TESO Conference and Role of Kalaignar Karunanidhi ... Flash Back 25 May 1986, Madurai

The Tamil International Research Unit, on behalf of Lankan based Tamil International Centre, published an eight-page publication on 25 May 1986, about the TESO Conference organised by Kalaignar at Madurai on May 4, 1986. We reproduce the excerpts from the publication barring their comments on developments in the island nation then which are not relevant now:

;Sunday May 4, 1986, was the day when the Tamil Eelam Supporters’ Organisation (TESO) held its SAVE CEYLON TAMILS CONFERENCE at Madurai. It certainly promised to be an event of considerable political significance at that point of time. For the first time, leaders and representatives of Opposition parties, particularly from the North, with differing approaches on domestic politics were gathering in the heart of Tamilnadu on a united bid to express solidarity with Tamils of Sri Lanka. Notwithstanding the absence of the ruling party of the country, and the ruling party of the State, and the two Communist parties which were invited but declined to attend, the nation- wide representation was broad enough to attract interest.

In Democracies, decision making is brought about not by government thinking alone, but also by the attitudes and stances adopted by Opposition parties. Governments work on pressure, and in a continent like country such as India where large sections of opinion are guided by regional loyalties and where the government has to continuously meet domestic compulsions of all kinds, a gathering of Opposition leaders and the striving for an Opposition consensus on an issue affecting the foreign policy of the country, cannot be wholly unwelcome to the government in power. On the other hand, it could even make it easier for the government to fashion foreign policy on the given issue. Let us look back. There was BJP leader and one-time Foreign Minister of India-Atul Behari Vajpayee; there was Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh and leader of a powerful regional party, the Telugu Desam - NT. Rama Rao; there was Lok Dal leader and one-time Minister in the Central Government - H.N. Bahuguna; there was the Punjab Akali Dai’s General Secretary Balwant Singh Ramoowalia; a leader of Dr. Farook Abdulla’s National Conference of Kashmir – Abdul Rasheed Kabuli; the maverick of Indian politics who launched the “Hindustan Front” to help Eelam Tamils - Dr. Subramaniam Swamy; General Secretary of the Congress (S) and M.P. - K.P. Unni Krishnan Janata’s Karnataka Home Minister-S. Rachaiah; also Telugu Desarn front-liner and Parliamentarian - P. Upendra. And then of course DMK chief - M. Karunanidhi; that dedicated activist of the Eelam cause and leader of Kamaraj Congress - P. Nedumaran; DK leader - K. Veeramani; Muslim League leader - A.K.A. Abdul Samad a distinguished galaxy of leaders hardly ever seen together on any occasion, whether in the North or South. Karnataka Chief Minister Ramakrishna Hegde, convalescing after a throat ailment sent a special message for the Conference; and so did the leader of the Janata Parliamentary group - Prof. Madhu Dandavate.

There is no doubt at all that it was an impressive occasion; and for TESO marking one year of agitational success. Formed in May 1985 with DMK President Karunanidhi as Chairman, it had as its senior leaders P. Nedumaran, K. Anbazhagan and K. Veeramani. It defined its objectives as :- to help the Tamil partisans to carry on the struggle against State terrorism in Sri Lanka; to help Tamil refugees; and to propagate the demand for Tamil Eelam at the national and at international levels. Within three months of the formation of TESO there came about an unfortunate turn of events which gave the organisation its first chance to test its strength. Deportation orders were served on two Eelam activists - S.C. Chandrahasan and Dr. A.S. Balasingam on 23 August 1985,  and both were bundled the next day into Air India planes, the former to New York and the latter to London. The very next day TESO held a rally and “resolved that if the Centre did not revoke its orders of deportation against the Sri Lankan militant leaders, the TESO would stage black flag demonstrations when the Prime Minister, Mr. Rajiv Gandhi and the Union Home Minister Mr. S.B. Chavan, visited Tamil Nadu next” (Hindu : 26 Aug.) The Hindu report said further : “The DMK leaders, Mr. M. Karunanidhi and Mr. K.Anbazhagan, the Dravida Kazhagam General Secretary, Mr. K. Veeramani and the President of the Tamil Nadu Kamaraj Congress, Mr. P. Nedumaran, who addressed the rally, declared that the people of Tamil Nadu would raise a banner of revolt if the Sri Lankan Tamils were denied asylum in the State. “Don’t force us to create a situation when none from the North could step into the soil of Tamil Nadu”, they said. Strong words indeed. But that was not all.

Reported the HINDU : ‘Mr. Karunanidhi warned the Centre that if it continued to initiate anti-Tamil militant steps, the people of Tamil Nadu would be constrained to organise training camps for their brethren to achieve their cherished goal of Eelam. He hastened to add that if the Centre found itself helpless to hammer out a solution to the ethnic crisis the people of Tamil Nadu themselves would clinch the job. “The training camps would include not only the militants but also the youths from Tamil Nadu to fight for the cause of Sri Lanka Tamils”. VEILED THREAT: Mr. Karunanidhi and other leaders issued a veiled threat that the cry of “Tamil Nadu belongs to the Tamils” would gather momentum if the Centre failed to protect the legitimate aspirations of the Sri Lankan Tamils...” That was on 25 August.

On 27 August, the Madras evening daily “News Today” never known to be friendly towards the DMK. reported : “The DMK-led Tamil Eelam Supporters Organisation (TESO) today decided to stage a “rail roko” (stop train) agitation in Tamil Nadu on August 30 to press for the immediate withdrawl of the deportation orders against two Eelam activists, Dr. A.S. Balasingam and S.C. Chandrahasan. A meeting of TESO, chaired by its President M. Karunanidhi, the DMK party chief, also called on its constituent parties to hold rallies in district headquarters for 3 days from today in this connection Karunanidhi said the “stop train” agitation had been scheduled for Friday in order to give three days’ time to the Prime Minister to revoke his government deportation order...” One day before the planned “rail roko”, S.C. Chandrahasan was back in Madras, his deportation orders withdrawn; but in a statement issued from Tiruchi, TESO Chairman Karunanidhi said the agitation would continue until the deportation orders on the other two Eelam Tamil leaders, A.S. Balasingam and N. Satyendra (who had left before the order was served) were also withdrawn. The HINDU of 31st August reported : “Train services remained suspended in Tamil Nadu, following a one-day ‘rail-roko” agitation launched by the TESO.... though the State government and the Railways had repeatedly emphasised that there was no intention to stop the services hundreds of comuters who made a beeline to railway stations, particularly in the suburban section, even from 4 a.m. were disappointed to find that the services had been suspended ‘until further orders”.

TESO therefore had a proven record of achievement when the Madurai “Save Ceylon Tamils Conference” was called. LTTE spokesman A.S. Balasingam too was back in Madras on October 10, one and a half months after deportation. TESO had also reason to be satisfied with the response to the Conference. Apart from the nation-wide representation of Opposition parties, all five Eelam militant groups that were invited, sent their representatives - the LTTE, the EROS, EPRILF, TELO and PLOT. The TULF trinity was there - Secretary General A. Amirthalingam. President M. Sivasithamparam, and front-liner R. Sampanthan. There were the TULF radicals, the rebels and break-aways

under the banners of two other organisations- ProTEG and TELF, - S.C. Chandrahasan. A. Thangathurai, the former TULF M.P. for Muthur, M.K. Eelaventhan and Kovai Mahesan, once Editor of the powerful Tamil weekly ‘Suthanthiran”. Other Eelam Tamil organisations represented at the ‘closed door” meeting with the Indian leaders were the Tamil Information & Research Unit (TIRU), Madras, headed by S. Sivanayagam founder-Editor of the Jaff na-based “Saturday Review” and the Tamil Information Centre Madurai, headed by Maheswary Velautham. both present only as “special observers” and therefore declining to make any statements. If the “Save Ceylon Tamils” conference and the huge attendance and enthusiasm at the public rally at the Racecourse grounds that same evening gave the impression that it was more an occasion for a political and personal triumph for DMK leader Karunanidhi

“Talking to newsmen, the chief organiser of the conference Mr. Karunanidhi said that the various Tamil groups had given an assurance in the presence of the national opposition leaders (excepting the teaders of the two Communist Parties which didnot attend) that they would work together. This assumed comic proportions in the immediate background of the murderous clashes between the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and Tamil Eelam Liberation Organisation (TELO) resulting in the death of nearly 150 young Tamils and the former group claiming that it had disarmed the fighters of the latter. On the positive side one important outcome of the conference was the decision to set up, at the all-India level, a Co-ordination Committee to constantly monitor the Lankan developments and regulate the reactions to them. Karunanidhi said that the Committee would comprise the representatives of the BJP, Congress(S\u Desam, Akali Dal, J&K National Conference (Farooq) and Janata, besides of course the DMK. To begin with, Messrs Jashwant Singh (BJP), Upendra (Telugu Desam), Unnikrishnan Congress(S), Ramoo Walia (Akali Daf). Abdul Raheed (National conference), Subramaniam Swamy (Hindustan Front) and V. Gopalaswamy (DMK) would be members of this panel. The Janata, Lok Dal, IUML, the CPI, CIP(M) and Asom Gana Parishad would be asked to join the Co-ordination Committee....

“The TESO and DMK leader claimed that the very fact of TESO conference being attended by so many opposition stalwarts had resulted in Delhi despatching an official team to Colombo for exploring a political solution to the issue. All the Tamil groups stationed in Madras, were present at the Conference. None of them voiced , however any complaint against what India did or failed to do Karunanidhi said the second Save Ceylon Tamils Conference would be held at Andhra Pradesh. The date and venue of the conference had not yet been decided. He appealed to the tiger groups of Sri Lanka to remain united....”

While the “News Today” report remains faithful to the factual outcome of the conference the critical comments appear largely pointless. Firstly, what took place was (despite the dominant presence of Karunanidhi) not a DMK conference nor even a TESO conference but a Save Ceylon Tamils Conference of Opposition parties SPONSORED by TESO, and hence resolutions were expected to, and would naturally reflect, an Opposition consensus on the Sri Lankan Tamil question. The significance of the Conference did not lie in the resolutions it passed, but in the fact that such a conference took place. It was time to show that Indian sympathy and concern for Sri Lankan Tamils was something not confined to the boundaries of Tamil Nadu, but which involved the whole of India. The TESO-sponsored conference did precisely that. It lifted the TESO concern into an all India one, and that should surely give the government in the Centre additional political and diplomatic leverage to deal with the Sri lanka government. The strong sentiments expressed by leaders like Vajpayee, NT. Rama Rao and Bahuguna helped demolish the Sri Lankan government propaganda that it was only the Tamil Nadu factor that was determining New Delhi’s outlook on the Sri Lankan Tamil question. These were therefore positive achievements of the Madurai Conference, and if credit for it flowed to the dominant TESO partner, the DMK and its leader, it would be churlish to deny them that

Public memory being short, it has to be said that the DMK’s involvement and interest in the Sri Lankan Tamil question is not a recent one. It began in the early 70s, and the TULF leaders dedveloped a personal rapport with Mr. Karunanidhi when he was in power, at a time when the late Tamil leader S.J.V. Chelvanayakam was alive. While the question whether “bandhs” and rallies and processions which dislocate or paralyse life in Tamil Nadu are really useful or whether they are wasteful and even counter-productive is a debatable question, it must be remembered that the first successful total bandh in protest against killings of Sri Lankan Tamils was carried out, not in 1986 or 1983, but in 1977 - by the DMK. Under the headline - HARTAL ALMOST TOTAL - the Indian Express of 25 August, 1977, reported :- “The one-day hartal called by the DMK on Wednesday to express sympathy for the Tamils in Sri Lanka, was almost total in the City. The DMK also took out a huge procession from the Anna statue on Mount Road to the office of the Deputy High Commissioner of Sri Lanka.

“Mr. Karunanidhi presented a memorandum to Mr. Gautamadasa, the Deputy High Commissioner .... The memorandum condemned the efforts to “annihilate the Tamil race in Sri Lanka” and urged those interested in human rights and the Prime Minister of Sri Lanka to “stop the fall of human corpses and restore to the Tamils their legitimate rights and peaceful living” Mr. Karunanidhi told newsmen later that the DMK had also sent a telegram to Mr. Jayaprakash Narayan to intervene and stop “the genocide of Tamil population of Ceylon” The TESO conference took place at a time when the conflict between the Sri Lanka government and the Tamils was moving towards a decisive phase. The impulses towards a peaceful settlement were gaining ascendancy on the one hand, while on the other, the idea of giving the Tamils a more bloody nose was increasingly tempting to a government which misread the consequences of the LTTE-TELO clash.

In the meantime, TESO chairman Karunanidhi, on the eve of the Madurai Conference made a desperate appeal to Tamil militant groups to stop fighting. “The killings were not creating the best atmosphere”, he said helplessly. At the conference itself, both warring groups were represented, and all delegations gave a pledge in turn that they would henceforth work together. But the climax to the LTTE-TELO confrontation came two days later when TELO leader Sri Sabaratnam was himself killed. That was on May 6.

On May 7, came the second bomb explosion in Colombo, exactly 96 hours after the Air Lanka blast. Eleven people died and 114 were injured when a powerful bomb wrecked the Central Telegraph Office in the heart of the busy city. The month of May ended with’another bomb blast in Colombo - at the Ceylon Cold Stores - and with several bomb hoaxes in between, Colombo residents, the Sinhalese particularly, were reduced to the same sense of insecurity that the Tamils had been experiencing for years earlier.

There is a new sense of fear that has overtaken both the Tamils in the north and east and the Sinhalese in the south. Fears can drive people into acts of desperation, and if that happens, there might be a long, long way to go before anyone can save Ceylon Tamils. But it is equally likely that fears on both sides can even push warring sides into an honourable settlement, provided a strong external force imposes its authority on both. The next month or two might give the answer.    http://risingsunweekly.blogspot.com/2012/03/