Devotee of rapist 'yogi'?:

Dallying with the chauvinist RSS?:

Wigneswaran unravelled

by Dr. Muttukrishna Sarvananthan

The Chief Minister of the Northern Province, Canagasabapathy Viswalingam Wigneswaran made a 'private visit' to India in November 2014.

Pic: ANCL library

It was reported that he was invited to deliver a memorial lecture in Chennai to commemorate civil liberties activist, K.G. Kannapiran, who is a person from the legal fraternity.

Later, Wigneswaran also attended a World Congress of Buddhism and Hinduism in New Delhi, which was graced by Dalai Lama, among others.

Here Wigneswaran had complained to the Dalai Lama about attacks on and destruction of Hindu temples in Sri Lanka. It is true that during the time of the previous Rajapaksa regime, places of worship of minority religions came under frequent attack by religious bigots who had the tacit patronage of the ruling coterie. As a matter of fact, many more churches and mosques were attacked than Hindu temples; in this circumstance, the Chief Minster complaining about the attacks on Hindu temples only smacks of parochial partisanship.

It was unbecoming of the Chief Minister of a multi-religious province to highlight the attacks on Hindu temples only to the Dalai Lama. The Chief Minister should be aware that the population of Christian faith comprises 20 percent and the population of Islamic faith three percent of the total population of the Northern Province, according to the Census 2012.

It was also reported that Wigneswaran had paid two other visits in India which are ethically and morally reprehensible.

One was to an ashram of late Swami Premananda in Trichy, Tamil Nadu. Premananda was born in Matale (Sri Lanka) but moved to Trichy (India) after the 1983 riots and set-up an ashram there. He was arrested by the police on charges of rape and murder of few female disciples within the ashram, convicted, and sentenced to life imprisonment in the 1990s. He died in prison on 21 February 2011.

It was disgraceful for the Chief Minister of the Northern Province to pay respects to a rapist and murderer, while violence against women (including rape) in his province is rampant, which Wigneswaran often blames on the security forces personnel.

His visit to the ashram of a deceased criminal is an affront to women who outnumber men in his province and who had undergone immense suffering during the course of the long civil war. Even worse is the fact that, in April 2015,the Chief Minister had written to the Prime Minister of India, pleading on behalf of the family members of the disciples of Premananda, who are co-convicts in the rape and murder cases and serving life sentences in the prisons in Tamil Nadu.

It is also important to note that the disciples of Premananda, including Chief Minister Wigneswaran and the Minister for Resettlement and Hindu Religious Affairs, D.M. Swaminathan, had a commemorative meeting for the late Premananda in Barnes Place, Colombo, in March 2015.

It was disgraceful for the Chief Minister and the Minister of Hindu Religious Affairs to be worshiping a rapist and murderer.

The politicians are expected to be role models for the citizens they represent; not to patronise rapists or murderers.

This author also learns that Chief Minister Wigneswaran had met the head of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS - National Volunteer or Patriotic Organisation) in New Delhi in November 2014. The RSS is a Hindu supremacist organisation notoriously famous for the murder of Mahatma Gandhi and frequent attacks and pogroms against minority Christian and Muslim communities in India and their places of worship since independence to date.

The Chief Minster should explain the purpose of meeting the RSS chief to the people of the Northern Province. He also should explain the difference/s (if any) between the RSS and the Buddhist supremacist organisation, Bodu Bala Sena (BBS - or the Buddhist Power Force), in Sri Lanka, which he often chastises for championing hatred against the people of minority religions.

Championing wrong causes

Furthermore, the Chief Minister appears to dodge meeting useful persons from overseas and within.

It was reported that the Malaysian Special Envoy on Infrastructure to India and Southern Asia (with ministerial rank), Samy Vellu (former longest serving President of the Malaysian Indian Congress and the second longest serving minister in the country), visiting Sri Lanka in March 2015 wanted to meet the Chief Minister to explore investment opportunities in the Northern Province, but the Chief Minister had not responded to the request for a meeting.

The Chief Minister should be aware that Malaysians are one of the largest investors in Sri Lanka and the Northern Province should proactively seek private or public Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) from Malaysia. Some members of the Northern Provincial Council (NPC) also complained publicly last year that they are unable to meet the Chief Minister to talk about provincial matters.

This author also learns that the CM of the Northern Province had attempted to hire a former Tamil Tiger mole in the UN who held a high position in the UNDP office in Colombo (Deputy Head of the Umbrella Project) during the time of the ceasefire (who had subsequently worked for the TRO office in Colombo since the Tsunami) and an Australian national currently living in Sydney to be an advisor to him in early 2014. Apparently the mother of the former Tamil Tiger mole is said to be a family friend of the Chief Minister. It is learnt that the previous Rajapaksa Government had turned down the request by Chief Minister Wigneswaran to provide dual nationality to this former Tamil Tiger mole in order for him to be hired as one of his advisors.

Rasiah Nimalan Karthikeyan (aforesaid former Tamil Tiger mole at the UN office in Colombo) is currently accompanying the Chief Minister in his 'private visit' to the UK and USA as the "Diary Secretary, Executive Assistant and Advisor to the Chief Minister", according to The Sunday Times of July 12, 2015, Nimalan Karthikeyan had told this author in the early 2000s that he is a Chartered Marketer by profession and worked as a sales executive at the Oberoi Hotel (now called Cinnamon Grand) in Colombo for long time. He claimed that subsequently he had obtained a Master of Business Administration (MBA) from the Sri Jayawardanepura University in Colombo.

Though he had no qualification or work experience in the development field, he was appointed as the Deputy Project Manager of the Umbrella Project of the UNDP during the time of ceasefire in 2002 due to political influence.

Nimalan Karthikeyan, a pukka (perfect) pandankaraya (bootlicker), has had double dealings with the LTTE and the UN in Sri Lanka functioning as interpreter during the UN missions to Kilinochchi during the ceasefire time 2002 - 2004.

All the foregoing indicates serious lack of judgement on the part of the Chief Minister of the Northern Province who is a retired judge of the Supreme Court of Sri Lanka. The war-torn people of the Northern Province deserve a much better person than an inept, religious bigot, and sexist Chief Minister Wigneswaran.

Muttukrishna Sarvananthan (Ph.D. Wales, M.Sc. Bristol, M.Sc. Salford, and B.A. (Hons) Delhi) is a Development Economist by profession and the Founder and Principal Researcher of the Point Pedro Institute of Development (http://pointpedro.org), Point Pedro, Northern Province, Sri Lanka. He was an Endeavour Research Fellow at the Monash University, Melbourne (2011-2012) and a Fulbright Visiting Research Scholar at the Elliott School of International Affairs, George Washington University, Washington D.C. (2008-2009).