Tamil Nadu State Government Urged to Build a Mullivaaikaal Monument in Marina Beach: TGTE

” Appeal to Declare May 18th as Global Tamils Mourning Day”

A Protest Webinar was held on Monday over the destruction of Mullivaaikaal Monument in the University of Jaffna campus by the Sri Lankan Government. Student leaders from the University, political leaders and activists from the North East, Tamil Nadu and from Tamil diaspora participated.

Visuvanathan Rudrakumaran, Prime Minister of the Transnational Government of Tamil Eelam (TGTE), stated in his speech that the destruction of the Mullivaaikaal monument at the University was a clear demonstration of the fact that in the island of Sri Lanka Eelam Tamils not only do not have political space to express their political aspirations fully, but they also have been denied the space to remember the dead. Therefore, such a space has to be created outside the island of Sri Lanka to mourn the death of innocent Tamil civilians.

** He called upon the Tamil Nadu State Government to construct an appropriate Mullivaaikaal monument either in Marina beach or in another prominent place in Chennai.

** He went on to also call the Tamil Nadu State Government to declare May 18th as the Global Tamils’ Mourning Day in view of the genocide that had taken place in Mullivaaikaal. Such acts will serve to contribute to the build and solidify Tamil power in the region.

Rudrakumaran pointed out that, as was stated in the condemnation message of the Tamil poet Kasi Ananthan, the destruction of the monument took place within 20 short hours ofthe Indian Minister for External Affairs Mr. Jaishankar’s return to India, following his surprise visit to Sri Lanka, raising questions about any correlation between Mr. Jaishankar’s visit and the destruction of the monument. Minister Jaishankar, in his visit to Sri Lanka, stated “it is in Sri Lanka’s own interests to meet the expectation of Tamils”. Rudrakumaran said that the destruction of the Mullivaaikaal monument was Sri Lanka’s reply to Mr. Jaishankar’s message, and by extension, a message to India.

Rudrakumaran went on to cite the 1954 Nehru-Kotelawala Pact in which India accepted the repatriation of Indian population in Ceylon, the Sirima-Shastri Pact of 1964 which casually distributed Tamils of Indian origin between the two states, and the 1974 India-Sri Lanka Maritime Boundary Agreement in which India ceded Kachatheevu island to Sri Lanka. Rudrakumaran said that through these agreements India persistently employed a policy of appeasement to keep Sri Lanka within its zone of influence. However, the recent activities of Sri Lanka necessitate Indian policy makers to re-evaluate their age-old premises and strategy.

Mr. Sutharsan Sivagurunathan, the Minister for Political Affairs of the TGTE, commented that given the fact the Tamil Nadu State Assembly had already passed unanimously a Eelam Tamils Genocide Resolution, it would go on to materialize the TGTE’s appeal within a year.