{"id":37734,"date":"2012-04-09T07:24:49","date_gmt":"2012-04-09T07:24:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/?p=37734"},"modified":"2012-04-17T09:03:12","modified_gmt":"2012-04-17T09:03:12","slug":"do-not-trample-the-grass","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/do-not-trample-the-grass\/","title":{"rendered":"Do Not Trample The Grass"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>By\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/?s=Pradeep+Jeganathan&amp;x=10&amp;y=8\">Pradeep Jeganathan<\/a><\/span> &#8211;<\/strong><\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_35247\" style=\"width: 150px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/thinking-through-and-beyond-the-sandahiru-saya\/pradeep-jeganatan-colombo-telegraph-4\/\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-35247\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-35247\" class=\"size-full wp-image-35247\" title=\"pradeep Jeganatan Colombo Telegraph\" src=\"http:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/03\/pradeep-Jeganatan-Colombo-Telegraph.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"140\" height=\"140\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/03\/pradeep-Jeganatan-Colombo-Telegraph.jpg 140w, https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/03\/pradeep-Jeganatan-Colombo-Telegraph-50x50.jpg 50w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 140px) 100vw, 140px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-35247\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Dr. Pradeep Jeganathan<\/p><\/div>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">\u201cThe time to use the big stick has come,\u201d\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.outlookindia.com\/article.aspx?280270\">wrote B. Raman recently<\/a>, he Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai, and Associate of the Chennai Centre For China Studies.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">He was not it seems, speaking metaphorically; the \u201cbig stick\u201d here is \u201call means of political and economic pressure at its [India\u2019s] disposal.\u201d I will consider the length and width of the big stick in a moment, but first let\u2019s ask why the big stick? It is because \u201cIndia\u201d is unhappy. \u201cIndian unhappiness can hurt Sri Lanka and it should be made clear that we would not hesitate to hurt it if it continues to follow its present policy of duplicity.\u201d And the duplicity? The Rajapaksa government has \u2026wrigg[ed] out of\u2026[its] commitments to India \u2026for finding a satisfactory political solution to meet the aspirations of the Tamils.\u201d The quid pro quo is clear. India supported the \u201ccrushing of the LTTE,\u201d and the heavy human cost associated with it, in exchange for significant regional autonomy of the Tamil majority areas of the North and East. Once promised, now withheld, this brings out the big stick.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Why does India want this? The accepted answer for years now has been that India cares for the Sri Lankan Tamils, and seeks to protect their rights, through a federal or quasi federal arraignment in Sri Lanka. The other answer is that India continues to seek a major, physical foot hold in Sri Lanka more so now that its arch international rival China has several such footholds, notably in the growing port city of Hambantota in Sri Lanka\u2019s deep south.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">And what of the stick itself? That\u2019s opaque to me, but it\u2019s certainly an open threat. If it\u2019s not empty, and there is no reason it should be, then its substance must concern us. There are incipient but ominous signs that this big stick is being interpreted by the Sri Lankan government to be tactical support for the arming and training of former LTTE carder in the South of India. The Island recently ran such a\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.island.lk\/index.php?page_cat=article-details&amp;page=article-details&amp;code_title=48862\">story<\/a>, citing Sri Lankan intelligence sources, to cries of denial from the High Commission and angry demands of \u2018prove it!\u2019 from the Indian press. When confronted with the denials, the Island\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.island.lk\/index.php?page_cat=article-details&amp;page=article-details&amp;code_title=48926\">pointed<\/a>\u00a0to a previous story in the Hindu that ran an year ago, which said: \u201cHighly placed intelligence sources confirmed to\u00a0<em>The Hindu\u00a0<\/em>on Saturday that the Ministry of Home Affairs had sent alert messages that some LTTE cadre had arrived in Tamil Nadu and were engaged in a training program at an \u201cunknown location.\u201d They were in the process of procuring weapons and explosive substances to execute their plan.\u201d Its seems reasonable to conclude that if this story of fresh LTTE training camps in South India is fabrication, the Hindu is as implicated as the Island in it; if it is not, then it is good to recall, as the Island itself pointed out, pre 1987 Indian denials of such Sri Lankan claims of training of militants in India are now known to untrue.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">R. Hariharan, a \u201cretired Military Intelligence officer of the Indian Army,\u201d\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.colhariharan.org\/2012\/04\/subterranean-threats-to-india-sri-lanka.html\">does not dismiss<\/a>\u00a0this news report out of hand. He says, like I do, that \u201cI do not know whether the news story is true or not.\u201d In any event, he says \u201cIndia should immediately take serious notice of any reports of Eelam separatists taking refuge in Tamil Nadu to gather support or undergo training. It should tighten up actions to prevent such resurgence of separatism. It should take action to weed out suspicious elements immediately.\u201d I do hope his advice is heeded.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">For our part, as Sri Lankans, we need to own our\u00a0own democracy, which is, beyond any doubt withering in the winds. There is a need,\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.pjeganathan.org\/south-paw\/2012\/4\/6\/fundamental-rights-is-our-business.html\">as I have been saying<\/a>, to make our fundamental rights our business. While elections to the Northern Provincial council under the 13<sup>th<\/sup>\u00a0amendment should be held sooner, rather than later (there is now some talk scheduling it), our more immediate and serious concern must be the rights of all our citizens, especially those in North and the East.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">When Elephants clash, it is the grass that is trampled.<\/p>\n<p>You can read\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/colombotelegraph.com\/\/?s=Pradeep+Jeganathan\">Dr.Pradeep Jeganathan<\/a>\u2018s wrtings @\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.pjeganathan.org\/\">www.pjeganathan.org<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p> [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22,"featured_media":35247,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-37734","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-colombotelegraph","category-editorial"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.3 - 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