Refugees pin hope on India to help Sri Lanka implement 13th amendment to return home

C Shivakumar
Chennai:

Sri Lankan refugees in India may be celebrating the defeat of Mahinda
Rajapakse in the elections but the longing to return back home is
clouded by fear of persecution and safety back at home.

“If India along with Tamil Nadu government helps the Sri Lankan
government in implementing the the 13th amendment in “letter and
spirit” and ensure safety and security for Tamils, then the refugees
in Tamil Nadu won’t hesitate to return to their homeland,” said
Jayanth, who took refuge in India during the ethnic war in Sri Lanka
in 2006.

The 38-year old refugee who entered the Indian coast along with his
brother is just living on hope after being detained in Chengalpet and
other camps. “We want to return home but want assurances of safety and
freedom from fear to live on our land without the fear of being picked
up and never to return again. We want the safety of our womenfolk who
can venture even during the night,” he says.

“We want the Indian government to come forward and initiate talks with
the Sri Lankan government to implement 13th amendment,” he says. The
13th amendment to the constitution of Sri Lanka to establish
provincial councils came into being after then prime minister Rajiv
Gandhi and then Sri Lanka president J R Jayawardne signed the Indo-Sri
Lanka accord in 1987.

But the scars of ethnic war in the Island that came to an end in 2009
is still deep in the heart of many refugees. While in one hand they
are happy that Rajapakse is defeated but they are still unsure of his
successor Maithripala Sirisena.

“Sirisena is still a Sinhalese and in what way he will be different
from Rajapakse,” says Rangasamy Somasundram, who migrated from Adamban
in Mannur district.

“Sirisena never gave assurances that the Sri Lankan army would be
removed from the Tamil majority areas during the campaign. If he
provides safety, guarantee rights and self determination besides
equality in education then the refugees can think about returning to
Sri lanka,” says Somasundaram, who took refuge in India in 1990 and is
working as a Omni bus driver.

Somasundaram has two sons and two girls and all of whom are married
and have adopted the culture here. “We don’t want to go back. We have
now settled here for the last 25 years,” he says. His family is
settled in Metupatti camp in Trichy.

K Kamalan, another refugee who migrated to India in 1990, says that
after the ethnic war ended one of his relatives went back to
Killinochi in Sri Lanka. “He was picked up for investigation and he
never returned back,” he says. “It is not safe to return back,” he
adds.

But has the yearning for separate Ealam waned. “No says a refugee. “It
is still in our blood. We will struggle for it,” he says.