

Gone are the days!!!

When

The school reopened in June,

And we settled in our new desks and

benches!

When we queued up in book depot,

And got our new books and notes!

When we wanted two Sundays and no Mondays,

Yet managed to line up daily for the morning prayers.

We learnt writing with slates and pencils, and

Progressed To fountain pens and ball pens and then Micro tips!

When we began drawing with crayons and evolved to

Color pencils and finally sketch pens!

When we started calculating

first with tables and then with

Clarke's tables and advanced to

Calculators and computers!

When we chased one another in the

corridors in Intervals, and returned to the classrooms

Drenched in sweat!

When we had lunch in classrooms, corridors,

Playgrounds,

under the trees and even in cycle sheds!

When all the colors in the world,

Decorated the campus on the Second Saturdays!

When a single P.T. period in the week's Time Table,

Was awaited more eagerly than the monsoons!

When cricket was played with writing pads as bats,

And Neckties and socks rolled into balls!

When few played

"kabadi" and "Kho-Kho" in scorching sun,

While others simply played

"book cricket" in the

Confines of classroom!

Of fights but no conspiracies,

Of Competitions but seldom jealousy!

When we used to

watch Live Cricket telecast,

In the opposite house in Intervals and Lunch breaks!

When few rushed at 3:45 to

"Conquer" window seats in our School bus!

While few others had "Big Fun", "peppermint" ,

"kulfi", " milk ice !" and "sharbat !" at 4o Clock!

Gone are the days

Of Sports Day,

and the annual School Day ,

And the one-month long

preparations for them.

Gone are the days

Of the stressful Quarterly,

Half Yearly and Annual Exams, And the most

enjoyed holidays after them!

Gone are the days

Of tenth and twelfth standards, when

We Spent almost the whole year writing revision tests!

We learnt,

We enjoyed,

We played,

We won,

We lost,

We laughed,

We cried,

We fought,

We thought.

With so much fun in them, so many friends,

So much experience, all this and more!

Gone are the days

When we used

to talk for hours with our friends!

Now we don't have time to say a 'Hi'!

Gone are the days

When we played games on the road!

Now we

Code on the road with laptop!

Gone are the days

When we saw stars

Shining at Night!

Now we see stars when our code doesn't

Work!

Gone are the days

When we sat to chat with Friends on grounds!

Now we chat in chat rooms.....!

Gone are the days

Where we

studied just to pass!

Now we study to save our job!

Gone are the days

Where we had no money in our pockets and still fun filled on our hearts!!

Now we have the atm as well as credit card but with an empty heart!!

Gone are the days

Where we shouted on the road!

Now we don't shout even at home

Gone are the days

Where we got lectures from all!

Now we give lectures to all... like the one I'm doing now....!!

Gone are the days

But not the memories, which will be

Lingering in our hearts for ever and ever and

Ever and ever and ever .....

Gone are the Days…. But still there are lot more Days to come in our Life!!

NO MATTER HOW BUSY YOU ARE ,

DONT FORGET TO

LIVE THE LIFE THAT STILL

A soldier who was the bravest of the brave

2008-02-05T22:32:00.000-08:00

Before he turned 20, Chuni Lal had already won a Sena Medal for bravery on the icy heights of the Siachen glacier. At 21,153 feet, the Siachen glacier is the world's highest and toughest battlefield. To get a sense of the height and what super human effort it must take to fight a battle there, the post that he fought to recapture was just 7,875 feet lower than Mount Everest, which is 29,000 feet tall

The young sepoy, just two years into the army, had volunteered to be a part of the operation led by the indomitable Naib Subedar Bana Singh, one of India's greatest living heroes, who himself won the Param Vir Chakra, the country's highest gallantry award for that operation.

Chuni Lal was a member of Bana Singh's team, which had the task of clearing Pakistani intruders from the post, which was almost an unbreachable glacier fortress with 1,500 feet high walls of ice on both sides. In extremely difficult circumstances, the men led by Bana Singh crawled from trench to trench and cleared the post of all infiltrators.

Twenty years after that feat of courage, by June 2007, Naib Subedar Chuni Lal had won three gallantry awards and was amongst the most highly decorated soldiers of the Indian Army.

The man from Jammu and Kashmir's Bhaderwah in Doda district -- once the hotbed of militancy -- Chuni Lal's medals and his valour are the stuff of legend. In 1999 he was awarded the Vir Chakra -- the third highest bravery award for fighting back Pakistani infiltrators in Poonch and was instrumental in killing 12 intruders as the post commander.

He also did two stints with the United Nations Peace Keeping Force in Somalia and Sudan. His team's courage under fire in Sudan won them a UN citation for valour, the only Indian battalion to be so honoured.

On June 24, 2007, Chuni Lal proved -- yet again -- what made him such an exceptional soldier. Commanding his post in Kupwara, Jammu and Kashmir, at 14,000 feet with a visibility of just 5 metres and a temperature measuring minus 5 degrees, he detected some movement across the fence from the Line of Control. He quickly deployed his soldiers to stop anyone from crossing the LoC.

At 3.30 am the Indian soldiers heard some noise on the fence and challenged it. A volley of Kalishnikov fire greeted the Indian inquiry. The exchange of fire continued for almost an hour, the soldiers surrounded the whole area and searched for the terrorists till daylight broke. On finding nobody, they made way to the last remaining bushy patch -- as they approached closer, to ensure no one had crossed the fence, they were fired upon.

Chuni Lal along with his men continued to close on to the area where the terrorists were hiding and killed two of them on the spot. In the gunfire two soldiers were badly injured and lay precariously close to where the terrorists were. Risking his life Chuni Lal crawled towards them, pulled his men to safety and saved their lives. Then he took charge of the search party again.

He started searching the area, anticipating another hidden terrorist -- his hunch proved right and he saw a third terrorist trying to escape. Chuni Lal charged at him with his weapon, killing him. Unfortunately, the terrorist�s bullet tore his abdomen and left him bleeding profusely.

Unmindful of his grievous injury he took cover behind a boulder, continued firing and did not allow the other terrorists to break the cordon. Under his leadership the two remaining terrorists were also killed. At the end of the operation, five terrorists had been killed and a large amount of ammunition was recovered.

Chuni Lal had lost a lot of blood and by the time a helicopter could airlift him to hospital, the brave soldier had passed into the ages. For his exemplary courage and leadership, Naib Subedar Chuni Lal, who was not even 40 when he died, was awarded the Ashok Chakra, which is equivalent to the Param Vir Chakra, the highest award for bravery.

His rare courage will enhance the annals of Indian military history. The evening before the President of India was to present the award to his grieving wife, his commanding officer and family revealed what made him such an extraordinary soldier and why we should all be grateful to him.

The Real Heroes

2008-01-24T23:36:00.000-08:00

Three Army personnel will be awarded the coveted Ashok Chakra, all posthumously, by the President of India on the Republic Day. These are Col Vasanth V, Captain Harshan R, and Naib Subedar Chuni. These awards were announced last year and will be received by their next of kin.

Col Vasanth V of 9 Maratha Light Infantry laid down his life in a fire fight when he was personally leading an operation to flush out militants near Uri town in Jammu and Kashmir. He succumbed to his injuries before he reached the hospital. He is survived by his wife Subhashini, two daughters Rukmini and Yeshodha and parents Mr and Mrs Venugopal.

Col Vasanth went to school at many places in Karnataka as his father was working with the LIC. His schooling took him to Mangalore, Ooty, Udupi, Shimoga, Bangalore etc. He graduated from MES College, Bangalore. He was an ardent NCC Cadet and had also participated in a Republic Day parade at Delhi. He also visited Canada on exchange programme through the NCC.

Even as a youngster, he had expressed a desire to be in the army. Being a bright student, he had got selected to do an MBA in the prestigious IIM, but he chose to go to IMA, Dehradun as a Gentleman Cadet.

Col Vasanth – a true idealist and a man of peace – was proud to be an officer of the Indian Army till the very end. He was no armchair idealist. He read widely about military histories and strategy and would take great care to analyse the inscrutable choices that armies have made in history. He attended many seminars and talks, and listened with care to the many different voices of our nation. He was genuinely motivated by sacrifice. He was excited about commanding the 9 Maratha LI and thrilled that he would be joining them on the frontline. For Vasanth, his lifetime commitment was simple – his word and his honour. His personal life always came second.

In 1997, during a discussion with his wife, Subhashini, a Bharatnatyam dancer, Vasanth expressed that there are a lot of people speaking about the soldiers but not many who try to depict the life of the women in their lives. He felt that she should use her talent and her experiences to tell the story of the army wife. This gave the birth to The Silent Front, an organization dedicated to the widows of martyrs. Mrs Suhasini will receive the award bestowed on the gallant officer from the President.

The award will be received by his wife, Mrs Subhashini.

Captain Harshan R was born on 15 Apr 1980 at Manacaud, Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala. An alumnus of Sainik School, Kazhakootam, National Defence Academy (Khadakwasla) and Indian Military Academy, Dehradun, Capt Harshan R volunteered for the Special Forces and was commissioned into 2 PARA (SF) in Dec 2002.

As is known from his Academy days, Harshan was both mentally and physically an outstanding officer. The officer excelled in all his courses, with a special mention to his excellent mountaineering skills which helped him to do exceedingly well in High Altitude Warfare Course. Amongst his other skills, the officer was an under water diver and an excellent cross country runner.

Capt Harshan was a tough officer blessed with uncommon tenacity which reflected in the operations conducted by him and his relentless pursuit of terrorists in the harsh confines of Lolab valley of J & K. The officer established his reputation when in the beginning of Mar 07 he single handedly eliminated two terrorists in an operation that included two top leaders of Hizbul Mujahidin of North Kashmir.

On 20 Mar 2007 the officer received specific input regarding presence of a group of hard core terrorists in Chhoti Margi area of Lolab. Without waiting a moment and despite continuous snowfall the officer rushed to the area with his troops and laid cordon of the house in the early hours of the morning. Taking advantage of a pitch dark night and poor visibility, the terrorists attempted to break cordon. Four terrorists rushed out firing and virtually came face to face with Capt Harshan. Despite being outnumbered Capt Harshan killed one terrorist on the spot, and at the process the officer received a gun shot wound on his neck and fell down. Despite his grievous injuries, the officer continued to engage the remaining terrorists before succumbing and in the process wounded a third terrorist. His valour and supreme courage inspired his colleagues to eliminate the remaining two terrorists in the same operation, one of whom was wounded by the officer.

His award is to be received by Mr K Radhakrishnan Nair, the father of this brave officer.

Naib Subedar Chuni Lal, who received Vir Chakra and Sena Medal for gallantry in earlier operations was born on Bhaderwah in 1968. During training he excelled in military subjects, displayed courage and camaraderie and showed potentials of a true soldier and joined 8 JAK LI (SIACHEN). In 1985, when he was a Sepoy, Chuni Lal volunteered for and played a crucial role in capturing the now famous Bana Top (21,153 ft) on Siachen Glacier. For this act of gallantry he was awarded Sena Medal. He became an example to emulate when in Poonch during OPERATION RAKSHAK he fought an attempted intrusion and was instrumental in beating back the attack killing 12 of the intruders. He was awarded Vir Chakra for this act of gallantry.

An asset to the organization, he represented Indian Army twice as United Nations Peacekeepers in SOMALIA in 1992 and SUDAN in 2006. He again displayed his utility and unflinching devotion to duty while serving in the difficult operational situation of Sudan as a peacekeeper. He was at the forefront in the Malakal crisis for which the battalion was awarded United Nations Unit Citation for valour. He excelled professionally and also did instructor tenure at NCC Officers Training Academy, Kamptee.

On 24 June 2007 on information about likely infiltration in Kupwara Sector he re-sited ambushes to block all escape routes. Leading from the front Naib Subedar Chuni Lal, out-maneuvered the terrorists. By killing three terrorists himself, he inspired and facilitated his small team to kill all other terrorists. The twice-decorated hero displayed exemplary gallantry courage of exceptional order and made supreme sacrifice in the highest traditions of the Army.

The award bestowed on him is to be received by his wife Chintha Devi.

Pakistan: Miracle that keeps going wrong

2008-01-16T03:46:00.000-08:00

“Pakistan, the peeling, fragmenting palimpsest, increasingly at war with itself, may be described as a failure of the dreaming mind…a miracle that went wrong.” Salman Rushdie’s old description of Pakistan has come alive again in the wake of Benazir Bhutto’s assassination and the aftermath of chaos and uncertainty. Pakistan has faced crisis after crisis from the moment of its creation, which was a miracle in more than a literary sense. But sixty years after the partition of British India and thirty six years after the severance of East Pakistan (as Bangladesh), Pakistan is a social and political reality of 162 million people who form the sixth largest national population in the world. The people of Pakistan deserve more than a failing miracle.

For the first twenty five years after partition and independence, Pakistan’s main challenge was keeping the two wings of the country, separated by a vast Indian territory, together as a nation state. The leaders of Pakistan went to extraordinarily counterproductive lengths to meet this challenge, seemingly obsessed with proving wrong the cynical Indian skepticism about Pakistan’s survivability. Their efforts failed with the breakup of old Pakistan, in 1971, into Bangladesh and the current Pakistan, and the hangovers from the failed attempts are still haunting Pakistan. In addition, new predicaments have emerged in the last thirty five years.

Both Bangladesh and Pakistan have shown their propensity to alternate between civilian and military rules, but whereas Bangladesh’s difficulties are mostly internal and often compounded by floods and famines, Pakistan’s predicaments are internal and external, national as well as international. The seamless spread of Islamic radicalism from West Asia and the involvement in the Afghan war against the Soviet Union has led to the talibanisation of Pakistani society, even as it has transformed the nature of Pakistan’s conflict with India over Kashmir. On the other hand, President Musharraf’s ‘official’ fight against the al-Qaeda and the Taliban, as part of the US retaliation against the 2001 al-Qaeda attacks on America, is tearing apart Pakistani society. The country is again “at war with itself”, as Rushdie wrote earlier.

Past hangovers and new predicaments

The hangovers from the first twenty five years are also the result of Pakistan’s peculiar inheritances from British colonial rule. Chief among them were the remnants of the British Indian Army who were mostly Punjabi Muslims, and the Muslim members of the colonial bureaucracy who massively migrated to West Pakistan from Muslim-minority Provinces in India. The latter, known as Mohajirs (refugees or immigrants, whose ranks have included such famous names as Mohammad Ali Jinnah, Liquat Ali Khan, Perverz Musharraf, Javed Miandad, to name a few), who were the real instigators for a separate Muslim state, became a power unto themselves in the new Pakistan. Together with the Punjabi dominated army, Mohajirs formed the military-bureaucracy complex that has dominated Pakistan’s politics for most of its history and prevented the development of a constitutional democracy.

The main reason for foreclosing representative democracy was to prevent majority rule by East Pakistanis (Bengalis) who constituted 54% of the population. Pakistan’s leaders even contrived a one-unit arrangement in West Pakistan snuffing out the provincial, ethnic and linguistic identities of the Punjabis, Sindhis, Pashtuns and Baluchis. English was made the official language and Urdu (spoken by about 9% of the population, mostly Mohajirs) the lingua franca of the nation. Despite Jinnah’s occasional allusions to secularism, Islam was made the state religion primarily to achieve an overarching national unity. To complete the circus, Pakistan also become America’s satellite state in South Asia, a status that suited the interests of the ruling elites and was sold to the people of Pakistan as the nation’s insurance against the enemy next door, India.

It is fair to say that the development of a secular constitutional democracy became possible on the Indian side because of more diverse inheritances from colonial rule and a postcolonial leadership that was also diverse and secular in character. As Pakistani commentator Khalid Sayeed has aptly noted, between 1950 and 1958, Pakistan had seven prime ministers and one commander-in-chief, while India had one prime minister and several commanders-in-chief. India successfully enacted and adopted a new constitution soon after independence, while Pakistan took nine years to adopt its first constitution but only to have it suspended two years later, by General Ayub Khan, Pakistan’s first military ruler. The second constitution was adopted in 1973 under Bhutto’s premiership and that was set aside by General Zia-ul Haq in 1978. The third constitution adopted in 1991 is currently in force, but only in name.

During the nearly dozen years of military rule under General Ayub Khan (1959-1968) and General Yahya Khan (1968-1971), Zulifikar Ali Bhutto, Benazir’s father, emerged as a prominent civilian political leader holding a variety of ministerial positions. Belonging to the Sindhi community and hailing from a wealthy landowning family, Bhutto was educated in the West, a lawyer by training and an eloquent speaker both in English and the national languages. As Foreign Minister he passionately pleaded Pakistan’s case at the UN during the East Pakistan crisis, and when the country invariably broke up took on the task of rallying what was left as the new Pakistan.

Bhutto was Pakistan’s first long serving civilian Prime Minister. He negotiated a peace agreement with India and laid the foundation for a constitutional democracy in the country. However, he faced implacable opposition from the conservative and religious sections of Pakistanis who feared Bhutto’s progressive and secular tendencies. In the end he did not bring about any radical secular changes, and lost the support of the progressives without appeasing his religious opponents. Worse, Bhutto turned autocratic and undemocratic in dealing with political opposition and dissent. Within four years of the new constitution and election he had polarized the nation, and ethnic differences involving the Sindhis, Pashtuns, Baloch and Mohajirs, long suppressed, burst out into the open. The country was at war with itself again, and once more the military took control.

General Zia-ul Haq, a religious fundamentalist handpicked by Bhutto as the Army Chief for his supposed loyalty, ousted Bhutto him from office in 1977, and had him hanged two years later on a controversial murder charge ignoring worldwide please for clemency. Zia was isolated internationally, and found in the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan the opportunity to rehabilitate himself with the West. He made Pakistan the bridgehead in America’s war against the communist “evil empire” on Afghan soil. Pakistan became the conduit for supplying weapons to Taliban forces in Afghanistan, weapons purchased worldwide with American money and with China being the major supplier.

Pakistan’s role led to the emergence of what Ahmad Rashid has called “an enormous nexus of corruption” pervading the entire Pakistani establishment. Ideologically, the war in Afghanistan paralleled Zia’s brutal efforts in Pakistan to impose his version of Islamic law, and paved the way for the talibanisation of many sections of Pakistani society. After the Soviet Union’s inglorious withdrawal from Afghanistan, and with America washing its hands off the resultant mess, Pakistan was left with loads of Afghan refugees on its soil and the Taliban regime in Kabul to look after.

Daughter of destiny

Zia’s end came in a mysterious air crash in 1988, but his political nemesis, Benazir Bhutto, had been working independently to avenge the heinous hanging of her father. She was unique among South Asian leaders, female or male, in charming Western governments and media and presenting herself as their best option to bridge the clashing civilizations of Islam and the West. She established and maintained at considerable expense well-cultivated networks in Washington and London, using her contemporaries at Harvard and Oxford. According to the New York Times, Benazir understood Washington more than Washington understood her; she used Washington more than it used her in both her first and second political comings. It took Washington to convince the Pakistani military and the then acting President Gulam Ishaq Khan to invite Ms. Bhutto to form a new government, after her party won the largest number, but not a majority, of seats in the 1988 election following Zia-ul Haq’s death.

But for all her natural charm and inherited charisma, Benazir was a political failure. Even her sense of destiny sprang more from father fixation than any extraordinary sense of history or vision for the future of Pakistan, and she never quite succeeded in rallying the nation behind her. Her appeal did not go far beyond the followers of the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) founded by her father and now bequeathed to her son, the nineteen year old Oxford University student, Bilawal Bhutto Zardari. Bhutto’s two terms as Prime Minister, in 1988-1990 and 1993-1996 clearly showed that she was not only incompetent, but also autocratic and corrupt. She was thick-skinned enough to appoint her husband Asif Ali Zardari, aka Mr. 10 Percent, to her second term cabinet. Following her death, Mr. Zardari has assumed the role of being the regent for the young prince in waiting to lead the PPP, and is promising to be Pakistan’s Sonia Gandhi-looking after the (family) Party without running for election or holding public office.

Benazir’s feminism did not go deeper than her make up. As Pakistani women commentators have noted, Benazir faced monumental difficulties in being a political leader in a patriarchal society fed on religious fundamentalism, but the least a woman leader in such situations could do is to scrupulously avoid the failings of corruption and abuse of power associated with male politics. Benazir Bhutto showed notorious proclivity for both, not unlike other South Asian political heiresses. And so was her-again, not unlike her South Asian counterparts-selective understanding of democracy, that democracy is only for the country, but not for the Party. The Party leadership will always stay in the family.

Sacked half way through each of her two terms and facing criminal charges for corruption, Ms. Bhutto was forced to stay out of Pakistan for eight years, “living in splendid exile”, as a Western newspaper put it. She again used her Washington contacts to enable her return to Pakistan and share political power as Prime Minister, while General Musharraf remained President. The cynical opportunism in the arrangement was transparent and was reviled even by her supporters, but this was the only way Benazir Bhutto could have returned to Pakistan for a final attempt for power and restoration.

General Musharraf had taken control of Pakistan in 1999 in a power struggle with Bhutto’s rival successor as Prime Minister, Nawaz Sharif. Bhutto and Sharif were equally corrupt and inept, and the two had started meddling in military affairs to firm up their own positions. However, Musharraf’s ousting of an elected Prime Minister (Nawaz Sharif) did not go down well with Western powers, and Musharraf was ostracized internationally, just as Zia had been isolated earlier for hanging Bhutto. Then came the 9/11 al-Qaeda attacks in the US and Musharraf seized the opportunity to rehabilitate himself, just as Zia had done after the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan twenty years earlier.

This time, however, Musharraf took Pakistan in the opposite direction, against the al-Qaeda and the Taliban, and in support of the American retaliation against the Taliban government in Afghanistan. It was a bold decision that won the support of secular and moderate sections of Pakistan’s society and the wrath of religious extremists. He won praise for turning the economy around after a decade of mismanagement and corruption under Bhutto and Sharif. But all goodwill for the benign dictator evaporated when Musharraf ham-handedly took on the judiciary for ruling against his government. America’s attempt to salvage the situation by brokering a political marriage between Musharraf and Benazir Bhutto has now backfired even before the ceremony could begin.

The Bush Administration is now reportedly considering new covert operations within Pakistan to prevent further destabilization of Pakistan by al-Qaeda and Taliban forces. But direct American operations are ill advised according to many in the US including the State Department, as they will only lead to a massive backlash and general instability. Musharraf for his part has indicated his opposition to any direct involvement by the US. The elections rescheduled for 18 February are unlikely to lead to a stable parliament and a new power sharing arrangement, although the consequences of not having an election could be far worse than having one.

There is no easy way out for Pakistan from its current predicaments. In its crises-ridden past, Pakistan got past each crisis by alternating between civilian and military administrations and sacking the incumbent leader as the scapegoat responsible for the crisis. Every leader reflected and personified one or the other of Pakistan’s multiple contradictions and none has left behind a positive legacy for successors to build on. Each new leader began with new support from Washington, even as each new phase began as farce and ended in tragedy, and none more so than Benazir Bhutto.

இப்படிக்கு சாஃப்ட்வேர் இன்ஜினியர்..!

2008-01-06T22:04:00.000-08:00

இருந்தாக வேண்டிய அவசியத்தில்
இறங்கா முகங்காட்டும் வாடகைக்கு
இறுக்கத்தோடு இருக்கக் குடியேறுவது
என் விதி..
ஆசையல்ல..!

அறுசுவை அன்னம் கேட்கவில்லை.
அன்போடு ஒரு வாய்ச்சோறுதான் கேட்டோம்..
அம்மா சமையலின்
அருமையை அறியவைத்ததை அன்றி
வேறொன்றுமில்லை..
இங்கே அருந்திச்சுவைக்கும் உணவின் ஆதாயம்..!

அடைய விழைந்த கனவுகளையெல்லாம்
பரணில் போட்டுவிட்டு
அப்பா அடைந்துவிட்ட கடனையடைக்க
தரணி புகழ ரயிலேறினேன்.

விசைப்பலகையிலாடும் விரல்கள் தொட்டு
கசையடி பெற்றேனும்
கணக்கைச் சரி பார்க்கும் மூளை வரை
ஒவ்வொரு கணமும்
எப்பொழுது தொலையுமிந்த
எட்டு மணி நேர இலக்கு
என்ற போராட்டமாய்..!

காசில்லாமல் கார்டைத் தீட்டும்
ட்ரீட்டுகளும்,
தொட்டவை தொண்ணூறுகளுக்கும்
பார்ட்டிகளும்,
செலவழிப்பதற்கு வழி செய்யும்
செய்வினைகளல்ல..
கருமமாம்
கார்ப்பரேட் கல்ச்சரது
காட்டிக்கொடுத்த
கைவினைகள்..!

அகவை இருபதில்
ஆயிரங்கள் இருபது ஈட்டியதை
இசைபாடி வாழ்த்தாவிடினும்,
"நாகரீகக் கோமாளிகள்" என்று - வசமாய்
வசைபாட வந்துவிட்டனர்
எம் சகோதரர்கள்..(?!)

புரிந்து கொள்ளுங்கள்
தயைபுரிந்து..
எங்களுக்கும் இருக்கிறதென்று,
இதயமென்ற ஒன்று..!

உறவுகளைத் துறந்திருப்பினும்,
வாழ்வியலின் சிற்சில
வரைமுறைகளை மறந்திருப்பினும்,
உயிர்த்திருக்கிறோம் நாங்கள்..
பொசுக்கியெடுக்கும்
பொருளாதாரப் புகைச்சல்களினூடேயும்
எங்களை ஈன்றெடுத்து ஆளாக்கிய,
நீங்கலா உறவுகளின்
நிதிநிலையை
மேம்படுத்தத்தான்
மேற்கூறியவையனைத்தும் என்பதால்!

வெல்க பாரதம்!

Where have all our heroes gone?

2007-12-14T02:33:00.000-08:00

Do you remember Dinesh Raghuraman? Or K P Vinay Kumar?

Unless they were your friends or family members, chances are that the names of these two army majors mean nothing to you.

Both of them died early October, fighting terrorists in Kashmir. Read story.

Both are now mere statistics: according to the South Asia Terrorism Portal or www.SATP.org, 62 members of our security forces made the ultimate sacrifice till November 21 this year.

Men in uniform, sworn to protect and to defend. And if needed, to die for the country.

I know that this is the season of goodwill and cheer, and perhaps not the time to discuss this. But then again, the officers and men protecting our borders are probably missing their families too, even as they battle terrorists and inclement weather.

I have always wondered what it takes for a person to be willing to die for the flag.

I have also wondered how the families of these usually young people react to the event. Was the sacrifice by their loved one worth it? Is their obvious grief and sorrow tinged with pride? Or is there only regret, and the obvious question: Why?

Let me come at this from another way: Do we, as a nation, understand and appreciate these sacrifices? Do we honour and cherish our heroes, for that is what they are? or do we take them for granted?

Is the token annual ceremonial salute at the Amar Jawan Jyoti all that we have for them? Is a pension and perhaps a medal all that we can offer them?

Forget the dead: do we even honour our living heroes?

This December 16 marks the 36th anniversary of the liberation of Bangladesh. On that day in 1971, the Pakistani army ate crow by publicly surrendering the East to General Jagjit Singh Aurora. It is often described as the Indian Army's finest hour.

But today, how many of us are aware, or even care, that the then Eastern Command chief, General JFR Jacob, the man who actually negotiated the surrender of East Pakistan in 1971, lives in a small apartment in New Delhi's Som Vihar? Today, he is not even invited for official events to commemorate the occasion.

How many of us have even heard of General Ian Cardozo, who used his khukri to sever his left foot, which was turning gangrenous after being wounded in East Pakistan during the last days of that war?

That did not stop him from becoming the first disabled officer to command an infantry battalion, when he was appointed a Colonel of the Regiment of 5 GR (FF). And subsequently commanding a brigade and a division, encouraging and setting a precedent for other war-disabled officers.

General Cardozo, who was commissioned into 1/5 Gorkha Rifles in June 1958, had also taken part in the Sino-Indian War of 1962 and the war with Pakistan in 1965.

Does the loss of a foot stop him from walking ramrod straight, from regularly writing, or indulge daily in his passion, swimming, even though he is in his early eighties? No sir.

But what have we, as a nation, done for him? Zero. Zilch.

Speaking of khukris, how many of us know about Captain Mahendra Nath Mulla, who in true naval tradition, went down on December 9, 1971, with the INS Khukri, the only ship we ever lost in war?

Till the very end, he was seen frantically helping his crew to escape from the torpedoed vessel before it was swallowed by the sea.

It took a General Cardozo to write a book about this act which "upholds the highest traditions of the armed forces and exemplifies the upper limits of cold courage."

In my view, these are Our Heroes. In my view, these are the people we need to cherish, remember and salute.

Yet it took national outrage before our Service Chiefs were exempted from frisking at our airports. While our politicians (most of whom have mile-long criminal chargesheets against them), and in some cases even their distant relatives, gleefully enjoy such privileges.

What message are we sending out to our men in uniform? That the people who head our armed forces pose a security risk? While our politicians, many of whom can be compared unfavorably with the north end of south-bound cows, leave alone headless chickens, do not?

Villagers return the body of a BSF jawan killed during clashes with the Bangladesh Rifles

My blood still boils each time I recall the picture of our BSF jawans, killed by the Bangladesh Rifles during a border skirmish in April 2001, being returned trussed up on poles, as if they were animal carcasses.

But how did we, as a nation, react to this barbaric act by a small nation that we can flood at will by just opening up the sluice gates at the Farakka Barrage? Was there even a muted protest from our leaders? Not that I recall.

Because our politicians were far too concerned about the implications this would have on their vote banks. Who cares about our armed forces losing face?

Speaking at the release of his book on INS Khukri on a cold Delhi evening, General Cardozo, flanked by Captain Mulla's wife and daughter, declared: "It is sad that while the armed forces and these women lose their husbands in battle, we do not have a national war memorial. India Gate is a memorial built by the British for those who died in World War I and II.

"What have we done as a nation? We have fought wars in 1947-48, 1962, 1965 and 1971- but what do we have? An upturned rifle with a helmet on top, with Amar Jawan written on it. Is that all we can do? I believe that a nation which does not honour its war dead dishonours itself."

As we enter another year, it is important to remember that message. Otherwise, we might not remain a country worth dying for.

Even if hungry tigers do not eat grass

2007-11-28T03:37:00.000-08:00

There are two sayings in Tamil about the four - legged tiger or “puli” . One is “Puli pathunguvathu paaivathatku” (The tiger crouches only to pounce).

The other is “Puli pasithaalum pullai thinnaathu” (Even if hungry tigers do not eat grass).

The essence of this proverbial wisdom can be applied to the two - legged tigers too. Past history of The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) demonstrates that.

If the LTTE is unusually quiet for a while people suspect that the tigers are plotting a surprise operation. A sudden strike is imminent it is felt. Likewise however much the tigers are hard - pressed the LTTE does not give up or change its policies easily.

It is against this backdrop that last week’s audacious assault by the LTTE on the Sri Lanka Air Force base at Anuradhapura needs to be viewed.

Recent events led to an impression that the LTTE was on the decline . Aggressive propaganda by the Rajapakse regime contributed greatly to this opinon being moulded.

The tigers had lost the East completely; they gave up Mannar South without a fight;they were hard - pressed on multiple fronts in the North having to face limited millitary offensives continuously;tiger controlled areas were being regularly bombed and shelled and claims were being made that LTTE targets were severely hit ; Colombo and other areas in the South were quiet and memory of past tiger operations were waning; coordinated action by several western governments against key tiger activists was constricting fund raising abroad ; successful strikes by the navy against LTTE ships were being regularly reported.

In such a situation the Government of Sri Lanka’s (GOSL) boasts that the tigers were on their last legs found many believers.Some observers of the LTTE - including this writer - found it difficult to accept this dominant line of thought. The tigers were down but certainly not out they stated. It was only a matter of time before the LTTE launched a counter - offensive or counter - strike they felt.

This prediction came true on Monday October 22nd!

Twenty - One black tiger commandoes engaged in a nocturnal assault on the Air Force base at Saliyapura, Anuradhapura. They dominated the base for nearly eight hours and destroyed several aircraft. In what was described as a co-ordinated land and air attack two planes of the LTTE’s nascent air force dropped bombs too. 14 security forces and all 21 tigers were killed.The greatest casualty was the image propagated by the GOSL that the LTTE was a spent force!

The tigers are engaged in asymmetrical warfare against the GOSL security forces. The LTTE is at a disadvantage vis a vis the GOSL in manpower, airpower, seapower, firepower, armour power etc. Given this imbalance the tigers would prefer to fight a defensive war rather than go on the offensive. What is important for the LTTE is the retention of some territory at least as a “rear “base. But the security forces are knocking at the gates. So the tigers need to conduct some guerilla strikes at least and reduce the military threat.

With this overall objective in mind , LTTE supremo Velupillai Prabakharan , has set in motion plans for many military projects. Preparations were - and are - on for several guerilla operations. One such strike was “Operation Ellalan” named after the Tamil monarch who reigned in Anuradhapura for 44 years .

A group of twenty - five “black tigers” were given specialised training for the “operation Ellalan” project for nearly six months. The squad studied maps and models of the Saliyapura Air base without being told it was at Anuradhapura. Elaborate reconnaissance missions known as “recce” had gone on for more than a year. Information and knowledge had been carefully gathered, processed, checked and confirmed.Attack motions were carefully rehearsed and simulation exercises conducted.

This team of black tigers was put together from different branches of the LTTE. They had all volunteered to become “Karumpuligal” (panthers) or suicide cadres. After being selected for a specific mission the black tigers are given specific training required for the particular mission. The “Ellalan operation” cadres got training at a secret location of the Lt. Col Rayan academy for tiger special forces. The project co-ordinator was a senior leader whose nom de guerre is Kalaikone.

21 of the 25 were picked as the final team after training was over. Tiger leader Prabakharan met the team for a meal in the second week of October. He posed for photos with the cadres destined for death. The photos are released after the operation is over. Usually LTTE cadres are promoted post- humously.

But in a departure from this practice black tigers are told of their posthumous promotions and given their new ranks while alive. This may be a method to enthuse cadres and attract more volunteers for the black tigers.

The pseudonyms, real names, new ranks and their districts of origin are stated below:

Lt. Col. Veeman (K. Pratheepan) from Trincomalee , Captain Panchaseelan (S.Kajendran) from Batticaloa ,Major Kanikkeethan (R. Kandasamy) from Batticaloa ,Lt. Col. Ilangko (R. Paheerathan) from Jaffna ,Major Mathivathanan (B. Thayaaseelan) from Jaffna ,Captain Puradchi (S. Thanushan) from Jaffna ,Major Supan (K. Jeevakanthan) from Jaffna , Major Ilampuli (T. Kalairaj) from Jaffna , Captain Pukazhmani (T. Puvaneasvaran) from Jaffna ,Captain Eezhaththeavan (T. Moasikaran) from Jaffna ,Major Ezhilinpan (V. Pirapaharan) from Jaffna ,Captain Pulimannan (K. Nanthakumar) from Jaffna , Captain Senthooran (K. Thinesh) from Jaffna , Lt. Arun (P. Thivaakaran) from Jaffna ,Captain Eezhappiriya (K. Keethanchali) from Jaffna , Capatain Arivumalar (S. Uthaya) from Jaffna ,Captain Tharmini (K. Nirmala) from Ki’linochchi ,Major Kaavalan (S. Saththiyan) from Ki’linochchi ,Captain Karuveanthan (M. Satheeskumaar) from Ki’linochchi , Captain Anpukkathir (V. Thileepkumar) from Mullaiththeevu and Captain Subesan (N. Maharaj) from Mannaar .

The mission commander was Paheerathan alias Ilango. His deputy was Pratheepan alias Veeman. Three of the squad were girls. Thirteen of the team were from Jaffna, three from Kilinochchi, two from Batticaloa and one each from Trincomalee, Mannar and Mullaitheevu districts. The senior most cadre was the squad’s commander Lt. Col Ilango who was 26 years old. He had joined the LTTE in 1995 and had participated in more than a dozen major battles including those of “Jayasikurui”. The junior was 17 year old Lt. Arun who was recruited in early 2006.

The black tiger team was asked to write letters to their loved ones on October 9th. These letters would be given to family members only after the operation was over. When family members read the “last” letters the person who wrote that epistle would not be among the living. The families would not have prior knowledge that their loved one had embarked on a black tiger mission.

Once D- day was finalised the black tigers would start off on their secret mission. Usually they would be accompanied and even guided by the intelligence wing members up to a point. Those involved in reconnaissance would take them to their destination and lodge them in “safehouses” for a while. They would have travelled lightly and would receive supplies and be given their arsenal shortly before H- hour.

It is believed that the “Operation Ellalan” squad travelled through jungle areas of Mannar - Wilpattu - Tantrimale -Anuradhapura etc to reach their target destination. Kajendran alias Panchaseelan was reportedly responsible for guiding his colleagues through jungle routes . Apparently he had travelled those routes earlier as preparation. Omanthai the norther province entry - exit point between GOSL and LTTE areas is about 60 km away from Anuuradhapura. The Saliyapura Air Force base is about 4 km from Anuradhapura city.

It is not clear as to where the tigers stayed in Anuradhapura prior to the attack. It is suspected that they used the grand “Gajaba Cross” motor show to mingle with nearly 100, 000 spectators who converged in Anuradhapura on Sunday October 21st. They had then allegedly proceeded from the Pillaiyar junction towards Nuwarawewa and reportedly walked by the tank bund. It is suspected that the black tigers hid themselves in a patch of shrub jungle bordering a small coconut grove before zooming on to their target.

It was around 2. 20 - 30 am in the early hours of Monday morning that the tiger squad crossed the Nelumkulama road and arrived at the North - Eastern side of the base.There is a three - tiered barbed wire fence. The outer and inner wires are quite thick while the thinner middle wire is electrified. The tigers cut through all three and entered without being electrocuted.. Apparently the power supply to the electric fence had been turned off earlier. Why this happened remains a suspicious mystery!

There was also a system of sound mines installed alongside the paths and also at strategic points. The tigers however seemed to know everything and swiftly de- commissioned them. Expansion work was on at the runway and mounds of earth and sand were heaped at a particular spot. The squad took cover behind those mounds and also moved their arsenal there. This spot became their field headquarters.

This arsenal consisted of T-56 ’s, Rocket propelled grenade launchers. Light Anti - tank weapons. multi - purpose machine guns, light machine guns, handgrenades etc. There was also a communications wireless operated by Thayalaseelan alias Mathivathanan. The black tigers used cellular phones to communicate among themselves during the operation.

The Anuradhapura air base is strategically important for a number of reasons. The biggest pilot training school is set up there. The aerial surveillance headquarters is also there.The base is home to the first flying training wing squadron; the sixth and seventh transport and training helicopter squadrons;the ninth attack helicopter squadron, the 11th UAV “drone” squadron and the 14th aerial surveillance squadron.

Several types of aircraft like the Beechcraft 200, RQ - 2 pioneer and IAI Scout Unmanned Aerial vehicles are kept here. These are used for Reconnaissance and maritime patrol; Mi 24 and Mi 35 “Hind” attack helicopters as well as Mi 17 and Bell 206 helicopters used for transport,training and logistic support are also stationed here. There also K - 8 Karakorum, Cessna 150 and Nanchang CJ6 primary training aircraft (PT6).

After the LTTE’s airwing sprouted wings the Anuradhapura air base gained greater importance. An elaborate radar system capable of monitoring the Northern skies and north - eastern seas has been installed. The Beechcraft is also of great utility value being capable of staying in the skies for marathon hours to monitor the seas. The Navy has benefited immensely. Anuradhapura base was the aerial surveillance headquarters apart from providing basic pilot training and also limited advanced training. It was also logistically important to ferry men and materials to and from the Mannar, Vavuniya and Weli - Oya/Manalaaru battlefronts.

With these strategic objectives in mind the tigers got to work. Zero hour was 3 am. The LTTE broke up into two main teams and began operations. Though the overall commander was Illango he headed a 7 member team. The second in command Veeman led a 14 member team. Both teams broke into smaller groups to implement specific duties.

The top priority was to mop up the four sentry points and two guard posts. This was done quickly. Thereafter the radar surveillance unit was seized and neutralised. The communications room was also knocked out.The other objective was to seize control of the air defence system and artillery units. Two 40 mm ,two 23mm artillery guns were seized . The 12.7 m anti aircraft guns were also taken. In 20 minutes the artillery and anti - aircraft guns , radars, communications and guard posts - sentry points were all taken over.

By this time sleeping airforce personnel were alarmed and began retaliating. There had been heavy partying on Sunday night due to the Gajaba cross motoring event and also because base commandant , Group captain Priyantha Gunasinghe was on the eve of retirement. Another diversion was the “Sri Laka Idol” program on Sirasa TV. Still airmen began responding bravely.

LTTE snipers climbed trees and began sniping at the elevated watchtower and command and control tower Flight Lt. Ruwan Kumara Wijeratna was killed near the tower. An Armoured Personnel carrier moved in blazing. A tiger cadre fired an anti - tank weapon at point blank range hitting the gunner and damaging the APC.

The three girls Eezhapriya, Arivumalar and Tharmini were trained in artillery. They took over the big guns and began firing them. Eehapriya apparently was a gunner of great ability. A tiger trio set up cut - out points at key positions and engaged in covering fire. Two tiger formations began to move into the hangars and destroy the helicopters , fixed wing aircraft and also the UAV drones. At least eight aircraft were totally demolished. Another nine were extensively damaged. Ten other aircraft damaged partially are in working condition.

Meanwhile the LTTE “control” in the Wanni was regularly informed of developments. Once it became known that the radars were knocked out and air defence system neutralised ,two small planes of the LTTE’s fledgling air wing started out from the Wanni. The airforce personnel saw the planes as they came close but were helpless as the anti - aircraft gun could not be used. The aircraft too could not be flown.

At this point of time A’pura base commandant informed Vavuniya commander Maj - Gen Upali Edirisinghe of the situation and tiger planes. Two Bell 212 helicopters set out from Vavuniya but friendly fire from a military camp in Mihintale hit one copter which crashed down at Doramadalawa about 11 km away from the Saliyapura airbase. All four crew were killed. The other copter turned back.

LTTE planes flew in and dropped two bombs each. One fell near the airbase hangar. The other three were dropped around the nearby army camp housing Gajaba regiment troops. One fell on a billet. One fell on the parapet wall surrounding a school and one fell on a field killing about 12 buffaloes. The idea apparently was to target the army camp and prevent soldiers coming to the aid of the airmen.

But the soldiers upon hearing of the tiger attack had set out from camp but were unable to do much because of the night’s darkness. They could not fire indiscriminately for fear of hitting the airmen. But the soldiers took up positions in the general area outside the camp and virtually surrounded it.

The bombing by tiger planes did not make any significant contribution to the assault on the air base apart from deterring troop movement for some time. Its symbolic effect however was immense. Taking possession of an air base. neutralising anti - aircraft guns and then bringing two planes to drop bombs over the very same base is well and truly an exercise of audacity.

The LTTE was showing that their nascent air force was still active and that the Sri Lankan security forces were incapable of restricting its movements in spite of boastful claims. The Lankan air force base was attacked by the Tamil Eelam air force was the message sought to be conveyed. Most media reports refer to the assault as a Land and Air co-ordinated attack. There was also confusion that the air attack preceded the ground attack.

A handful of tiger guerillas not only caused much destruction but also fought resolutely for nearly eight hours in the midst of the base. Two Gajaba special force contingents led by Major Chandimal Peiris and Capt Kosala Munasinghe arrived at daybreak at the base. Once the SF got into action the tide began to turn against the tigers.

The black tiger operational leader Lt. Col Ilango succumbed to injuries and died at 8. 30 am. At about 9 am Maj. Mathivathanan was killed. With that communication between the Wanni and combat zone ended. The fighting began subsiding gradually and finally ended at about 11. 30 am. Six tigers including the No two Lt. Col Veeman blew themselves up at the end. The Airbase was cleared of tigers who were in action for nearly eight hours. All 21 black tigers courted death as destined.

Wing Commander Amila Mohotti, Squadron Leader Ruwan Wijeratne, Flight Lieutenant A.B.M.Silva, Flying Officer S.R.Siyambalapitiya, Warrant Officer KPS Dayaratne, Corporal M.P.W. Deegalla, Corporal W.M.Warnakulasuriya, Corporal .M.W.Dissanayake, Corporal E.P.N. Dayaratne, Corporal Preethikumara, Lance Corporal H.E.N.D.Fernando, Lance Corporal Gunawardane of the Air Force and Lance Corporal R.J.S. Ratnayake of Gajaba Regiment of the Army paid the supreme sacrifice during the incident.

[Members of Sri Lanka’s Air Force march at a funeral procession of wing commander Amila Mohotti in Kurunagala, north central Sri Lanka, October 26, 2007 - Reuters Via Yahoo! News Pic: Anuruddha Lokuhapuarachchi]

Four of them died in a helicopter crash when it was rushing to help fighting troops at the base. One more Airman of the Air Force, Sergeant Asvedduma breathed his last late monday (22) night while being treated at Anuradhapura hospital after he was admitted with severe injuries. Accordingly, fourteen brave men of the Armed Forces perished as a result of the incident. A total of twenty two members of the Armed Forces are still receiving treatment in hospitals. About fifty - five are classified as walking wounded.

A large number of aircraft were destroyed or damaged. Peter Foster the Colombo correspondent of the “Daily Telegraph” of London has reported that the Black Tigers destroyed an expensive Beechcraft surveillance plane worth £14 million, two Mi17 helicopters, two Mi24 helicopters, three unmanned aerial vehicles, a K-8 jet and eight trainer aircraft.

The LTTE however says “officially” that only eight aircraft were destroyed. Rasiah Ilanthiraiyan the LTTE defence spokesperson explained this discrepancy to a Tamil journalist by saying that they had lost communication with the attack squad at 9 am. At that time eight was the figure. He said that subsequently more damage was done. It is indeed a strange situation when the LTTE claims a low figure while sections of the media and opposition quote a much higher figure.

The LTTE is exploiting the attack and sacrifice for propaganda purposes. Major Mathivathanan was given a special post-humous promotion and made Lt. Colonel. Ceremonies paying tribute to the twenty one “martyrs” were conducted in many parts of the Wanni. Incidently one of the black tiger bodies was not recovered as it was very badly mangled. The 20 recovered bodies were paraded in a naked state by the Anuradhapura Police and buried.

[LTTE cadres and civilians paying homage to the Black Tigers in Ki’linochchi - Photo: LTTEPS]

Let me conclude by quoting from a recent article on the attack by B. Raman, retired additional cabinet secretary of India. Raman is by no means an acolyte of the LTTE and has often criticised the tigers severely. This is what he had to say:

” Reliable details of the combined air and land attack launched by the LTTE on the Anuradhapura air base of the Sri Lankan Air Force early in the morning of October 22, 2007, indicate that it was neither an act of desperation as projected by the embarrassed Sri Lankan military spokesmen nor an act of needless dramatics as suggested by others. It was an act of unbelievable determination, bravery and precision successfully carried out by a 21-member suicide commando group of the Black Tigers-significantly led by a Tamil from the Eastern Province-with the back-up support of two planes of the so-called Tamil Eelam Air Force. ”

” Reliable Western sources say that no other terrorist organisation in the world would have been capable of organising such a raid, which had been preceded by painstaking intelligence collection, planning and rehearsal. The commandoes, divided into groups, infiltrated into the air base from two directions and, within 20 minutes, took the security guards by surprise, overwhelmed them, seized their weapons and communication equipment, neutralised a radar and an anti-aircraft gun position and then intimated their headquarters that they were in effective control of the air base. Only then the two aircraft of the LTTE’s air wing flew to Anuradhapura and dropped two bombs on the base and flew back safely to their hide-out.”

” The successful operation would seem to have been launched by the LTTE in retaliation for the recent operations of the Sri Lankan Navy against the transport ships of the LTTE and the air strikes of the SLAF over LTTE positions in the Northern Province. It once again underlines the LTTE’s reputation as an organisation with a tremendous tenacity of purpose, grit and sophistication in thinking and planning. Its recent set-backs have not weakened its morale. They have only redoubled its determination to keep fighting for its political objective unmindful of the losses in the Eastern Province.

Annual Heroes’ Day statement on 27 November 2007

2007-11-27T23:45:00.000-08:00

Leader of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), V PirapaharanToday called upon the international community to stop supporting Sri Lanka and ‘take a new approach in relation to our freedom struggle’.

‘Our people firmly expect that at least from now on the international community will take a new approach in relation to our freedom struggle,’ Prabhakaran said in his speech.

‘On this sacred day, it is the hope of our people that the international community will cease giving military and economic aid to the Sinhala regime and accept the right of self determination and the sovereignty of the Tamil nation.’

Full Text of Annual Heroes’ Day statement on 27 November 2007 by The leader of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), V Pirapaharan:

Propping up the genocidal Sinhala State is counterproductive-International community should change its approach:

The 21st century began as the ‘Asian century’ and the world is looking towards Asia. Many countries in our region have grown in leaps and bounds in social, economical and scientific fields. They are researching space, moon and atom. The whole human race is taking up new challenges and has embarked on a united path, seeking answers to many of nature’s mysteries and looking for remedies to incurable diseases. It is seeking to protect the entire globe and its plant and animal lives. Sadly, the Sinhala nation is moving in exactly the opposite direction, on a path of destruction. It is trying to destroy the Tamil nation and, in the process, it is destroying itself. This beautiful island continues to soak in blood.

Buddhism is a profound spiritual duty. Its philosophy emphasizes a life without desires, a life of love and justice. The Sinhala nation, claiming that it has followed this path for more than two thousand years, has in fact remained immersed in the poison of racism. It is unleashing unthinkable violence against another people. During the long history of the Tamil struggle, first through non-violence and later through armed struggle, the Sinhala mindset has remained unchanged. The Sinhala nation did not change even after so much destruction and lost lives. It continues on the path of violence. It only desires to find a solution to the Tamil question through military might and oppression. It cunningly evaded efforts to seek peace and is boldly taking forward its military plan. The international community’s economic and military aid, its moral and political support, its diplomatic efforts, and its one-sided involvement directly aided this turn of events.

We know very well that the military, economic and geo-political interests of the world’s powers are embedded in our region. We understand their concern to take forward their interests. We also recognize the concerns of the international community to bring about stability and good governance to this island for these reasons. At the same time the chauvinistic Sinhala State is attempting to exploit this interest in our region of the international powers. It is trapping the international community in its chauvinistic project and turning the international community against the Tamil freedom struggle. Our people are dismayed and disappointed that these countries, trapped in the deceptive net of the Sinhala State, are being unhelpful in their involvement to resolve our problem.

These one-sided involvements of foreign powers are not new in our prolonged struggle. India intervened in our national question then as part of its regional expansion. India signed an accord with the Sinhala State without the consent of the Tamils. The Indo-Lanka Accord was not signed to meet the aspirations of the people of Tamil Eelam. In fact, India then attempted to force an ineffectual solution on our people - a solution which did not even devolve powers to the extent of the Banda-Chelva pact signed in the 1950’s. India tried to enforce that accord with the strength of more than 100,000 Indian forces, with the power of the agreement between two countries and with the assistance of treacherous Tamil paramilitary groups. However, even this ill-considered solution, which did not even address the basic national aspirations of the Tamils, was blocked by the chauvinistic Sinhala State.

We are intimately familiar with the Sinhala State and its deceptive politics. Our people have a long history of bitter experiences. That is why we explained to India on many occasions, at many locations and at many levels about the implacability of Sinhala chauvinism. We explained to India then that the aim of the Sinhala State was not to find a solution to the Tamil question and bring peace; but to occupy the Tamil homeland, destroy its resources, and enslave the Tamil nation. India refused to accept this reality. As a result our land witnessed great sorrow and destruction.

Today, the international community is making the same mistake that India made many years ago. Even the countries that are the guardians of the peace efforts succumbed to the deception of the Sinhala State and listed our freedom movement as a terrorist organization. What we find most incomprehensible is the fact that these same nations, which labeled us terrorists, not so long ago fought in defence of their own freedom.

The Sinhala nation is unable to stomach the support of our Diaspora for the Tamil freedom struggle; it is unable to accept the humanitarian help and the political lobbying by the Diaspora to end the misery heaped on our people. That is why the Sinhala nation is trying hard to shatter the bond between our people in our homeland and our Diaspora. Some countries are also assisting this amoral effort of Sinhala chauvinism. These countries are denouncing, as illegal activities, the humanitarian actions and political protests of our people abroad-actions that are carried out according to the laws of those countries. These countries have imprisoned and humiliated Tamil campaigners and representatives. These countries have ridiculed their protests and their efforts to seek justice.

This partisan and unjust conduct of the international community has severely undermined the confidence our people had in them. And it has paved the way for the breakdown of the ceasefire and the peace efforts. Furthermore, the generous military and economic aid they have given to the Sinhala State and their diplomatic efforts to prop up the chauvinistic Sinhala State has encouraged the Sinhala nation further and further along its militaristic path. This is the background to the confidence of the Rajapake regime in continuing with its unjust, inhuman war of occupation of our land.

Overconfident of its military victory over the Tamil freedom movement, the Rajapakse regime has shut fast the door for peace. The desire to oppress the Tamils has intensified as never before. With the entire world giving support, the Sinhala State, using the ceasefire as cover, and exploiting the peace environment, prepared its war of occupation. The SLMM that was monitoring the peace covered its eyes, tied its hands behind back, and went to sleep in Colombo. The exhausted Norwegian facilitators remained silent. The countries that preached peace to us also went silent and refused to speak out. The Sinhala State started its war and justified it with slogans like ‘War for Peace’, ‘War against terrorism’ and ‘War for the liberation of the Tamils’.

The Rajapakse regime assembled its military might and let loose a massive war on the eastern region of our homeland. This part of our homeland became a wasteland after incessant bombing and shelling. Trincomalee, the famous Tamil capital, was destroyed. Batticaloa, an ancient cultural city of the Tamils, became a land of refugees. Jaffna, the cultural centre of the Tamils, was cut off from the rest of the world and turned into an open prison.

The Sinhala State’s war of genocide destroyed the peaceful life of the Tamils. It turned the Tamils into refugees in their own homeland, ruined their nation’s social and economical infrastructure and plunged them into unprecedented hardships. While our motherland, caught within gruesome Sinhala military rule, is destroyed, Sinhalisation of our historic territory is going on under the pretexts of High Security Zones and Free Trade Zones. This naked Sinhalisation proceeds by the hoisting of Lion flags, the erection of Sidharthan statues, the renaming of Tamil streets with Sinhala names, the building of Buddhist temples. Sinhala settlements are mushrooming in the Tamil homeland.

The unjust war, the economic blockade, the restrictions on our people’s freedom of movement, the killing of thousands, the displacement of hundreds of thousands, have all deeply wounded the Tamil psyche. The Sinhala nation is celebrating this tragedy as a victory. It is lighting firecrackers believing it has defeated the Tamils. The Sinhala military leadership believes that its occupation of the east has been completed and the barbed wire noose around the neck of Jaffna has been tightened. The Sinhala nation arrogantly believes it has manacled the eastern coast from Pothuvil to Pulmoddai. The Sinhala leadership thus believes it has won great victories against our struggle.

The Sinhala nation has always misunderstood our freedom struggle. It consistently underestimates us. Only after carefully scrutinising the global situation and external conditions; only after accurately estimating the strengths and weaknesses of the adversary; only after gauging the enemy’s goals and strategies; only after ensuring that we remain focused on our own strategy; only then did we implement our plans to take our liberation struggle forward. We have strategically withdrawn from the east while launching defensive attacks. The Sinhala nation could have learnt the dangers of putting its feet too wide apart in our land as it did during past battles. But the Sinhala military has fallen yet again into the net we spread and it is now forced to commit large numbers of troops to rule land without people. Caught in a territorial trap, it will soon be forced to face the serious consequences of its misguided ambitions.

Operation ‘Ellalan’, the very first combined Black Tiger and Tamil Eelam Air Force attack was a massive blow to the Sinhala military. It has disrupted the daydreams of the Sinhala nation. The Sinhala nation has not emerged from this massive shock delivered by our beloved fighters. The immeasurable dedication and sacrifice of our Heroes is delivering a message to the Sinhala nation. Those who plan to destroy the Tamil nation will in the end be forced to face their own destruction.

The Rajapakse regime is never going to realize that the Tamil national question cannot be resolved by military oppression. The Sinhala leadership is not going to shed its desire for military supremacy or the Sinhalisation of the Tamil homeland. The Rajapakse regime is working hard to import more and more destructive weapons from all over the world without care for the cost. Therefore, it is not going to give up its war of genocide.

The All Party Representative Committee was appointed by the Rajapakse regime to spread a smokescreen over the misery that its military adventures are creating in the Tamil homeland and to deceive other governments to get their aid and support. We clearly predicted this would happen one year ago. We have been proved right. After dragging on without putting forward any solution, the committee has gone on holiday.

The past sixty years have proven beyond any doubt that no political party in the South has the political honesty or firmness in policy to find a just solution to the Tamil national question. It has been also proved beyond any doubt that none of the Southern parties are ready to accept the core principles for a lasting peace: the Tamil homeland, the Tamil nation and the Tamil Right to self determination. The ruling party is adamant on unitary rule; the red and yellow parties are calling for no solution at all; and the main opposition party, somersaulting from its earlier position, is, on the one hand, saying nothing concrete and using evasive language to support the military actions of the government and, on the other hand, saying it supports peace efforts. All this clearly clarifies our point and proves beyond doubt that all the Sinhala political parties are essentially chauvinistic and anti-Tamil. To expect a political solution from any of these southern parties is political naivety.

The Sinhala nation showed eagerness in the peace talks only when we shattered their ‘Operation Fireball’ military action and made them realize that the Tigers cannot be defeated. It was only when we proved our military prowess and only when we were militarily in a position of strength that the Sinhala nation signed the ceasefire agreement. Now, with abundant monetary and military aid from several countries, it has rehabilitated its destroyed military and has prepared itself for war again. It is yet again walking the military path having abandoned the peace path.

The Rajapakse regime, after unilaterally abrogating the ceasefire agreement, is ruthlessly implementing its military plan to remove the contiguity of the Tamil homeland. It has killed and disappeared thousands of our people. It reprimands and controls the Norwegian facilitators. It vehemently criticizes the SLMM. It even dares to brand senior UN officials as terrorists in order to hide its own terrorism. It is obscuring the ground reality in the Tamil homeland by striking fear among journalists and NGO workers.

The world’s powers, even while taking forward their own geo-political interests, respect human rights and democratic institutions. Be it this universe, human affairs or international relationships, they all revolve on the wheel of justice. That is why nations like East Timor and Montenegro broke free of their subjugation and gained their freedom with the help and support of the international community. Even now, the international community continues to work for the freedom of nations like Kosovo.

Yet the actions of the international community with respect to our own national question are unjust. The confidence our people placed in the international community has been eroded. By only paying lip-service to peace the international community has contributed to the killing of an extraordinary son of our nation, Tamilselvan. It has stopped the heartbeat of a light that walked the path of peace. I will be lighting the lamp for my dear brother, Tamilselvan, who until last year was with me every time we, with a burning desire to reach our goal, lit the lamps for our fallen Heroes. The international community has made the entire Tamil world drown in its tears. Had the international community firmly and unambiguously condemned the anti-peace activities and the war mongering of the Sinhala regime, Tamilselvan would be alive today. A huge blow would not have fallen on peace efforts.

The Co-chairs, acting as the guardians of the peace process, have failed in their responsibility. If the Co-chairs do not have a moral obligation to protect peace efforts, what exactly is the purpose of their meeting from time to time in different places? Is it their intent to assist the Sinhala regime to wipe out the Tamils? Questions like these have arisen in the minds of our people. Our people firmly expect that at least from now on the international community will take a new approach in relation to our freedom struggle. On this sacred day it is the hope of our people that the international community will cease giving military and economic aid to the Sinhala regime and accept the right to self determination and the sovereignty of the Tamil nation.

My beloved people,

We are an ancient people with special qualities. We have a unique national identity and national foundation. We have been struggling non-violently and by armed struggle for a very long time against national oppression. We are not terrorists, committing blind acts of violence impelled by racist or religious fanaticism. Our struggle has a concrete, legitimate, political objective. We are struggling only to regain our sovereignty in our own historical land where we have lived for centuries, the sovereignty which we lost to colonial occupiers. We are struggling only to reestablish that sovereignty and rebuild our nation. The Sinhala nation is continuing to reject our just and civilized demands for freedom. Instead, it has declared a genocidal war on our land and our people. Behind the smokescreen of fighting terrorism, it is creating immense human misery.

Despite our people enduring injustice and oppression, facing death, destruction and massive displacement, no country, no nation, no international organization has raised its voice on our behalf. We face this situation alone because, although 80 million Tamils live all around the globe, the Tamils do not have a country of their own.

On this day, when we remember our Heroes, I ask the entire Tamil speaking world to rise up for the liberation of Tamil Eelam. I wish to express my love and gratitude to you for your past participation in the building of our nation, bringing together your abundant intellectual, material, monetary and many other resources in the service of our nation and ask that you stand with us in the coming years of our freedom struggle .

Thousands of our fighters are standing ready to fight with determination for our just goal of freedom and we will overcome the hurdles before us and liberate our motherland. On this day when we remember our Heroes who sacrificed themselves for this sacred goal, let each one of us carry their dream in our hearts and struggle until it is achieved

Fall of Col.Karuna

2007-11-27T06:24:00.000-08:00

Vakarai division, largely jungle tracts crisscrossed with 14 or so villages and little hamlets, situated along the northern border of Batticaloa District. The people of Vakarai are engaged in subsistence farming and fishing, with a small element of those who are traditionally hunter-gatherers.

It was somewhere in December 1995; I was in the middle of conducting a meeting at a village called Paalchenai, in Vakarai, when suddenly a visibly distraught man from the same area burst into our meeting with a tiny transistor in his hand. “Amma, the army has entered Jaffna town,” he blurted out.

All of us, the Paalchenai villagers and I, exclaimed in horror. We quickly gathered round him to listen to the news of the conclusion of the first leg of the Riviresa operations that captured Jaffna town.

[In 2004]

Whenever I recollect this incident, I cannot help but marvel at the power of the idea of nationalism that is able to mobilise such a diverse group of communities. There are no perceptible common links between the people of Jaffna and Vakarai in terms of class, caste, kinship, education, traditions or any of the generally referred to classifications based on primarily economic and cultural interests.

Both people would most probably have never visited each others’ localities. Yet, there in Vakarai, we saw them join on the basis of a nationality that was under threat of extinction.
But then, mobilising as a nation does not preclude the function of other smaller contradictions within. Take village-based loyalties for instance. This is extremely strong in Batticaloa District, so much so that they invariably change in to hostilities between contending villages.

The continuing animosities between the adjacent villages of Vantharumoolai and Sittandy, Santhiveli and Kiran, and, Karuwakkerni and Sungankerni, Kinnaiyadi are cases in point.
Conflicts often erupt during temple festivals between inhabitants of the two villages in question over issues of protocols provided for the various clans and other matters. This polarisation is apparent even within organisations and armed groups such as the LTTE. These parochial differences are emphasised and dug up when needed to mobilise support for one-self, win positions of power or compete for resources.

Similarly, regional sentiments against Jaffna were triggered amongst the Batticaloa middle class, which was reacting to the preponderance of Jaffna Tamils in government positions and also within the bigger trading establishments in the district.

It was ironic that almost everyone who led the anti-Jaffna agitation at that time was from the second generation of Jaffna Tamils settled in Batticaloa. Whatever the social forces at play at its origins, today this situation has been equalised to a great extent.

Almost all the government officers in the district are locals, and the Jaffna trading establishments have dwindled to only a handful. However, the Jaffna bogey is resuscitated every time the need arises for restricting competition, such as filling vacancies within the Eastern University or gaining recognition as community leaders.

In these situations the antecedents of possible competitors are aired, debated and used effectively to cancel them out in the first round itself.

That is what Karuna did when he felt the need to consolidate unbridled power for himself within the LTTE. He wanted all supervision and control from the north off his back, for which purpose he conveniently used the Jaffna bogey. His claim was that Batticaloa cadres were sacrificing their lives to protect Jaffna.

It is not my intention here to undermine in any way the contribution of Batticaloa cadres within the LTTE. But if at all a study could be conducted to ascertain the percentage of cadres within the LTTE in proportion to the populations of Jaffna, Batticaloa and the Wanni, other interesting facts may emerge.

One guess is that the plantation community that settled in the Wanni during the late 1970s and early 1980s in the aftermath of the communal violence in the South might easily score highest.

Be that as it may, Karuna’s emotive claim prompted the hierarchy to dispatch him as supreme commander of the Batticaloa-Ampara region with autonomous political, military and financial powers, back in 1999.

The principle underlying this strategy was that Jaffna and Batticaloa each would manage and advance its own army in its own area. Perhaps this move may be termed as the beginning of the end of Karuna, for it was to lead to his ruin.

He amassed huge personal fortune through indiscriminate taxation on farmers, fishermen, traders and liquor dealers; and ensured a percentage cut off every village infrastructure development project in the district.

While the northern command was still engaged in merely exhorting potential recruits and trying to impose regulations for their compulsory services to the LTTE, he introduced the method of blatantly forced abductions.

Mysterious deaths occurred of a few of his insiders who had been identified by the people as being fair minded. Tactics of public relations changed whereby the people were intimidated and suffered extreme humiliation at the hands of his boys. They were so cocky in their boast that there was no appeal beyond Karuna Amman.

Although he styled himself as the undisputed leader of the Batticaloa Tamils, it looked like he was concerned only about his own village, Kiran. As they say in Tamil, “A full sized donkey wasting down to become a tiny red ant.”

Any government or NGO programme had to benefit Kiran first, no questions asked. A 100 housing project approved for a village called Settiyaar Kudiyiruppu was ordered by Karuna to be transferred to beneficiaries in Kiran.

The education community from Santhiveli had lobbied hard to obtain a much-needed additional building for their school. Karuna arbitrarily decided that this had to be built for Kiran School instead, despite the lack of a real need.

In addition to all this, a ‘modernising’ Kiran project was also underway. He wanted to bring down houses and temples in an attempt to re-route the Batticaloa Colombo main road through Kiran.

It is said that when a president of the board of trustees of one of the temples objected to this plan citing that he as the head of the temple had a responsibility to protect it, Karuna had curtly replied through the mobile phone of one of his assistants, “He may be head of the temple but I am the head of Tamil Eelam.” He was so drunk with power.

Due to lack of contacts with rural Batticaloa, the professionals and intellectuals living within Batticaloa town were to a large extent ignorant of the highhanded approaches employed by Karuna, and the gradual ‘Kiranification’ of his original Batticaloa vision.

Therefore, when he declared his independence from the mainstream LTTE in March 2004, there was an initial jubilation amongst them, which began to taper only when the reality of his necessary collaboration with the army sank in.

Naturally, Batticaloa is not a terrain which can be held on its own. The battle for real estate was in the north, and it transpired that even to secure Batticaloa District, the cadres of Batticaloa had to fight in the north after all.

If we say that the Military Intelligence tripped a falling Karuna into a coffin, the Sri Lanka Army drove the final nail. As soon as areas of east were captured, they mowed down hundreds of tombs of LTTE cadres both in Vakarai and in Tharavai. These graves were of the sons and daughters of Batticaloa who had fought along with Karuna, for the liberation of their people.
Even as he was instrumental in helping the army to capture the district, Karuna appeared powerless to prevent this desecration. All his tough talk (remember his Derana interview?) and his boast of being able to bring development to Batticaloa ended right there. He was finished. Karuna sang his own requiem.

Therefore, the purported expelling of Karuna from his party, Tamil Makkal Viduthalai Puligal (TMVP) in early October is a mere ritual of a fact that had concluded some time ago.

Pillaiyan, his deputy who has replaced him, is now busy calling traders, NGOs and others in the districts of Batticaloa and Trincomalee for meetings to explain the present status quo.

“Karuna embezzled money within TMVP. That is the reason for which Thalaivar (Leader) also had to sack him before,” he is reported to have said.

Thalaivar? But is that not the term LTTE cadres and other supporters use for Prabhakaran? On being asked for clarifications, he is supposed to have stated, “Then and now and always he is the only Leader (Ore Thalaivar).”

The Successor

2007-11-27T05:51:00.000-08:00

WITHIN 24 hours of Tamilselvan’s death, Tiger supremo V. Prabakaran made Balasingham Mahendran alias Nadesan the new political division head of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). Nadesan was formerly in charge of the Tiger police, known as “Kaaval thurai”. A new police chief is likely to be appointed soon.

Nadesan cut his teeth as political commissar on November 8 when he met Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission head Maj. Gen. Lars Johann Solvberg for a 75-minute powwow at Kilinochchi. He expressed regret that Norway had not issued an official statement condemning his predecessor’s killing.

Nadesan, like Prabakaran, is a native of Valvettithurai and is a distant relative of the LTTE leader. The bespectacled political commissar is in his mid-50s, and a few years older than Prabakaran. Nadesan’s father, Balasingham, was a dyed-in-the-wool Trotskyite known generally as “Comrade Balasingham”. Nadesan’s younger brother Lucas was a first-batch recruit of the LTTE but is living abroad now.

After serving as a seaman on merchant vessels, Balasingham Mahendran returned to Sri Lanka and joined the state police force as a constable. He was serving in Jaffna when the LTTE attacked the Jaffna police station in April 1985 during former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher’s visit to the country. Sathasivampillai Krishnakumar alias Kittu was the LTTE commander for Jaffna then.

Nadesan apparently drew up a diagram of the premises, which helped the LTTE greatly in planning and executing the attack. Tiger cadre crawled through drainage canals and drains to surprise the police. Having prior knowledge of the attack, Nadesan and his wife, also in the police, kept away from work on that day.

Their absence soon aroused suspicion, so the LTTE clandestinely took them across to India by boat. Nadesan began working at the LTTE’s political office in Chennai.

Nadesan’s wife is a Sinhala woman from Morawaka in Matara district. She too has a Left background; her family members were long-standing supporters of the Communist Party leader and former Akuressa Member of Parliament Dr. S.A. Wickremasinghe. She and Nadesan now live in the Wanni region.

Nadesan returned to Jaffna in 1987 and worked in the LTTE’s political office. But during the Indian Peace-Keeping Force’s (IPKF) stint in Sri Lanka, he took up arms. He was badly injured in a battle and was thought to be dead by the LTTE. The IPKF took the wounded Nadesan to India and treated him. After he recovered, he was detained at Kankesanthurai.

When the LTTE started a fledgling police force, Nadesan was placed in charge of it. He was jokingly referred to as the Inspector General of Police (IGP) of Tamil Eelam. Nadesan emulated various international police force models in developing his own force.

Nadesan speaks Tamil, English and Sinhala. He is a confidant of Prabakaran. This is the primary qualification to be the political commissar of the LTTE.

Nadesan’s appointment was hardly a surprise as he was slowly being groomed for this role by Prabakaran. The past few years have seen Nadesan participating in many political meetings with visiting dignitaries in Kilinochchi.

He was also part of the LTTE delegations that went abroad for talks. Once he left Switzerland suddenly and returned home after serious disagreements with Tamilselvan.

There has been speculation in sections of the media why LTTE men such as Pulidevan, Thangan and Daya Master were overlooked while nominating the political wing chief and why Nadesan was given a dual role.

The criteria were not seniority, experience or ability though Nadesan is certainly a veteran. The chief criterion was the trust of Prabakaran.