Pitasanna Shanmugathas
A few months ago, on the 26th anniversary of Dr. Neelan Tiruchelvam’s assassination, I publicly released NEELAN: UNSILENCED, a non-profit documentary examining the life and legacy of the constitutional scholar. The film features interviews with Dr. Tiruchelvam’s political colleagues, family members, and friends.
Most recently, I was interviewed by a group of young graduate students of Sri Lankan Tamil origin at the University of Toronto’s Munk School of Global Affairs about the documentary. During the conversation, one of the students posed a question I had never been asked before: Why choose Dr. Tiruchelvam instead of any other Sri Lankan Tamil to make a documentary about?
In answering the student, I explained that Dr. Neelan Tiruchelvam was the most important Tamil figure to come out of Sri Lanka in the second half of the 20th century and that Dr. Neelan Tiruchelvam is the Martin Luther King Jr of Sri Lanka. I emphasized:
“Dr. Tiruchelvam is the Martin Luther King Jr of Sri Lanka – and this isn’t hyperbole. There are significant similarities between the ideologies of Neelan Tiruchelvam and Martin Luther King Jr. Both Martin Luther King Jr and Neelan Tiruchelvam spoke out against militarism and advocated for peaceful coexistence among their nation’s diverse communities. And both Dr. King and Dr. Tiruchelvam were killed by their own countrymen for that very reason. Both Dr. King and Neelan Tiruchelvam sought to work with their respective national governments to improve the welfare of their own communities. In the case of Dr. King, he worked with U.S. President Lyndon B Johnson to usher in the Civil Rights Act, and the Voting Rights Act—both of which tremendously advanced the rights of black Americans. Dr. Tiruchelvam worked with the Sri Lankan government under President Chandrika Kumaratunga to help formulate the boldest and most progressive constitutional reform proposals in the nation’s history to date—and the proposals sought to give the Tamil minority community significant regional autonomy and political power under a united Sri Lanka.”
Dr. Neelan Tiruchelvam
I also emphasized Dr. Tiruchelvam’s lifelong commitment to pluralism, democracy, and institution-building:
“Dr. Tiruchelvam, like Dr. King, was a firm proponent of ethnic pluralism, coexistence, and in the early 1980s, Dr. Tiruchelvam actually created institutions in Sri Lanka – the International Centre for Ethnic Studies and the Law & Society Trust – these institutions still exist in Sri Lanka today and they were focused on producing scholarly research and dialogue on democracy, the rights of minority communities, coexistence, feminism, constitutional reform in diverse societies, and Dr. Tiruchelvam also helped pioneer democratic election monitoring in the Global South – in countries like Chile, Bangladesh, South Africa because, like Dr. King, Neelan Tiruchelvam believed that democracy is the foundation that is required for any meaningful progressive reforms to emerge that can give rights and protections to the various communities in a society. Furthermore, in addition to pursuing constitutional reform in Sri Lanka, Dr. Tiruchelvam also engaged in constitutional reform initiatives, with a dedicated focus on protecting the rights of minorities in other countries, such as his involvement in contributing to the draft constitution of the newly independent state of Kazakhstan after the fall of the Soviet Union.
So, for these reasons, I would argue Dr. Tiruchelvam, in addition to being the Martin Luther King Jr of Sri Lanka, was the best Sri Lankan Tamil person to do a documentary about.”
I concluded by highlighting a final, difficult parallel between the two leaders:
“One final parallel I should mention is that both Dr. King and Neelan Tiruchelvam, due to their willingness to work with their respective governments to advance the rights of their own people, were maligned as traitors by the most reactionary elements of their own communities. In the case of Dr. King, he was maligned as a traitor (specifically an Uncle Tom) by black people like Malcolm X. And, in the case of Dr.Tiruchelvam, he was maligned as a traitor by extreme Tamil supporters of Prabhakaran.”
Sri Lanka, with unresolved ethnic, political, and constitutional grievances, is more in need of embodying the vision of the Martin Luther King Jr of Sri Lanka than ever before. The full documentary on the life and legacy of Dr. Neelan Tiruchelvam can be watched for free on its website by clicking this link.
SJ / December 6, 2025
Does the author know what MLK did to compare him with any Tamil politician?
Assassination was the only seeming common factor.
Such comparisons insult both people.
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wisecat / December 7, 2025
You obviously didn’t read the article properly. The author made clear observations of their similarities with respect to the importance of democracy, coexistence of diverse communities within a single nation, and both MLK and Tiruchelvam’s willingness to work with the national government to advance the rights of their minority communities.
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SJ / December 7, 2025
You may have a good memory to remember that many of us called SJVC ‘Eezhathtuk Kandhi”, Amirthalingam ‘Eezhathtu Mujibur’ and later ‘Eezhathtu Arafat’.
This attempt is not wise either.
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We can draw parallels to justify any equation.
Calling any Lankan Tamil politician the Tamil MLK is ridiculous, as the contexts themselves are vastly different.
MLK grew into a leader through struggle and defiance of a racist establishment. He also had an egalitarian outlook that evaded the Tamil elite of this country.
I cannot imagine any Lankan Tamil leader who could get even a mile close to him in that regard.
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Have we not had enough of our “Eezaththu ******” nonsense?
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wisecat / December 8, 2025
I think the comparisons are quite sensible. Nowhere in the article does it suggest the two people are identical but I can’t think of a Sri Lankan who has a stronger similarity to the ideological trajectory of MLK Jr than Neelan Tiruchelvam.
Similar to Dr. King working with LBJ to champion and advocate for solutions to the address the grievances of the black minority community, Neelan Tiruchelvam worked with the Sri Lankan government to help formulate the boldest set of constitutional reform proposals the nation ever saw which sought to address the grievances of the minority communities in Sri Lanka. Both Dr. King and Dr. Tiruchelvam were strong opponents of militarism and violence.
And Dr. Tiruchelvam took his views of protecting the rights of minority communities within a democratic framework to an international level – as exhibited by his involvement in the draft constitution of Kazakhstan or his democratic election monitoring which saw Chile transition from dictatorship under Pinochet to a return to democracy or the fact that he was the chairperson of the London-based Minority Rights Group.
I suggest you educate yourself from your deep ignorance by watching the recent documentary released on Neelan Tiruchelvam’s life: NEELAN UNSILENCED
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Agnos / December 8, 2025
MLK was a tireless activist pastor who led mass marches and took enormous risks in the face of racist challenges. That more radical elements of the Black civil rights movement considered him an Uncle Tom is a secondary issue; he was murdered by a White racist, not a disgruntled Black man.
Neelan was not really an activist; by SL standards, he came from relative privilege and led a comfortable life in Colombo; I believe he even held board memberships in Colombo businesses. He was a reluctant politician brought into Parliament to represent the seat held by a militant in prison, murdered by Sinhalese prisoners ( was it Kuttimani? My memory is a bit hazy on that.)
I know people like Pitasanna ( aka wisecat), DBSJ, and others idolize him, but despite the senselessness of his murder by the LTTE, and his good faith efforts to get a political deal with CBK, Neelan was no MLK.
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