Divisional Secretary, TNA MPs must act to release Chegnchoalai lands: civil activist

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 08 October 2019, 18:43 GMT]
The Human Rights Commission of Sri Lanka (HRCSL) seems to have blindly applied the 2013 Circular of the SL State to arrive at its recommendation to reverse the ownership of Chegnchoalai orphanage lands at Malaiyaa'la-puram in Ki'linochchi. The circular proposes that the original landowners, displaced during the times of war, were the rightful owners to their properties. However, the HRCSL has failed to take all the facts regarding the Chegnchoalai lands, says civil activist from Karaichchi, Mr Murugiah Thamilchelvan. The Divisional Secretary and Tamil National Alliance Parliamentarians should take responsibility and cancel the decision mooted by the HRCSL, he said.



The HRCSL has notably failed to apply the basic principles such as those expressed in 2008-01 and 2013-01 circulars which state that the landless people who are residing in the lands must be provided alternative grounds through alienating crown lands.

However, in this case, the initial landowners who sold their lands to the LTTE run civil administration, had also received alternative grounds and housing schemes when the properties in question were under the custody of the SL military after 2009.

Once alternative lands have been provided for the original lands, how could they demand the initial properties back, Mr Thamilchelvan asked.

Fifty-four former orphaned children from Chegnchoalai, who were stranded at different places in the North and East after the end of the war, got together with some assistance from the community to put up the huts and resettle in the lands last year.

Long before 2009, the Tamil Eelam Administrative Service (TEAS) had bought thirty acres of lands from seventeen landowners at Malaiyaa'la-puram in Karaichchi, Ki'linochchi, paying ten lakhs of rupees per acre.

The TEAS allocated these grounds for Chegnchoalai and Kantharoopan A'rivuch-choalai orphanages.

Since the TEAS was a parallel administration to that of the civil administration of the SL State, the LTTE run public administration didn't bother about cancelling the LDO permits that fall under the system of the SL State. The TEAS didn't obtain the LDO permit documents from those who sold the lands to them, the well-informed activist said.

Furthermore, a unanimous decision was made at the District Coordinating Committee meeting held in Ki'linochchi on 11 April.

The District Secretary and Tamil National Alliance parliamentarians who were present at the DDC meeting must act before it is late, Thamilchelvan said.

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