Multi-faceted personality Lakshman Kadirgamar’s spiritual side

FORMER Sri Lankan Foreign Minister Lakshman Kadirgamar was killed on 12 August 2005 by a sniper of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) concealed in the house of an unsuspecting neighbour.

- By D.B.S. Jeyaraj

Kadirgamar had just completed his customary 1,000 metre swim at the pool in his residence, when the assassin struck. Two decades have passed since that fateful day but the memory of Kadirgamar lingers still in the hearts and minds of the nation. This column focuses on the man regarded by many as Sri Lanka's finest foreign minister even as Lakshman Kadirgamar's 20th death anniversary draws near.

I have written extensively about Lakshman Kadirgamar over the years, so much so that his only daughter Ajita has stated in her book about her father that D.B.S. Jeyaraj has written about LK possibly more than any other journalist. Ajita Kadirgamar's eminently readable book about Lakshman Kadirgamar is titled "The Cake That Was Baked At Home." A new edition of the book has Kadirgamar's 20th death anniversary.

According to Ajita, the book has 78 references to lines and passages from my articles.

She even says on one page that she 'would almost term me as 'LK's unofficial biographer'. It is against this backdrop therefore that I write on the multifaceted personality, Lakshman Kadirgamar drawing on some of my earlier writings also.

Lakshman Kadirgamar was born on 12 April 1932 to Tamil Protestant Christian parents of Jaffna origin. But in later life he refused to conform according to those labels. He never denied that he was a Tamil, but claimed to have transcended such labels. At a time when the Tigers (LTTE) and their acolytes were trying to equate being Tamil with being a pro-Tiger, Kadirgamar stood out 'far from the madding crowd'. For that he was ridiculed as a 'token' Tamil, dubbed a traitor and ultimately assassinated.

BBC 'Hard Talk'