The poetics of pillage

 

There’s no way around it. Richard will be remembered. He will be remembered and others will be forgotten or rather remain forgotten. Aruni Walker put things in perfect in the following elegant and thought-provoking poem titled ‘Remembering Richard,’ which she posted on Facebook:

Let the dead be dead

And not become topics for debate!

Rest in peace, with untold narratives,

Like the first draft of a book—

Unpublished.

Their story, shall only be known

On the tombstone

By crows,

And occasional May beetles.

Richard, as in Richard De Zoysa, abducted and murdered during the tenure of President Ranasinghe Premadasa. Aruni was probably inspired to write the poem by the noise regarding Richard produced by Ashoka Handagama’s film ‘Ranee,’ which was about Richard’s mother Manorani Saravanamuttu, who, after her son’s death, came into prominence as a human rights activist.

I responded by posting an article written more than ten years ago titled ‘Remembering Richard and forgetting Ranjithan,’ Ranjithan was the Convenor of the Inter University Student Federation back in the late eighties. He was captured, tortured and killed.

Aruni responded: ‘You’ve written about selective remembrance. I feel nothing is needed. Just let that vacuum be there, that’s it.’

It is an option worth considering, I told her, because ‘the dead, after all, have been unburdened of memory,’ but observed nevertheless that such a choice tends to serve the interests of the powerful.

Portraits are painted that may or may not resemble the person being portrayed. There’s been criticism, for example, of Handagama’s portrayal of Manorani Saravanamuttu. He has responded saying that it is his piece of fiction and that others are welcome to their personal narratives. The problem is that we are not talking about fictional characters. So, in a sense, if narrative is not in the very least prompted by an honest effort to do justice to the subject, then letting it remain untold has some virtue.

The problem is that vacuums get filled, whether we like it or not. Events and personalities are remembered. They are written and they are read. There’s history and there are histories. Some are privileged, that’s the problem.  Historiography is a competition where some versions get privileged and some are not.

Aruni posted the poem on the 23rd of March. Coincidentally, as I learned from another Facebook post, the 23rd was also Ranjithan’s birthday. His sister, Niranjani, who mentioned the fact, also wrote the following:

Yesterday was [the] 23rd of March. If my elder brother Ranjithan Gunaratnam would have been alive , he would be 64 years. But he was tortured and killed during the dark period in 89 by the Premadasa Ranil regime along with thousands of other dear ones. I personally know that my brother was abducted and held at the Wahara Camp in Kurunagala because we, myself, my mother and my father, were too taken to the same camp. The army personnel confirmed [to] us that my brother was under their custody. We were kept separately and we were shown to him several times. But unfortunately we couldn’t see him as we were blind folded. Definitely he would have seen us. We were detained there for five days. I could still remember how my mother wrapped me with her saree and held tightly closer to her. No words to express the fear the agony the mental torture that we went through. But above all we lost our dear “Periya.”

A few days ago I visited an old friend in Doratiyawa, Kurunegala, who I hadn’t seen in almost 40 years. I asked him about one of his friends who I had met just once. Gamagedara Prematillake joined the JVP after a bomb was thrown at his house. His last words to my friend was, ‘You will most probably never see me again.’ He was killed in the jungles of Sigiriya. He had passed the SLAS Examination, the results being released after he was killed. I remembered Prematilleka. My friend could not forget him, for Prematilleka had mentioned him in several diary entries, thanks to which he, my friend who had actually urged Prematilleka to leave the JVP, was arrested and held for several months. In fact he hadn’t been home when the police arrived. His father and brother were proxy-arrested and released only after he handed himself in. Prematilleka’s family, if still alive, would remember. Maybe other friends too. That’s about it.

Why Richard and why not Ranjithan, we can ask. Why a film on Manorani Saravanamuttu and nothing on Rajamani Gunaratnam? Freedom of choice? Is that a sufficient enough plea?

I was searching for things written about Ranjithan and Richard and came across an article I had written seven years ago titled ‘No movies on the collective dead, ladies and gentlemen.’ Interestingly, I had forgotten about it. Anyway, I asked:

Do we talk about how there are certain names remembered while the nameless are numbered? Do we ask how value is attached to certain victims while others are ‘disappeared’ into a collective, marked by a number?

And I suggested:

Ask 100 readers of English newspapers about those who were killed in 88-89 by the security forces, the police or state-run vigilante groups. Ask them to name victims. Check how many can come up with even a single name apart from Rohana Wijeweera and Richard de Soyza.  Therein lies a story, therein lies a narrative about selectivity, the politics of forgetting, the downsizing of guilt.

I also mentioned that a well-known literary critic and poet Chulananda Samaranayake, in a collection of poems titled ‘Glimpses of a Shattered Island’ had recounted his experiences in one of the many camps for suspected JVPers. He had been asked if he had ever seen a mass grave. He was informed that he would be buried in one.  In one of the poems, he wrote what he did not say that day:

‘Dear Sir,

no point of asking such question

from a man who has already been buried

in a mass grave.’

I opined that perhaps Chulananda has the last line on the condition of amnesia we’ve discussed here. For him, I observed, everyone is buried in a mass grave, ‘some in uniform and some in rags’. He puts it thus:

‘This is a country

buried in the silence, injustice, betrayal.’

It’s all selective and this selectivity is no accident but a deliberate product of political convenience, he would no doubt agree. Death is a leveller, they say. Remembrance also levels, in a sense. It elevates some and re-slays and buries others. No films for the collective dead.

Aruni’s assertion reminded me of something that Shiran Deraniyagala is supposed to have said about archaeological artefacts, ‘if we can’t ensure protection, it is better to let them remain buried.’ So, if we can’t recreate to some degree of accuracy, it is better to let the dead remain buried.

They won’t be, though. Pillage is not the preserve of treasure-hunters or maybe it is, for there are all kinds of treasures that can enrich in all kinds of ways. If desecration is inevitable, justice demands that the desecrators be called out. Then again, one could argue that any excavation is a form of pillage. Why soil our hands, one could argue.

Aruni, inadvertently I believe, has created a topic for debate. I wish I was endowed with the composure that enables equanimity, let’s say. I just found it hard to look the other way when those murdered are re-murdered, sometimes even in the name of keeping their memory alive. She would forgive me, I think.

[This article was published in the Daily News under the weekly column title 'The Recurrent Thursday']

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Let us exhume, ladies and gentlemen!

When the koha calls we know it is avurudu. When certain names are mentioned over and over again, we know elections are around the corner. Yes, Thajudeen, Lasantha and Ekneligoda. Throw in Keith Noyahr and Upali Tennekoon if you like. And of course white vans.  The first two were killed. The third disappeared. Keith and Upali were attacked; Keith in fact might well have been killed had not it been for the untiring efforts of the CEO of the newspaper house he worked for at the time. They both live in other countries now.

All of these things happened when Mahinda Rajapaksa was the President, his brother Gotabhaya was the Secretary, Ministry of Defence and Sarath Fonseka was the Army Commander.  It was natural that they became poster boys of all political campaigns of the United National Party (UNP) and its allies. 

There’s a problem though. Well, two problems certainly (and probably more). First, in the case of the first three, they are all dead. There’s a need to bring to justice their killers. There’s a need for truth to triumph over deceit, lies, foot-dragging and duplicity. There is a need for ‘exhumation’ literally and of course metaphorically. And yet, there’s a certain indecency that borders on or moves into the despicable in exhumation and burial followed by re-exhumation and re-burial ad nauseam. 

There’s a second issue that also demonstrates disrespect for the dead. Selectivity.  

It is not unnatural, just as the Rajapaksa-haters do, for those who are against this regime to dig up the past. They too can talk of abductions. They too can talk of extra judicial killings. They can talk of proxy arrests, torture, the operative equivalent of ’white-vans’ in the late eighties, the tyre pyres’ and the numerous vigilante groups. Then there was censorship. 

It’s all old hat. Right? Wrong. For two reasons (and possibly more). First, the perpetrators of those crimes, their approvers or staunch loyalists of the relevant parties, are all still around. Secondly, THAT time has been invoked by a would-be presidential candidate of the United National Party (UNP), Sajith Premadasa. 

So let’s get some perspective here. 

There’s ‘concern’ over Lt Gen Shavendra Silva being appointed as Army Commander. Who is upset? Well, officially, the USA, Canada, the EU and the UNHRC. Two thing (and possibly more). First, that’s our business. Second, the cause of concern that they’ve stated, ‘accused of war crimes,’ is as of now just an allegation. We assume innocence until guilt is proven. That’s what the Book of the West (aka ‘Book of the White Man’) says. 

Second, these ladies and gentlemen had no issues whatsoever when Barack Obama literally ‘oversaw’ the capture and murder of Osama bin Laden. Extra-judicial killing. Same goes for Col Gaddafi. 

Ok, here’s a third. Ranil Wickremesinghe is accused of overseeing terrible events in 88-89. Did any of these people or rather their predecessors in the relevant country or UN agency ever express similar concern? 

No. Ok?

Censorship? There was a name that was known to all journalists. Ariya Rubasinghe. He facilitated the production of the strangest newspapers in the world: full of entire columns, boxed off in black. Censored. That however hardly warranted ‘concern’. There was much worse. 

Right. Let’s talk exhumation.  For that, there has to be burial, but let’s take liberties and extend it to incineration. Cremation, if you want to be cute about it. Yes, all this has to be preceded by ‘death’. And so, there are names. 

Wimal Surendra. Photojournalist of the ‘Divaina’. Abducted, murdered. His helmet was found in the house of a prominent UNPer and a minister in the present cabinet. He took a photograph of a ‘lady’ playing netball. Was that his ‘crime’?

H.E. Dayananda, a freelance contributor for the ‘Divaina’ who wrote a column titled ‘vame kathava’ (The story of the Left). Killed outside the petrol shed on Union Place. 

Richard De Zoysa. Poet. TV presenter. Dramatist. Abducted. Killed. 

Rohana Wijeweera was captured, allegedly tortured, tossed into the incinerator at the Borella Cemetary AND BURNT ALIVE. 

Add to all this, 10,000 Thajudeens, 10,000 Ekneligodas, Noyahrs and Tennekoons, but let us not forget Rohana Wijeweera.

No issue there? No concern? All ok? Alright! 

Then we have what the ‘revolutionaries’ did, i.e. the uncles of Anura Kumara Dissanayake and the brothers of Tilvin Silva. They showed the way to their long lost but later found cousins in the UNP.  Here's a very, very short list: Nandalal Fernando, Harsha Abeywardena, Premakeerthi De Alwis, Sagarika Gomes, Prof Stanley Wijesundera, Lionel Jayatilleka, Vijaya Kumaratunga, Thevis Guruge, Prof Chandraratne Patuvatavithana, Daya Pathirana, A. Jayantha, Chandrawimala, Devabandara Senanayake. 

Was Chandrika Kumaratunga 'clean'? Ask Rohana Kumara. Wait. He was 'done in' during her tenure. Dead men don't talk. 

But that’s the story of abduction, torture, murder, burial/cremation and ‘exhumation’ ladies and gentlemen. You either want the entire sordid story or else you want none of it. If you want some of it, then you are indulging in political humbuggery. Seriously. Thajudeen, Lasantha, Ekneligoda, Richard, Wimal, Rohana and of course the 10,000 plus Thajudeens, 10,000 plus Lasanthas and 10,000 plus Ekneligodas who are just numbers and not names and whose memories deserve something better than this burying-exhuming circus that we are seeing come election time.

malindasenevi@gmail.com, www.malindawords.blogspot.com

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Remembering Richard and forgetting Ranjithan

There were some 60,000 people killed in what is clearly the bloodiest period in post-Independence Sri Lanka, 1988-1990. Our roadsides were turned into crematoriums, our rivers, canals and such into cemeteries. I remember a day in June 1988, in Bingiriya. I remember distinctly thinking this thought: ‘I can’t do anything to stop this!’ ‘This’, then, was an inevitable hurtling of an entire nation over the edge of sanity and into an abyss made of fire and bullets, the order to assassinate and the screams of the dying. Almost twenty two years later, I have a question for everyone reading this: can you name one person who perished during that time?

I am sure that more than 90% of those who grew up speaking English and who live in Colombo (and close to 100% of those in Colombo 3 and 7), if they can come up with any name, it would be that of Richard de Zoysa. That’s one out of over 60,000 victims. Some might remember Nandalal Fernando, Harsha Abeywardena, and Stanley Wijesundera. Those who have had any association with left politics would remember Vijaya Kumaratunga, L.W. Panditha, Devabandara Senanayake, Dharmasiri, A. Jayantha, Chandrawimala and others killed by the JVP. Still, I am willing to bet that if asked to name one person who was killed during that time, nine out of 10 would say ‘Richard de Zoysa’ and that if asked to name a victim who was known, very, very few would speak up.

Is it something to do with the fact that Richard de Zoysa was an exceptional individual? He was certainly a ‘personality’, a public figure inasmuch as any non-politician could be one. He was a poet, a theatre man, a personality in literary circles. A talented and to some an exceptional one too. Richard didn’t fall from the sky. He was born of a woman’s womb, he grew up, went to school, had fun, got his knees bruised etc. He had friends. He had feelings, I am sure. Fears too. Desires. He breathed, he ate, he drank, he sweated, had a pulse etc etc. If you pricked him, he would bleed. When tortured, he would have cried out in pain.

And what of those other 59,999 plus people? Well, they would have been differently talented. They couldn’t have fallen from the sky. They too would have been held in wombs, birthed by mothers, taken care of, sent to school, formed friendships, learnt lessons; they also would have entertained dreams, felt things, breathed, loved, sweated, pulsated etc. If you pricked them, as the bard said, they too would have bled, they would have cried out in pain too when tortured. Their last moment would not have been any different to that of Richard’s in that they too would have released one last sigh as exclamation mark and as question. There are some 60,000 plus question marks and an equal number of exclamation marks, but how is it that we remember and name one but not the 59,000 plus others?

Who has heard of Senadheera from Kurunegala, a teacher and who of Dassanayake from Matale, born with a congenital defect in an eye that made it impossible for him to hide behind a disguise? Dassanayake knew his time was coming and he refused to escape: ‘I have brought too many people into this to leave now,’ he said. He was drawn and quartered, literally, and his body parts hung from a tree in Katugastota. His question/exclamation marks don’t have identity tags. Neither did those of Lalith from Kuliyapitiya, the medical student Atapattu, and countless others, including Thrimavitharana of the Colombo Medical Faculty who had nails driven into his skull, who was tied to the back of a jeep and dragged along a gravel road.

There was a massive crowd attending Thrimavitharana’s funeral. How many remember his name today? This I am asking from the comfortable and comfortably complaining, whining, dining, self-righteous people who think that ability to speak English is a sign of wisdom and a right to be snooty and condescending. Do you remember Thrimavitharana? Richard was special, yes. Talented, yes. Wasn’t Ranjithan Gunaratnam special? Was he not talented? Have you heard that name? Do you know who he was? Do you know what kinds of skills he possessed?

People who had never met Richard know of him. I have never met Ranjithan, I know of him though. He was an engineering student at Peradeniya. Born to humble, dignified and utterly civilized parents who lived in Kegalle, Ranjithan was highly conversant in all three languages. He was a poet. An artist. An orator. He was well read by all accounts, a good friend, a man of immense capacity and endowed with indefatigable energy. Arrested. Tortured. Killed. Each time I look into his mother’s eyes, I see how special each person who died was to those who knew and loved them. But Ranjithan was not Richard. He was not ‘English’. He was Tamil. He was Sinhala. He was Hindu and Buddhist. He was not ‘city’. He was ‘city and village’. His name is not remembered. Why not?

There is, I believe, a politics to remembrance. Sepulchers are not innocent. Commemoration is vile. There is erasing and ‘oblivioning’ in the matter of selective commemoration. No, I am not saying that Richard should not be remembered. I am merely asking myself and you, ‘why do we remember Richard and why have we forgotten Ranjithan, if we ever knew of him that is?’

During the UNP-JVP bheeshanaya of 1988-1990 democracy was bruised and tortured. Our sensibilities were lacerated. We acquired a certain degree of immunity to violence and crime. Death by violent means became something like pickpocketing; a few raised eyebrows, some political mileage for some, sweeping under carpets and years of forgetting. We lost something else. And this is why we can’t dwell in 1989-1990, however sad we are and however much we need to celebrate the lives of those who are not around today. There’s one thing that few acknowledge or even remember today when thinking about Richard or Ranjithan, or any of the other 59,998 plus people. That thing is called HR. Human Resources.

I told this to Werawellalage Premasiri, born Kumarigama, Ampara, my batchmate at Peradeniya, former lecturer in Political Science and now a public servant. I said ‘Aliya, (that was his ‘card’ at campus) me rate maanva sampath pilibandava deventha prashnayak thiyenava’ (there is a huge human resource problem in this country). He answered quietly: mama dannava; ape rate maanava sampath bheeshanaya kaale athurudahan karala demma (the human resources of our country were liquidated during the bheeshanaya).

We lost the best we had, didn’t we? Not all those who died were guilty of wrong doing and even if they were extra-judicial killing was the wrong way to go about sorting out the problem (those who howl about human rights violations were silent back then and those who call for truth commissions and such are conspicuously silent about such mechanisms for that particular blood-letting). I have no doubt about this: we lost our spirit, the cream, the most talented, the young people most endowed with attributes such as integrity, sacrifice, energy and ingenuity.

There were many Richards among them, but they didn’t write in English. They did not get published, they did not have the Lionel Wendt to perform in. They were born to humble parents, raised their voices against injustice and were slaughtered for this crime.

Let us remember them all. Let us remember that if we are struggling today on account of a serious lack of human resources, there are people responsible for this. Let us also remember that the conflict in the North and East saw a similar though less voluminous ‘evacuation’ (since it dragged across several generations). Let us remember that languishing in harsh circumstances in these regions and in the rehabilitation camps are young Tamil people who too are endowed with the same kinds of attributes. Let us remember that there are Richard de Zoysas among them; only, they do not write in English, have not got published and have not played at the Lionel Wendt. They must be allowed to do so.

So when we remember Richard, let us remember these others who didn’t/don’t have a Christian name, were/are quite un-English, but were/are no less talented, no less human.

msenevira@gmail.com


*First published in the Sunday Island in February 2010.

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