The Madras Cafe Protests: Eelamism Marches On By Srimal Fernando I Published by The International Center for Political Violence and Terrorism Research (ICPVTR) - Singapore )

The Madras Cafe Protests: Eelamism Marches On 

By Srimal Fernando

(The International Center for Political Violence and Terrorism Research (ICPVTR) is a specialist center within the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies at Nanyang Technological University, Singapore.)
www.cttajournal.org

Protests against the recently released Bollywood film Madras Cafe provide an opportunity to examine the continued support among southern Indian Tamils and members of the Sri Lankan Tamil diaspora in the UK for a separate state in Sri Lanka’s Tamil-dominated north and east

One of Bollywood’s more controversial releases in recent times has been Shoojit Sircar’s Madras Café, which is based on Sri Lanka’s civil war. The film stirred up a range of reactions over its portrayal of events that occurred after India’s involvement in Sri Lanka from 1987 to 1990. Tamil militancy developed in Sri Lanka during the mid-1970s partly in response to post-independence state policies that favored the majority Sinhalese at the expense of the minority Tamils. During the course of the conflict, India’s role has been seen in different perspectives, even to the extent of being interventionists.

Cold War politics coupled with fears over its own restive Tamil population in the southern state of Tamil Nadu and a desire to project its influence were some of the reasons behind India’s involvement. However, India found itself dragged into a direct confrontation with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), the strongest

Tamil militant group that would eventually dominate the struggle for a separate state called Tamil Eelam. After the breakdown of peace engineered by an accord signed between India and Sri Lanka in July 1987, India launched Operation Pawan under which thousands of troops were deployed to rein in the LTTE. The LTTE’s revenge for India’s military involvement was the assassination of former Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi in 1991 by a female suicide bomber. It is this part of the conflict that Madras Cafe addresses, albeit via a selective interpretation of events.

The film follows the journey of Major Vikram Singh (played by John Abraham), an Indian army officer who is sent to Jaffna in northern Sri Lanka to take charge of the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW, India’s agency for external intelligence) operations there. The plot is fictionalized, but it is not difficult to draw linkagesbetween what happens in the film and what has happened in reality. This is the basis used by Eelamists who allege that it portrays Tamils and the secessionist struggle unfavorably. In response to what they termed as a “misguided portrayal of the history of Tamil Eelam,” supporters of the Eelamist cause triggered protests in Tamil Nadu and in the UK.

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Source : (The International Center for Political Violence and Terrorism Research (ICPVTR) is a specialist center within the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies at Nanyang Technological University, Singapore.)
www.cttajournal.org