Bilateral relations between Sri Lanka and India have been on the rise and India’s interest in the island nation’s affairs has grown.
And yet, some Indian journalists covering Sri Lankan President Anura Dissanayake’s first state visit to New Delhi last week went beyond lazy, umbrella headlines like “fishing problem”, “Tamil question” and “China conundrum” in their analysis. .
Yes, there is the “fishing issue”; This is not a new phenomenon. Despite committees dedicated to preventing unfair practices, Indian trawlers still fish in the shallow waters of the Pak Strait, depriving small Sri Lankan fishermen of their daily catch, and the Sri Lankan Navy frequently arrests intruders.
As expected, there was fresh discussion on the matter during Mr. Dissanayake’s visit but it is not likely to do miracles overnight.
However, it would be relevant to mention that China, not India, is the largest fish poacher in the Indian Ocean’s major fishing grounds. Moreover, Sri Lanka is not only a member of China’s “Belt and Road Initiative” (BRI), but also its partner. Mr Dissanayake’s own far-left party, the Janata Vimukti Peramuna (JVP), has always been close to Beijing.
China has the largest fishing fleet in the world. China accounts for one-fifth of global catches. According to a 2022 report by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), an unreported 60 percent of China’s total annual catch is collected through “illegal, unreported and unregulated” (IUU) fishing activities in the Indian Ocean and elsewhere. Indo-Pacific region. It is China that tops the Geneva-based “IUU Index”. And it affects both Indian and Sri Lankan fishermen.
Moreover, China has sensed an opportunity in the unresolved dispute between India and Sri Lanka over the relatively small Palk Strait, and is “cultivating” the Sri Lankan fishing community. Among other things, it has established a thriving fish cannery in Mannar, Sri Lanka.
All of these aspects went unchallenged in reporting last week. The positive outcome of last week’s India-China talks is also fueled by the fact that they may reassess their hostility towards Sri Lanka (where China enjoys strategic advantages thanks to its brand of debt trap diplomacy). No informed guess.
Other regular bullet points that are raised by journalists whenever the two countries meet are the “Tamil Question” and the related “13th Amendment” issue.
The amendment was co-authored by former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi, when Sri Lanka was in the throes of a devastating civil war in which more than 130,000 people, including Rajiv Gandhi, were killed.
But that amendment was written 28 years ago and the war ended almost 16 years ago. Apart from being good about returning army-held private land to Tamil owners after he came to power, Mr Dissanayake has made no reference to the amendment – nor that it guarantees autonomy to Sri Lankan Tamils - so far, not even in the run-up. In the presidential election in September, nor in New Delhi last week. Sri Lankan Tamils are angry over many other issues. But non-implementation of dated documents is not one of them. If that had happened, an unprecedented achievement in Sri Lanka’s tumultuous electoral history: Dissanayake would not have received 25 percent of the Tamil vote in a Sri Lankan election.
Then Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s own achievements in Sri Lanka, especially in relation to the “Tamil Question”, were rarely mentioned.
Love him or hate him, it was Mr Modi who first unleashed India’s earlier obsession with Sri Lanka’s “Tamil question”. Whether the (Rajiv Gandhi’s) Congress Party is shocked or not, it is the Prime Minister who never mentions the 13th Amendment. And importantly, it is Mr. Modi who has begun the long-stalled task of forging better relations with the country’s Sinhalese-Buddhist majority.
Indian Foreign Secretary Vikram Mishri said at a press conference last week that the well-nulled, even extemporaneous responses to the “Tamil question” were a reflection of India “getting real” about Sri Lanka. Mr. Mishri chose to emphasize the “numerical weight, importance and spatial distribution” of the staggering mandate that Mr. Dissanayake, leader of the Sinhala extremist, controversial, far-left party in Sri Lanka’s minority Hindu-Tamil-dominated north. And East, of all places. As for the “Tamil Question”, the Foreign Secretary left the job not to any Indian-engineered idea, but to Mr. Dissanayake. “Now he (Disnayake) is expected to respond to (Tamil) expectations,” Mr. Mishri said. “We look forward to that moving forward and wish him success in this endeavour.”
New Delhi’s vigilance comes from an accurate estimation of the mood on the ground in Sri Lanka. India extends aid worth around $4 billion to rescue its southern neighbor during the economic crisis in 2022. India stands as a global guarantor for Colombo on the question of restructuring its outstanding external debt.
But despite cultural cousins and neighborly generosity, India is far from popular among ordinary Sri Lankans, as many pompous Indians who wander around the beautiful country on vacation have mistakenly imagined.
Full evidence of the distrust towards Big Brother was in the Sri Lankan media’s reporting of their President’s visit to India last week. Many Sri Lankans also found Mr Dissanayake’s “tone” in New Delhi “serviceable” and “conciliatory”.
In a scathing editorial, the right-of-centre Sri Lanka Daily the island Between 2016 and 2023, Mr. Dissanayake was a staunch critic of signing any trade deal with India and alleged that India controlled Sri Lanka’s economy, manipulated its policies and any connectivity projects with India would be detrimental to Sri Lanka. Independence of Lanka.” And yet, here he was in New Delhi, co-signing the documents, which the paper called “Hobson’s Choice” for Sri Lanka.
Jehan Perera, head of Sri Lanka’s most respected think tank, the National Peace Foundation (NPR), recalls the volatility and contingency of the civil uprising against the government that Sri Lanka happily elected two years ago when the economic crisis began. He rings a warning bell.
“The Disnayake-led NPP” (the ruling National People’s Power Alliance, which includes activists and intellectuals) “thinks it is very good on human rights. It does not allow riots between two communities. But it is not very keen on the rights of any single community – like, say, the minority Tamils.” – too. The government is not only consulting the minorities on their behalf. And this can prove their Achilles Heel.