5th Column
Et tu, India?
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My Dear Manmohan,
I thought I must write to you when I heard that your country has voted against Sri Lanka at the United Nations again, while your countrymen are engaging in their favourite pastime of bashing Sri Lankans-even Buddhist monks-who visit your country.
Whenever this type of event happens-which, these days, is quite often-we on this side of the Palk Strait like to refer to India as the country that produced Lord Buddha and Mahathma Gandhi. I guess the hope is that you too will act in a benevolent manner.
In a sense, it is good that the Mahathma is no longer with us. If he was, he would have died of shame after seeing how your countrymen have treated Sri Lanka and Sri Lankans in the past few weeks. They are not exactly following the doctrine of non-violence, are they?
That is all well and good, Manmohan, but let us talk business, shall we? You have a country to run with a minority government and an election to win. So, who cares about what a mere twenty million people in a little island think?
Besides, that pest of a fellow, Karunanidhi is always at you, making statements that belie his advancing age. Now he says that you are not doing “enough” about Sri Lanka and wants you to do more. I guess he wants more people beaten up in Tamil Nadu!
Karunanidhi, of course has to deal with his own problems. Shoved out of power by Jayalalitha, he has to make sure that the people of Tamil Nadu don’t forget him that easily. So he does the next best thing: he says he is withdrawing support for your government!
We know, Manmohan, that even if he does that your government will be safe. But he has to have his fifteen minutes of fame and appear as if he is doing something for the “oppressed” people of Sri Lanka, so that he can score over Jayalalitha in the popularity stakes in Tamil Nadu.
And what do you do? You too decide to pass a resolution on Sri Lanka in your Parliament. You know, Manmohan, it makes us feel pretty special with resolutions being passed about us everywhere-in Geneva, New Delhi and maybe in Chennai too in the days to come!
I know many people on this island blame you for the way in which you are acting right now, trying to bully a little country instead of minding your own business but I suppose it was our folly in the first instance when we expected you to act like a true friend.
The signs were there for all to see, except that we didn’t realise it-and some don’t seem to realise it even now. Surely, we should have known about your country when your Iron Lady encouraged tiger cubs in her back yard, just to spite our Old Fox. That was when all these problems began, I suppose.
Since then, your country has been trying to interfere with what we are doing on this side of the Palk Strait and we were so daft that we still trusted you- even when the likes of Dixit were behaving as if he was the Viceroy of Sri Lanka.
That chap masterminded the Indo-Lanka accord that achieved nothing except getting a military presence in our country-and thousands of your soldiers killed by the Tigers. And not stopping at that, Prabhakaran ordered that your Prime Minister be killed too-and succeeded!
Manmohan, sometimes justice works in funny ways doesn’t it? I say so because I have heard that some people in your country now want the killers of your Prime Minister pardoned because they have spent a long time in jail.
On the other hand you want those who fought and defeated the killers of your Prime Minister punished! After all, that is what this resolution in Geneva is all about, isn’t it? And, by endorsing it, that is what you are saying, isn’t it?
It seems nothing has changed since the days when your then Prime Minister dropped parippu when we were on the verge of what could have been a decisive military victory over the Tigers. Of course, you may find it harder to bully us now, because the Tigers are no more.
We know you have been asking us to give “thirteen plus”, whatever that means. Remember, the last time you wanted us to give provincial councils, what a mess that got us into? So, pardon me, Manmohan, we are once bitten twice shy about doing what you want us to do.
Your actions tell us you are too afraid to stand up to Uncle Sam, even though we, little though we are, have done that. Even Japan, which also probably didn’t want to offend Uncle Sam, had the courage to abstain but you didn’t do even that. A big country you may be, but you are cowardly, aren’t you?
Manmohan, you may be an economist and a ‘doctor’ to boot and a highly respected man but in this instance, you are merely a politician. That is why you are playing to the gallery and doing what is most popular, ignoring what would be the right thing to do. Don’t worry, we can understand that.
Yours truly,
Punchi Putha
PS-If I were you, Manmohan, I wouldn’t bully your little neighbour too much. We’ve got friends too, you know-friends that gave us a Nelum Pokuna in Colombo and an airport in Mattala. The next thing you know, we might give them a military base in Kachchativu!
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