Unabashedly partial to Sri Lanka

PADMA RAO SUNDARJI, AUTHOR OF SRI LANKA: THE NEW COUNTRY IN CONVERSATION WITH DILSHAN BOANGE :

Part III

Q: Writers who have written about the war the Sri Lankan Government fought with the LTTE for near 30 years tend to discuss the 'mental impact' that affected a whole generation and devastated the entire island. But the truth is there was a serious containment of the war's impact in terms of its direct effects, to certain specific territories that made a great many people in many parts of Sri Lanka 'feel' the gravity of the war through the mass media alone. And then there was the centre- Colombo - which was a primary target repeatedly attacked by the LTTE, where extravagant New Year's eve parties and other such revelry went on unhindered. In this respect how much a 'New Country' do you see in the 'perceptions' of the people in post-war Sri Lanka?

A: I would disagree to some extent with the 'containment' argument and the question of how, when the war was restricted thus to the 'theatres' of the North and East, could writers speak of all Sri Lankans feeling its 'mental impact'. The media - any media, be it Sri Lankan or foreign - obviously had to report on developments in those venues with regularity since the major part of the war was fought there. I don't see any larger motive behind that aspect.

Equally obviously, it is the hapless people resident in the North and East who were impacted the most by the devastating war. It was a mind-numbing impact and one that will take decades to dull and fade away. But, one cannot discount the impact the faraway war had on Southern Sri Lanka either. First of all, think of the Sri Lankans all over the country who are thirty years old today. Ordinarily, they ought to all peaking their professions and careers. But while Southern Lankans may have had a head start, given that their situation was a lot more stable and protected than in the warzones, 30-year-old Tamils have a mammoth task ahead to catch up.

Second, my book focused only on the North and East, so it would be presumptuous of me to vehemently insist that all Southerners were affected by the war. But from what I can remember of, say, Colombo, or Galle, or Kandy over those war decades, I know that there was always a pall of uncertainty, of lurking insecurity in the air.

Parents sending their kids to school were on hot coals till they came home. There were bombs going off all over the place, explosions killing people right in Bambalapitiya, suicide bombers walking into high-security establishments and blowing themselves up.

Finally and when recruitment into the Sri Lankan armed forces increased dramatically during the last years of war, your generals told me that in many Southern Sri Lankan villages, there would be at least ten funerals a day.

So I think there was indeed a nation-wide mental impact, but one which was essentially different in the south and the north. Then, there were other crippling side-effects of the war. For instance and every time hostilities peaked or there was a particularly brazen attack on a Colombo installation, western countries would advise travel advisories. Along the long south western tourism belt of Sri Lanka, one of whose revenue mainstays in tourism, it would be the small and medium establishments that would suffer the most. That was an impact too, albeit an indirect one, of the war. Finally, think of the massive problems all Sri Lankans faced to get visas to travel overseas.

For three decades, a Sri Lankan passport was guaranteed to evoke suspicion, detention, questioning and many times - even a denial of a visa. And of course that sort of discrimination has a debilitating, humiliating impact too.

Yes, it was certainly odd to see big wedding parties on at the Galle Face while your soldiers were fighting a terrible war just 300 kilometers north of Colombo.

But then again, it was a lot like in India, where the big cities of Delhi and Mumbai are so disconnected and were far away from sectarian battles being waged in states like Chhatisgarh and Jharkhand. To summarize: yes, I perceived a vast difference in the mood of your nation and her people after the war ended. It was like the palpable, almost visible lifting of a giant pall of depression, anxiety, gloom and tension. It was like 'hearing' millions of Sri Lankans release a huge, collective and simultaneous sigh of relief. That, to me, is definitely a 'new country'.

Q: What were the areas you felt you had to handle with a lot of sensitivity and perhaps with tact when interviewing subjects for your book?

A: Actually, none! That is the wonderful way that Sri Lankans have - all of you. I have never been glared at by Tamils for asking why they are, say, voting for Rajapaksa and not the TNA, nor have I been abused by Sinhalese when I ask them why and how some Buddhist monks can be strident nationalists willing to resort to violence.

I think a lot depends on HOW one asks questions. You need patience, time with your subject and plenty of space to build up mutual trust. In a country that has just emerged from a deadly war, that takes some doing. And you must never betray that trust by misquoting them or quoting out of context, just to 'sex up' your copy. Tape-recording all conversations and transcribing each word - no matter how tedious the task - and respecting confidentiality promised to the odd interview partner, are practices that always pay off. I don't know for sure but I would like to think that this is perhaps why successive Sri Lankan authorities over two decades - having seen my earlier work - have not impeded me in any way from carrying out my research with absolute freedom.

Q: How has the critical reception been so far to the book?

A: Excellent. There was a well-attended book talk event at the Foreign Correspondents' Club of South Asia. Then, the official Delhi launch was a packed house with a very senior and respected Indian journalist and commentator moderating the session, two Sri Lankan professors resident in Delhi participating in the panel discussion and Nirupama Rao, India's former foreign secretary and high commissioner to Sri Lanka, bestowing lavish praise on the book to high heavens during her address as chief guest.

The most professional and largest-circulated publications like Mail Today (of the India Today group), Hindustan Times, Open magazine and the Daily Pioneer did what all professional media houses do: get experts in regional history and current affairs or those with vast experience in Sri Lanka themselves - like Col Hariharan - to review the book. That is the way it should be done.

They liked the book, had some criticism to offer too, and that is perfectly fine. In any case, one can only be sincere to one's work and can't please everyone. A historian reviewing the book wanted me to have written more about history, while a Sri Lankan sociologist told me I should have skipped the historical background altogether and stuck only to the 'new country'. Another found one chapter too long, yet another remarked that he would have welcomed an additional one on a given subject. All their comments are welcome. Most importantly, they read every line, and they straightaway got the book's essential message.

Sadly, I can't say the same of two other reviews that appeared in otherwise professional media concerns Business Standard and the India edition of the Huffington Post. The former got a resident hobby poet whose obvious dependence on the 'western take' on Sri Lanka made it painfully embarrassing (for him) that he had never set foot in Sri Lanka.

The latter got a young, Washington, DC -based US Peace Corps intern - of all people, who made it obvious in his 'review' that his brief, post-tsunami gig in Sri Lanka had made him the expert on your country and its long civil war.

Both reviews made it clear that the young men had barely 'speed-read' the book. I don't know these writers and don't give a flying kite for their comic posturing. What appalled me much more is the lowering of journalistic standards and norms displayed by the senior editors of those two publications in asking such people to review the book.

There is something I must emphasize: you cannot understand or appreciate the 'new country' that Sri Lanka has become unless you experienced first-hand the horrors of the 'old country'. I am certain neither of these boy-reviewers were born when the war began and almost certainly had nothing to do with it at close quarters. There are many more reviews planned in the coming months ahead of the Colombo launch of the book, tentatively slated in July.

Q: How do you view your career thus far as a journalist and what have you planned for the days ahead?

A: Despite the war, the destruction, the terror attacks, the natural disasters and many other distressing and catastrophic events that I witnessed over 25 years and continue to, I can honestly say that I would never exchange my profession for any other in the world. Being a journalist gives one the rare privilege of being able to reach out to strangers in all kinds of different situations and enrich one's own knowledge, sharpen one's own sensibilities.

What lies in the future, I can't say. For now, I am pleased and proud of my book, I have the enormously light feeling of having finally come out with all the thoughts about Sri Lanka that were welling up inside me for so many decades.

But I must say that being sent to cover the January presidential elections, was profoundly exciting. And yes, did sow the seeds of yet another book on Sri Lanka, the new and eternal country.

Concluded