India's RAW behind ‘Tiger identity erasure’ campaign

[TamilNet, Friday, 23 November 2018, 21:15 GMT]
The foreign intelligence agency of India, known as the Research and Analysis Wing’ (RAW), has advised its counterpart in the island to transform Tamil Eelam Maaveerar Naa'l (Heroes Day) as well as all other remembrance days of the LTTE members and cadres into remembrance days bereft of identity, politics and valour. The only way to do this is getting rid of terminology associated with the LTTE, Tamil nationhood, the concept of Tamil valour. Usage of the terms ‘maaveerar’ and ‘Eelam’ should also be avoided, the RAW has advised, according to informed paramilitary sources in the island.

The RAW is running a covert operation to convert the remembrance days into passive remembrance days with the participation of personalities associated with the LTTE in the past who reside in Tamil Nadu.

The Indian intelligence establishment has been trying to influence the modus operandi of five remembrance events: Annai Poopathy Remembrance on April 19, Maa-manithar Sivaram's Remembrance on 28 April, Tamil Genocide Remembrance on 18 May, Lt. Col. Thileepan's Remembrance on 26 September and Tamil Eelam Heroes Day on 27 November.



Foreign governments in Europe and North America were also being briefed by the RAW to avoid the use of the terms seen as ‘controversial’ by the North Indian Intelligence Establishment.

Most of the terms introduced by the LTTE were from the ancient Sangam (Changkam) classics. The denial of terms such as ‘maa-veeram’ and ‘nadu-kal’ to be associated with Tamil remembrance days tantamounts to serious cultural infringement, according to grassroots activists in Jaffna.

The use of the term Eezham cannot be constitutionally faulted as the Tamil version of the so-called ‘Sri Lankan’ national anthem also uses the term.

Even though the SL ‘Consitution’ appears to have no meaning at all in the politics in the island, especially with regards to the latest happenings in the South, it is not ambiguous when it is applied to suppressing the nation of Eezham Tamils.

The PTA, as well as the newly proposed ‘leaked’ drafts of the Counter-Terrorism Act (CTA), give plenty of interpretations, provisions and powers to the legal system of the occupying SL State to relate these terms as ‘terrorism-related offences’, they said.

“With the intention of causing harm to the territorial integrity or sovereignty of Sri Lanka, or the peaceful coexistence of the people of Sri Lanka, by words either spoken or intended to be read or by signs or by visible representation or otherwise, causes or intends to cause, the commission of acts of violence between different communities or racial or religious groups,” is the phrasing used in the leaked version of the policy and legal framework of the proposed CTA.

The SL Police filed a case before the SL Magistrate's Court in Jaffna on Wednesday requesting a ban on the public memorial event scheduled to be held on 27 November at Koappaay arguing that the organisers of the event were using LTTE symbols.

The case was taken up on Friday by Magistrate Sinnathurai Satheeswaran. The magistrate did not prohibit the event, but has ruled that LTTE symbols could not be used during the Remembrance.

The RAW induced concept of ‘Tiger identity erasure’ is identified as ‘puli-neekkam’. The Tamil activists equate it with ‘theasiya-neekkam’ (disowning/erasing nationhood). They say it is a concerted move to erase the Tamil identity.

The occupying genocidal Sri Lanka with its Mahavamsa mindset interprets every Tamil as a ‘terrorist’ unless he or she can prove otherwise by becoming a Quisling, the activists said.

However, Eezham Tamils are set to defy the harassments of the SL Establishment as well as that of the RAW establishment on Tamil Heroes Day while not giving space for the SL establishment to legally block the public remembrance event at Koappaay, the activists said.



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