Lanka takes positive strides

A remarkable feature of the run-up to the Tamil Nadu Assembly polls is that the Sri Lankan Tamil question has created no ripples, unlike in the past when the neighbouring island nation loomed large in local politics. The continuing arrest of Indian fishermen straying into Sri Lankan waters does create tensions, but it is not a big poll issue as of now. One reason why Sri Lanka is not figuring as much is there are good things happening there which are promising to smooth the path for a more united island nation. The wheels are already moving in the direction of the island getting a new Constitution and for a “constitutional resolution” of the ethnic issue, with the active participation of Tamil parties and Tamil civil society groups.

The 24-member public representations committee on constitutional reforms has gathered the opinions of a wide cross-section of Sri Lankan society, which are to be made over to the Cabinet. The active participation of the Tamils in the framing of the new Constitution should make for a very different scenario, unlike in 1972 and 1978 when they were isolated from the mainstream thanks to religious, ethnic and language majoritarianism which led to a divisive figure in Mahinda Rajapaksa riding roughshod over the Tamils in the name of Sri Lankan nationalism. Maithripala Sirisena’s notion of an inclusive democracy, which takes into its fold the minorities, is a refined 21st-century view of nation building and is not to be dismissed as appeasement. In the year and three months since Mr Sirisena emerged victorious, so much has happened in the island with a National Unity government as to render the whole Sri Lankan scene sanguine.