Abducted Tamil child found deployed in slave labour in Sinhala district

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 08 June 2011, 21:22 GMT]
The grandfather of an abducted 11-year-old Tamil boy from Batticaloa has been threatened by paramilitary for having braved to rescue his grandson from the grips of ‘treasure hunters’ who had deployed the abducted boy for slave labour in Dambulla. Mr. Velmurugu Sivalingam, the grandfather, upon receiving information on the whereabouts of his grandson, had rushed to Dambulla to rescue his grandson, Athisayarajah Soundararajah.

The boy, a student of Chiththaa'ndi Maha Viththiyaalayam was abducted by a paramilitary recruit, Ramachandran Mariyaraj, in May 2011.

He was later taken over by a Sinhala gang that deployed him in slave labour in Dambulla. The gang is said to be involved in treasure hunting.

Now, the paramilitary operated by the Sri Lanka Army has been threatening the grandfather and the grandson, according to complaints lodged with the Ea'raavoor Police and the Human Rights Commission of Sri Lanka (HRCSL) regional office in Batticaloa.

There have been several reports of Tamil children being abducted from Jaffna, Vanni and Batticaloa.

Dambulla, a key junction where Jaffna - Kandy and Colombo - Trincomalee highways cross, is situated in the Central Province.