Ill-treatment for Tamil scholars (1)

[nas_ng at lms420.jsc.nasa.gov]

Several Tamil scholars of repute were denied entry into
India to attend the ongoing World Tamil Conference in
Thanjavur.
N. Ganesan
nas_ng at lms461.jsc.nasa.gov



                       Copyright 1995 Reuters, Limited   
                           The Reuter Library Report
            January 3, 1995, Tuesday, BC cycle  -04:35 Eastern Time

Swedish professor asked to leave India
Swedish professor decries deportation from India

A Swedish academic asked to leave  India  said  on  Tuesday  that
allegations  he  was  linked  to  guerrillas fighting for a Tamil
homeland in Sri Lanka were false.

"I am being deported," said Peter Schalk, a professor at Sweden's
Uppsala  University,  who  had planned to attend an international
Tamil conference in the southern town of Thanjavur near Madras.

A Foreign Ministry official  in  New  Delhi  said  at  least  two
delegates to the conference had been "politely asked to leave the
country" but gave no reasons.

The six-day meeting, which began on Sunday, addresses the  ethnic
Tamil  people's  culture.  Prime  Minister P.V. Narasimha Rao was
scheduled to deliver a speech to the meeting on Thursday.

"At midnight on December 31, five policemen knocked at  the  door
of  my apartment and told me that I should leave Thanjavur by six
the next morning," Schalk told Reuters by phone from a  hotel  in
Madras.

"When I asked why I should do so, they said that there were alle-
gations  that  I was a supporter of the LTTE," he said, referring
to the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, who are fighting  for  a
separate Tamil state in northern and eastern Sri Lanka.

A Swedish embassy spokeswoman in New Delhi said  authorities  had
asked  Schalk  to  leave  the country for "security reasons." She
said the embassy did not know why the decision was taken.

The Swedish embassy said Schalk was planning to leave for  Sweden
with his wife and two children.

The professor said allegations that he supported  the  LTTE  were
"rubbish."

"I am a family man and I have no intention of contributing to any
armed conflict," he said.

Schalk said he was associated with Sri Lankan Tamils because Upp-
sala  had  an  exchange  programme  with Jaffna University in the
LTTE-controlled northern region of the island nation.

Conference delegates said one of Schalk's Uppsala colleagues from
Sri  Lanka,  A.  Velupillai,  and  Karthigesu Sivathamby of Jaffna
University were also denied entry to the meeting.

"This is nothing but a collective punishment of Jaffna scholars,"
Schalk said.

The Indian Express newspaper said police  had  combed  hotels  in
Thanjavur looking for LTTE members.

A suicide bomber from the LTTE was suspected to have killed form-
er  Indian  prime  minister  Rajiv  Gandhi in 1991. The group has
denied any involvement in the assassination.


Indian PM faces boycott over Tamil conference

By Jawed Naqvi

Indian Prime Minister P.V. Narasimha Rao, fighting a major rebel-
lion  in  his Congress Party, faced more trouble on Tuesday after
colleagues from southern Tamil Nadu state threatened  to  boycott
an international Tamil meeting he was due to attend.

Tamil Congress Party leaders urged Rao to call off his  scheduled
visit to the World Tamil Conference in Thanjavur city near Madras
on Thursday.

They said the conference was organised by the state's ruling  All
India  Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIDMK) party. Congress re-
cently ended an electoral alliance with the AIDMK in  Tamil  Nadu
in a dispute over seat allocations.

Congress  officials  in  the  state  said  Tamil  Nadu   Congress
President  K.   Ramamurthy  had sent Rao a letter explaining that
the party had been excluded from the organisation of the  confer-
ence,  which  is  to discuss the culture of the ethnic Tamil peo-
ples.

"There was no choice left for the Tamil leaders in  Congress  but
to oppose the prime minister's visit," said Rangarajan Kumaraman-
galam, a former minister in Rao's cabinet and deputy  from  Tamil
Nadu.

A Congress spokesman in New Delhi described the boycott  move  as
"highly irresponsible."

Congress leaders, speaking privately, linked Ramamurthy's  threat
to  the  recent resignation from Rao's cabinet of his arch critic
Arjun Singh.

"It looks like part of the revolt the prime  minister  is  facing
within the Congress," a Congress deputy said.

The Asian Age newspaper said Ramaurthy was a known  supporter  of
Singh.  Both are loyal to Sonia Gandhi, the Italian-born widow of
former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi who was assassinated  in  1991
by a suspected Sri Lankan Tamil militant.

Indian news agencies said three suspected sympathisers of the Sri
Lanka-based  Liberation  Tigers  for  Tamil Eelam (LTTE) had been
stopped from attending Thursday's meeting.

A Foreign Ministry official in New Delhi confirmed at  least  two
Sri  Lankan  delegates  who were not part of Sri Lanka's official
delegation to the conference had been "politely asked to  return"
to the island off India's southern coast.

He did not not identifiy the two.

The LTTE is fighting for a separate Tamil state in  northern  and
eastern  Sri  Lanka. The group has denied India's accusation that
it was involved in Gandhi's assassination.

Singh, in his resignation letter to Rao, charged him with  trying
to  curtail  a  high-level  probe into Gandhi's murder by a woman
suicide bomber, a suspected LTTE activist.

Gandhi was killed while campaigning in the 1991 general elections
which eventually brought Rao to power.

"Let us not for a moment forget  that  this  government  came  to
power  literally  because  of  the  supreme sacrifice made by our
beloved leader...Rajiv Gandhi," Singh wrote.

Newspapers say Sonia Gandhi, regarded as a  potential  threat  to
Rao's leadership, was unhappy with his handling of the probe into
the killing of her husband.

Kumaramangalam said Rao's gesture in attending the Tamil  confer-
ence, despite resistance from his party colleagues, could be part
of an effort to revive an alliance with the AIDMK.

"There is no other logical explanation for the visit," he said.


Thanks  :: Reuter