Archives

by Dr. K. Indra Kumar

The 101st birth anniversary of late G.G. Ponnambalam, Q.C., leader All Ceylon Tamil Congress fell on November 8th 2002.

He inaugurated the All Ceylon Tamil Congress on August 29th 1944 to safeguard and look after the interests of Tamil speaking people in Sri Lanka.

The Ceylon Tamils suffered from the mid-1920s until the arrival of G.G. Ponnambalam in the mid - 1930s from the absence of a strong and imaginative leader.

Sri Ponnambalam Arunachalam had died a disappointed man in 1924, convinced that he had been let down by the conservative Sinhalese political elite. Sir Ponnambalam Ramanathan in the last phase before his death in 1930 was said to have been more "pietistic than political", looking "more like an old Testament prophet than a politician". Other able Tamils like Sir Ambalavanar Kanagasabai, K. Balasingham and H.A.P. Sandrasagara did not have the same political clout of the two brothers.

However, during the mid - 1920s, the Tamils had found in Ceylon's Governor, Sir William Manning, and the Secretary of State for the Colonies, the Duke of Devonshire, unexpected upholders of their political and constitutional interests and ambitions. Between 1924 and 1934, these two gentlemen, despite Sinhalese accusations of "divide and rule," which were baseless, tried in their own way to protect the interests of the Tamil community. They sent numerous dispatches emphasising the need to protect minority interests in general and Tamil interests in particular.

In 1922, Sir Willam Manning laid down the governing principles for constitutional reform, which from the mid-1930s onwards became the sheet anchor of the bold and marathon crusades launched by G.G. Ponnambalam for balanced representation for the minorities ("Fifty-Fifty"). Governor Manning wrote: "The composition of the Legislative Council was so arranged that while the Government cannot carry a measure, except under clause 52 of the Order in Council, in the face of the united opposition of the Unofficial Members, no single community can impose its will on the other communities".

Clause 52 provided that if the Governor deemed the passing of any bill of paramount importance, only the votes of the Official Members and the Nominated Official Members, not those of the Unofficial Members, needed to be taken into account for the bill to be carried through. On january 11, 1923, the Secretary of State approved this arrangement.

Sir Andrew Caldecott, who succeeded Manning as Governor, disposed of the demand for balanced representation "in one line," according of G.G. Ponnambalam.

In a marathon speech delivered by Ponnambalam in the State Council in 1939, the longest on record up to that time, on the Reform Dispatch of Sir Andrew Caldecott, he said:

"Mr. Speaker, I now come to an observation made by His Excellency the Governor. His Excellency the Governor, before he deals with the machinery of Government, disposes of in one line what he has chosen to call the fifty-fifty demand, a crude arithmetical formula. The demand, as far as I am aware, of the minorities in this country has been for balanced representation, for representation on the basis that no single community should be in a position to out-vote a combination of all the other communities in the Island. That does not necessarily mean a fifty-fifty basis. It might mean more or less".

"His Excellency must have been aware more than any one else that what was contemplated by all of us was not a reversion to communal representation, not a demarcation or reservation of communal seats, not even a reservation of seats in joint electorates for particular interests, but a re-demarcation, a re-delimitation of the electoral boundaries in this country in such a way as to permit members of the minority communities, if they feel so disposed, for some time to come, to return Members belonging to their communities so that the major community should not be in a position to out-vote the other communities. I submit to every right-thinking Member of his House that to make that demand is one thing and to put down an inflexible, crude mathematical formula such as fifty-fifty is another thing. And by whom was this demand made?"

"Not by me, It might appear to some Members of this House that this is the demand of a mischievous mind, made within the last few years: that neither the Tamils as a community nor the accredited leaders of the Tamil community in the past, had made a demand of this nature. Sir, I should like to nail that misapprehension to the counter".

That clearly shows that G.G. Ponnambalam did not like the "fifty-fifty" tag and would have preferred his demand to be referred to as the demand for balanced representation.

This historic speech was subsequently published under the title "Minorities and Constitutional Reforms", and is published in full in the first part of this book.

Ponnambalam was infuriated that Governor Caldecott had prepared his Dispatch, that it was "hatched in secret and in darkness" and was secretively forwarded to the Colonial Secretary for approval.

He takes the Governor to task thus: "His Excellency, as a matter of fact, wanted the imprimatur and sanction of the Colonial Office to go forward. Why, I ask Hon. Members, this unbecoming haste even on the part of His Excellency? One can only put the one possible generous interpretation on it and that is that there was persistent pressure brought to bear by the Board of Ministers in order that the scheme, the little pet scheme, hatched in secret and in darkness may receive the approval of the Colonial Office before Hon. Members had an opportunity of discussing it.

And I am happy to be able to pay my humble tribute to British legislators, to the Colonial Office and to His majesty's Government that they thought if fit to send back the Dispatch of His Excellency to be discussed in this House before any action was taken. Otherwise we would have been completely shut out from expressing our opinions on this question".

Ponnambalam cannot understand what the Sinhalese have to fear about his demand for balanced representation.

This 1939 speech of G.G. Ponnambalam is a masterpiece, its compilation the work of an outstanding genius, and every Sri Lankan should read it.

If the request of late G.G. Ponnambalam for balanced representation had been accepted, this country would not have come to the present situation and suffered to this extent.

News | Business | Features | Editorial | Security
Politics | World | Letters | Sports | Obituaries |

Produced by Lake House
Copyright 2001 The Associated Newspapers of Ceylon Ltd.
Comments and suggestions to :Web Manager