Wednesday, December 2, 2009

Velupillai Pirabaharan is the leader of Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam and also the National Leader of Tamil Eelam.


Valvettithurai was one of the important Northern ports during the period of the Jaffna Kingdom and even before. It served as a bridge between northern Tamil Eelam and the port of Kodikkarai in Tamil Nadu. The people of Valvettithurai are brave sailors who traveled the stormy seas and amassed great wealth through trade. This sea-port has earned an indelible fame in the annals of Tamil Eelam. This is because it is the birthplace of Pirabaharan, founder of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Liberation (LTTE), who with popular support of the people is leading the Tamil Eelam National struggle. He is now unanimously accepted as the National Leader of Tamil Eelam. He was born in this historic village on 26th, November 1954.

“Thirumeniyar family” is one of the reputed families in Valvettithurai. Thirumeniyar is one of 4 sons born to Iyampillai Velayuthar. His brothers are Gnanamoorthiyar, Puniyamoorthiyar and Arumugathaar. Thirumeniyar’s maternal uncle Ponnambalam was a successful businessman and was conferred with the title of Mudali during the Dutch period. Thirumeniyar Venkadasalam alias Thirumeniyar Periyathambiyar erected the famous Vaitheeswaran Sivan temple of Valvai according to the wish of his father.

The temple construction commenced in 1867 and was consecrated in 1883. He renovated two more temples viz Vaikunthap Pillayar and Puddanip Pilaiyar temples. He also built many Madams for the use of pilgrims at Mullaithivu. The family also built two more temples. Valvai Muthu Mariamman temple and Nediyakadu Pillaiyar temple. Another family called Methaiveedu Nagalingam lived in the adjoining town of Point Pedro. This family was also reputed for building many temples in this area. These two families were joined together through marriage. Thiruvenkadam Velupillai of Thirumeniyar family married Paarvathy of Nagalingam family.

Pirabaharan was the youngest child born in that family. Pirabaharan has one elder brother and two elder sisters. All of them are happily married and settled down in life. One of his sisters, Vinothini Rajendram is in Canada. The other sister and brother are living in Denmark.

Pirabaharan's father served under the Ceylon government as a District Land Officer for several years. Pirabaharan’s father and mother are domiciled in Tiruchi, Tamil Nadu at present.

Pirabaharan had his education upto 10th grade at Sithamparam Vidyalayam in Oorikkadu, Valvettithurai.

In those days the sole ambition of children from affluent and middle class families was to receive good English education and then seek employment abroad or secure employment in the government. But from his childhood days Pirabaharan's way of thinking was completely different.

When he travelled with his father to the other parts of Ceylon he saw for himself how the Sinhalese policemen ill-treated innocent Tamil people by kicking and beating them. Such incidents caused shock and pain and left deep scars in his psyche.

Especially, the first major genocidal attack against the Tamils during 1958 affected his mind profoundly. Still in his teens, he heard numerous heart-aching stories of inhuman and brutal murders of Tamils by racist Sinhalese goon squads and thugs.

He heard at first hand from a widowed mother who is well known to his parents the anguish and pain she suffered. How Tamil children were killed by heartless mobs by throwing them into cauldrons of boiling tar. How a Hindu priest was burnt alive at a temple in Panadura. So when he came to know how the unfortunate Tamils have been at the receiving end of horrible attacks at the hands of Sinhalese goons, he developed deep sympathy, love and a firm resolve to defend the defenseless the Tamil people.

So he perfected an irresistible urge in his mind to free the Tamil people from the clutches of the oppressive Sinhalese government. He came to the firm and resolute conclusion that the only way to confront the racist Sinhalese government which used military might against the defenseless and innocent Tamil people is through armed struggle.

So during his student days, he and his friends learnt the art of making improvised hand grenades. On one such occasion a grenade exploded accidentally and he received burnt marks on his leg. After medical treatment the burnt area became black. This earned him the nickname 'Karikalan' (person with a blackened leg) when he was still a young lad.

The standardization system introduced by the Sinhala government in 1971 acted as a stumbling block against Tamil students gaining entry to Universities after finishing high school. Pirabaharan who studied upto 10th grade could not continue his studies because of his involvement as a liberation fighter.

Pirabaharan's parents were completely unaware of his clandestine activities. But the opportunity for the parents to know of his clandestine revolutionary activities came knocking at the door on its own.

One day a posse of policemen came in search of Pirabaharan. They knocked at the front door of his house at the unholy hour of 3 a.m. in the morning. Immediately on hearing the knocks, Pirabaharan immediately knew it is the Police had come in search of him. Sensing trouble, he vanished thorugh the back door into the darkness of the night without anyone's knowledge.

Pirabaharan’s mother opened the door and was startled to see several policemen in khaki uniform standing in front of the house. She was shocked because at that time she was unaware of Pirabaharan’s involvement in any ‘clandestine movement’. Finally, after a thorough search of the house a disappointed Police went back empty handed failing to apprehend Pirabaharan. He was only 19 years old at that time and he never returned home thereafter.

When his father came to know of his involvement in revolutionary activities, he went to Pirabaharan’s hideout and brought him back home.

Pirabaharan told his parents "I will never be of any use to you or to other members of the family. Let there be no trouble for you because of me. Please allow me to go my own way. In future never expect anything from me." So saying he left the house. Then he plunged himself fully in the clandestine activities of the movement. He became a full time activist living under ground and moving from place to place to escape arrest by the Police.

11 comments:

  1. The Government of Sri Lanka has intentionally created a news black-out.

    There is a big danger that the internees as well as the general human rights situation will just drop off the radar, and people will assume that the situation has improved. But for the human right activists the bottom-line is clear.

    As long as there are people still in the camps (whatever the number); and

    As long as “release” simply means new holding centers or otherwise wholly inadequate conditions where people have been “resettled”, and

    As long as people in these camps, including those detained as alleged members of the LTTE, face huge risks to life and well-being, so long will this Campaign continue.

    Thank you for taking the time to read this letter. We are doing our best to figure out what would help the innocent civilians who have already been imprisoned for too long. If you have any suggestions, please tell us and we will respond as soon as possible.

    And finally, let us all remember and be inspired by the words of the last editorial that Wickramatunga, editor of Sri Lanka’s “The Leader” and brave defender of the rights of all Sri Lankans, wrote earlier this year – shortly before (and in anticipation of) his assassination.

    No other profession calls on its practitioners to lay down their lives for their art save the armed forces and, in Sri Lanka, journalism. In the course of the past few years, the independent media have increasingly come under attack.

    Electronic and print-media institutions have been burnt, bombed, sealed and coerced. Countless journalists have been harassed, threatened and killed. It has been my honour to belong to all those categories and now especially the last.
    With great foresight he predicted that:. a military occupation of the country’s north and east will require the Tamil people of those regions to live eternally as second-class citizens, deprived of all self respect.

    Do not imagine that you can placate them by showering “development” and “reconstruction” on them in the post-war era.

    The wounds of war will scare them forever. A problem amenable to a political solution will thus become a festering wound that will yield strife for all eternity.

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  2. Sri Lanka has maintained its ban on journalists reporting the plight of war-displaced civilians who have been allowed out of their internment camps, officials said today.

    Foreign minister Rohitha Bogollagama said yesterday the media now had full access, prompting a flood of requests from reporters to travel to the former war zone in the north.

    But restrictions on visits to the northern district of Vavuniya where the government maintains its camp complex remained in place despite them being declared open yesterday.

    “The restrictions on journalists to visit displaced people in camps have not been relaxed yet,” Human Rights Minister Mahinda Samarasinghe said.

    Pressed for a date when the camps would be open to the media, the minister said:“We are trying to lift the ban on media access, but it will take time.”

    The few visits that have been allowed have been under strict military supervision.

    “The media is not allowed to go into the camps,” the defence ministry’s media centre chief Lakshman Hulugalle said.

    The International Committee of the Red Cross said they had also been denied access to the camps and there had been no relaxation of the restrictions despite Bogollagama’s announcement.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Sri Lanka's claims of free access a lie, says media, ICRC

    Reporters and aid workers said they are still being barred from visiting Government internment camps housing thousands of Tamil refugees, days after Sri Lanka's Foreign Minister Rohitha Bogollagama proclaimed on British television that the areas were "totally open."

    Numerous media requests to visit camps in Vavuniyaa district and to witness the announced release of thousands of civilians had been rejected, reported Australia’s Daily Telegraph.

    “The International Committee of the Red Cross said they had also been denied access to the camps and there had been no relaxation of the restrictions despite Bogollagama's announcement," the paper said.

    The accusation comes days after Bogollagama told the BBC on his visit to London “that they [the media] can go tomorrow, you take my word. Absolutely there is no restriction that we impose on anyone, any journalist."

    Bogollagama's statement has been publicly contradicted by the Sri Lanka Government, with Human Rights Minister Mahinda Samarasinghe confirming that "restrictions on journalists to visit displaced people in camps have not been relaxed yet," whilst refusing to provide a concrete date as to when this would happen.

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  4. Hello
    Sin Hella StateTerror
    Don’t waste yo time on Punc. I can write letters and you can send them to VIPs . I already sent some but it would be better from different email addresses and many

    ReplyDelete
  5. An ancient Hindu site called Akaththiyar Thaapanam was destroyed .

    And to add insult to injury on Maaveerar Naal !!!!!!!

    A Siva temple located at an ancient Hindu site called Akaththiyar Thaapanam, at Kangku-veali in the Moothoor division of the Trincomalee district, where Hindus gather especially to perform the Aadi Amaavaasai ritual for ancestors, was destroyed without any traces coinciding the Maaveerar Naal.

    The location of the temple is under the control of Sri Lanka Army stationed at a nearby Sinhala village, Neelaappola.

    The Tamil villagers who were shocked and wept to see the temple wiped out, suspect ‘outsiders’ and are scared now whether this is a prelude to wipe out their traditional village as well.

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  6. Thambi

    The photos of Dwarka’s dead body had been published. During the last phase of the war, among the other LTTE cadres she also attempt to surrender and get killed horribly.

    News had been informed that, International NGO’s and UN representatives are being there, believing that in whole, Nadesan and Puleedevan went with a white flag. But they were killed cruelly. In the same way, Dwarka and Balachandran were killed by SLA and the photos published with the proof that they are the evidences. The photos cannot be fully published because SLA had its extremity making her unclothed. It is also supposed that India is behind this action.

    Also the doubts are raising why these photographs are being published now? Already, Fonseka had stated that Gothabaya ordered to kill the LTTEs while they attempt to surrender. All these are the election tricks to act as good to make up the tamil’s vote. With regard to this, some photos and videos from the cell phones belonging to SLA are now coming out. All these photos are taken during the final phase of the war.

    Though the photos are not confirmed as Dwarka, but the close resemblance of the photos makes the same. The Sinhala army had make nude of her and then killed her in cold blood.

    The question stand before us is what we are going to do for all this? Let we make a resolution today. As we, Tamils, we had suffered a lot, but our goal is never changed, Tamil Eelam. Let we start telling the history of the struggle for Tamil Eelam to our children. All international Tamil schools should make a academic history lesson of Tamil Eelam struggle. Even it is not today, tomorrow our children will leads to the goal – Tamil Eelam.





    http://www.lankasrinews.net/view.php?22TmIcc3oO34doYd302JOo4d2Yl30aL5A3e2KMC3a34B5e

    ReplyDelete
  7. Only the visible violence, suffered by the Sinhalese, ever gets spoken clearly.

    The unabating sixty-year structural violence - political and economic discrimination resulting in the deteriorating social fabric of Tamils - doesn't get spoken clearly: the draconian Prevention of Terrorism Act and the languishing of thousands of suspects in prisons without trials for years and decades, continuing abduction-murders, absence of investigations into the thousands of abduct-murders of the last few years alone, preventing aid workers from operating in Northeast and harassing and arbitrarily expelling them from the Northeast from helping the suffering:

    ICRC was forced to close down offices in the East where IDPs have been dumped in jungles of elephants or just left to shrivel up as punishment for refusing to comply with oppression.

    Jaffna is still an open prison and the occupation army continue to wring the residents.

    If one wishes to have peace, one would try to stop the injustice first?

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  8. Very good video

    http://www.tamilkathir.com/news/2188/57/d,view_video.aspx

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  9. I think, we all need to learn more about the history of the country that you are staying at.

    JVP came existence in the last 40 years.

    LTTE came into existence in the last 30 years.

    Long before the LTTE the Tamils were simply butchered by the Sri Lankan government and the racist Sinhalese + JVP for asking for equal rights.

    When the Tamils couldn’t take it anymore the Tamil youths rose up and took arms to defend the Tamil people eventually forming the LTTE.

    Tamils were fighting for equal rights and now fighting for the right to be free from an oppressive government, not for wealth.

    Ignoring the history and just talking about the recent phase of the conflict will not help.

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  10. 1)
    Mudaaka raatta Modakam sadaa vimukti Saadhakam
    Kalaa dharaava tamsakam vilasi loka Rakshakam
    Anaaya kaika naayakam Vinaashi tebha Daityakam
    Nattashu bhashu Naashakam Namaami Tam Vinaayakam.

    2)
    Nateta raati Bhikaram Navodi taarka Bhaasvaram
    Namatsu braari Nirjaram Nataadhi kaapa Duddharam
    Sureshwaram Nidiswaram kajeswaram kaneshwavaram
    Maheshwaram Samaashraye Paraatparam Nirantaram

    3)Samasta Loka Shankaram Nirasta Daitya Kunjaram
    Daretaroda ram Varam Varebha vaktra-maksharam
    Kripakaram Kshamaakaram mudaakaram yashaskaram
    Manaskaram Namaskritam Namaskaromi Bhaasvaram

    4)Akimcha naarti maarjanam chiram tanokti Bhaajanam
    Purari purva Nandanam Surari karva Charvanam
    Prapancha naasha Bhishanam Dhananjayadi Bhushanam
    Kapola daana Vaaranam Bhaje Puraana Vaaranam

    5)
    Nitaata kaanta Danta kaanti mAntha kaantha kaatmajam
    Achintya roopa mantaheenam Antharaaya Krinthanam
    Hridantare Nirantaram Vasantameva Yoginaam
    Tameka dantameva tam Vichintayaami Santatam

    6)
    Mahaa kanesha Pancharatnam AadareNa yonvam
    Prajalpathi Prabha take Hridi smaram kaneshwaram
    Arogataam Adoshataam Susaahitim Suputrataam
    Samaahitaayurashabhutim Abhyupaithi Sochiraat
    Daretaroda ram Varam Varebha vaktra-maksharam

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  11. This is a very disturbing video and calls for an independent investigation. No doubt Tamil Tigers were rebels to the core, but that does not give any rights to the Sri Lankan government to execute Tamils in cold blood. This will only lay the ground for a new terrorist organization to form unless the guilty soldiers are brought to justice. The UN must pressure Sri Lanka to provide access to Tamil areas where journalists are still not allowed. Who knows what other war crimes are taking place even now. The reaction of the Sri Lankan government to this video evidence sounds like a page taken from the Israelis. In the end, the bunker mentality of the victor-can-do-no-wrong only hurts themselves, in addition to forestalling national healing and reconciliation between their own peoples. They may think they can ignore this and carry on as business as usual, but the rest of the world does not. Tourists can choose to go elsewhere than Sri Lanka and send a strong message of disgust over the current intransigence. Yes, War is not pretty and can be ugly, but if there are no civilized norms, then who are we really?

    ReplyDelete