The Sinhalese preferred death to giving up their land

by Elmo Leonard in Vavuniya

This village called Kala Siyambalawa, is the last Sinhalese settlement on the periphery of what is called (Sri Lanka) "government held land." Beyond, is where the LTTE terrorists walk tall, breed a mono ethnic doctrine and with it, emblem themselves as the sole representatives of a community.

That apart, ask a peasant of Kala Siyambalawa his address and he will add to the name of this village, Neeriyakuluma, and postal town, Vavuniya.

In Kala Siyambalawa, on a moonless night in 1985 the LTTE (terrorists) torched 85 houses of Sinhalese peasants, killed three, while the others escaped. The deserters were housed as refugees in a place called Nochchiagama, near Anuradhapura where their only income was from selling their labour, they said.

The once irrigated rice fields of Kala Siyambalawa turned into the mating grounds of the wild boar and other savage animals. The coconut trees were uprooted by wild elephants, for, the soft parts were considered their fodder.

The pinch of hunger is more difficult to bear than the bullet which brings on merciful death, Sinhalese home guard G. Jayasakera 57 said. In 1992, the refugees came back to their abandoned village.

Now, amidst killing of home guards and civilians by the LTTE, the Sinhalese villagers say that they have nowhere else to go. For, the little land they hold is all they must cultivate for a living.

"Every one of us in this village has resolved to fight to the last," home guard, T. B. Upali Dissanayake 27, summed it up.In 1880 the British built a sluice here and there are signs that within these environs, three communities lived in harmony. In 1920 seven Sinhalese families settled here, coming from a village called Poonawa, in Madawatchchiya. Relations followed.

Today, there are 170 Sinhalese families. Bunkers are being built everywhere. One kilometre away is a village called Veerapuram, where Tamil peasants till the soil. The Tamil villagers said that at times of ploughing and harvest, they work for the Sinhalese.

There is another village called Neeriyakulum, four kilometres away, where Muslims live and toil under the same tropical sun. The Sinhalese said that they can live side by side with the Tamils and Muslims; what they feared was the LTTE militancy.

While the peasants in these environs get water for cultivation, from Thammanakulama Wewa (irrigation tank), they said that rain is their economy. Their harvest of rice is purchased by the private sector and the money they get is a consolation. The other seed they gather like kurukkan and maa are transported to Dambulla and sold.

For human beings, there is something called the spiritual basic. The nearest Buddhist temple is eight kilometres away.

A bus leaves in the morning and returns only after dusk. In the village of Kala Siyambalawa, where all are Buddhists, there was but a shrine under a bo tree, with three statues of the Buddha placed inside a shelter, as a place of worship.

The Karuna Trust built what is called a Buduge at the cost of Rs. 900,000 ($9,000). On a poya fullmoon day, we witnessed children dressed in white, being instructed on the doctrine of the Buddha.

But, there is no temple here, no Buddhist monk resides. There is no electricity there. The building of the Buddhist temple and a residence for a monk will cost Rs 1 million ($9,090) and work is expected to begin in March.

When the buduge was completed a few months ago, villagers undertook a Buddhist procession, or perehera. They hoped that this perehera would grow into an annual event.

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