{"id":97694,"date":"2013-07-29T01:38:56","date_gmt":"2013-07-28T20:08:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/?p=97694"},"modified":"2013-08-02T00:02:58","modified_gmt":"2013-08-01T18:32:58","slug":"on-politicized-black-july","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/on-politicized-black-july\/","title":{"rendered":"On Politicized Black July"},"content":{"rendered":"

By\u00a0Malinda Seneviratne<\/a><\/span>\u00a0–<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Malinda Seneviratne<\/p><\/div>\n

Last week The Nation<\/em> commented<\/a><\/span> on the events of July 1983, referring inter alia<\/em>, to the context and how it helped shape the larger tragedy that unfolded.\u00a0 July 1983<\/a><\/span>, referred to as \u2018Black July\u2019 has been politicized to the point where the victims have receded into a statistical figure, a rhetorician\u2019s convenience to be debated about, to be manipulated for political ends.\u00a0 Inevitable, one might say.<\/p>\n

It was black, that July.<\/p>\n

There were other Julys that followed, in many ways as or more tragic, as or more violent, as or more dark, but strangely forgotten.\u00a0 \u00a0On July 24, 1996 was a black day.\u00a0 The Dehiwala train bombing.\u00a0 Sixty four is less than 300+, but death is death, the loved ones of the victims would not have wept less.\u00a0 No commemoration, though. No \u2018Never Again!\u2019<\/p>\n

There was a July in 2001. Katunayake.\u00a0 Twenty four aircraft were damaged or destroyed in an audacious LTTE<\/a><\/span> attack which had a tremendous and negative impact on the economy. It paved the way for \u2018regime-change\u2019 and the Ceasefire Agreement on February 22, 2002, the ill-effects of which, including the massive loss of lives, are well documented.\u00a0 Unremembered.\u00a0 No \u2018Never Again!\u2019<\/p>\n

And if only numbers matted, we had a July in 1990. Thousands were killed in that month by vigilante groups who did the bidding of the then Government.\u00a0 If July 1983 was black, then a darker color to describe the July of 1990 is yet to be named.\u00a0 No commemoration.\u00a0 No \u2018Never Again!\u2019<\/p>\n

Blackness is about the horror of the moment, true.\u00a0 But \u2018black\u2019 is a color that can be used considering effect.\u00a0 In this sense, the July that came in 1987 is as black as any other.\u00a0 This was the July of the Indo-Lanka Accord<\/a><\/span>, whose (il)legality, Indian machinations embedded in background construction and text, violation by the principal architect (India) and other \u2018thereafters\u2019 are excellently detailed in an article by Dimuth Gunawardena titled \u2018Indo-Lanka Accord a nullity\u2019 (see page 11).<\/p>\n

No commemoration. No tears; none for the 60,000 who were slaughtered in the insurrectionary thrust spawned by the Indo-Lanka Accord.\u00a0 No \u2018Never Again!\u2019\u00a0 Instead there are shrill cries for \u2018full implementation\u2019.\u00a0 There\u2019s also the Oliver Twistian \u2018More, I want more!\u2019 And there is the shameless sycophancy of those who caution, \u2018India might bark and bite!\u2019<\/p>\n

July 1987 was the blackest month for Sri Lanka in terms of what happened to national dignity, sovereignty, territorial integrity and so on.\u00a0 An unnecessary war that had already cost much in terms of lives lost was given what turned out to be a further 22 years to live.\u00a0 It took a strong and determined political leadership to put that baby to rest, yielding as \u2018price\u2019 a regime which in after-conflict glory acquired a half-sanctioned and half-wrested \u2018do as we please\u2019 complexion.<\/p>\n

The dead cannot be brought back to life.\u00a0 They will be mourned by those who they left behind.\u00a0 They will be the plaything of the rhetorician.\u00a0 Little can be done to stop that.\u00a0 The relevant \u2018blacknesses\u2019 will not lose hue until time covers event and buries memory with other tragedies and\/or the consecration of a resolve to \u2018move on\u2019, either by grievance-redress or acquisition of better sense or the counting of blessings.<\/p>\n

The blackness of July 1987, however, can be dealt with. Decisively.\u00a0 The LTTE is no more.\u00a0 A different avatar<\/em> of that monster can of course be birthed by the marriage of communalism.\u00a0 An \u201983 can recur.\u00a0 The blackness of July 1987 is a ready platform for the full flowering of both kinds of blackness, for the monumental lies that underpin the Indo-Lanka Accord and the abiding nature of the signature it crafted on the political landscape.\u00a0 A cancer if ever there was one.\u00a0 It requires removal.\u00a0 One less \u2018blackness\u2019 in these dark times is certainly welcome, after all.<\/p>\n

*Malinda Seneviratne is the Chief Editor of \u2018The Nation\u2019\u00a0and his articles can be found at\u00a0www.malindawords.blogspot.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[…]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22,"featured_media":93503,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,46,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-97694","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-colombotelegraph","category-constitutional-reforms","category-editorial"],"yoast_head":"\nOn Politicized Black July - Colombo Telegraph<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/on-politicized-black-july\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"On Politicized Black July - Colombo Telegraph\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"[…]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/on-politicized-black-july\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Colombo Telegraph\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2013-07-28T20:08:56+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2013-08-01T18:32:58+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/06\/Malinda-Seneviratne.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"329\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"367\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"COLOMBO TELEGRAPH\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"COLOMBO TELEGRAPH\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/on-politicized-black-july\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/on-politicized-black-july\/\",\"name\":\"On Politicized Black July - 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