Tamils are not going to suffer by not singing the National Anthem in Tamil – former CM
The President has recently said that the National Anthem would be sung only in the Sinhala language this year at the Independence Day Celebration, targeting the votes of Sinhala People, the former CM, Justice C.V.Wigneswaran has said.
He further said the following:
May be His Excellency has recognised the fact that the Tamil speaking People in Sri Lanka have still not got their Independence and he has found it incongruous to sing the National Anthem in Tamil. He seems to have accepted the fact that the Tamils are a separate Nation having a separate language of their own and separate homelands of their own but that until today they have not received Independence from Sinhala hegemony set up on the heels of the British who evacuated from Ceylon.
May be he wants the Sinhala people to realise that the Tamils who have an unbroken existence in Sri Lanka for over 2500 years even from pre Buddhistic times have been deprived of their legitimate rights so far by successive Sinhala majority Governments and in this way he is publicising the wrongs done by he Sinhalese to the Tamil speaking. He is probably aware that Sinhalese never owned nor lived in the North nor East as Sinhalese until their language came into existence in the 6th or 7th century after Christ – just circa 1400 years ago. The fact that the Sinhalese have been extremely harsh and unreasonable to the Tamils has been realised by His Excellency. We must welcome His Excellency’s down to earth policy in this regard.
Of course some misinformed Military men think that they need not sing the National Anthem in Tamil because they have captured the Tamil areas during the so called War and the Tamil speaking are all now slaves of the Sinhalese and are expected to do their biddings only. This misconception comes from the Military thinking that they are now entitled to keep the lands in the North and East having captured them during the so called War times. In effect they too recognise the lands in the North and East belong to the Tamil speaking but by capturing them during the so called War they are trying to claim title to them. But they are mistaken in thinking so. The writ of the Central Government ran in the North and East during the violent period. Government officers were paid their salaries by the Central Government. There were no two independent countries at War to claim any War captures. It was an insurrection where the severely affected Tamil youths took up to arms in the light of discrimination, desecration, defilement, destruction, denudation and damage directed towards the Tamil people.
Thus under the Law there is no right for the Sri Lankan Military to hold on to lands captured during the insurrection. They must be returned to the People. If they are unable to identify the owners the Lands must be returned to the Provincial Council to keep them and search for the owners and hand back them to their legitimate owners. Thus the Army and the Forces must come out of their erroneous presumptions. It is mostly those in the Forces who think in an isolated fashion.
May be the talk about singing the National Anthem in the Sinhala language is part of a political gimmick to obtain Sinhala votes at the next Parliamentary Election. I am sure this sort of gimmicks would not be welcomed by the saner sections of the Sinhala intelligentsia. Thus such gimmicks might become counter productive.
Some refer to India having a single language National Anthem. If Sri Lanka wants to follow India they could very well sing the National Anthem only in Tamil like how they sing in Bengali, a minority language, in India.
Singing in Tamil the National Anthem in Sri Lanka would be most appropriate because
- Tamil is the oldest living language in the World
- Tamil is the oldest language spoken in Sri Lanka from pre Buddhistic times for over 2500 years while Sinhala language came into vogue only 1400 years ago.
- Tamil is a minority language today in Sri Lanka just like Bengali is in India.
- Decreeing the singing of the National Anthem in Tamil only, will remove the negative opinion that the World so far has had of the Sinhalese. World view of our majority community would change for the better overnight.
- Tamil has a rich literature comparable with any literature in the World.
Hence the World would welcome such a move.
So my answer to your question is that the economic situation in Sri Lanka is deteriorating day by day. By resorting to Election gimmicks at this stage, this Country would suffer more. Let His Excellency’s advisors become pragmatic and practical instead of holding on to archaic sentiments.
The Tamils are not going to suffer by not singing the National Anthem in Tamil nor will most of the Tamils sing the National Anthem in Sinhala even if they know it. In fact they would gladly be silent rather than opening their mouths. Or they may boycott the event.
Of course there are options. Sing the National Anthem only in Arabic a minority language or in English again a minority language in Sri Lanka. I do not know how feasible it would be to sing in the Veddah language, again a minority language. I remember learning a Kaviya in my student days in Veddah language which started like this- Nil bara nil rukkata pita unu liye! I did not find out the meaning though the Kaviya had stuck in my memory. Though Veddah language is originally Dravidian it has undergone lots of changes in recent times by the influence of the Sinhala language.
So let us like India sing in a single minority language our National Anthem. Certainly not in Sinhala Only. It was Sinhala Only in 1956 which made Ceylon lose its foremost place in the field of economics in the South East Asian Region. Let us not forget that. Hope pragmatism wins!
