Gajalakshmi
Paramasivam
14 October 2016
‘What
is and is not terrorism?’
Two Muslim youth were punished this week through
Anti Terrorism laws. Yesterday, at the social level a Malaysian-Tamil accused me of terrorism. At global level it is
difficult for the ordinary person to define terrorism. I highlighted this as
follows in my yesterday’s article:
[At
individual level – unless we have had the direct experience, we are driven by
the interpretation of our leaders. Such interpretations come with the leaders’
fears and desires. I am one who did not fear Terrorism in Sri Lanka nor in
Australia. When we dwell deep into the problem and make it a part of ourselves
we are protected by our True contribution and hence there is no fear.]
To this the Malaysian wrote:
[From: Malaysian
Sent: Thursday, 13 October 2016 4:02 PM
To: Gajalalakshmi Param
Cc:
Sent: Thursday, 13 October 2016 4:02 PM
To: Gajalalakshmi Param
Cc:
Subject: Re: Terrorism and Sovereignty
If as you claim , you were not
afraid of terrorism in S L - why did you leave your motherland (SL)
and deny your people your services amongst them - and not away from them ?
Also as you say - How do you `` dwell deep into the problem (Terrorism )and make it part of ourselves ``
Thus I hope you don`t empathise with Terrorism ?]
and deny your people your services amongst them - and not away from them ?
Also as you say - How do you `` dwell deep into the problem (Terrorism )and make it part of ourselves ``
Thus I hope you don`t empathise with Terrorism ?]
My response to
this was as follows:
[I left Sri Lanka to make money to build a home. I went to PNG
first and then came to Australia. I did not leave Motherland due to the war. I
was there in 1977. You assume without asking. Not that I think it would
have been wrong of me to leave for reasons of war. But my genuine feelings took
me back and now I feel for both my countries. As for empathising
with Terrorism – the first question is ‘what is terrorism?’ Each
person would construct it was per their own positions and experiences . None of
mine – positions or experiences have thus far raised that need to list someone
else a Terrorist.
To my mind, you are not able to comprehend my analyses due to
your own conclusions about me. I respect your request to disconnect
communication with you by taking you off my email list. In the meantime – thank
you for your responses – however irritating I found them to be – they were
useful to how some like you think.]
The Malaysian who asked for disconnection –
responded again - confirming his
position of sailing in two boats. Terrorism fears also can cause Mental
Disorders when we go beyond our needs. One good example that manifested
virtually at the same time I had the above mentioned conversation is presented
as follows:
EXCLUSIVE:
Brooklyn judge reduces convicted terror trio's jail sentence over haunting
'injustice' in Sri Lanka case
Judge Raymond J. Dearie (pictured) has reduced the
sentence of three Canadian nationals with ties to Tamil Tigers after admitting
the haunting Sri Lanka case "has just taken over my head.”
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Thursday, October 13, 2016, 4:00 AM
2016-10-13 16:00:39
[Three men convicted by the US of being LTTE
terrorists would get their sentences reduced by 10 years after a Brooklyn judge
revealed that he had been “haunted” by the case, the New York Daily News
reported on Thursday.
“I
just believe in my heart of hearts that an injustice has been done and I can’t
correct it,” Federal Judge Raymond Dearie has said, according to a transcript
of a July 15, 2015 conference with prosecutors and defense lawyers.
Dearie was referring to the 25-year prison terms he
was mandated to give to Canadian nationals Sathajhan Sarachandran, Sahilal
Sabaratnam, Thiruthanikan Thanigasalam in 2011 for conspiring to acquire
surface-to-air missiles on behalf of the Tamil Tigers, a rebel group fighting
against the government of Sri Lanka.
The men filed a lawsuit in 2012 in Brooklyn Federal
Court seeking a reduction in their sentences and disclosed details about the
civil war chaos including the deaths of dozens of innocent children in a Sri
Lankan air strike.
“Now that we’ve
become a little bit more sophisticated in our thinking about what is and is not
terrorism, now that we know a lot more about the conflict in Sri Lanka and the
horrors visited upon these people, perhaps there’s a way to provide a fair
measure of justice to all without condemning these men to essentially a life
behind bars” Dearie said.
Federal prosecutors informed Dearie this month that
the Brooklyn US Attorney’s office had reached an agreement with lawyers for the
three men which calls for essentially dropping the arms deal charge.
Their conviction for providing material support to a
terrorist organization will remain along with the 15-year prison term.]
I read the above only this morning (14 October). It has been included for publishing by the New York Daily News at 4 a.m. which would have been around 7 pm our Sydney time. My article was published around 2 pm Sydney time. As confirmed in the above email - the Malaysian’s response came to me at 4.02 p.m. yesterday which was 3 hours before the above article went into the free Medium that New York Daily is in this instance.
The
honorable judge’s words of wisdom contain the best lesson any leader in Justice
could learn from:
“Now that we’ve become a little bit more sophisticated
in our thinking about what is and is not
terrorism, now that we know a lot more about the conflict in Sri Lanka and
the horrors visited upon these people, perhaps there’s a way to provide a fair
measure of justice to all without condemning these men to essentially a life
behind bars”
Mine were ‘the first question is ‘what is terrorism?’ Each
person would construct it was per their own positions and experiences . None of
mine – positions or experiences have thus far raised that need to list someone
else a Terrorist.’
As per my inner search – as an Australian –
I was positioned at lower levels than I had earned in the official system and
even those who knew through their own positions - that I had earned relatively higher positions failed to publicly uphold
that value. In 1998 when Ms Pauline Hanson was ‘free’ to express her personal
opinion – it was a Hindu Leader whom I did not consciously follow at that time –
who came to me. Australia, which
recognizes Mother Mary Mackillop as a Saint – has the moral obligation to recognize
that people of other faiths also would feel such Divinity. But instead I was
punished.
The psychologist who assessed me wrote:
“CLINICAL ISSUES
Mrs. Paramasivam acknowledged that for several years
she had been in communication with a range of people including Yoga Swami, Our
Lady and Sai Baba the leader of an Indian Religious Group. She told me that Sai
Baba was a saint and on the 5 November 1998 red powder materialized on her
picture of him. She interpreted this as meaning that he was in communication
with her and felt that it was a miracle, a sign of his love for society.
She said that Sai Baba was able to anticipate her
thoughts and she felt comforted by this and said that she had experienced an
intuitive relationship with Sai Baba and her communication with him had
continued to this day. She described the communication as a “blissful state” it
felt as if she did not have a care in
the world. She acknowledges that her current charges did not concern her because
of the comfort she received from Sai Baba and said that he was the only one
whose opinion counted with her.
On specific questioning Mrs.
Paramasivam said that she had never heard external imaginary voices (auditory
hallucinations), the communications were through her body. She mentioned that
she was a follower of Gandhi and when she meditates she believes that she is
able to connect directly with Gandhi’s mind and she referred to how this was a
form of “mental telepathy”. She went on to
tell me about a doctor who is now
deceased. She believed that the doctor sends his thoughts to her and said that
when he is reborn the work she is doing based on their partnership will benefit
him.
While on bail Mrs.
Paramasivam said she had made no attempt to go back to the university because
she honoured her word and she has also honoured
her word by not sending any emails. However when asked if she would be
able to guarantee that she would not send any emails in the future she said
“why should I not educate them or share my experiences”. She again referred to
her beliefs that Sai Baba was there to protect her and she was not concerned
for her own well being. She told me that she was not a violent person, that she
was someone who absorbs the pain so that others are protected and would never
hurt anyone.
PSYCHIATRIC DIAGNOSIS AND OPINION
Mrs. Paramasivam has a paranoid psychosis. This
condition has been present for several years and is characterized delusions of
grandiosity, passivity and persecution and probable visual and auditory
hallucinations, In addition she has prominent obsessional traits in her
personality with a tendency to be quite moralistic, rigid and somewhat
inflexible in her manner in relating to the world.
This was also the verdict by the Malaysian
in his own words. To date I have not taken any medication for mental illness.
Even if I did suffer from mental illness – as per someone else’s definition - so long as I do not harm their values – they have
no jurisdiction over me. As a Sovereign person – I have the right to define my
own area of Sovereignty and so long as I live within those boundaries – I cannot
be punished. When I take reward from another system – I am automatically bound
by that system. To the extent I have enjoyed less benefits than I have earned
in Australia – I am free of the boundaries of the system / institutional hierarchy.
Before I realized this, I felt depressed and let down at the University of NSW –
from which Institution, I expected much more integrity than other institutions
I had worked for. A few like Dr. David Garlick – the doctor referred to in
paragraph 3 of the above excerpt – believed that I was genuine and upheld it Publicly.
Like Projects – we need to complete our
experiences in the privacy of our community to free ourselves of bondage. The
project may look small – but the value when the project is completed – would be
exponential. Such value merges naturally with the program. This is why where
one religion is defined – others need to be defined – not as per numbers – but as
per their values to their respective members. Buddha did not come when
Buddhists were in need of protection from Tamil Tigers. They made a project of
Buddha and as per the rules of Truth – Buddha would have gone first to those in
need but did not have the support of the Constitution nor the Buddhist leaders.
If Hinduism is not equal to Buddhism –
Buddhist political leaders including the current President and the Prime
Minister must stay away from Hindu places of worship. Where Buddhism has ‘foremost’
label – they need to be duty bound to not show that they are open to other
religions. To do so would be like the Army being friends with the LTTE combatants. Relations need to be firmly
defined and we need to stay within the borders of our positions. During a
training session in English, one Buddhist Police officer in Vaddukoddai –
started ‘telling me’ about Krishna and it was all confusion – like the
Malaysian mentioned above. I reminded him that he was the student and I was the
tutor there. We sailed smoothly from then on.
The danger with punishing a person without common
belief is that we are likely to USE that person for our own purposes – for example
show of armed power. Common belief helps us to include the person of lower
status and work out a system unique to that relationship but exercise it as per
Common language. Where someone confesses to something and it is punishable by
law – but that person did what s/he did as per her/his conscience – the punishment
needs to be minimal. Such punishment amounts to disciplinary action. Any more
is to punish ourselves. This translates often as fear of the other person and
the group that the other person belongs to.
I would have been desperate if I had not
felt the support from Swami Sai Baba whom I had not seen physically at that
time when the holy powder manifested. To my
mind only God is capable of coming to the support of those who are desperately
in need and there is no human support at that place at that time. I have since
tried to be there for someone who needs support that I can render. The Tamil
Tigers are one such group because of the gap in belief and the excessive punishment at their level. Innuendos such as
those from the Malaysian – help me weaken my connection with those who ‘tell me’.
Likewise self-governing minorities in Sri Lanka who are ‘told’ by Buddhist
leaders including through the Constitution.
The leadership of Tamil National Alliance –
the political group with the duty to prevent future wars has proven to be
lacking in strength in this regard. As per Sri Lankan Daily News report under
the heading ‘Foremost place for Buddhism
in new Constitution, says Ranil’:
[Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe’s
recent remarks that Buddhism would be given the foremost place in Sri Lanka’s
new Constitution has sparked concern among sections.
“As a state, the President, I and all of us protect
Buddhism, not through words, but through action,” Mr. Wickremesinghe said
recently, the State-run Daily News newspaper reported.
Mr. Wickremesinghe said all political parties and
religious leaders across faiths had “no issue in giving priority to protect
Buddhism in the country.” He added the Tamil National Alliance (TNA), the main
political grouping here representing Sri Lanka’s northern Tamils, agreed to
retain those articles protecting Buddhism in the existing Constitution
unchanged.
Exclusionary move
However, TNA parliamentarian and senior human rights
lawyer, M.A. Sumanthiran, said he would oppose such a move. “If equality is a provision,
then you cannot give primacy to one religion,” he told The Hindu on
Wednesday. Terming the move “exclusionary”, he said while the TNA would not mind “some kind of
recognition to Buddhism or Buddha’s teachings”, giving the religion the
foremost place, explicitly, was discriminatory.
Buddhists are Sri Lanka’s majority religious group,
accounting for about 70 per cent of the island’s population. Hindus are the
largest religious minority, constituting 12.6 per cent of the population, while
Muslims and Christians, respectively, make up 9.7 per cent and 7.6 per cent.
Following the January 2015 Presidential elections that
brought about a regime change in Sri Lanka, the country embarked upon drafting
a new constitution that, a section of lawyers and civil society hoped, would be
“secular”.
Mr. Wickremesinghe’s remarks have made evident that
the newly-elected government would retain the special place given to Buddhism
in the 1972 and 1978 constitutions.
Senior constitutional lawyer Jayampathy Wickramaratne,
who currently chairs a government-appointed committee to guide the
Constitution-making process, said Sri Lanka is a “secular state” on the basis
that there is no state religion. “To that extent, giving Buddhism the foremost
place does not necessarily make the Constitution anything other than secular,”
he told The Hindu.]
The TNA does not have the right to state
that it would not mind some kind of recognition to Buddhism. Who is TNA to make
such concessions outside the laws of democracy? An individual without political portfolio has the right to such
expressions but not a politically elected person through majority vote.
If Buddhists are ‘seen’ as an overwhelming
majority and a Hindu fears that – that would mean that that group is driven by the
seen and the heard. If anything, the minority need protection from such fears.
If the higher powers of Buddhism are ‘known’ through the law – for example
through Article 9 of the Sri Lankan Constitution - a non-Buddhist would access
that system less and less – especially where the rulings are highly subjective –
as they are in Sri Lankan Courts also. Under those circumstances – religion
becomes the Higher pathway for minorities. I know that it became to me. Without
this ‘refuge’ victims would lose self-confidence and that is the first step
towards mental disorder. Just because we live with those disappointments does
not mean that we do not have disorders. We internalize the pain and then our
God within makes the final judgment. When we accept that judgment as final –
there is no more expectations and therefore no need for appeals – nor reverse
judgments. The System reverses the judgment to the true owner of wrong doing.
We merely identify with it. Those who make the stronger contribution to such
manifestation – would know that God has delivered. Those who react at the lower
level – as LTTE did and as Buddhist clergy do regularly – lose this opportunity
to raise their pain and loss to the level of Truth/Divinity.
As per the above report:
[Senior constitutional lawyer Jayampathy
Wickramaratne, who currently chairs a government-appointed committee to guide
the Constitution-making process, said Sri Lanka is a “secular state” on the
basis that there is no state religion. “To that extent, giving Buddhism the
foremost place does not necessarily make the Constitution anything other than
secular,” he told The Hindu.
Debate on secularism
If a country does not have an official state religion,
it is secular, Mr. Wickramaratne said, giving examples. “India does not have a
state religion, so it is secular. But Islam is the state religion of Pakistan,
therefore Pakistan is not a secular state.”]
If the above legal expert says that Sri
Lanka does not have a state religion – then there is obviously a problem between
his mind order and that of the President who declared at the UN that Sri
Lanka was a Buddhist country. A White Australian Academic said to me in 1999, that
Sri Lankans have a habit of saying no,
no, by shaking their head sideways but it was an expression of acceptance when
they responded in words. That is what Dr. Jayampathy Wickramaratne is also
doing – saying no, no, we are secular but within his brain Article 9 of the constitution
is saying – yes, yes we are a Buddhist state. If these leaders do not have the
courage to express their inner thoughts – then those of us who seek peace of
mind – need to be left to our own laws – however primitive they may seem to
others.
While these pundits are dilly dallying –
those who are more closely connected to grassroots of Tamil Community have acted in the right direction:
Siva Senai in
Sri Lanka Gets Shiva Sena Support, Colombo Worried
[New Delhi: Shiv Sena in Mumbai has extended
its support to a new Sri Lankan Tamil outfit called Siva Senai, triggering
concerns among the mainstream politicians of the island nation that sectarian
outfits will reopen wounds of a 20-year-old civil war that ended only in 2009.
The Siva Senai, based out of Vavuniya in the
Tamil-dominated northern Lanka, is led by Maravanpulavu Sachithananthan. The
party takes its name from Lord Shiva and plans to fight “coercive conversion”
from Hinduism to Buddhism, the dominant Sinhalese religion……]
The wounds are there and the timeline would
confirm that it was the President followed by the Prime Minister – who have
interfered with the restructuring process towards a Secular State. In terms of
maintaining our Sovereignty at all levels – non-Buddhists have to match ‘Buddhism
foremost’ by ‘showing’ religious connections beyond Sri Lankan boundaries. If
Buddhism is foremost – then Sri Lanka as it is defined legally is not
Sovereign. Non-Buddhists have to extend their borders to include religious
leaderships to maintain Sri Lanka’s Balance of Sovereignty. Swami Sai Baba came
to me and to that extent Australia includes Sai Baba’s mind to maintain its Sovereignty.
Muslims like the family of the above youth who were arrested – are likely to shrink the borders of fellow
Australians due to lower mind-order. Punishing them would not cure either side.
When we fear – we mentally shrink our borders.
The above Hindu leader on the other hand has
confirmed accessing Shiv Sena in Mumbai
to help maintain that Sovereignty that every Hindu has the responsibility to
uphold. He did not act to shrink Buddhists but Politicians fear shrinkage of
their own space.
Lord Shiva, as per my belief is the Lord of
the Mind. The mind driven by Truth / Love is a perfectly orderly mind. Lord Buddha is also worshipped
due to his mind being filled with Truth. If Buddhism derives any part of its power
from Political Leaders – and the laws they make – Buddha is being reduced below
that level. Where would a Buddhist go when the secular system lets her/him
down? As per the Constitution s/he would not think of going to any non-Buddhist
group which is obviously rendered minority status very firmly by the
Constitution. One who has nowhere else to go – would tend to bring the other
side down to its level. Buddhists are no exception to this rule. The most
active religion at that time would be seen as their Natural Opposition. In Sri
Lanka, it could be Hindus, Muslims or Christians.
If no religion is shown as being of higher
status – we would all be free to follow our own instincts. In terms of origins –
Hinduism does pre date Buddhism – and if a Sri Lankan Hindu is in need of
support Lord Shiva would come to Sri Lanka as Swami Sai Baba came to Australia
to balance the books of Sovereignty.
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