Issues: Human Rights, International, Law & Order, National, Srilanka

Region: Tamil Nadu

Category: Articles, Letters

Dear Dr. Manmohan Singh ji,
 
Vanakkam. I would draw your immediate kind attention to the following matter, causing serious concern and sorrow in the minds of the Tamils, not only in Tamilnadu, all over the world. News have appeared that the sacred Kapilavastu Relics, fragments of Buddha’s Bones are to be transported to Sri Lanka from India to be put on display across Sri Lanka from August 20th to September 5th.

It is shocking that an agreement has been signed in Colombo on 18th May, 2012, by Mr. Praveen Srivastava, Director General, National Museum India and H.P. Cashian Herath, Secretary, Ministry of Buddhasaasana and Religious Affairs, Sri Lanka.

It is learnt that this agreement was signed due to the request of Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapakse to the Government of India.

This decision is pouring fire in the terribly wounded hearts of the Tamils. More than 300 thousand Tamils were brutally massacred due to the genocide of the Sri Lankan racist government. The report of the three member panel of the United Nations has established the fact with evidence that Tamil children, innocent men and women were mercilessly killed by the Sri Lankan armed forces. Now, the international community, whose conscience has been awakened, is making efforts to put Mahinda Rajapakse and his henchmen in the dock of the International Criminal Court of Justice.

The Indian Government committed the sinister wrong of fully diluting the resolution in the Human Rights Council at Geneva to bail out the Sri Lanka racist Government, which had committed the barbarous crime of genocide against the Tamils.

I am pained to say that the Indian Government stands as a co-accused in the crime of genocide as it had given all military assistance and logistic support to the Sri Lanka Government to perpetrate the crime.

From 1st January to 17th of May, 2009, hundreds of thousands of Tamils were annihilated by the Sri Lankan armed forces. But, the Government of India repeatedly invited Mahinda Rajapakse to India and gave red carpet reception to hoodwink the people of the world.

For the past three years, Sinhalese colonisation in the traditional homeland of Tamils is done with the help of Police and army of the Sri Lanka Government.

Places of worship of Tamils, particularly Hindu temples are converted into Buddhist monasteries. Under the yoke of Buddhist hegemony, the Sri Lankan Government is trying to convert the whole island as a Buddhist nation.

Mahinda Rajapakse and his bloodthirsty monstrous regime have no moral right to pronounce the name of Buddha. When the Tamils all over the world has been mourning and paying homage on 17th and 18th of May 2012, to the Tamil martyrs and those who have been annihilated, the signing of the agreement on 18th May 2012 in Colombo by the Government of India to send the Kapilavastu Relics, the fragments of Buddha’s bones is an unpardonable betrayal of the Government of India against the Tamils.

The sacred Kapilavastu relics are among the most protected and revered relics in the world, which are now at the national museum at New Delhi. These relics were excavated by Alxander Cunningham, the first director of the Archaeological Survey of India in the late 19th century from ruins in Piprahwa in Bihar. It was known as Kapilavastu in ancient India.

Historical chronicles say that after Buddha’s passing away, the holy relics, the bones of Buddha, from the cremation site were divided into eight portions and handed over to separate groups for preservation.

According to Mahaparinibba Sutta of 5th century B.C., one portion of the relics was handed to Sakyas of Kapilavastu.
 
I would request you to cancel this agreement which has caused terrible agony in the minds of the Tamils, and stop sending the relics to Sri Lanka.
 
With regards,
Yours sincerely,

(Vaiko)

Hon’ble Dr. Manmohan Singh
Prime Minister,
Government of India,
New Delhi - 110 001