Ahilan Kadirgamar
Courtesy of HIMAL, February 2010 issue, http://www.himalmag. which features everal articles on Sri Lanka
Even as the people of Jaffna – and those who were displaced – make use of their new freedoms of movement, they are confronted with the effect of decades of political stagnation.
Illangai enpatthu nam thai thiru naadu
elil mihuntha iyerkai valam niraitha nal naadu
maanikka muthuhalum maanburu katchihalum manathai kavarthuvudum naadu
yaalpaanam entru sonnal then suvai oorum
panai palamum puhai ilaiyum ondraha valarum
Ceylon/Lanka is our respected motherland
A good land endowed with environmental benefits
A Land where precious gemstones and beautiful sceneries cover our minds
When we pronounce the word Jaffna the taste of honey oozes
Jaffna, where the palmyra fruit and the tobacco leaves grow together
– Translation (by writer) of the opening lines of Tamil song, “Ilangai enpathu” by A E Manoharan
Allaippidy, Jaffna in the afternoon. 
Cricket outside a community centre.
When I visited Jaffna recently, like all those returning home after years away I too sensed feelings of nostalgia welling up inside. This was my first visit in six years, and almost 25 since I had last lived in Jaffna, as an 11-year-old. The opening lines are by A E Manoharan, the Tamil pop star and baila singer who took Jaffna by storm in the 1970s – a time when, in my mind, Manoharan was more popular than the youthful leaders of the militant movements who would emerge soon enough. I have vague memories of going to an open-air Manoharan concert, sitting on the bicycle bar as one of my relatives rode us to where we could hear the loudspeakers. Incidentally, Manoharan composed “Ilangai enpathu”, with its reference to the palmyra fruit, two decades before rights activist Rajani Thiranagama and her colleagues would write The Broken Palmyra, for which she would be murdered.
