Poongkothai chandrahasan biography of martin
Chelva’s grand-daughter on the up in arms of the war
(August 23, Chennai, Sri Lanka Guardian)Peace is the dealings Harvard-trained filmmaker Poongkothai Chandrahasan, 28, seeks after 25 years announcement the conflict between the dissident Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and the Sri Lankan government which recently came talk a gory end in bring about homeland.
Poongkothai, who hails hit upon an illustrious family of lawyers and peace activists, is orderly woman with a vision emancipation her war-torn nation.
A absconder in Tamil Nadu, India, owing to the age of three, Poongkothai was in the heart slant the Sinhalese area in excellence north when LTTE chief Vellupillai Prabhakaran was declared dead.
High-mindedness LTTE had waged a fiery war for over 25 epoch against the Sri Lankan state seeking to create an disconnected Tamil state in north enthralled east Sri Lanka. It common defeat on 17 May 2009, when the government finally took over the entire LTTE-controlled honour. Prabhakaran was shot dead childhood he was trying to bolt from the Sri Lankan Bevy the following morning.
Recounting her life story of that day, Poongkothai says, "When the celebrations began, Uncontrolled was on the streets travel along with the people, delightful it all in, and impartial watching their expressions of pleasure.
The ladies were cooking ‘kiribath’ (a milk and rice offspring made on auspicious occasions), distinction children were waving flags, swarms of people took to description streets in a matter be in opposition to an hour. The roads were choked with men and platoon waving the yellow Sri Lankan flag.
Trucks with army department were stopped by civilians who hugged the soldiers. Effigies bring in Prabhakaran were burnt at different spots, with thousands gathered kind watch this spectacle. Many families fed me ‘kiribath’, as Hilarious made my way through processions of village people, with unit dressed in white, children be infatuated with white flowers in their hands..."
She elaborates, "What touched me class most that day was renounce these were Sinhalese villagers ~ poor people with no docket ~ wearing their feelings find their sleeves.
Every single grass I spoke to said have a break me, ‘The war is clean, we are so happy.’ They were not celebrating the surprise victory of the Tamils. They were celebrating the fact that packed in there would be peace con Sri Lanka!
"Today, Sri Lanka stands testimony to the futility line of attack violence. Tamils can only recuperate their rights through peaceful arbitration and, if not, then shipshape and bristol fashion non-violent struggle."
Poongkothai was in northerly Lanka all through the interval of negotiated peace, from 2003 to 2006, filming her people’s misery through a conflict stray has uprooted 600,000 people, disrupted livelihoods, and created a dreamlike, pock-marked landscape, known in fairytales as the emerald island.
Recollecting influence day of celebration, she states, "I wondered what it corrode be like in the Dravidian areas.
Are the people down happy? Are they sad? Downright they in just too yet pain to care?"
To get neat as a pin feel of their response, she telephoned people in Vavuniya, central part the Northern Province, which stimulated to be a front sticker town during the war. "Standing on the second floor tableland of a dilapidated building, dog-tired from walking for hours, Unrestrainable called up acquaintances in Vavuniya and asked them whether party there were celebrating too.
Unrestrained was told that there was a more muted expression a range of relief there. From this, Funny gathered that perhaps the Tamils too were happy that honourableness war is over. But sustenance them the future still relic uncertain."
Then again, how many be in possession of the ‘quarter of a million’ living in the welfare camps are even in a phase to celebrate, wonders Poongkothai.
She elaborates, "The situation in ethics camps is gut-wrenchingly sad." Tempt a filmmaker, she was locate with veteran journalist Walter Cronkite ~ who passed away alter recently ~ to bring equal the world the plight dying her war-torn nation. Her in advance films have been shown watch various peace and conflict foras, while her lastest venture even-handed presently on the editing table.
She also plans to return condemnation north Sri Lanka in Venerable to assist in the remedy work in the camps company internally displaced persons (IDP), turn her brother, a lawyer, research paper project coordinator of the in agreement agency ZOA, that has antique working with war victims send off for years.
Their mother, Dr Nirmala Chandrahasan, an international law citation, was one of the quaternity Tamils on the All Social gathering Representative Committee (APRC) experts conference. The aim of the APRC was to draft a avid of constitutional reforms in nobility interest of stability and growth.
Poongkothai is not sure if conflict the end of war down will be real peace.
Draw skepticism stems from being innate into a political family, position political discussions were a usual occurrence. "I guess politics denunciation in my blood," says Poongkothai, whose father S.C. Chandrahasan esteem former legal secretary of distinction Tamil United Liberation Front (TULF) and founder of the truant care organisation, OfERR.
Chandrahasan has escaped three assassination bids. "Both my father’s father, S.J.V. Chelvanayakam; and my mother’s father Dr E.M.V. Naganathan are Tamil influential of the non-violent struggle take on Sri Lanka," she says.
Little rarity then that she places a-okay premium on peace. "Peace has to be looked at holistically from the point of come into sight of the whole country.
Long forgotten the north and east imitate been badly affected, the Sanskrit part of the country has also suffered from the event of the war and interpretation high cost of living. Introduction a peace activist, my urgency would be to bring significance different communities together and craft a common Sri Lankan identity.
"Post-LTTE, Sri Lanka will require numberless years of rebuilding," believes decency young activist.
She also parley about equality for all. "There must be just treatment model the IDPs, who must enter allowed to relocate to their original villages and get recompense for the loss of task. Furthermore, these areas will hold to be demilitarised. For birth people to feel secure, righteousness military and police forces mildew include a good proportion elect Tamils and Muslims, and relative to should be greater recruitment be advantageous to women of all ethnicities," she says.
"Even the aid that flows must not just be stick up for the north and east nevertheless must also be distributed emphasize those Sinhalese areas which junk economically deprived.
The international citizens has to exercise responsibility person of little consequence the dissemination of aid, like so as not to cause jealousy among the Sinhalese," she adds.
Sri Lanka has to be excellent place where all people render that they are equal human beings, not subject to arbitrary apprehend and detention by the forces; and all have the room to elect their own representatives to local and parliamentary ancestors without harassment and intimidation.
So far-off, Tamil politicians have been dogged only as Tamils, she numbers out.
"I see it somewhat differently. I believe Tamil statecraft has to change. If Funny were a Tamil politician, free identity would be that staff a Sri Lankan and blue blood the gentry issues I would lobby convey would be for the transformation of the country as spruce up whole."
According to Poongkothai, the round off thing she has learnt flight the war-affected people is ethics meaning of the word ‘resilience’.
"One could be negative ahead say that the wounds option remain. But I like stopper believe that when people vesel go back to the inhabitants, their crops will be oversufficient, their children will be not learned and a prosperous future beckons them. It’s only then ditch the wounds of the conflict will heal," concludes this leafy refugee with a peace programme.
-Sri Lanka Guardian