A battle against life and death won:

From village girls to career women

By Dhaneshi Yatawara

Fear and sadness was visible in her when Vijayasaliny began talking about her gloomy past. Vijayasaliny, an ordinary Tamil girl from a village called Manduvil in Pudukuduyirippu had seen and heard the worst in life. She just turned twenty this year. She saw her friend living next door dragged by the LTTE to be recruited by them into their outfit. “I saw her that afternoon. She had a bath and just went into her house.

Her brother was already in the LTTE outfit, yet the terrorists took her forcibly – she was screaming, her family was crying and begging of them not to take her. All in vain, the LTTE cadres dragged her out,” said Vijayasaliny. Even as of today no one knows what happened to Vijayasaliny’s friend – she never returned home.

It was that by some miracle that Vijayasaliny and some others in Manduvil village were not forcibly recruited by the LTTE. Another girl in her neighbourhood, Vijayasaliny's friend was forcibly recruited by the LTTE. “Yet after a few months the LTTE brought her back home unconscious,” she said. “The story is that she has tried to escape from LTTE clutches but each time they caught her and an injection was administered. We do not know what it is. But when LTTE cadres brought her home, she became unconscious every now and then and although she regained consciousness, “My friend died suffering from the illness,” she said.

When the firing escalated people of Manduvil village had fled to the coastal area of Puthumathalan during March 2009. “It was a horrible time. Days passed days without any food. One kilogram of rice was 3000 rupees then. We had to give away gold jewellery and other valuable goods just for food,” Vijayasaliny said reminiscing the horrible past.

Yet, today she is one of the happiest women in Mullaitivu. She is a proud soldier of the Sri Lanka Army having confidence and stability in her life – which in her words “I thought would never dawn”. A strict, disciplined lifestyle of the Army is not an obstacle to her. With a stable job in hand, most of her problems are sorted out.

Vijayasaliny is a new woman recruit to the Sri Lanka Army. Yet she symbolises almost all the stories of girls living in and around the Mullaitivu district who recently joined the Sri Lanka Army. Just like Vijayasaliny, the majority of these new women soldiers from Mullaitivu have never travelled beyond the town while a few of them have travelled up to Vavuniya a few times. During their training period these recruits got the chance to travel to Colombo and visit key places in the city. Many have not even stepped into the Bandaranaike International Airport. It was for the first time they stepped into the airport. They were opened to a new world.

Career women

The training, language and computer classes, discipline and etiquette that they are being taught is bringing out the career woman hidden inside the 21- year- old Nandanee. She is a typical Tamil girl from Udayarkattu in Mullaitivu. She and her family sacrificed a great deal just to stay alive during the height of the battle. “When we were displaced to Pudumathalan (the narrow stretch of coastal land that separates the lagoon from the sea) we literally lived in bunkers,” said Nandanee. The LTTE made us cling onto tyres while swimming. We sent my younger brother with our aunt to swim with the help of tyres but there were no tyres for us to use. So we had to give up,” she said relating the horror story. The people who escaped through the lagoon on tyres were fired upon by the LTTE with paddle guns. Amidst the rain of bullets people reached the other side of the lagoon where the Sri Lanka Army waited to receive these destitute people with food and water and safety. Nandanee, her parents, older brother and sister returned to a bunker. Heavy firing continued and when it ceased they came out and found that the Army had liberated the land. They joined the massive crowd of civilians walking towards the Vadduvakal causeway and reached the safety of the Army.

With god’s grace she is safe and today she is a proud career woman. How are you feeling now? we asked. ‘Romba santhosama (so happy),’ the happy answered answered with a giggle. Traces of suffering are no more visible on her face.

“We never thought that the Army will give us such a different experience,” said Chandrakala or fondly called Kala by her friends in the batch. Kala has a more matured approach towards life and shows potential of a successful career woman. “When we joined the Sri Lanka Army we thought it was only the conventional training and then deploying to relevant areas. We never thought that we would be be shown the world at large and thus making us understand the levels we have to achieve in our lives and in our careers,” she said.

New chapter

Altogether there are more than 400 Tamil women recruited to the Army, as of today. The newest batch is undergoing training at the Mullaitivu Security Forces Headquarters. The batch includes 29 women recruits enlisted to the Army.

The inaugural session of the training course began on March 17 at the Security Forces Headquarters- Mullaitivu under Security Forces Commander of Mullaitivu, Major General Jagath Dias.

“They are not trained any different to other women soldiers. They will be given the same tasks and thus the new recruits need to go through the standard training,” said Major General Dias.

“These communities underwent a difficult period during LTTE control before 2009 and the enemy they saw was those terrorists. We had to specifically guide the new recruits to understand that the enemy is any party who poses a threat to the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the motherland,” Maj. Gen. Dias said.

These brave women, who won a battle against life and death in their youth are now preparing to transform ethnically distant societies in to one Sri Lankan community. the recent batch of woman recruits to the Sri Lanka Army are preparing to change their lifestyles and turn a new leaf in Sri Lankan military history. They will be messengers of peace and harmony to the North and South.