SL Police threatens Tamils for observing annual temple festival in Vavuniyaa North

[TamilNet, Sunday, 15 September 2019, 07:09 GMT]
A group of SL police officers from the Nedungkea'ni station in Vavuniyaa North have been questioning and recording statements from the trustees of Vedukkul-naa'ri Aathi-linkeasvarar temple in Vavuniyaa North on Saturday and Sunday. Furthermore, the SL Police was making phone calls to selected people in the area, stating that a case had been filed against those who were actively involved in the temple festival that completed on Saturday. The trustees and devotees have ‘violated’ the SL Antiquities Ordinance by using a ladder to reach the hilltop, the SL police claims. The SL Police was demanding the removal of the ladder before 10:00 a.m. on Sunday.

The Tamil villagers say that the ladder was not causing any harm to the inscriptions in the rock or any other monument.

The devotees are being intimidated for the second consecutive year for marking the annual feast at the foothills of their deity located at the 157-meter-high hill.



The Tamil people in the area worship Siva (Lingkeasvarar) as their village-deity with seasonal rituals such as ‘madai’, ‘anna-thaanam’ and an annual festival at the foothills.

When the annual festival began on 05th September, the Sinhala police was quick to ban the use of loudspeakers, which were playing devotional songs in Tamil.

Amidst police threats, the annual feast was successfully staged on Saturday.



Around 200 people, including a section of Tamil students at the University of Jaffna, took part in the festival.

There are remains of an ancient cave and reservoir along with inscriptions on the stones. Old structures which look like bunkers of a hill-based fortress are also found at the foothills of Vedukku-naa'ri.

Rock inscriptions connected to Tamil-Brahmi script are preserved at least in two places in Veduukku-naa'ri hill, one at three meters above the ground surface and the other at thirty meters height.

The villagers believe that the hilltop, foothills and the adjacent area belonged to Tamil kings in the ancient times.

However, Sinhala Buddhist monks and the ‘All Sinhala’ SL Archaeology Department have started to claim the locality with Sinhala-Buddhicisation motives.



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