The Tamil race had many foreign ‘friends’, then and now?
Baila?
What’s baila?
It’s luso-African music, that came our way via the Portuguese. This was Professor C. R. de Silva’s explanation, and he should know, being one historian who has been taking a keen interest latterly in matters dealing with the Portuguese occupation.If baila is luso African, what else did the Portuguese leave behind?? Even if we can come to that later, some of what they did in our part of the world continues to intrigue us – five hundred years after that occupation began.

A group of academics and Portuguese-occupation dilettantes learnt at a seminar organized by the American Institute of Sri Lankan Studies recently, that the Portuguese Captain Generals wanted to eliminate the Ceylonese Muslims entirely because that’s what Lisbon had asked them to do. But coastline Muslims of this country were too valuable for that kind of persecution.

They knew all about rigging sailboats, and they had knowledge of navigation, and accounting -- plus they were excellent butchers.
Dr Lorna Devarajah, historian, and authority on the history of Muslims in this country, says this prevented the Portuguese Captain Generals from persecuting all the Muslims. Instead most of them were left to their own devices, and Lisbon’s order was observed in the breach.

But if the Portuguese needed the Muslims for their skills, why were they not converted to Christianity?? Wouldn’t that have solved the problem handily, by way of asimilation rather than persecution and harassment??
The answer to that poser is not a difficult guess, in this era of the clash of fundamentalisms. Says Lorna Devarajah that the Portuguese found that it was the “Jaffna Tamils that were the easiest to convert.

Then it was the Sinhalese. But the Muslims, they found impossible to convert.’’ Maybe then the Portuguese left behind more than just baila from Africa. They may have left behind with us, the knowledge that it’s the Jaffna Tamils - - and perhaps Tamils in general -- who had the most liberal attitude towards their heritage and their culture. They were the most amenable to being converted, forced or otherwise (...and the Portuguese of course were not exactly known for their gentle methods of persuasion.)

Is there something in the gene - - or is that the mindset? -- of the Tamil that made him more amenable to the winds of change, handed down either by force of arms or otherwise? Is it this same proclivity of the Tamil race, that some say, makes it more amenable today to the diktat of the Norwegians, the foreign NGO lobby – and all our assorted neo-colonizers??

Some would say -- and some do say it in no uncertain terms -- that the Tamil liberation struggle goes hand in glove with the help of the non-governmental community which is being supported with foreign input, at least in the main.

If the funders of these NGOs, the Norwegians the Swedes the Danes, the Americans the British and the Germans are our neo-colonizers, what’s the kink then in the Tamil gene, that makes Tamils more than all other races, amenable to the persuasions of these neo-colonizers??
Is it then a hangover from the Portuguese era, where the Captain Generals found that the “Jaffna Tamils were the easiest to convert to Christianity??’’

It is a tough call, answering this particular poser. In the first place, this is some people’s view. There can be no easily documented, rigorous proof that the Tamils as opposed to other races in cotemporary Sri Lanka, are more prone to link their destinies with the NGO wallahs, and take NGO money and run in the bargain.

But yet, there are many assertions made, from time to time, that it is the Tamil struggle that depends on the input from outside the shores of this country, whether it be input from the diapora, or from the Non Governmental Organizations, or from foreign lobby groups or foreign support structures. “It’s a subversive foreign plot,’’ is an allegation thrown more at the LTTE backed pro Tamil forces, than it’s thrown at the Sinhalese or the Muslims. If that’s the case, the amenability of the Tamil race is a conjecture that at least merits more digging into. Can you quantify the “Tamil struggle’’ in this way?? How much of it is really defended, egged-on and propelled by NGO lucre, and the neo-colonizing globalizing interference by foreign powers??

Well, such quantification, if possible at all, is not possible in one article or in a couple of columns. But in the absence of a rigorous study - - and while asking that somebody seriously gets down to the task of doing one -- is it possible to map the contours at least in outline, for such an argument??

What’s it in the Tamil culture, or the Sri Lankan Tamil culture, that as some say, makes the Tamil race more “convertible’’ -- more amenable, then and now, to pressures, persuasions and blandishments from outside our shores??

Ratnajeevan Hoole’s book about caste in Jaffna may give some indication, but more than the past, it’s the Tamilian proclivity of the present -- the right here and the right now -- that’s relevant.
One can argue that the Tamil race’s yen for the foreign influence is natural in the context of today, for the simple reason that it’s the Tamils who have a diaspora - - and it’s the Sinhalese, at least a rump group of them, who drove the Tamils into establishing the diaspora, because Tamils were driven away by rampaging mobs in 1983.
Therefore, they say, the Tamils put down roots in the West, inculcated Western ways, and it’s only natural that they have kindred feelings for Western peoples, who gave them their homes away from home. But it can be counter-argued that ’83 notwithstanding, it’s the Tamils that got on best with a colonizer, any colonizer.

A good many writers for instance trace the origins of the Tamil Sinhala conflict to the days that preceded 1983 by decades, when the Tamils were very cosy with the colonizing Britishers. Tamils held most of the top civil service jobs, and were the favoured minority in the British policy of divide and rule. This they say led to Bandaranaike redressing the balance in 1956 by re-enthroning Sinhala as the national language. The intention here is not to re-open this forever-stinking can of worms -- the one which attempts to trace the origins of Sri Lanka’s on-running conflict.

The intention is to narrow down the argument to the confines of the particular proposition of this article which is -- “is it true that it’s the Tamils historically, who have been most amenable to any sellout to the foreign and alien influences??’’

I just returned from Tiger controlled Kilinochchi. It’s interesting to see the world go by there -- and to see German-Tamils and British-Tamils enter that terrain. What I mean is that Kilinochchi is now the place of “Visa issuance’’ for many mixed race Eurasian Tamils who are touring the territory, and who are of mixed Tamil and European parentage.

But none of that can take the colour off the sheer foreign presence in Kilinochchi -- it seems that no project, no enterprise -- nothing in that land -- is complete without the input of the foreign NGO, an INGO or the international expert. Foreigners are so consummately interested in Kilinochchi, and it’s not just to watch the birds. To the Norwegians, Kilinochchi seems to be more like home than Colombo - - their body language seems to suggest it.

Of course I risk the accusation being levelled at me that this is no rigorous study. But this is what I stated from the beginning of this article. A rigorous study is what is called for. All I have ringing in my ears is that faint recollection of what Dr Lorna Devarajah said: “it’s the Jaffna Tamil that the Portuguese found easiest to convert.”

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