by Kumar David

Article 15 of the Indian Constitution states that the State shall not discriminate against any citizen on grounds of religion, race, caste, sex, place of birth and so on. The text-box in this piece is an abbreviation of this Article and had the Sr Lankan Constitution contained such a provision the Sinhala Only Act, the chapter on Buddhism, the Indian & Pakistani Citizenship Acts, caste-based prohibition on entering temples and such abhorrent provisions would, in theory, have been ultra vires. Unfortunately, however, such shameful provisions would actually have been lawful in Sri Lanka subject to a referendum after their parliamentary enactment. The disgraceful thing about this country is that such referenda would have been carried by thumping racist majorities.

Dr Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar a polymath who headed the committee that drafted the Constitution of the Republic India was a Dalit (“untouchable” or Gandhi’s Harijans, the children of God) and made no bones about it. He was Law and Justice Minister in Nehru’s first Cabinet, an economist, social reformer and human-rights advocate. His early methodological affinity to Marxism is unsurprising. In the land of the Gautama who was born in Nepal, of Gandhi who spent two intellectually formative decades in South Africa and of Mother Teresa of Albanian descent, such things were possible. At home in Lanka those who protected people of another race or faith during riots, rape and arson had to be themselves shielded from miscreants of their own race and faith.

Democracy Stillborn by Rajan and Kirupaimalar Hoole traces the plight of Sri Lanka to the battles of the 1920s over the championship of labour by Ponnambalam Arunachalam. His ouster in 1921 from the Ceylon National Congress, led to the domination of estate capitalism and blended an anti-working-class stance in general with communalism and the disenfranchisement of plantation workers. The legal battle about the citizenship of plantation workers compromised the judiciary too. Habeas corpus affirmed in the Bracegirdle case of 1937 was undermined by the 1947 Public Security Ordinance permitting “murder in good faith.” With the complicity of the Tamil and Muslim elite, politics which was anti- labour at first, turned ethno-chauvinist surrendering Parliamentary political power to Sinhalese exclusivism. Organised labour, weakened by the exclusion of plantation workers, was finally crushed by the UNP government in the General Strike of 1980. The right of habeas corpus, rendered virtually extinct by the 1979 PTA, made way for the cruel joke of the 2007 ICCPR Act.

The Hooles diligently and painstakingly recount the legislative, juridical and administrative history of this country since 1901 and express hope for the survival in a “mangled” form at least, of the Separation of Powers and a revived judiciary with the courage to declare bad laws invalid. Indeed, all across the world extremist, racist and neofascist assaults are proliferating, hence the Hooles’ thesis may seem legitimate not only in domestic discourse but also internationally. However, when history repeats itself it does so to the strains of a different melody.

But let me make a personal remark first. I got to know Rajan more than 40 years ago when he was a final year student in my Electrical Power Systems class at the Peradeniya Engineering Faculty. A clever but grumpy fellow, methought, youth is only a passing ailment. I am not sure if he is talkative and jolly now.

Global Context

Global growth is slowing sharply and countries are falling into recession with consequences that are devastating for developing economies. As Central Banks simultaneously hike interest rates in response to inflation, the world is edging toward recession in 2023 and the emerging financial crises will do lasting harm in developing economies. Though Central banks are raising interest rates inflation will not come down. Furthermore, the political scenario of spreading global extremism voids usual recession-recovery expectations. The Biden Administration finds it a matter of existential necessity to a take stand against extremism (racism, “election deniers”, reinvigorated Trumpism, a fundamentalist anti-abortion surge versus feminist outrage and a primitivist majority in the Supreme Court). Therefore, the Administration is pumping money into consumer’s pockets; fiscal stimulation; a $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan, tax credits and rebates for energy-efficient vehicles and renewable electricity. Then there is the Ukraine war and political uncertainties such as the victory of neo-fascists in the Italian elections and the strengthening of the far-right in France, Poland Hungary, Denmark and elsewhere in Europe. Worry is justified.

Actually, what I am humming and hawing about is the Hooles’ hopes that a revived judiciary will have the courage to declare bad laws invalid. And when they suggest that talk of “revolution is discredited” they oversimplify the “mangled processes” maturing in the innards of global capitalism. Things now are different from the familiar post-war recession-recovery cycle. Global recession, a deep-recession or even a depression cannot be ruled out and complicate the aforesaid purely political picture. The processes are different this time and need to be fleshed out with their own empirical detail. Is a decade of global capitalist durability possible, or will it be a deeper recession than usual?

Comments on coverage

The authors are at their best in the scholarly presentation of how British juridical and colonial administrative practices challenged and eventually ended the denial of habus corpus and even contributed to the downfall of slavery in the Empire (pages 76-79). In Sri Lanka conversely since independence “governments have shown their repressive character by targeting the right of habeas corpus by legislative acts” and since 1978 by muzzling the judiciary. The historical scholarship of chapter two may prove to be the most informative section of the book for the lay reader unfamiliar with this history. The early chapters also expose the class bias and racial shakiness, if not worse, of the old “national leaders” DB Jayatilleke, DS Senanayake, James Peries, DR Wijewardene and SWRD Bandaranaike.

The book is a 730-page hagiography of Ponnambalam Arunachalam – I must hasten to add that I am not suggesting that loquacity is the outcome of matrimony. Many share the view that Arunachalam was the greatest Ceylonese political figure of the Twentieth Century. I will not dream of attempting to summarise the book’s argument in my 1,700-word column. Read it, you cannot afford not to, or you will miss a wealth of carefully researched detail. Chapter 11 on the Citizenship Act debates, convey a great deal of information about the intrinsic racism of Sinhala leaders and Tamil treachery (not only GG). While the book pays justifiable homage to Sarath Muttetuwegama I am surprised it makes no mention of two far more important leftists of the same period, Vijaya Kumaratunga and Vickrmabahu Karunaratna. The Hooles are strong on textual scholarship but alas have little grasp of left-politics.

An edited summary of chapter subheadings of the first part (up to page 480) of this 750+ page book is as follows and gives a flavour of its scope.

Champion of Labour (Arunachalam, Coup in the Ceylon National Congress, Tamil Mahajana Sabhai, Indian Labour Short-changed, Oligarchy of Planter-Politicians, Donoughmore and Status of Indian Labour, Formation of the Left, Blaming Indian Labour for Landlessness, Mooloya, Bandaranaike Cleanses Electoral Rolls, D.S. Senanayake, George E. de Silva, B.H. Aluwihare, Release of LSSP Detenus. Independence, Unions, Extending Colonial Repression, Undermining Working Class, Jayewardene and Keuneman, Ponnambalam and N.M. Perera, Naganathan and Nadesan, Jennings, Citizenship Act, Ponnambalam ditches Plantation Tamils, Chelvanayakam, Political Imperative to Shackle the Judiciary, the Ceylon Act: Invalid, Absurd and Impossible, Supreme Court clears the way for Disenfranchisement, Taming the Judiciary: Undermining Separation of Powers.

The second part of the book from about Independence right up to the present time are dealt with in equal detail in pages 480-649, I am not providing a summary because it is better known and for reasons of space. There are also nine useful Appendices, a Bibliography and an Index in the remaining 80 pages.

I am a believer in the maxim that brevity is the soul of wit. If one can possibly say it in 25 words why drag it on for 250? On this count I should not be an admirer of Hoole & Hool’s tome. But they can be forgiven the length because of their admirable coverage of socio-political and labour movement perspectives.

I will now explore some associated issues. There is for example a comment in a newspaper by Ranga Jayasuriya on Nov. 1, 2022 asking how come Britain has an Asian, Hindu Prime Minister, Rishi Sunak, and the US elected Barrack Obama, but no Lankan Tamil or Muslim came even close to reaching the pinnacle? Is it that in the early stages, Tamil politics was not a reaction to a Sinhala Buddhist majoritarian threat, but rather it was driven by Dravidian societal, caste and elitist imperatives? This of course is abundantly clear in the post-independence period where GG Ponnambalam’s reactionary Tamil Congress, and SJV’s quaint Federal Party and its successors, came to delineate the scope and nature of Tamil politics.

The aforementioned comment does not rub off on Arunachalam who “Kumari Jayawardena describes as far ahead of his colleagues in championing self-government and universal suffrage”. His vision was that of a Ceylon that would in about 20 years be a non-sectarian democracy along the lines of Switzerland. He noted “The slums of the poor, though not so bad as in the big cities of Europe, are nests of filth and disease. Children run about untaught, uncared for, their mortality running into hundreds per thousand.” Michael Roberts says in https://thuppahis.com/2022/12/04/caste-in-jaffna/ that M.M. Mahroof, a researcher into caste, makes the distinction “The Tamil system is based on a notion of pollution; the Sinhala is not. The former is supplemental to Hinduism the latter antithetical to Buddhism. Non-Govi castes are often wealthy and powerful, non-Vellala castes are not. Govi negation of others is subtle, Vellala negation of others is overt and offensive”. Was Arunachalam not a champion of the fight against caste prejudice in Tamil society of his day? Or is this an anachronistic question to ask?