The Post War Sri Lanka and Ethnic Harmony (with a review of the film of “Oba Nathuwa Oba Ekka” by Prasanna Withanage)

The Post War Sri Lanka and Ethnic Harmony (with a review of the film of “Oba Nathuwa Oba Ekka” by Prasanna Withanage)

(Written by M. M. Nirmal Chathuranga, Undergraduate in University of Sri Jayewardenepura, Sri Lanka)

The war in Sri Lanka was not begun within one mid night. There are lots of background factors which put the foundation to bring such a painful situation to this Island. There were lots of political, socio-cultural and ethnographical factors which affected to begin a war. However it was begun in 1983, the group of Liberation Tigers of Tamil Ealam (LTTE) were appeared as the rescues of Tamil people which they face the discriminations from the Majority Sinhala people. At that time the Sinhala population in the country was 76.12% and both Sri Lankan and Indian Tamils population was 18.47% (Department of consensus and statistics, 1981). The latest scenario was declaration the Sinhala language as the National language. However when the LTTE group is becoming more powerful they forgot what is their real mission is? The LTTE head Welupille Prabakaran’s popularity among the Tamil people is gradually decreased and they wanted to escape from him because he was tended to enroll the child soldiers with the unwillingness of them and their parents. However it was negatively affected the existence of that group and they were declared as terrorists subsequently and in 2009 defeated by Sri Lankan military forces under the former president Mahinda Rajapaksha’s regime.

The Ealem war was finished. The politician said that now the war is finished, now all ethnic groups can live very peacefully and harmony as a one family… they began to boast about the war victory. Actually can we? Physically LTTE was defeated. But their influence among the Tamil people is still remaining even it has spent only seven years after the war. The film of “Oba nathuwa oba ekka” by Prasanna Withanage gives a better conviction to the nature of ethnic harmony, attitudes and psychological nature of the people after the war. After the war the governments (Mr.Mahinda Rajapaksha’s government since 2015 and The National government of Mr. Ranil Wickramasinghe) are trying to do developments and reconstructions in Northern area, still they could not implement a proper programme to rebuild the broken hearts of both Sinhala and Tamil people. Still Sinhalese are looking at Tamils in a suspecting manner and Tamils are also looking at Sinhalese in an envy manner. They are still live as two separate groups. Even in the universities (the people who are educated) we can see this scenario. Some Sinhala students do not sit near the Tamil students, Tamils are also. Mahinda Rajapaksa regime established the All Party Representative Committee chaired by Minister Thissa Witharana in July 2006.   The committee met 126 times over three years. Its final report was presented to the President in July 2010. Later the government proposed a Parliamentary Select Committee (PSC) ostensibly to reach a consensus among the main political parties.  (Keerawella, 2013).

Post conflict developments of Sri Lanka rapidly increase, but they are not enough to construct the people in mental vice and construct only the infrastructure development. There are not enough resolutions to find the missing people. Nation building is limited for only the majority’s minorities are almost not considered. As the mega developing projects are concerned as boons, they increase the support of present government highly in south part of Sri Lanka (Jabar, etal.,2013).When we concern the film, Selvi is an upper class Tamil girl who escaped in the Upcountry (Nuwara eliya) in war season and she lost all worthy things of her life including her family. Still she hates the Sinhalese. She do not use the word of Sri Lankan army, instead she uses the word of “Sinhala People” as the responsible party to her tragedy. But she marries Sarathsiri, though he is a Sinhala man. Sometimes, the reason may be Selvi had not another alternative to live. She was in a very helpless situation and Sarathsiri pleased her. He had a guilty feeling in his career as an Army soldier, but he kept it as a secret even after the marriage with Selvi. Most probably that guilty feeling may influence him to marry such a helpless Tamil girl. Prasanna Withanage’s “Oba Nathuwa Oba Ekka” film also smoothly reveals the topic of “Benevolent patriarchy” which is common in most of Asian societies (Anon., 2015). Even Selvi married Sarathsiri, her perceived intention towards Sinhalese had not vanished. She always tried to love Sarathsiri very much. Sometimes Sarathsiri’s patriarchal behavior made her anger. When she knew that Sarathsiri was an army soldier, she was confused so much. When Selvi breaks into a final frenzy after Sarath confesses why he left the Army, we see that same inexplicable break from sanity and embrace of madness to be seen in many of Bergman’s female characters. She could not make her mind to love a Sinhala army soldier. But she must, because according to their culture the ideal Tamil women has full of fealty. She had entangled among love, fealty, envy and hate. She cannot remove the resentment feeling from her heart, but she wanted to love Sarathsiri. Because Sarathsiri is loving her very much. She could not bear up his love. She may never expect such a love from Sinhala army soldier, from the party she ever hated. Sarathsiry was ready to dedicate all the property he owned for Selvi’s happiness. Selvi could not imagine what to do. Actually she was not a girl who is very strong in mentally. She was a very silent character. She was blasted. She could not match the lovely and hatefull feelings together. That is why she decided to suicide. The dialogues which used by the script writer gives a clear approach to the mental/ psychological situation of Selvi.

Sarathsiri – I saw fire in your eyes and lips.

Selvi – Is that how you see me? No wonder you did not see the fire burning inside me.

Finally she said that she was feared that she will be unable to be a better wife for Sarathsiri. Because she could not love Sarathsiri by keeping a disapproval feeling about Sinhalese and Army soldiers.

The film mainly focuses the mental situation of a Tamil girl who was highly punished by the war. Their minds are still struggling. Some researchers have identified psychological problems in the post war context.  A study too identified complex psychosocial problems that adolescent boys and girls faced in the post-war context. Some of those problems were cyclical, spanning generations, such as early marriage and domestic violence, while others were more symptomatic of deeper individual and collective impacts of war such as the silence around war and post-war trauma and suffering, attempted suicides and family breakdown (Emmanuel, etal., 2015). So it is clear that the ethnic problem in Sri Lanka is not completely solved. Still it is here. Today it is reporting some cases in Northern and Eastern provinces in Sri Lanka (E.g. Awa group, killing two of Jaffna University students by police, Eastern protests against Buddhist temples, Sinhala students were beaten in Jaffna University, some Jaffna people are celebrating the LTTE soldiers...etc.). The government is trying to show those as isolated cases to save their popularity among the people in south. Also currently the rivalry among the Sinhala and Muslim people is gradually increasing. The social Medias are creating a path for that racism. However all Sri Lankans have a responsibility to reconstruct the broken hearts among the races because of the war and not to allow a conception of such a disaster again. The government its principles should be the prior of that responsibility and should guide all the Sri Lankans to a sustainable peace and harmony.

Reference list

      Anon. (2015). Patriarchy is also within ours. Ginisiluwa, vol. 8, p.16.

Department of Consencus and Statistics. (1981). The consensus of population.

Emmanuel, s., Wettasinghe, A., Samuels, F., Thambaiah, A., and Rajendran, I. (2015). Failing Adolescents: Social Control, Political Economy & Human Development in post-war Sri Lanka.

Jabbar, M.A. and Sanjeetha, T.F. (2013). Conflict Transformation Post war Sri Lanka, 4^th International Symposium;SEUSL.

Keerawella, G. (2013). Post war sri lanka: Is peace a Hostage of the Military Victory?; Ethnic International Centre for Studies.