The tiny 10x16 sq ft houses awaiting doors, windows and a coat of paint at the Melmonavoor Sri Lankan refugee camp in India, one of the six camps in Vellore district, reflect the conflict that every refugee from the island nation is going through.
Away from the land they originally belong to, the thousands of men, women and children are still on the hunt for a sense of belonging, haunted by the incomplete nature of things around them. It has been close to three decades since many of the Sri Lankan Tamils sought refuge in Tamil Nadu. With the war coming to an end in 2009, many of them find themselves in a dilemma: Whether to stay back or return to their native land. They feel that the latter choice poses a sense of uncertainty about their future.
This predicament came to the fore nearly six months ago when the refugees held a referendum among themselves. S Sivagaran, head of the refugee camp in Banavaram, says that over 90 per cent of the refugees in the camp expressed their unwillingness to return to their homeland.
The refugees in five other camps at Melmonavoor, Palar Anaicut, Chinnapallikuppam, Gudiyattam and Minnur in the district also opine that their homeland will never be a safe place to live in harmony. The after-effects of the war will continue for many more years to come, they feel.
A resident of Trincomalee says he landed in Tamil Nadu in August 1990 as a 13-year-old. “We lived a nomadic life in our own land with fear whether we will be alive the next minute. We do not want the ghastly experience once again,” he says.
“Here, there is no threat to our lives, but still we are looked upon as negative elements. We are not allowed to leave the camps when some key leader visits Vellore. Despite the stigma, many of us want to stay back, as going back to Lanka means starting from scratch.”
The refugees here are under the impression that the Sinhala government is giving a call for them to return home to show that normalcy is returning to the once war-torn nation. However, the the situation prevailing there is in stark contrast, they point out.
Back in Sri Lanka, their relatives are still searching for pieces of their lives after the war, say scores of refugees, who speak in a single voice against going back to the island nation. “Agriculture has been completely wiped out. Our relatives there are struggling for a livelihood as unemployment rules the land. Many are still living in the camps. Except for fishing, there is not much of scope and the government is yet to address our people’s needs of employment and housing,” says M Noel Yugkendran, member of Vellore Sri Lankan Refugees Vazhikattu Kuzhu.
The refugees point out that though they study in Tamil Nadu, they can only land up in a few private jobs or as daily wage labourers. They are also bound by 22 rules laid down by the State government, which restrict the free movement of Lankans. “Despite a lot of restrictions here, we would prefer to die here rather than going back to Sri Lanka,” he says, while many echoed the same. “We get a one-way passport, which is otherwise called paper passport, to travel to Sri Lanka from India. Once we take that chance, we will lose our last solace (refugee camps in TN) to live in peace here,” points out another refugee.
For those who take the chance to get back home, Sri Lanka serves only as a transit point to take them to foreign lands that promise better and peaceful living conditions. Many opt to get back to Sri Lanka in order to fly to other countries, observes Seeman Pillai, a refugee at Melmonavoor camp. His son left for Sri Lanka a year ago with the hope to get a passport and a job abroad to lead a peaceful life, New Indian Express reports.
