National leaders among the Sri Lankan Tamil community
by S. K. Thangavadivel
The victory of Barack Obama gives encouragement to minorities living in other countries. But they must not forget the love of Barack Obama towards his country. Obama feels he is an American and not a Kenyan. He won the hearts of the majority of Americans. Prime minister Manmohan Singh, a Sikh by birth thinks He is an Indian and not a Sikh. Abdul Kalam ex-president of India, a famous scientist and a Muslim by birth too, thought he was Indian.
We had national leaders among Tamils. They were respected by the majority of the Sinhalese. The late Sir Vaithiyalingam Thuraisamy, the first Speaker in the then Legislative Assembly and the late Sir Ponnambalam Ramanathan, a well known national leader were some of the national leaders among the Tamil community respected by the majority of the Sinhala community.
We had two other national leaders among our community respected by the Sinhala community but ignored by us. One is Late Mr. Jeyam Tharmakulasingham, a Samasamajist, who stood for equality –– not only for racial equality but also for social and economic equality. He lost the parliamentary election in 1947.
Another national leader was the late Handy Perinbanayagam, a genuine follower of Mahathma Gandhi, and good supporter of Dr. N. M. Perera. He led the Youth Congress in Jaffna, successfully boycotted the Donomoughre Constitution, but Tamils did not treat him as a leader.
The so-called Tamil leaders specialise in condemning other politicians but they hide their own mistakes. They made and are still making mistakes and easily put the blame on others. The deaths of innocent Sinhala and Tamil youths are due to the mistakes of some of the Sinhala and Tamil politicians.
Tamils are not promoting national leaders. But even now there are National leaders among the Sinhala community. Some of them are: ministers Dew Gunasegara, Prof. Tissa Vitharana and Vasudheva Nanayakara. They are very genuine in their desire to solve the ethnic problem.