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Will the International war crimes inquiry ever take place in Sri Lanka ?

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On March 26, the UN Human Rights Council has approved an international war crimes inquiry into alleged crimes committed during Sri Lanka's civil war. It has adopted a resolution that allows the Office of the High Commissioner of Human Rights (OHCHR) to monitor progress and undertake a comprehensive investigation into atrocities committed between September 2008 and May 2009, before the end of the war, by the government army and the LTTE. Among the 41 countries participated in the Council, 23 voted in favour of the resolution, 12 against and 12 abstained from voting.

The Sri Lankan government has strongly rejected the allegations against it declaring “The resolution will not only constitute a serious breach of international law but also sets a precedence on the sovereignty of nations”.

Navi Pillay, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, who is very critical about the attitude of Sri Lankan Government since long time, has said that Sri Lanka has made "little progress" towards ensuring accountability for alleged atrocities and war crimes committed during the 26-year civil war against the Tamil fighters.

War crimes are prohibited by the Geneva Conventions, of which Sri Lanka is a signatory. In 2002 the International Criminal Court (ICC) was created by the Rome Statute to prosecute individuals for serious crimes, such as war crimes. Sri Lanka is not a signatory of the Rome Statute. Therefore it is only possible for the ICC to investigate and prosecute war crimes in Sri Lanka if the UN Security Council was to refer Sri Lanka to the ICC, which is unlikely.

Background of the resolution

Tamil people are an ethnic group native to the state of Tamil Nadu of India and to the northeast zone of Sri Lanka. This community mainly consisting of Hindus, with small section of Christians and Muslims, is the victim of civil war, which wreaks havoc across Sri Lanka since 1983. After the Independence in 1947, the conflict between the Sinhalese and Tamils only increase as the former consider the latter as Indian nationals. In 1949, the government withdrew the citizenship of a large part of the Tamil population to reduce their representation in the electorate from 33% to 20%. Then in 1956, the government changed the official language English by Sinhalese, which actually helped establishing the dominance of the Sinhalese Buddhist community in local government. The Sinhalese majority had imposed its language, culture and religion while monopolizing political power.
It was the year of 1971, when the Sri Lankan Government implemented the policy of standardization to rectify disparities created in university with the enrollment number of Tamil and Sinhalese students and later the government added district quota as a parameter within each languages, but the Sinhalese were in majority in number. Before that, the Tamil population enjoyed a kind of social dominance in the education structure because of their strong English background. But the advantage of quota system for the Sinhalese students pushed the number of Tamil students towards gradual declination in the universities. For example, in 1969, the Northern Province, which was largely populated by Tamils and comprised 7% of the population of the country, provided 27.5 percent of the entrants to science-based courses in Sri Lankan universities. By 1974, this was reduced to 7%. This is why an organization called Tamil Students League was born to oppose the law of standardization implemented by the government.
Later at the national level, in 1976 a pro-Independence organization named Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) was created in Sri Lanka. After several attempts to restore the Tamil rights by forcing the Sinhalese Government, they took up arms in 1983, at the beginning of the militarization of the conflict. Officially, it is between 1983 and 2009, the civil war took place in Sri Lanka between the Sri Lankan Government dominated by the Sinhalese and the LTTE. The latter’s principle objective was to defend the rights of Tamil people in Sri Lanka. In fact, the Singhalese people have imposed their language, their culture and their religion on the Tamils by monopolizing the political power. This movement wants to establish historical Tamil Eelam, comprising the Northern and Eastern Provinces.

In 2009, the Sri Lankan military cornered LTTE in its area, after regaining all the cities controlled by it. The latter finally took refuge in the region of Mullaittivu with a civilian population between 150 000 to 300 000. During the final days of the war, the army put embargo on the media entering the combat zone. The 16th May, LTTE lost its access to the sea, which was vital for their supply. On 17th may 2009, LTTE finally surrendered and ended this 26 years long civil war by dropping their guns. On 18th may, Velupillai Pravakaran was killed in the hands of Sri Lankan forces. 

According to the local authorities, around 15,000 and 20,000 civilians were surrounded in that combat zone. This figure even goes up to 40,000 according to the UN. No one knows the exact number of dead and injured during the last phase of the combat. This secessionist war took over 100,000 lives and more than 800,000 people have become refugees. 



The reportage was done on last 18 may, the Sri Lankan Tamil community of France demonstrated at Paris’s Trocadéro against the persecution and torture it suffered in Sri Lanka, and to demand for an international enquiry into the atrocities committed by Sri Lankan Army.

After the announcement of the UN Human Rights Council’s decision, the Tamils are now expecting that the justice will be done and the perpetrators of human right violation will be punished.

In Sri Lanka, led by President Mahinda Rajapaksa, there is undeclared censorship on the freedom of speech and the liberty of press. Quite an important number of journalists and civil right activists are victims of repressive state apparatus. A few died, some are in prison and a handful took refuge in foreign countries.

In the South-Asian perspective, this ethnic conflict has greater political significance. It marks a number of points in Indian context. In Tamilnadu where the sentiment related to the persecution of Tamils in Sri Lanka continues playing an important role in the State politics. The issue has also created uproar in national politics. India got embroiled in Sri Lankan conflict by sending Indian Peace Keeping Force (IPKF) in the island to disarm the different Tamil militant groups under the mandate of Indi-Sri Lankan Accord in 1987, with the objective of ending the Civil War. But the action escalated into armed conflict between IPKF and LTTE. Finally IPKF was withdrawn in 1990. But there were a number of accusations of human right violation against the peacekeeping force. LTTE had took its revenge by killing one of the two signatories of the accord, then prime minister of India Rajib Gandhi in a terrorist attack in 1991.

The assassination had dented severely into the support base of LTTE in Tamilnadu, which shelters a large number of Sri Lankan Tamil refugees. 

After the IPKF debacle, the bilateral relation between India and Sri Lanka decorated gradually. But with the time, the subject turned again into an ethnic solidarity among the Tamil regional parties during the last phase of the war in 2009, and which remains alive in the political climate of the State, resulted in a number of violent incidents.

There are speculations that the Chinese government has helped Sri Lankan State with arms and other useful services. Those become convincing when one sees the Chinese as the biggest foreign investor in that country.

Thus, India must take notice of the changes in Sri Lanka for its own regional interest.

The provincial council election in the north of Sri Lanka was held in September 2013 and the Tamil National Alliance (TNA), which is the political proxy of the LTTE, won 30 out of 38 seats.

The election result has threatened to reignite the tension between the government and the Tamils. Many in the north appear unwilling to give up longstanding claims to greater autonomy despite economic development and significant investment in infrastructure in the north since the end of the war.

Informations compiled by Jayanta Chakrabarty

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One Year after Savar Tragedy and the Garments Industry of Bangladesh

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The garments industry in Bangladesh has been expanded almost uninterruptedly since the late 1970s. The successful export oriented readymade garments (RMG) industry of Bangladesh has observed remarkable growth since its beginning late 1970s. Paradoxically, this flagship industry of Bangladeshi private entrepreneurial talent took roots through the first export consignment of shirts from Bangladesh made by state trading agency, the trading corporation of Bangladesh made by state trading agency, the destination was some east European countries. Subsequently, however, private entrepreneurs entered the industry and phenomenal growth took place in RMG exports in Bangladesh. Export of RMG increased from us dollar 40 thousand in 1978-79 to us 6.4 billion in 2004-05. The industry has also provided employment to nearly 2.8 million workers (BGMEA, 2009) most of them women drawn from the rural areas.

Explosive growth of RMG exports is of not inimitable to Bangladesh. The annual compound growth rate of RMG export industries Indonesia (31.2%) Mauritius (23.8%) Dominican Republic (21.1%) compares favorably with that of Bangladesh (81.3%) over the 1980- 87 periods. However while the initial conditions were favorable for export growth in the countries noted above; this was far from the truth in case our country. The ratio of the workers male: female was 9:11 and there age limit was 18 - 35 years. 90% of the workers are from helper to operators. Others are supervisors, technicians etc. Their education level is primary to secondary level where 57% workers are only able to write their names, 36% of the workers are living in the slums and others are in the match sift houses. Only 62% workers are sending their children to school.

The garments workers are earning their breads by very hard labor. They render to the owners from the dawn to midnight. Sometimes they have to work even for more than 24 hours without rest (they get breaks for their snacks, which are arranged by the authority) during in the emergency shipment. Of course they are still ill paid, notwithstanding the different labor revolution for various times. In 2006 there was a huge movement in the garments industry where a lot of factories were gutted, vandalized the infrastructures for their various points of demand. The fast point demand was to increase the minimum salary in the entry level at least 3 thousand taka per month. Later govt. had fixed that 2200/- tk. per month but later the BGMEA fixed it only tk. 1667 (one thousand sixty seven) per month by a trilateral agreement (BGMEA-Bangladesh govt. and labor union of garments workers) which is final to concluding the movement so far.

During a fieldwork, working with the questionnaire it was randomly found by the visitors that some workers are not getting this amount also from the factory owners. They have no holidays and even sometimes they are forced to work in the holidays. On occasion, the owners pay their salary after a month’s delay by showing different excuses. Moreover, reduction of wages, attendances are in the common practices in the garments floor. The garments workers have no job security yet. Anytime without any reason they may be suspend, demotion, transferred even sacked from the company. Even though there is a clause in the service rule that the sacked employee should get at least one month salary from the company if he/she is sacked from the company without any cause (surplus, lack of work) but in fact, the due salary is not given sometimes. Very few companies abide by the rules of govt. and BGMEA. Each company has its own rules as all of the garments workers are ill fed and ill clad. Hardly can they spend for their accommodation after purchasing their food staffs. They can’t be a chooser rather live in an area only to stay alive. In our field work, we have found that most of the garments workers are live in the rented slums; the room is 10 feet x 12 feet, roofing by iron sheet. Common unhygienic bath, kitchen for 8 – 10 family, shortage of water, crude electricity line etc. monthly rent each of the room is tk. 1800.

The garments workers are in low profile regarding the academic education. In the fieldwork most of the female workers only can write their names and address, most of them left the school after primary education. Few of them have gone to class viii. Most of the guardians of the garments workers are poor. They prefer to thing job is better than education. Most of the guardians are also illiterate. They think female education will not bear a good result to their family rather working in the garments factory will bring some money which will help them to run the family smoothly. Only 87% of garments workers send their wards to school while other 13% are showing different causes that why could not send their children to school. 73% are in the primary level, 19% are in the high school and only 8% have crossed the S.S.C and none was found H.S.C passed above.



As a human being we must need amusement in our leisure time, to refresh the mind. In fact, work productivity is ultimate goal. But hardly the garments worker can manage time to have the amusement even in the holidays they have to work sometimes. Recently, a collapse of a cracked building where there was 5 RMG garments has caused nearly 1100 deaths and most of them were female workers. The clients of these garments are mostly from western countries. Due to the high demand, the owners forced the laborers to work because they had to export urgently. Once again, the workers were trapped and they could not escape death because of the lack of emergency exits.

Bangladesh, which focuses on the low cost labor to attract the international companies, is today the 2nd largest exporter of RMG products in the world but this strategy is based on a short-term view et is not aware of the social and environmental costs. What is needed is a long-term vision to invest in the developments of buildings & managerial competences. The owners & the Govt. should also be entitled to take their share of responsibility. The Govt. should investigate the cause of accidents and prosecute those whose negligence is the cause of the death of workers. They should also be engaged in a national inspection program to make sure the factory buildings meet the safety requirements. For their parts, the owners should also immediately examine the security issues of their garments, perform a investigation on their factory buildings, cooperate with the unions to train the workers of security policies and should also allow the workers to voice their concerns. Bangladesh is proud of being the 2nd largest exporter of RMG products in the world. We want this country to enhance its pride by assuring the security of factory workers.

Wahid Murad

Copyright : www.multidimensionparis.com

Pohela Boishakh and its history

To read our full magazine, click here : Bengali New Year or Pohela Boishakh, occurring on 14th April, is the first day of the Bengali calendar. This is the first day of the Bengali first month Boishakh according to Hindu Vedic Solar Calendar, based on Surya Siddhanta. This festival generally celebrates in West Bengal, Bangladesh, Tripura and Assam. The New Year begins in different seasons in different countries of the world. The Bengali New Year is in summer. Summer is not so pleasant time in the region of Bangal. Festivals and merriments are not as much possible in summer as during the beginning of winter or spring. However, Pohela Boishakh connects all Ethnic Bengalis irrespective of religious and regional differences. Ethnic Bengalis across the world and from all walks of life unite to celebrate this festival. To every Bengali, young and old, rich and poor, wise and ignorant, it is a time of gaiety to be celebrated with great merry-making, to be enjoyed in every possible manner.

This festival was promulgated by the Mughal emperor Akbar in 1584 AD. During Mughal reign, Hindus were bound to pay taxes as per the rule of Muslim Hijri calendar, based on lunar calendar which did not coincide with the harvest. To give relief and to streamline the tax collection Mughal emperor ordered a reform of the calendar.  Revenue was collected according to the lunar year, whereas the harvest was dependent on the solar one. From the beginning of his reign, Akbar had felt the need of introducing a uniform, scientific, and workable system of calculating days and months through a reformed calendar. With this end in view, he commissioned Amir Fathullah Shirazi, a distinguished scientist and astronomer, to make the changes.  However, the Public celebration of Pohela Boishakh and the large-scale organizations of cultural events have started more recently.

Observance of Pohela Boishakh has become popular in the cities these days. The most colorful Pohela Boishakh festival takes place in Dhaka. After the sunshine people gather under the banyan tree at Ramna Park where Chhayanat artists open the day with Rabindranath Tagore's famous song, ” Esho, he Boishakh”. Social and cultural organizations celebrate the day with cultural programmes. Newspapers bring out special supplements. Prior to this day, special discounts are available on furniture, clothes, electronics, shopping and various deals. Special line of sarees, usually cottons, and white sarees with red print is sold before this day as everyone dresses up for this day. Jasmine flowers are also a huge sale for this event which adorns the women's hair. Pohela Boishakh is also the beginning of all business activities in Bengal. The Bengali Hindu traders purchase new accounting book. On this very day many shop keepers worship Ma Lakshmi, the Goddess of wealth for wealth, prosperity and welfare. It is marked as the beginning of the business. The Hindu traders purchase new accounting book which is known as “Halkhata”. People have also chosen this day for socializing. Many shop keepers invite their customers to their shops, so that they can be a part of this celebration.

The historical importance of Pohela Boishakh in the Bangladeshi context may be dated from the observance of the day by Chhayanat in 1965. In an attempt to suppress Bengali culture, the Pakistani Government had banned poems written by Rabindranath Tagore . Protesting this move, Chhayanat opened their Pohela Boishakh celebrations at Ramna Park with Tagore's song “Esho he Boishakh”. The day continued to be celebrated in East Pakistan as a symbol of Bengali culture. After 1972 it became a national festival, a symbol of the Bangladesh nationalist movement and an integral part of the people's cultural heritage. Later, in the mid- 1980s the Institute of Fine Arts added color to the day by initiating the Boishakhi parade, which is much like a carnival parade.

In France, the Bengali New Year is celebrated in various cities such as Paris, and Toulouse through Boishakhi fairs, where people gather to celebrate the culture Bengalis through dances, fashion shows, stalls of art, music, clothing, food etc. But the largest celebrations of the Bangla New Year are held in Paris. Along with France, Sweden, Italy and United Kingdom also celebrate the Bengali New Year with festivals and merriments. The Bengali community in the United Kingdom celebrates the Bengali New Year with a street festival in London. It is also the largest Asian festival in Europe and the largest Bengali festival outside of Bangladesh.

Pohela Boishakh and Boisakhi Mela  are one of the most colourful aspects of Boisakhi celebrations in the Bengali culture. One can find vivid and vibrant colours of life in rural Bangla in such fairs. Happy with the harvest and the ensuing prosperity, men and women dress themselves in their fanciest clothes and participate in the Boisakhi fair with joy. Various activities have been incorporated in Boishakhi fairs to give people a chance to let their hair loose and enjoy the spirit of life and inner freedom. However, this fair is no longer a part of bengali rural culture. Boishakhi fairs are everywhere nowadays. It is a major cultural day for Bengalis and they spend this day with nice celebration. Bengalis use to celebrate this festival with great love, spirit and enthusiasm and in this modern era they also greet their closed one through beautiful Bengali New Year SMS and by saying “Subho Noboborso” or “Subho Pohela Boishakh” to convey their love and feelings for them. Today Pohela Boishakh is a national holiday of Bangladesh and public holiday of Kolkata and West Bengal.

By Shovan M. RAHMAN

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Is The Delhi Rape Case Verdict “Justified”?

To read our full magazine, click here: The Delhi Saket court gave verdict to the four convicts in the December 16 Delhi gang-rape case.  “ Death Penalty” as the court said that the intensity of the offense could really not be tolerated.  This heinous incident had provoked the citizens of India and forced the Indian government to be more stringent on anti-rape law.

The culprits Mukesh Singh (26), Akshay Thakur (28), Pawan Gupta (19), and Vinay Sharma (20) comes under the rarest of rare category of capital punishment. The judge convicted them for gang-rape and murder of the 23 old paramedic student in a Delhi private bus. The judge commented that it would be inhuman if it turns a blind eye towards such a gruesome crime! The crime against women is on the high and it is time to challenge the brutality with punishment.

The Indian judiciary has to imbibe confidence amongst the women particularly during this time when crime against women is on the forefront . The fire has not only been convicted of gang rape but also of murder, dacoity, kidnapping and destroying the evidence. The mother of the 23 year old victim thanked the nation and the actions taken by the media – expressed satisfaction with the verdict of the Saket court. She was happy with the new legislation and the fast track case.

Analytical view about the Death Penalty

Overall, the Indians feel that such a death sentence should be a warning to all the rapists and psychopaths. The public demand was also that the culprits have their genitals cut before hanged to death. Hope it will instill fear into the hearts who would even think about committing such a crime in the future. But is it so?  The Women’s rights activists are absolutely against the popular public demand. They strongly refuse to support this. Kavita Krishan, secretary of the All India Progressive Women’s Association who was also one of the prominent voices against this December rape, said that a death sentence cannot make much difference to the society. In fact Delhi witnessed a damaging child rape case immediately after these four were arrested.

Sexual violence runs deep in our Indian society amongst every strata or culture. So the source or the root cause of this violence has first to be identified. How can a death sentence in one case make any difference to the Indian male mentality? The death penalty is seen as a quick fix solution. Hanged till death is just a vindictive attitude to show “violence against violence”.Rapes, kidnapping wife beating, torture by relatives, child trafficking, dowry deaths are all results of lack of respect for women.

Masculinity or the typical Hindi translation of its “mardangi” is to be done away with from the mindsets of the men. Violent features in men are imbed to them since their birth. This gets imbued with due course of time. The bad behavior of the men in the family toward his mother, seeing the neighbors treating women as doormats, gives them the right to be bad or violent towards other women. So unlearning this process should begin in school as well as the public places. The contemporary masculinity is to be unwinded from the deep root.

Children from an early age must be educated about equality, not only in terms of gender but also in terms of other castes or religions. Women should come forward with the sexual complaints more often, rather than shying away from it. They should have strong faith in the criminal justice system. And the police officer who is really good in helping these kind of women should be awarded and honored . This would change the mindset of the society and the police to respect lesbians, or women who are skimpily dressed, and also to the lower caste women like the Dalits or the tribal women. A large number of public forums are to be organized to educate the parents along with their children regarding the safety in public places and guidelines to make the women feel safer. More self defense classes are needed in school for girls. Boys should be specially made to learn to respect and treat his girls schoolmates equally. Anger management courses should be introduced in the school syllabi as it has proved encouraging.

Rapists are not scared as our judicial system is not reformed. Very low conviction has happened and this discourages the women to go for criminal proceedings. The investigative methods are not strong which after the Delhi rape case should be properly implemented now. The witnesses are threatened along with the victim. The recent rape case of a small town Malda, West Bengal is a very good example. The victim had to change her home along with her family, but died a brutal death in a house fire, that is still under investigation.

Setting up fast track court or speedy trial to give a verdict can never be a complete Redressal to a case. Men will continue to subjugate a woman to stay to certain standards. The gang rape of a 20 year old girl in a village called Birbhum, West Bengal, is a recent incident that highlights the plight of woman folk. Since she was having an affair with a man of another village, the village headman punished her by raping along with 13 other men.  Men cannot accept the fact that they need to respect the women, but rather subjugating the women to violence would only establish the superiority of men. A complete change in the society is needed, which cannot happen after the night.

Most rapists during the reform session inside the confinement, mostly confesses to the psychiatrist that he wants to kill the woman he raped. The vindicticdive attitude remains there. As seen in the Delhi rape case, that the girl after the rape was inserted foreign objects inside her private parts. This is a kind of perversion of men.

Again, another perspective has been seen that the punishment is very swift and fast in rape cases when the men belong to lower classes or is a common man. Had it been a BSF Jawan or a celebrity the investigations would be slower and even the punishment.

The police force has to be sensitized and not mock the woman who has come to lodge a complain. The police tries  to rape her again in the office room by making a mockery of her. The DNA has to be collected and proper gloves be used when there are no eyewitnesses. The more police post is to induce with proper training to these officers. They are also humans and one must remember that major chunk of these police belongs to smaller towns and also different caste. So their upbringing have been done with the knowledge that men are here to win and conquer. This perspective has to uproot during training.

And the worst is the media who try to make the rape just a few days coverage. More follow up is needed to support the backward class women. Stop using women as an object, particularly in advertisements, magazines and so on.

By Sudipa Singh

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