Sinhala-Buddhist temple to replace Kaa’li temple in Trincomalee

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 24 April 2013, 13:51 GMT]
A massive Sinhala-Buddhist complex is planned by the occupying Sinhala military at the site of an ancient Kaa’li temple of Eezham Tamils at Verukal in the Eechchilam-pattai division of Trincomalee district. A five-feet tall Buddha statue has already been installed at the site where the Kaa’li temple, called Malai-neeli-amman, is located. Huge stone slabs have now been brought and stored at a two-acre land of the Saiva temple for the construction of a Buddhist temple. About 10 acres of land will be eventually appropriated for the Sinhala-Buddhist complex, news sources in Trincomalee said. Seeing precedents in the other parts of the occupied country of Eezham Tamils, the local Tamils of the ancient village that has public buildings, schools etc., are now afraid that they would be chased out and would lose their village permanently.

When the LTTE was controlling the territory, it had built a communication tower at the top of the hillock there for its broadcasting services that were covering parts of Batticaloa and Trincomalee districts.

When the Sinhala military captured it in 2007, it destroyed all the facilities and installed a Buddha statue there.

Huge stone blocks are now brought from other areas to the site, in order to claim Buddhist antiquity for the site and to build the Sinhala-Buddhist complex, news sources in Trincomalee that are familiar with the Sinhala State’s modus operandi said.

The hill has an ancient temple with a statue of the Mother Godess Kaa’li that is called Neeli-Amman, and also called Malai-Neeli-Amman, as it is in the hill.

Worshipping Mother Goddess in the name of Neeli Amman is a cult of much antiquity among Tamils and it is found throughout the country of Eezham Tamils. The worship is popular among the Malayalis of Kerala too.

In fact, a form of the deity, Pazhaiyanoor Neeli of Tamil literary fame, is the royal deity of the rulers of Kochchi, in Kerala, as could be seen in their palace at Mattancheri in Cochin, now protected by the Archaeological Survey of India.

Ironically, the brand of genocidal Sinhala-Buddhism that operates with mania in erasing the religious, linguistic and cultural traces of Tamils in the island, and the Sri Lanka government that directs the entire operation, receive recognition and patronage not only from the Congress government in New Delhi but also from the BJP and its Chief Ministers, Tamil civil society sources in Trincomalee said.

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