So, Sri
Lanka has faced the ire of the world over hosting the Commonwealth summit.
There is widespread international demand for speedier trials and justice over
abuses done by its army in the 37 years long civil war. Now coming to the
ironical part; several nations including ‘India’ have boycotted the summit over
this issue. Has India forgotten its own problem / track record over Kashmiri
separatists? How is LTTE separatism any different from that and why should we
support it? To some extent Sri Lanka has
at least managed to end this deadly civil war somehow whereas we are yet to
even chalk out a plan for resolving the conflict. Also, why is the world shy of
demanding an equal trial including the excesses done by LTTE and its supporters?
We lost our beloved Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi to a terror strike by LTTE. So,
while Western countries like Canada may oppose this sort of a summit, I’m not
exactly clear what is India’s position based on.
Anyhow,
that is not the moot point of this blog. What is Commonwealth really? It is a
bloc of nations who were the erstwhile colonies of the British Empire and hence
figuratively the head is Queen Elizabeth. Nobody has a problem with this? Is
the colonial era something to be celebrated or looked back upon with nostalgia?
Are we even proud to be part of Commonwealth Nations bloc? This bloc was also
created by the London declaration in 1949 as if independence is some kind of
alms we received.
I do not
understand why the Commonwealth nations don’t object to the existence of this
bloc – it kind of looks like they totally lack any form of self respect. To my
mind Commonwealth summit is a celebration of the colonial past and not
something to be proud of or to be a part of - 65 years on since independence,
it is time to unshackle those chains.
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