Lt Col Thileepan’s 32nd commemoration gains momentum across North-East

[TamilNet, Thursday, 26 September 2019, 17:49 GMT]
Eezham Tamils in the North and East marked the 32nd annual commemoration of the sacrifice of LTTE’s Jaffna Political Head Lt Col Thileepan (Rasiah Parthipan), who sacrificed his life in a historical dry hunger-strike in 1987, which exposed India’s interests-oriented invasion at that time. Tamil National Peoples’ Front organised a march from Vavuniyaa to Nalloor in the North mobilising the youth with significant participation of women. The Tamil National Alliance marked the event in Ki’linochchi and Batticaloa while the former NPC Chief Minister Justice C.V. Wigneswaran’s Tamil Makkal Kootani commemorated the remembrance at Point Pedro. The Remembrance event at Nalloor, where Thileepan sacrificed his life, was marked as a joint remembrance event beyond group affinities.



The protracted genocide, which has worsened into heritage and development genocide and the ongoing continuous protests demanding the whereabouts of Tamils subjected to enforced disappearances and the protests demanding de-militarisation of the Tamil homeland has reinvigorated the demands that were put forward by Lt Col Thileepan in 1987.

Thileepan was the political head of the LTTE in Jaffna when New Delhi intervened with its military force after entering a State-to-State agreement with Colombo in July 1987.

Thileepan’s dry hunger strike lasted for 12 days in September 1987, and the LTTE had put forward five simple demands which the Indian Establishment could have easily accomplished had there been a genuine political will on the part of New Delhi.

Thileepan’s sacrifice was a significant historical event in the political emancipation of Eezham Tamils as it exposed the real agenda of the intervening power, India, which was calling the shots in the island during the times of the Cold War.



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