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The
Indian intervention in the Sri Lankan Civil War
was the deployment of the
Indian Peace Keeping Force
in Sri Lanka intended to perform a
peacekeeping
role. The deployment followed the
Indo-Sri Lankan Accord
between India and Sri Lanka of 1987 which was intended to end the
Sri Lankan Civil War
between
militant
Sri Lankan Tamil nationalists
, principally the
Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam
(LTTE), and the
Sri Lankan Military
.
The original intention was the Indian Peace Keeping Force would not be involved in large scale military operations. However, after a few months, the Indian Peace Keeping Force engaged the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam in a series of battles. During the two years in which it was deployed, the IPKF fought numerous battles against the LTTE. During 1989, the Sri Lankan government and the LTTE reached to an agreement and ceased the combat. From May 1989, the Sri Lankan government started to provide weapons to the LTTE for securing the departure of the IPKF. On June 2, the Sri Lankan government asked IPKF to leave and an official ceasefire agreement between the Sri Lankan government and the LTTE was signed on June 28.
[2]
In 1990, the IPKF withdrew under the government of
V. P. Singh
after
Ranasinghe Premadasa
asked IPKF to leave at the time when the LTTE was almost defeated.
[3]
Background
[
edit
]
According to
Rejaul Karim Laskar
, a scholar of
Indian foreign policy
,
Indian
intervention in Sri Lankan civil war became inevitable as that civil war threatened India’s "unity, national interest and territorial integrity."
[4]
According to Laskar, this threat came in two ways: On the one hand external powers could take advantage of the situation to establish their
base
in
Sri Lanka
thus posing a threat to
India
, and on the other, the
LTTE
’s dream of a sovereign
Tamil Eelam
comprising all the
Tamil
inhabited areas (of Sri Lanka) posed a threat to
India
’s territorial integrity.
[4]
The LTTE and other Tamil militant groups developed strong relationships with political parties in South India, such as
Pure Tamil Movement
(led by
Perunchithiranar
),
Dravidar Kazhagam
(led by
K. Veeramani
),
Kamaraj Congress
(led by
Nedumaran
) during the late 1970s.
[5]
These Tamil parties firmly backed the militants' cause of creating a separate Tamil
Eelam
within Sri Lanka. Thereafter, LTTE developed relations with
M. G. Ramachandran
and
M. Karunanidhi
, who served as
Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu
, succeeding one another.
Although Sri Lanka was a key member of
Non-Aligned Movement
in its initial stages, the
Government of Sri Lanka
's policies became pro-western as
J. R. Jayewardene
was elected
prime minister
with his landslide victory in
1977 parliamentary election
. Subsequently, he introduced a new constitution and
open economy
to Sri Lanka. Sri Lanka is the first South-Asian country to adopt liberal open economy.
[6]
Moreover,
President
J. R. Jayawardene did not enjoy the same warm relationship with
Indian Prime Minister
Indira Gandhi
that he had enjoyed with her father, Prime Minister
Jawaharlal Nehru
.
[5]
Thus, with the outbreak of
Black July racial riots
, the Indian government decided to support the insurgent groups operating in Northern Sri Lanka.
[7]
Operation Poomalai
[
edit
]
India became more actively involved in the late 1980s, and on 5 June 1987, the
Indian Air Force
airdropped food parcels
to
Jaffna
while it was
under siege
by Sri Lankan forces. At a time when the Sri Lankan government stated they were close to defeating the LTTE, India dropped 25 tons of food and medicine by parachute into areas held by the LTTE in a direct move of support toward the separatists.
[8]
Further Sri Lanka government accused, that not only food and medicine but weapons were also supplied to the LTTE.
[9]
Negotiations were held, and the
Indo-Sri Lanka Peace Accord
was signed on 29 July 1987, by Indian Prime Minister
Rajiv Gandhi
and Sri Lankan President
Jayewardene
. Under this accord, the Sri Lankan Government made a number of concessions to Tamil demands, including a
devolution
of power to the
provinces
, a merger?subject to later referendum?of the Northern and the Eastern provinces into the
single province
, and official status for the
Tamil language
(this was enacted as the
13th Amendment to the Constitution of Sri Lanka
). India agreed to establish order in the North and East through a force dubbed the
Indian Peace Keeping Force
(IPKF), and to cease assisting Tamil insurgents. Militant groups including the LTTE, although initially reluctant, agreed to surrender their arms to the IPKF, which initially oversaw a cease-fire and a modest
disarmament
of the militant groups.
The signing of the Indo-Lanka Accord, so soon after JR Jayawardene's declaration that he would fight the Indians to the last bullet, led to unrest in south. The arrival of the IPKF to take over control of most areas in the North of the country enabled the Sri Lanka government to shift its forces to the south (in Indian aircraft) to quell the protests. This led to an
uprising
by the
Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna
in the south, which was put down bloodily over the next two years.
Conflict with the LTTE
[
edit
]
While most Tamil militant groups laid down their weapons and agreed to seek a peaceful solution to the conflict, the LTTE refused to disarm its fighters.
[10]
Keen to ensure the success of the accord, the IPKF then tried to demobilize the LTTE by force and ended up in full-scale conflict with them. The three-year-long conflict was also marked by the IPKF being accused of committing various abuses of human rights by many human rights groups as well as some within the Indian media. The IPKF also soon met stiff opposition from the Tamils.
[11]
[12]
Operation Pawan
[
edit
]
Operation Pawan was the codename assigned to the operations by the
Indian Peace Keeping Force
to take control of
Jaffna
from the
LTTE
in late 1987 to enforce the disarmament of the LTTE as a part of the
Indo-Sri Lankan Accord
. In brutal fighting that took about three weeks, the IPKF wrested control of the
Jaffna Peninsula
from LTTE rule. Supported by
Indian Army
tanks, helicopter gunships and heavy artillery, the LTTE were routed; however, the IPKF lost 214 soldiers in the hostilities.
[13]
The Jaffna University Helidrop
[
edit
]
The Jaffna University Helidrop was the first of the operations launched by the
Indian Peace Keeping Forces (IPKF)
aimed at disarming the Tamil Tigers (LTTE) by force and securing the town of
Jaffna
,
Sri Lanka
, in the opening stages of
Operation Pawan
during the
active Indian mediation
in the Sri Lankan Civil War. Mounted on the midnight of 12 October 1987, the operation was planned as a fast heliborne assault involving
Mi-8s
of the
No. 109 Helicopter Unit
, the
10th Para Commandos
and a contingent of the
13th Sikh Light Infantry
. The aim of the operation was to capture the
LTTE
leadership at
Jaffna University
building which served as the
tactical
headquarters
of the LTTE, which was expected to shorten Operation Pawan, the battle for Jaffna. However, the operation ended disastrously, failing to capture its objectives -owing to intelligence and planning failures. The heli dropped force suffered significant casualties, with nearly the entire Sikh LI detachment of twenty nine troops falling to the heavy fortifications of the university and fighting until death, along with six Para commandos falling in battle.
End of Indian involvement
[
edit
]
Nationalist sentiment led many Sinhalese to oppose the continued Indian presence in Sri Lanka. These led to the Sri Lankan government's call for India to quit the island, and they entered into a secret deal with the LTTE that culminated in a ceasefire. But the LTTE and IPKF continued to have frequent hostilities. In April 1989, the
Ranasinghe Premadasa
government ordered the
Sri Lanka Army
to clandestinely hand over arms consignments to the LTTE to fight the IPKF and its proxy Tamil National Army (TNA).
[14]
[15]
Although casualties among the IPKF mounted, and calls for the withdrawal of the IPKF from both sides of the Sri Lankan conflict grew, Rajiv Gandhi refused to remove the IPKF from Sri Lanka. However, following his defeat in Indian parliamentary elections in December 1989, the new Prime Minister
V. P. Singh
ordered the withdrawal of the IPKF, and their last ship left Sri Lanka on 24 March 1990. The 32-month presence of the IPKF in Sri Lanka resulted in the deaths of 1,165 Indian soldiers and over 5000 Sri Lankans. The cost for the
Government of India
was estimated at over ?10.3 billion.
[16]
Rajiv Gandhi's assassination
[
edit
]
Support for the LTTE in India dropped considerably in 1991, after the assassination of ex-Prime Minister
Rajiv Gandhi
by a female suicide bomber named
Thenmozhi Rajaratnam
. The Indian press has subsequently reported that Prabhakaran decided to eliminate Gandhi as he considered the ex-prime minister to be against the Tamil liberation struggle and feared that he might re-induct the IPKF, which Prabhakaran termed the "satanic force", if he won the
1991 Indian general election
.
[17]
In 1998 a court in India presided over by Special Judge V. Navaneetham found the LTTE and its leader Velupillai Prabhakaran responsible for the assassination.
[18]
In a 2006 interview, LTTE ideologue Anton Balasingham stated regret over the assassination, although he stopped short of outright acceptance of responsibility for it.
[19]
[20]
References
[
edit
]
- ^
"Economic Burden by Sending IPKF in Sri Lanka"
(PDF)
.
Press Information Bureau of India - Archive
. 15 December 1999.
Archived
(PDF)
from the original on 28 September 2020
. Retrieved
16 April
2020
.
- ^
Dixon, J.S.; Sarkees, M.R. (2015).
A Guide to Intra-state Wars
. Correlates of war series. SAGE Publications. p. 555.
ISBN
978-0-87289-775-5
.
- ^
"Online edition of Daily News"
.
dailynews.lk
. 11 January 2013. Archived from
the original
on 11 January 2013
. Retrieved
13 May
2024
.
- ^
a
b
Laskar, Rejaul (September 2014).
"Rajiv Gandhi's Diplomacy: Historic Significance and Contemporary Relevance"
.
Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary Diplomatist
.
2
(9): 47.
Archived
from the original on 21 February 2018
. Retrieved
8 March
2018
.
- ^
a
b
"LTTE: the Indian connection"
. Sunday Times. 1997.
Archived
from the original on 15 September 2014
. Retrieved
25 July
2011
.
- ^
"Sri Lanka ? an Overview"
. Fulbright commission.
Archived
from the original on 16 March 2011
. Retrieved
25 July
2011
.
- ^
David Brewster.
India's Ocean: the Story of India's Bid for Regional Leadership
.
Archived
from the original on 24 January 2016
. Retrieved
13 August
2014
.
- ^
Weisman, Steven R. (5 June 1987).
"India airlifts aid to tamil rebels"
.
STEVEN R. WEISMAN
. New York Times.
Archived
from the original on 19 February 2008
. Retrieved
9 April
2010
.
- ^
"Invasion by Indian jets on June 4, 1987 enraged Sri Lankan army officers"
. Archived from
the original
on 19 September 2016
. Retrieved
19 September
2016
.
- ^
"Tamil rebels abduct 2 rivals, Sri Lankan military says"
. Associated Press. 12 December 2006.
Archived
from the original on 17 October 2015
. Retrieved
3 October
2010
.
- ^
Balasingham, Adele. (2003)
The Will to Freedom - An Inside View of Tamil Resistance
. Fairmax Publishing Ltd, 2nd ed.
ISBN
1-903679-03-6
.
- ^
NorthEast Secretariat report on Human rights 1974 - 2004 (see Further Reading section).
- ^
Operation Pawan. The Battle for Jaffna
Archived
March 30, 2009, at the
Wayback Machine
- ^
"Chapter 55: Assassination of Athulathmudali"
.
Asia Times
. Archived from the original on 4 June 2011
. Retrieved
28 July
2011
.
{{
cite web
}}
: CS1 maint: unfit URL (
link
)
- ^
Dissanayaka, T.D.S.A.: "War or Peace in Sri Lanka, Volume II", p. 332. Swastika, 1998.
- ^
John Richardson (2005).
Paradise poisoned:learning about conflict, terrorism, and development from Sri Lanka's civil wars
. International Center for Ethnic Studies. p. 562.
ISBN
955-580-094-4
.
Archived
from the original on 6 January 2024
. Retrieved
19 January
2012
.
- ^
"Prabhakaran had Rajiv killed for being 'anti-Tamil'
"
. Rediff. 31 August 2006.
Archived
from the original on 3 March 2016.
- ^
"26 sentenced to death for Rajiv Gandhi's assassination"
. Rediff. 31 August 2006.
Archived
from the original on 3 March 2016.
- ^
"Tamil Tiger 'regret' over Gandhi"
.
BBC News
. 27 June 2006.
Archived
from the original on 22 May 2009
. Retrieved
10 May
2007
.
- ^
"We killed Rajiv, confesses LTTE"
.
The Times of India
. 28 June 2006.
Archived
from the original on 7 May 2007
. Retrieved
10 May
2007
.
Further reading
[
edit
]
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Origins
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Combatants
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Phases
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Major
battles
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Major events
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Leaders
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Aftermath
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Related topics
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Leadership
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Organisation
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Personnel
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Operations
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External
Conflicts
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Annexations
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Insurgencies
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Equipment
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Documents
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Other topics
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