All the facts cited by me wherever necessary in the following passages are  from the Book titled, "Tamils in Sri Lanka, written by Dr. Murugar  Gunasingam, a Comprehensive History C. 300B.C. - C. 2000 A.D.  Published by MV Publications, South Asian Studies Centre , Sydney, Australia, 2008".

Sri Lanka is a tiny Island in the Indian Ocean like the drop of a tear below India.  It is called the  pearl of the Indian Ocean. Formerly it was called Ceylon which is famous for its Ceylon Tea. Two distinctive nations called Sinhalese and Tamil have existed in Sri Lanka continuously from times immemorial , each with its distinctive religious, linguistic, cultural, social, economic  and political values. The Sinhalese, the majority make up of  66% of the population, the Tamils about 26%, the Muslims about 6%, the rest is Malays, Burgers and others (Page #  437). 2100 years ago The Tamil King Elara or Ellalan  ruled the Anuradhapura Kingdom and  two other Tamil Kings known as Sena  and Gutthika who reigned in Anuradhapura  a little earlier than Ellalan (Page #  40). King Dutugemunu, a chieftain ruling in Homagama in the South, launched an invasion with the aim of extending his rule to the North. After conquering several chiefdoms on the way, he finally attacked the Anuradhapura Kingdom. Pali chronicles record that Dutugemunu killed King Ellalan and conquered  Anuradhapura and that he erected a monument at the place where he killed Ellalan, decreeing that all passersby pay their respects to King Ellalan's monument by dismounting from their mode of transport (Page # 43).

The history of Sri Lanka spans approximately 2500 years. The colonial rule of Portuguese and the Dutch falls into the medieval period and finally the modern period starts with the British colonial occupation and extends to the present times. (Pages # 2 & 3).  When the Portuguese invaded Sri Lanka in 1505 A.D. and ruled up to 1658 A.D. (Page # 127) Ceylon was divided into three separate and independent  kingdoms called Pallavam  which is the North part of Ceylon, Jaffna,  Malaiyakam  which is a Kandian kingdom and Oorukunam  which is the  southern part. The Pallavam in the north  called Jaffna  was ruled by the Tamil King Sankili Kumaran and the  Oorukunam was  ruled by the Sinhalese King Dharma Parakiramavaku (Pages # 442 & 443).  The Kingdom of Jaffna finally fell into the hands of Portuguese in 1619 and the last Tamil King of Jaffna Sankili Kumaran was executed and on February 16, 1621 and Filipe De Oliverya the commander of the Portuguese army,  proclaimed himself as the Governor of the Jaffna Kingdom (Pages # 144 & 141).  Oliverya was responsible for demolition of hundreds of  Hindu temples in the Jaffna region and stripping them of priceless treasures.(Page # 146).  The Dutch conquered  the Portuguese and ruled Sri Lanka between 1658 A.D. to 1796 A.D. and exploited the Tamil territories  (Page # 173).  Lastly The British took control of Sri Lanka in 1796 including the Malayakam  from the Tamil King  Kannasamy or Sri Vickrama Raja Sinkam and  joined all three kingdoms of Sri Lanka and ruled as one country for their administrative purposes.  The Soulbury constitution introduced in 1947 unfortunately handed the governance of the country to the principal leaders of the majority ethnic community, that is the Sinhalese (Page # 485).  In September 1947 D.S. Senanayake a prominent Sinhala leader known as the "father of the Nation" deceived the minority representatives by offering ministerial  and junior ministerial posts, earned their support in order to gain independence and to liberate the country from Britain while Britain was considering full independence to Sri Lanka. It is well worth mentioning here that the highly educated Tamil  representatives  G.G. Ponnampalam and C. Suntharalingam were taken for a ride by an eighth grader, non academic, D.S. Senanayake who  accompalished his mission and used these two educated intellectuals  to wipe out the roots of the inhabitant Tamils in Sri Lanka (Pages 488 & 489).

Prime Minister  D.S. Senanayake was forced to gain the support of the minority Tamils to earn the trust of the British government .  He called earnestly for the co-operation of all communities to help his government that lacked a majority in order to liberate the country and to gain independence when Britain was considering granting full independence to Sri Lanka (Pages 488 & 489).

The Muslims, Indian Tamils, Sri Lankan Tamils ( G.G. Ponnampalam and C. Suntharalingam) and the rest of the Sinhalese Parliamentary representatives supported the interim internal self government of D.S. Senanayake  and the British government granted  independence to Sri Lanka  on 4th February 1948 and the whole administration fell into the hands of majority  Sinhalese (Pages 488 & 489).

On the first of March 1940, The all Ceylon Aboriginal Inhabitants Association's Secretary,  Mr. M. Kanapathipillai requested the English Government  by letter to grant to the Tamils a Separate State Council  because the Portuguese got  Jaffna Kingdom from the Tamil King  Sankili and the British got the Kandy Kingdom from the Tamil King Kannasamy, but this request  fell in the deaf ears of the British rulers (Page 442 & 443). If the Britishers then had taken an alternative constructive decision to  give the Tamils the right to govern themselves within the unified country, the political instability and the ongoing  genocide of the Tamils which is at the maximum now, would have been averted. The failed democracy is evident in Sri Lanka. The democratically elected Sinhalese government ,  with the  support of the 66% of Sinhalese population made the laws in  their favour and let the Tamils as second class citizens in Sri Lanka and started preaching that the Tamils came from India and the whole country belongs to the Sinhalese. Of course The British brought  South Indian Labourers during the period 1880 to 1909 for Tea Plantation in the hill country, the Kandyan  Kingdom but this has nothing to do with the pure inhabitants of Jaffna Tamils especially in the North and in the East .

On 4th August 1948, D.S. Senanayake tabled the Indian Citizenship Bill to deny the citizenship of the Indian workers who were brought by the British for the plantation Industry . The main aim of this bill was to reduce the Tamil representation  in the parliament in order to weaken them and destroy the concept of traditional Tamil territories in Sri Lanka.  Sri Lankan Tamil representative G.G. Ponnampalam , a criminal lawyer of the first degree and a Queen Counselor, and C. Suntharalingam, who had a degree in law and mathematics,  Indian Tamil and Muslim representatives were among the supporters of the Bill.  S.J.V. Chelvanayagam , C.W. Thondaman including  other Tamil representatives,  Dr. N.M. Perera and Colvin R.D. Silva opposed the Bill.  Dr. N.M. Perera in reply to the question during the debate on the issue in Parliament said, that the Indians were prepared to work, live and even die here and as such to treat them as human beings and it was the barest justice that they be given citizenship rights. The Bill was passed with the majority of 20 votes on 10th December 1948. Most government representatives preferred to have the Indian Tamils returned to India after using them to meet the Sinhalese Governments' wish to establish a fertile Tea and rubber plantation industry.  S.W.R.D. Bandaranayake and J.R. Jayawardane the descendants of the Indian Tamil Chetty family who were immigrats to Sri Lanka four or five generations  back  and who later adopted Sinhalese names relinquishing their Christian names  to prove themselves Sinhalese nationalists to the Sinhalese people, were intent on stripping  their brethren's citizenship rights (Page # 494 to 496). 

J.R. Jayawardene who later became the president of Sri Lanka introduced a bill in the State Council on 24th May 1944, to make Sinhala as the official language of Ceylon. In 1951 the Federal Party put forward its demand for federalism but The All Ceylon Buddhist Congress was promoting the Sinhala only issue.  But C. Suntharalingam who was elected as an independent  member to the Parliament in 1952 strongly opposed the "Sinhala only " bill and warned of a dawning situation where the Tamils would be forced to establish a state of their own should Sinhala Language be made the only official language of Sri Lanka.  G.G. Ponnampalam  also expressed the same opinion and S. Natesan and V. Kumaraswamy  of United National Party also demonstrated their strong opposition to the proposal and threatened to leave the party should the Tamil language be denied its status. The leftist representative,  Dr. N.M. Perera advocated a policy of making both the Sinhala and Tamil as official Languages (Page # 503 to 505). Further Dr. Colvin R De Silva predicted that two languages meant  one country and one Language meant two countries".

   Mr. S.W.R.D. Bandaranayake , the founder of The Sri Lankan Freedom  Party announced that the Sinhala language was to become the official language within  24 hours if his party was elected to form the government, during his election campaign. Consequently, the Sinhala language Act was successfully passed in the Parliament in 1956. Until then English was the official language of Sri Lanka. This resulted in many Tamils losing their jobs due to their lack of proficiency in the Sinhalese  language.  All official letters and correspondence throughout the country were in Sinhala Language and the Tamils  were obliged to learn Sinhala. The Tamil leaders staged a sit-down protest in front of the Parliament on the Galle Face green. Their demonstration failed to achieve their objectives. There was no change in the attitude of the government. The Sinhalese thugs with the support of the Sinhalese Government assaulted the crowd in front of the Parliament and there were wide spread communal riots in the city of Colombo and in the Galloya colonisation scheme in the Eastern Sri Lanka.  Many Tamils in the Sinhalese south  were killed, women raped and their properties were looted and burnt down by incensed Sinhalese mobs.  In July 1957, Mr.Bandaranayake  the then Prime Minister in an effort to avert the imminent danger, entered into an agreement  with Chelvanayagam  a well respected Tamil leader , popularly known as Banda-Chelva Pact.  J.R. Jayawardene, a  prominent member of the opposition United National Party was quick to take advantage of that situation and led his party on a pilgrimage to Kandy walking all the way to protest against the pact accusing  Bandaranayake of selling the country to the Tamils by signing the pact with Chelvanayagam. The pact was torn and thrown  into the waste paper basket (Page # 505 - 508).

After the March 1960 election the Federal Party,  that is the Tamil's political Organisation,  presented its minimum demands to Dudley Senanayake, the leader  of the United National Party, based on the principles  that underlined the abrogated Banda-Chelva Pact. The demands were:( 1) Establishment of regional councils, (2)Recognition of Tamil as the language of the national minority. (3) Amendment of the Ceylon Citizenship Act, (4) Six of the appointed members to the house to be representatives from people of Indian Origin. Consequently a further pact known as Dudley-Chelva pact was signed by the Prime Minister Dudley Senanayake of the United  National Party and S.J.V. Chelvanayagam, the Tamil leader of the Federal Party. However, Dudley Senanayake was not in  a position to concede to the demands of the Federal Party as his United Nation Party had earlier campaigned against the Banda - Chelva pact. That pact too was abandoned (Page # 510). The hung parliament was defeated and Srimavo  Bandaranayake  the wife and successor of late S.W.R.D. Bandaranayake who passed the Sinhala only act came to power with absolute majority. In 1961 she took steps to implement it throughout the country, including in the Tamil regions. The Federal Party in response to her move launched a non violent direct campaign of Satyagraha backed by Tamil masses to prevent the implementation of Sinhala as the language of administration and  in courts of Law in the Northern and Eastern Provinces. The federal Party aimed at disorganising the functioning of the Government Secretariats by its action. It sought to prevent public  servants from entering their work places as a means to obstruct the implementation of the Sinhala only in Tamil territories. It continued for nearly two months. In April 1961 the Government imposed a state of emergency  in the areas affected by the Satyagraha  and deployed armed soldiers arrested the Tamil Parliamentarians and assaulted the passive participants of the non violent Satyagraha (Page # 506 - 508).

Sinhalese colonisation of Tamil territories were pre-planned and implemented by the Sinhalese government from 1932. Nearly  24 such colonization schemes mushroomed in these regions in the period around 1951. Such schemes, first begun in Galloya,  Kantalai and extended in stages from 1977 up to the well known Accelerated Mahaweli Scheme was intended  on reducing Tamil numerical representation in the parliament by appropriating their traditional territories (Page # 512).

In 1970 general election Mrs. Bandaranayakke's  Freedom Party and Marxists allies formed United Front and over-whelmingly  defeated  the United Nationl Party and formed the Government. They adopted a new constitution in 1972 which had no need of Tamil support.  But C.X Martin, member of Parliament for Jaffna, V. Arulampalam,  memper of Parliament for Nallur and A. Thiyagarajah, member of Parliament  for  Vaddukoddai  supported this constitution with the clear knowledge of its consequences to achieve  their personal desires and benefits of the Sinhala population, not for the Tamils.  The new constitution proclaimed the Sinhala Language to be the sole official language while granting special status to Buddhism, the religion of the majority Sinhalese.  It also did away the senate, the second chamber which had been in existence since 1947. It was originally established to function as a check against laws detrimental to minorities being enacted by the Parliament. On the whole the recommendations made by the Soulbury Commission  to protect the rights of the Sri Lankan Tamils, have been rejected and denied since the time of Sri Lankan Independence in 1948. Apart from the these constitutional and legal measures  there were major changes in policy and administrative procedures. A new system called standardisation was introduced in 1970 by the United Front Government  in relation to the University admission.  The qualifying marks for admission to the Medical Faculties was 250 out of 400 for Tamil students where as it was only 229 for the Sinhalese students. Same pattern applies even if they  sat  the same examination in English. In short,  the students  sitting  the same examinations in the same language, but belonging to two ethnic groups had different qualifying marks.  Dr. N.M. Perera  and Dr. Colvin R De Silva were opposed  to  the Sinhala only official language in 1951 when they were in opposition but when they came to power in 1972 they completely  supported the new constitution and thereby, after assuming powers ,their noble ideals and policies vanished into thin air. The so called  Dr. Colvin R De Silva with golden brain is the one who drafted the constitution. This is the clear evidence of failed democracy in Sri Lanka ( Majority Rules)(Page # 517 - 519).

In 1972, Tamil United Liberation Front (TULF) was formed uniting all Tamil parties in order to demonstrate the solidarity of the Tamils against the implementation of the new constitution. TULF for the first time began to speak of establishing an independent state for the Tamils. Tamil youth,  embittered by what they considered discrimination against them advocated the use of violence to establish a separate state of Tamil Eelam (Page # 518). A rapidly worsening employment situation was felt by the Tamil youths. Statistics show there was a sharp decline in employment held by the Tamils in Civil Service after Sri Lanka gained independence.  24.7 % Tamils were employed in the Civil Service Sector in 1948 was sharply declined to 13.1% in 1981 whereas  the share of the Sinhalese rose from 53.9% to 85.2% (Page # 520 - 521)

A significant event , the International  Tamil Conference convened in Jaffna in 1974, further aggravated the situation.  It was held from  January 3 to 10, 1974 despite enormous pressure from the Sri Lankan Government. On the final day the police attacked the participating crowd with tear gas, bombs, batons and rifle butts. A policeman fired at the electric cable, resulting in nine deaths among participants. The Government predictably took no action and its indifference rankled the Tamil Youth who braced themselves for an armed struggle (Page # 521). The Tamil United Liberation Front  convened its  first conference headed by  Chelvanayagam, on 14th May 1976 called upon the Tamil Nation in general and the Tamil youth in particular to come forward to throw themselves  in the sacred fight for freedom and to flinch not (shrink back or move away in fear or pain) till the goal of a Sovereign  Socialist State of Tamil Eelam is reached. Every word of the above resolution was taken literally by the Tamil youth who were now organised for the struggle for their nation (Page # 525 -  526). After the death of Chelvanayagam in April 1977, A. Amirthalingam  assumed the leadership of  The Tamil United Liberation Front . The Tamil United Liberation Front, despite its declaration to establish a Tamil Separate State  as its objective, decided to contest the July 1977 general election. To pacify the youth who had abandoned  faith in the Parliamentary system, the Tamil leaders stated they were seeking the establishment of Tamil Eelam , a separate state of Tamils of Sri Lanka. Predictably The Tamil United Liberation Front secured all the 14 seats in the Northern Province as well as four of the 11 seats in the Eastern Province.  They held the second highest number of seats and  was recognised as the opposition in The National State of Assembly and its head  as the leader of the opposition.  The new leader of opposition A. Amirthalingam , affirming this in one of the earliest addresses to the House said: Members of the TULF were elected to The National Assembly on the mandate to work for the liberation of The Tamil Nation with the establishment of Tamil Eelam on the basis of their right to self-determination. At this juncture, an anti-Tamil riot broke out in the South triggered by a confrontation between Tamil Youths and state police in a carnival held on 16th August 1977 in St. Patrick's College, Jaffna.  Many Tamils were killed and  injured, and their properties looted and set ablaze. Tamil women were raped and Hindu Temples set ablaze. The riot quickly spread to the hill country also victimising the Indian Tamil population. This was the third anti-Tamil riot since the program of 1956 and 1958. This riot contained a clear message to the Tamils, The Sinhalese Nation once again openly told the Tamils that the North and the East were their homeland and not the rest of the island. The Tamil youths united to rise up in arms against the Sinhalese state and its armed forces in order to gain liberation for the Tamils. Meanwhile, the Sri Lankan state actively attempted to crush the armed struggle of the Tamil youths restoring to oppression and repressive legal measures.  The communal minded  Sinhalese government  passed the "Anti-terrorism law" in Parliament in July 1979. This legislation enabled the law enforcement authorities to detain a person arrested under this law and hold them in detention for 18 months without any charge.  J.R. Jeyawardene and his regime believed  they could suppress the Tamil youths and root out the Tamil liberation struggle  using the anti-terrorism law. Contrary to their hopes the thousands of Tamil young men and women dedicated  themselves to the cause of Tamil Eelam and the armed struggle to achieve it (Page 526 - 528).

 J.R. Jeyawardene and his majority Sinhalese government  believed that they could satisfy the Tamils by creating District Developments Councils and a bill was tabled in the House of Representatives  and the election for these councils were scheduled to take place in July 1981 and duly announced. The TULF offered their support to the bill and decided to participate in the election and engaged themselves in election campaigns despite being cautioned by the scholars of Jaffna  University of the uselessness of these councils . Eventually the scheme to launch  District Developments Councils failed. A. Thiyagarajah , the Sinhalese United National Party's  first candidate in Jaffna was shot and killed by Tamil youths. Two policemen were also killed in separate incidents. Consequently rioting broke out in Jaffna in May 1981 during which the Sinhalese soldiers set ablaze the Jaffna public library that housed more than 95,000 volumes and irreplaceable Ola Leave manuscripts that were reduced to ashes. In addition, the soldiers set fire to  the office of Eelanadu, the Tamil daily published in Jaffna and  more than 1000 commercial establishments in the Jaffna market  and in Jaffna Town. The most racist minded  two United Party prominent  Ministers, Gamini  Dissanayake  and Cyril Mathew  were present in Jaffna and  were instrumental to the burning of the modern  Jaffna Town.  13 soldiers were killed in an ambush in Jaffna on July 23, 1983. Due to this incident a week long ethnic  program was let loose on Tamils in which 2000 defenceless Tamils were killed, torched to death by Sinhalese communal  elements.  Many Tamil women were raped by Sinhalese thugs, Tamil property worth millions of rupees including commercial establishment s, shops, and factories were burnt down or severely damaged. Nearly 100,000 Tamils were rendered homeless while over 40,000 Tamils sought refuge in India  and other parts of the world.  On July 25, 1983, 37 Tamil inmates in the Maximum security prison at Welikade  were massacred by the fellow Sinhalese inmates in the presence of the Sinhalese Prison Officials  who turned a blind eye.  When it was reported,  two days later, on July 27, 1983, 18 Tamil prisoners were killed in the same manner. The entire world was stunned at the scale of planned murder unleashed with impunity on the defenceless Tamils in a maximum security prison. This 1983 program conveyed the following stern  messages  to the Tamil political leaders, The Tamil Nation  and to the whole world very clearly:(1) The modern  Tamil political leaders fighting for the rights of the Tamils employing democratic means would never receive a justifiable solution from the Sinhalese Government, (2) There was no option left to the Tamil minority people other than to join the struggle for the liberation of Tamil Nation alongside the Tamil youth leading the struggle,(3) The Tamils had to live in their traditional homelands in the North and East and not in the Sinhalese dominated South, (4) Sri Lanka is one country geographically but it consisted  of two nations: One Sinhalese and One Tamil Nation (Page 528 - 531).

Many Tamil combatants organised themselves into various groups  with the aim of saving the Tamil Nation from the racist Sinhalese majority state but The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam under the command of Vellupillai Pirabakaran has fought continually for the cause from its very inception, and remain actively engaged in the liberation struggle(Page 531).

Mr. M. Sivasithamparam , the charismatic leader of the Tamils  was adversely affected by the activities of the Liberation Tigers , particularly their leader Vellupillai Pirabakaran, was living in India said, that the Tamils have the right leadership, it is a leadership that could not be bought over by anyone under any circumstance and I am prepared to raise my hat to Pirabakaran(Page # 532).

The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam is banned in India, Canada, USA, Japan, Briton and in many European countries  and branded as terrorist organisation. United States of America  contained several colonies, were  ruled by Briton.  The people in these colonies  decided  they no longer wanted to be ruled by the British. They did not want decisions made for them by  a country on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean. There were  consequences for this rebellion. Briton did not want to lose the American colonies.  There was a long war, called the American Revolution, and many people died. In the end the colonies won and became an independent country. when the war was over many Loyalists fought on the British side left USA and came to Canada(see Many Gifts, Social Studies for Catholic Schools in Canada, page 22 and 23, written by Sylvia Pegis Santin and Patrick Gallagher). What concept is adopted by the United  States of America  for itself and others who followed USA's  footsteps to gain freedom and independence is not understood.

 Nelson Mandela, Yasser  Arafat , Gerry Adams  also received the same treatment by the western world,  but later they were hailed as Heroes and Nelson Mandela and Yasser Arafat won the Nobel Price for Peace too.
For  the most Tamils The Tigers and its leader  Vellupillai Pirabakaran are the freedom fighters, for them, the Tigers cannot be separable from the Tamils, the ban on them by the world community as terrorist should be lifted immediately, the peace talk should be initiated without any further delay with the Tamil Tigers and not anyone else only on the basis of self determination and self governing of Tamils.  The Tamils  hope the world community  will take the necessary steps  sooner than later to avert the brutal genocide of Tamils by the Sinhalese regime.  During the last two months more than 2000 innocent Tamil civilians including children were killed, thousands wounded  and lost all of their belongings and most of them are kept in open prison by the murderous  Singhalese soldiers and by the brutal Sinhalese government. The details of these daily murders could be obtained in the www.tamilnet.com website.

Now  you could understand why   many Tamils gathering in big numbers and forming human chain, performing  peaceful marches  and carrying posters  to read as, "Canada help us", "Stop the war", "Start peace talk with Tamil Tigers" but this cry to the western democratic world is like water on ducks back.

My thanks are due to Dr. Murugar  Gunasingam from whose book  titled "Tamils in Sri Lanka, a Comprehensive History C. 300B.C. - C. 2000 A.D.  Published by MV Publications, South Asian Studies Centre , Sydney, Australia, 2008", from where even  much more valuable information could be obtained.  (In Canada this book is available for purchase in Tamil and in English with Canadian Tamil Congress, 31 Progress Ave, Toronto, Ontario, Canada, M1P- 4S6. Tel No : 416 240 0078 and  Murugan Book Depot,  1241 Ellesmere Road, Toronto, Ontario, Canada, M1P - 2X8. Tel No: 416 285 9118.)

- GERARD VICTOR-JOSEPH