The Mahinda Rajapakse administration that has been running to New Delhi since it took office, even for matters that are the internal affairs of this country, cannot help but take cognisance of the advice/warnings emanating from Indian leaders and officials on how we should resolve the ethnic problem. Even the Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has periodically sounded warnings that there is no military solution to the ethnic problem and that it has to be settled through negotiations.

Last week Indian National Security Advisor M.K. Narayanan once again issued a warning to the Rajapakse administration in language hitherto unheard, naturally ringing alarm bells at Temple Trees. The occasion Narayanan used to issue a virtual warning – the memorial lecture on Indian Air Chief Marshal P.C. Lal – was hardly the place to do it, and it appears that he was delivering an urgent communication of the Indian government.

India has come to the Rajapakse Government’s rescue on several occasions in the recent past with increased cooperation in the intelligence gathering and defence fronts, especially strengthening the country’s air defences after the LTTE displayed their fledgling air force and all what was asked of the government was to formulate a political package to address the minority aspirations and ensure India’s national security is not compromised.

For India, it was a small price to ask in exchange for the support extended given its own national security considerations and domestic political compulsions. But just like he dealt with the UNP after the signing of the Memorandum of Understanding, so was President Rajapakse’s approach to international relations, confining his goodwill to mere words with his actions to the contrary. And the upshot was earning India’s ire that came to be reflected in the words of the National Security Advisor’s words last week.

In his statement, the Indian National Security Advisor said: ‘We want the Sri Lanka government to treat its large Tamil minority with dignity… The Sri Lanka government

seems to have a single objective of a military victory without any devolution of power… We have to ensure that India’s pre-eminent position in the region is not compromised by Sri Lanka seeking arms from elsewhere. We need a national consensus on how much military assistance we should provide and how much pressure we should put on the Sri Lanka government."

President Mahinda Rajapakse having antagonised the powerful Western nations who were involved in the Sri Lankan peace process placed all his bets on New Delhi but is now coming a crop even on that front due to his inconsistent approach to resolving the ethnic conflict and the failure to honour the commitments made to New Delhi. It was India that came to President Rajapakse’s rescue just months earlier when he announced the implementation of a diluted 13th Amendment as a means to resolving the ethnic conflict and that despite Sri Lanka’s own opposition stating it was too little too late.

India however hailed Rajapakse’s move describing it as a ‘welcome first step,’ thereby giving the President much needed time to build a consensus through the APRC. But rather than implement even the 13th Amendment as a first step the President started back peddling yet again in the face of JVP opposition and not surprisingly, the Marxists also launched a scathing attack on India threatening to call for a boycott of Indian products for allegedly force feeding the 13th Amendment on the government. And not surprisingly there was nary a word from the President or the Prime Minister against the JVP leading to suspicion in diplomatic circles whether the whole campaign had the blessings of the government.

It is in this overall backdrop that Narayanan’s comments came to be made and the question is whether the government will take the warning seriously or ignore it and continue muddling through as it has done on many national issues?

The Indian government it appears does not take seriously what President Rajapakse claims he has done for the Tamil minority such as ‘the liberation of the east and the restoration of democracy.’ That is why Narayanan pointedly calls upon the government to ‘treat the Tamil minority with dignity.’ Inherent in that statement is the implication that the Tamil people are treated with indignity and the government has no one to blame but itself for such a perception given the forced evacuation of Tamils from the city and enforced disappearances and abductions in the north and the south.

An ominous political scenario is emerging quite similar to that of the mid and the late 1980s on Indo- Sri Lanka relations. At that time the J.R. Jayewardene government had launched the Vadamarachchi operation and was poised to move into Jaffna, and capture or drive out Pirapaharan from town while India was threatening that it would not let that happen. President Rajapakse with his gung ho brother Gotabaya, who is the defence secretary, is now claiming they are moving into the Wanni where the LTTE holds sway and New Delhi is having serious concerns about the unfolding scenario. This time however New Delhi’s concern is more about the stability of Sri Lanka rather than safeguarding an organisation that has been banned in India for murdering one of its former Prime Minister’s, Rajiv Gandhi whose widow is today the leader of the ruling Congress Party and her son Rahul, the general secretary.

Given the recent military developments in the north where in the month of February alone the security forces suffered over 900 casualties, both dead and injured with similarly high casualty figures reported for March, there is growing concern in New Delhi that the Rajapakse administration is losing the plot with the inevitable national security considerations for India and that in the face of even a viable political package not being on the table for India to point to given the domestic political pressures from the south.

That President Rajapakse was not particularly thrilled at the ground situation and called a meeting of the northern ground commanders for an urgent meeting to Colombo on Friday only reinforced the fears entertained by New Delhi that the military plans were not working as predicted. That in turn has led to fears that the government facing an economic crunch might look to countries like Pakistan and China for military assistance causing serious national security considerations for India. Hence, Narayanan’s warning.

The Rajapakse brothers are muddling through with the 13th Amendment which they claimed was their solution to the demands of the Tamils. Later they said that not all of the 13th Amendment could be implemented — pulling out most of the teeth of the devolutionary process. In the light of these developments is the Supreme Court decision that the amalgamation of the Northern and Eastern Provinces is ultra vires the constitution. President Rajapakse is now rubbing salt into Indian wounds by holding an election to the Eastern Province Council which will ensure the separation of the two provinces which remained amalgamated after the 1987 agreement. This dual posture towards New Delhi is bound to infuriate its Brahmins. On the one hand President Rajapakse is Salaaming the Brahmins while he is also kicking them under the table!

On the diplomatic front President Rajapakse’s policies have been that of a Hambantota buffalo in a pottery shed. With his new found aggressive diplomats and academics who would have been excellent orators in undergraduate unions, he has done his damnedest to wreck relations with powerful Western nations. When he scrapped the Ceasefire Agreement it also resulted in the Co-Chairs to the peace process — US, EU, Japan and Norway being kept out of the running.

It left only India fully backing Sri Lanka and now even the Indians are none too pleased with the Mahinda Chinthanaya. Sri Lanka is now being looked upon by the West with a jaundiced eye and the military onslaught on the north is attempted to be projected akin to that of the Serbs attacking the Albanians in the 1990s. Little wonder that Velupillai Pirapaharan (as reported) has told TNA MPs that he is looking towards a Kosovo kind of solution and that is exactly what India fears and attempting to avert by urging Rajapakse to implement a viable political package.

Mahinda Rajapakse has made a sordid mess on the political, military, diplomatic and financial fronts. He started on the wrong foot right at the commencement of his presidential election campaign by aligning himself with two extremist parties with whom no sensible democratic government would have been possible. All solutions which Rajapakse has put out such as even the toothless 13th Amendment have been shot down in flames by these two parties. Lacking a parliamentary majority, his only option of forming a stable and sensible coalition was with the UNP but sheer political chicanery put an end to all that. He was thinking of the next elections and the opportunity of whipping up communalism to be swept to power.