India: Dual Citizenship Myth & Reality

The competitive politics between the two major Dravidian parties, the AIADMK and the DMK, has come to the fore once again.

- PROF. V. SURYANARAYAN

The political atmosphere in Tamil Nadu is surcharged. The political leadership is accusing the other for betraying the Sri Lankan Tamil cause. In the famous Tamil film, Parasakti (script written by M Karunanidhi) hero Gunsekharan (actor Sivajj Ganesan) poses the question: “Why is the waters of Bay of Bengal saltish?”. After few seconds he himself provides the answer “It is because of the tears of the Overseas Tamils”.

If one distinguishes between rhetoric and reality, the record of two Dravidian parties is nothing much to write about. Let me first take the AIADMK. After the assassination of Rajiv Gandhi by the suicide squad of the LTTE then Chief Minister Jayalalitha declared that Sri Lankan Tamil refugees were no longer welcome in Tamil Nadu. The Government officials began to exert pressure on the refugees to return to Sri Lanka. The Human Rights organisations accused the Government of India and the Government of Tamil Nadu for violating the basic principle of international humanitarian refugee law, the principle of non-refoulement, which means that a refugee should not be sent out of the country against his/her wishes. They sought judicial remedy. It was a moment of great anguish for the Narasimha Rao Government. In order to save embarrassment the Government of India permitted the opening of UNHCR office in Chennai to verify the “voluntariness of repatriation”.