Indian corporate to build houses for Gotabhaya’s Colombo development

| by TamilNet

( May 21, 2014, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) Timed to the Indian election results, Gotabhaya Rajapaksa-controlled Urban Development Authority of Colombo has made an unconventional deal with a leading corporate house of India, the Tata Group, by giving a prime area of Colombo city on a 99 years lease ‘free of charge’, for the group to ‘build houses’. While Sri Lanka’s strategy is to bind India with the structural genocide of Eezham Tamils, through Colombo-centric interests and building Sinhala military capitals in Jaffna and Trincomalee, the Indian intelligence agencies deceptively tell Tamil activists that an ‘economic integration’ would bring in political solutions. The Colombo-backing stand of Observer Research Foundation has to be understood in the background of the actual happenings, said Tamil activists for alternative politics in the island.

The 400 million dollar operations of Tata Housing in the heart of Colombo city comes while New Delhi’s 50, 000 houses to war-torn Tamils in the North and East, promised 5 years ago, is either sabotaged or diverted to demographic genocide by Colombo.

Tata Housing will get 8 acres in Slave Island area of Colombo, where 3 acres will be used for providing housing to the evicted, in a floor-space equal or more than what is taken, in addition to providing rent money between 15,000 to 52,000 rupees per month for temporary accommodation during the period of construction.

Tata will be using the remaining 5 acres for building a commercial-cum-residential enclave, including a city hotel, posh residential apartments, commercial space and retail space for apparel, departmental stores, health & beauty care, multiplex, food courts and restaurants.

The first stage will be completed in 2 years time and the entire operation takes place on a consensual basis among the present residents, the UDA and Tata Housing, Colombo media reports said.

While the Tata Group has calculated strong ties with neighbours, ‘economic potential of Colombo-centric Sri Lanka’ and returns through future potential in real estate, the corporate will also seek Strategic Investment Project Status and tax concessions from Colombo.

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The striking contrast between the Indian corporate deal in Colombo and the India-backed Sinhala military appropriation of land in the country of Eezham Tamils, after genocidal massacre, incarceration in barbed-wire camps and refusal to resettlement, has to be carefully grasped, said Tamil activists for alternative politics.

Indian imperialism and corporatism could always achieve its ways through means of recognising the parity of the two nations and their territories in the island, rather than opting for genocide and structural genocide of one nation by the other.

The latter would never end the conflict in the given geopolitical context and more than any other power Indian imperialism and corporatism should have the bulk of the concern.

But, impelled by the greed for short-term benefits, carried away by the time-to-time geostrategic compulsions set by others, and with an inherent arrogance and bulldozing attitude inherited through British colonialism and associated Sanskritisation, a philosophy that is far away from moral high ground long prevails in India’s approach to the island.

It is unlikely that with a regime change there will be a change in the basic philosophy, unless a different philosophy to respect nations and peoples, to never contribute to genocide and to never stoop down to the level of backing a system as that of Colombo, is taught by the people to Indian imperialism and corporatism, for the betterment of India.

The edification process may be easier under a political regime than under a remote-controlled, esoteric and intelligence cum bureaucracy regime.

A conscious initiative of the people of Tamil Nadu in the philosophical edification of Indian imperialism and corporatism, in the case of the national question in the island, would benefit the entire region of South Asia in particular and humanity in general.

There is a historic opportunity.

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Earlier India’s intelligence outfits used to operate institutes and research organisations, staffed by retired intelligence personnel, largely for the purpose of political, military and strategic manoeuvrings. In the campaign against the cause of Eezham Tamils, the deployment of B. Raman and Col. Hariharan is well known.

Deployment of outfits jointly run by intelligence and corporates is a transformation that is seen today, as military interests and corporate interests overlap for the benefit of the latter, pushing back national interests or peoples’ interests.

One has to carefully grasp the fundamental dynamics behind the stand of Observer Research Foundation of India in backing the genocidal Sri Lankan State and the Rajapaksa regime. Its latest exercise was defending New Delhi’s abstention at UNHRC voting in Geneva.

Mr. Satyamoorthy of ORF, Chennai Chapter, operates in Colombo and Male.

The miscarriage of an Indian corporate GMR on the Maldives International Airport issue is internationally known.

The Indian corporate was insensitive to local sentiments and infringement into relatively smaller businesses of the locals.

The main problem is the absence of a principled corporate philosophy in India in respecting nations and peoples, or in shunning genocide and structural genocide.

Unfortunately Maldives that has to show solidarity with Eezham Tamils facing a shared situation in the neighbourhood steadily opts for backing the genocidal State in Colombo and the Rajapaksa regime.