The Sri Lankan Parliament convened on Tuesday May 5, the day after the results of the Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly elections were announced. Anyone watching the live broadcast of the proceedings on television could not be blamed for thinking that the seven members were speaking on a motion brought specifically to congratulate the electoral victory of the Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam, led by South Indian actor Joseph Vijay.
Although the actual topics slated for debate were entirely different, Tamil-speaking Parliamentarians dedicated most of their time to showering praise on Vijay.
Neither the Speaker, the Deputy Speaker, nor others presiding over the House seemed to monitor whether the members were speaking on the relevant subject. Whether they understood the content of speeches or not, they simply sat through the speeches, only reminding the members of their time limits as their allotted slots drew to a close.
Members from North and East Tamil parties, Up-country Tamil parties, and Muslim parties, such as the Sri Lanka Muslim Congress, expressed their delight and congratulated Vijay for achieving a ‘historic milestone’ in the election within just two years of entering politics.
Members of the Illankai Tamil Arasu Kachchi (ITAK), specifically S. Sritharan and Shanakiyan Rasamanickam, sought Vijay’s help and cooperation in finding a political solution to Sri Lanka’s ethnic issue during their speeches. Up-country members, including the General Secretary of the Ceylon Workers’ Congress, Jeevan Thondaman, extended congratulations on behalf of the Up-country Tamil people and reminisced about their ‘umbilical cord’ ties.
The leader of the Muslim Congress, Rauff Hakeem, praised Vijay’s achievements to the skies. Going a step further, he quoted Mahakavi Bharathiyar’s poem ‘Sindhu Nadhayin Misai Nilavinile…’, specifically the lines “We shall build a bridge to the island of Sinhala… we shall raise the causeway and pave a road”, expressing his hope that a bridge should be constructed between Talaimannar and Rameswaram during Vijay’s tenure as the Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu.
Hakeem did not stop there. He was also seen reading out and congratulating the names of ‘Islamic brothers’ newly elected to the Tamil Nadu Assembly, as well as those elected to the Assembly of Kerala, another South Indian state.
Meanwhile, Chamara Sampath Dasanayake, an MP from the Sri Lanka Freedom Party, stated that there is a possibility Vijay might ask for Katchatheevu, which currently belongs to Sri Lanka, to be handed over to Tamil Nadu.
It appears Dasanayake said this based on remarks Vijay had previously made regarding Tamil Nadu’s claimed rights over Katchatheevu during President Anura Kumara Dissanayake’s visit to the island last year.
For the first time in nearly half a century since former Chief Minister M.G. Ramachandran (MGR), a cinema actor is again coming to power in Tamil Nadu. The dominance held over state politics by the two main Dravidian parties for six decades has been shattered in this election. There is no doubt that these factors caused Sri Lankans to turn their attention toward the Tamil Nadu election results more than usual.
While Vijay’s victory may not bring any change to the current Indo-Lanka relations or New Delhi’s geopolitical strategic approach, the rhetoric of Tamil politicians, offering hollow hope to the North and East, and the rhetoric of majority politicians instilling unnecessary fear in the people of Southern Sri Lanka, is bound to continue.
