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About the author:
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Dr. Murugar Gunasingam is a Senior Librarian at the University of Western Sydney, Australia. Graduating from the University of Jaffna, Sri Lanka, with an honours degree in history, he served for a time on the academic staff of the Department of History and later on the staff of the library in the same university. After obtaining his Master?s Degree in Library and Information Science from the University of London, he joined the library staff of the University of Western Sydney in 1990. He was awarded the degree of Ph.D. in history by the University of Sydney in 1999.
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Foreword:
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Dr. Murugar Gunasingam has completed a pathbreaking and pioneering study of the Eelam Tamil quest for self determination under the able guidance of my good friend and one-time colleague, the late Dr. Sinnappah Arasaratnam. This study in my view will receive the plaudits of all students of Sri Lanka?s politics and modern history. For this meticulous work of scholarship, Dr. Gunasingam was justly awarded the degree of Ph.D by the University of Sydney. In undertaking this study, Dr. Gunasingam has left no stone unturned in his search for bibliographic material. Not only has he focused on almost every available source but he has also brought an analytical mind to bear on their veracity. His critical bibliography will be most welcomed by the world of Sri Lanka scholars and we are all in his debt for his untiring efforts. Some of his sources are highly original and they see the light of day for the first time.
Nationalism is a many faceted phenomenon in our present world of bloody ethnic strife, a fact of life which was not foreseen by any of the great social scientists or thinkers of the past. What effects such self-destructive and internecine ethnic strife will have on global equilibrium is fearful to contemplate. The examples of Kosovo and Rwanda, leave alone other uncared for and lonely outposts on the globe, are still to unfold themselves in the final reckoning. For ethnicity is global and infectious reaching almost epidemic proportions in countries where minority groups strive for a fair share of the ever-shrinking national pie and feel neglected if not adequately cared for and are not endowed with equal rights with an independent judiciary and enlightened forward looking political leadership especially from the majority ethnic group. Dr. Gunasingam has raised these questions with all their ramifications in his comprehensive thesis.
Nationalism is an elusive concept. Who of us would have imagined (had we been living in those halcyon times) that the two premier communities, Sinhalese and Tamils, would seek an end to their peace and tranquillity by engaging on the one hand in hegemonism and on the other with a defensive reaction, virtually hegemonism fighting a rearguard action, against an ever-expanding Sinhalese exclusivism. The two communities have been brought together under the single umbrella of the English language and British culture. But as the economy shrank and population increased, rivalries, mutual recriminations and conflicts began.
Apart from nationalism?s elusiveness, there were always ever present dangers in it transforming itself into a violent reactionary struggle for survival. Some ethnic minorities desire to preserve their identity while others let themselves be submerged and still others are strong and confident enough to maintain their separateness. The Sri Lankan Tamils were an illustration of an ethnic group?s insistence on maintaining its identity. Not merely their identity, they demanded that their identity be recognised in various constitutional safeguards. Their culture of several millennia, their language and their religion linked with their continuous habitation of a historic homeland provided them with the necessary impetus to opt in the end for a separate sovereign Tamil state of Thamil Eelam. Preceding this decision to pursue statehood, the Tamils and their leaders had hoped that ratios in representation will provide them with the necessary protection. There was always the dependence on the role that the impartial imperial arbiter would play. The demand for federalism was the ideal compromise which could have averted the bloody ethnic strife but the emerging Sinhalese middle class declined to make compromises remaining intransigent all the while and even willing to postpone independence in order to preserve their natural share in representation. The ?fifty-fifty? cry of G.G. Ponnambalam and his All Ceylon Tamil Congress was the acme of this agitation but the demand collapsed with its rejection by the Soulbury Commission
The genie was soon out of its container with the grant of independence in 1948. Democracy became confused with ethnocracy (the domination of the ethnic majority) and so began the road to separation. Now the two communities are locked in mortal strife with no end in sight, with the only outcome being total disintegration and interference by foreign powers.
Dr. Gunasingam brings us to this threshold point in the evolution of Sri Lankan Tamil nationalism, leaving his readers asking for more. He has accomplished a difficult task most competently and deserves all the accolades for his services to the world of scholarship.
A.J. Wilson
Emeritus Professor of Political Science,
29 August 1999 University of New Brunswick,
Frederickton,
Canada.
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