Sri Lankan Tamils will not be helped by chauvinist attacks on president Mahinda Rajapaksa

Sri Lankan president Mahinda Rajapaksa has commenced his visit to India, to the delight of assorted self-styled champions of Sri Lankan Tamils in India, most notably, Vaiko. Many groups and parties in Tamil Nadu seek to mobilise local support in the name of Sri Lankan Tamils. Their competition with one another in this race has degenerated into wholly retrograde measures such as attacking visiting pilgrims from Lanka, calling for banning football matches between Lankan schools and Indian ones, etc.

Now, they have pounced on the Sri Lankan president’s visit to India as a great opportunity to show off their zeal in support of Lankan Tamils. If they think that the people of Tamil Nadu do not have the sense to realise that their aggressive competition to stage the most attention-grabbing protest against Rajapaksa will only harm the Lankan Tamils, they are sadly mistaken. Money could not buy the support of the Tamil voters in their last assembly elections, as voters have developed too much self-respect to accept being treated as dumb creatures who would tolerate corruption by their leaders so long as they got some cash at the time of elections. That maturity is likely to extend to their response to competitive aggression against the visiting head of state.

India has many bones to pick with Sri Lanka, including thwarting Colombo’s game of playing Pakistan and China off against India. This calls for a combination of unrelenting pressure on some subjects, such as political rights of the Tamil minority, and generous accommodation on some others. This strategy is being wrecked by politicking by Tamil politicians like Vaiko, who give hardliners in Colombo a ready handle to stonewall any pro-Tamil demand. India has to promote people-to-people ties, build an expansive economic relationship with Lanka that gives a large cross-section of Lankans a vital stake in maintaining good relations with India and make Colombo deliver on principles and promises of democracy that it cannot afford to forswear. National leaders must convey this to the people and checkmate the chauvinists.