I started off this piece as a comment to Mr. Liyanage’s post which appeared on Groundviews yesterday (13 Septmber 2007) titled ‘Are we going to make the same mistake after 35 years’ but decided to post it in separate given its lengthiness.

Regarding Mr. Liyanage’s wishful thinking that Mahinda is not stead fast on maintaining the unitary character of the state.
While the interpretation given to the Mahinda Chinthanaya is fairly interesting unfortunately I don’t think we need to go into a finer details and employ tools of interpretation of what the Chinthanaya says in this regard - reading this part of the Mahinda Chinthanaya with that part of the Mahinda Chinthanaya and so on. It was quite clear what the populist …

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“Don’t worry. It’s only those who were not able to prove their identity and those who didn’t have a reason to stay in Colombo who have been evacuated”. This is how a friend who speaks a different language to mine responded to the ouster of 376 Tamils from Colombo on Thursday the 7th of June.

The need to possess a ‘legitimate’ reason to stay in Colombo.
A Tamil is expected to possess a ‘legitimate reason’ to stay in Colombo, which may include attending university, doing a job etc. Otherwise he does not have any business to be in Colombo. Even those who can stay in Colombo are expected to possess sufficient reason to be on the streets. The question “Kohitha Yanne?” …

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