When Dr. Neelan Tiruchelvam was mindlessly and ruthlessly assassinated by the LTTE 10 years ago, he was on a momentous mission which promised to give democracy in Sri Lanka a new thrust and dimension. Essentially, his endeavour was to develop this countrydemocracy to such a degree that it was fully accommodative of the legitimate interests and needs of all of Sri Lanka’s communities. In other words, investing every group and citizen of this country with total self-respect and dignity was foremost among Neelan’s priorities.

At the time of his death, Neelan was helping out in the crafting of the year 2000 draft constitution which was eventually consigned to the flames in Parliament by some irate Opposition MPs, who, not surprisingly, thought it wise to throw in their lot with the ultra nationalism of Southern Sri Lanka, at the proverbial eleventh hour. Through their shocking behaviour, these MPs established their lineage with the destructive hordes in this country’s post independence history, who, on numerous occasions, put a savage end to political proposals aimed at resolving the National Question.

It is fierce, fire-breathing nationalism of this kind in Southern Sri Lanka which set the stage for the unsettling emergence of the LTTE in the North, but the brutality of the Tigers only served to heighten communalism in the South, which, in turn, of course, unrelentingly fed the flames narrow Tamil nationalism in the North.

Neelan’s inputs into efforts at resolving the conflict by political means, since particularly 1994, would have helped in ending this vicious circle of mutually-reinforcing virulent nationalisms, but it was not to be because nothing would have been in accord with the LTTE agenda more, than a Sri Lanka which was reeling and weakening in the grip of fiercely competing, armed nationalisms, which would have ensured for the Tigers, a commanding and unassailable position in the politics of the North. By this Tiger logic, therefore, all attempts at resolving the conflict politically had to be quashed and those in the forefront of these efforts, to the LTTE, were ‘traitors’, who needed to be eliminated.

Besides, the LTTE entertained grave apprehensions about the Tamil community getting out of its grip of control. Needless to say, the majority of the Tamil community holds moderate political opinions or is apolitical, and a negotiated political solution would have been all that they would have been waiting for. Since Neelan’s efforts were promising just this, in the view of the LTTE, he needed to be got out of the way.

With the liquidating of the LTTE by the Lankan security forces a couple of months back, Sri Lanka has arrived at a crucial historical cross-roads in that some political forces in Southern Sri Lanka seem to be pondering that there is no need for a political solution to the conflict, now that the bargaining tool in the hands of the more militant sections of the North, the LTTE, is no more. The near cacophaneous animosity among some Southern sections to even the 13th amendment to the constitution, bears this out, to a degree.

Matters are complicated further, by the government sending out confusing signals on this issue. While some senior ministers have spoken of the state’s willingness to implement, ‘in full’, the 13th amendment, the country’s political leadership, per se, is yet to make an unambiguous commitment to the amendment, at least to local audiences. Nor has it shown eagerness to forge ahead with a political solution; nor is such a solution proving a particularly popular topic in ruling circles.

The current issues surrounding the Internally Displaced Persons of the North, seem to have come as a God-send to those sections among both the rulers and the ruled, who would prefer to shove into the back burner, as it were, all talk of a political solution. The IDPs, we are given to understand, are an armful, and the state could conveniently forget all else concerning the Tamil community, until the IDP issues are sorted out.

Here’s where the intellectual brilliance of Neelan would have proved essential. We need Neelan and many more of his ilk to help charter the future course of this country. Right now, many among the influential and powerful sections seem to be allowing themselves to be lulled into accepting the misleading notion that the National Problem has consigned itself to the Limbo of forgotten things with the elimination of ‘terror’ or the smashing of the Tiger leadership. This is wishful thinking which may prove fatal for the country in the long –term. If Neelan were around, one could be certain, the need for a political solution would have been constantly dinned into the collective consciousness of the polity.

There is no denying the absolute truthfulness of the proposition, although it is now somewhat clichetic, that the Tiger terror blight grew out of the unresolved National Question. We have just been through a wasting, impoverishing and dehumanizing war which claimed nearly 100,000 lives and cost the country billions and billions of rupees. We just need not have gone through this long, dark night of ‘terror’ if the conflict had been nipped in the bud and a political solution, which granted equality to the citizens and ethnic groups of this country, was worked out long ago. Instead, the forces of narrow ethnic chauvinism were placated in particularly the South, and all possible solutions which were worked out between the main parties to the conflict, thrown into history’s dust heap.

Violence in all its forms should be unambiguously condemned and we have just had proof of the utter futility of using violence for the achievement of political ends. However, identity-based issues in a plural society, just would not wither away until the dignity of all humans in the polity concerned, is absolutely guaranteed by the state. And the only means to this is a new constitution whose chapter on human rights would be based on the fundamental premise that ‘one should do unto others, as one would have others do unto oneself’.