PRABAKARAN

by Kappiya Reading

“Why didn’t he hit back,” was Pirapaharan’s reaction when he heard from his father, Thiruvenkadam Velupillai, about the burning of the Panadura Pillayar Kovil priest. His father, an admirer of the Federal Party Leader Samuel James Velupillai Chelvanayakam, had no answer. Tamils like him then believed in Gandhian non-violent protest to win their rights. They believed that sitting cross-legged on the dusty Galle Face Green, singing hymns and praying for divine intervention and a change of heart among the Sinhala leadership would earn them their lost rights. For the three and a half year old ‘thurai’ hitting back sounded more natural and practical. His parents, especially his mother, Parvathipillai, Parvathi in brief, called him ‘thurai’, meaning master, which he really was at his home, his wish granted by the parents and obeyed by his sisters and brother. Pirapakaran, the youngest of the four, was his father’s darling and during childhood slept with him. He was born in the Jaffna Hospital on 26 November 1954. Pirapaharan routinely sat with his father and his friends during their regular evening chat sessions. He was with them when they discussed the events of June 1956, the passage of the Sinhala Only Law, the Galle Face satyagraha, the Sinhala attack on the peaceful protesters, the spread of attacks in Colombo and the chasing of Tamils from Gal Oya, the signing of the historic Bandaranaike-Chelvanayakam Pact, its abandonment and the consequent riots of May 1958 and the cruel burning of the Panadura priest.

525 pages, Hardcover

Published September 20, 2021