Gajalakshmi Paramasivam

03 August  2021

 

CONSENSUAL OR  RAPE?

 

 

The Dily Mirror article ‘The story beyond Ishalini’s tragic death’ by Ranga Jayasuriya drew my attention. The article introduces the subject matter as follows:

[The suspicious death of a domestic help at the residence of former Minister Rishad Bathiudeen has momentarily unmasked the ugly truth of an exploitative affair that many a Sri Lankan middle-class family takes for granted: having a maid, predominantly from upcountry Tamil origin.  

16-year-old Ishalini Jude Kumar from Dayagama West Division 3 was admitted to the Colombo National Hospital on July 3, with severe burn injuries. She succumbed to injuries 12 days later and the post mortem found that the teenager had been subject to repeated sexual assault. Police investigations have led to a string of arrests including the wife and the father in law of the former minister and his brother, the latter charged with rape, after another woman who previously served at the house complained that she was subject to sexual abuse…….

..While many interrelated factors are at play, poor education attainment in the Upcountry Tamil communities, societal indifference to education, and political neglect to upgrade education facilities is at the heart of a vicious cycle of poverty]

 

Was it rape or part of a de facto employment arrangement?

Wikipedia provides the following presentation of rape:

[Rape is a type of sexual assault usually involving sexual intercourse or other forms of sexual penetration carried out against a person without that person's consent. The act may be carried out by physical force, coercion, abuse of authority, or against a person who is incapable of giving valid consent, such as one who is unconscious, incapacitated, has an intellectual disability, or is below the legal age of consent]

 

Recently there were discussions regarding Hindu worship of the phallus / Lingam and also cultural practices  of India where sexual enjoyment was codifies as Kamasutra similar to Thesawalamai Law applicable to Jaffna Tamils. As per my reading, many males applied today’s cultural principles in their current environments to demote ancient practices as being vulgar

[In a wedding ceremony the so called Iyer / (priest) or performs certain so called religious activities.

During that time he seems to deliver some so called manthras and what are the manthras he is muttering  under his breath. He address the bride: “You have been the wife of Soman (according to brahmins soman is their leader in Thevalokam/home of gods) then you were the wife of Indran, then so many Thevas, then to me (wife) and finally from today onwards to this man (then he point out the so called Groom. So, what the Iyer says is, you have been a wife to all these people living in Deva Logam. Please note, all these are chanted by the so called Iyer in Sanskrit.

Had the Iyer chanted the manthras in Thamil, the people at the ceremony would have gathered all the poles that were there and  thrashed him and made him a pulp.]

As per my derivation the above person is strongly infected by Separatism that the LTTE practiced to suit their own mandate. The LTTE also employed child-soldiers. But this generation Tamils have demonstrated a tendency to overlook such actions. The karma mutates and manifests itself through appropriate media.

As per my discovery – the value of mantras is their Energy. Hence we do not need to understand them. In the above case – the mantras have been interpreted at the low level – which is the parallel of the LTTE interpreting Vaddukoddai Resolution of Nationalism as decision to Separate.

In terms of marriage the parallel of Nationalism is sharing in others’ enjoyment through common mind. Towards this the wife would need to transcend much of her physical pleasures  to Energy level. It’s like in meditation. The Energy of such wives of the past is invoked during the religious ceremony. Also invoked are three generations of family leadership. Every night when I chant health mantras – my focus is on my need and not on what they mean. In science – and law these are presented as previous theories and case laws respectively. They represent the Energy of our predecessors.

In the case of this current pandemic – when our government gives us directions – I take it as mantras of the secular system. It is that core Energy that directs me to act further. I do not look for logic until I get stuck. I did get stuck when we tried to bring forward the booking for the AstraZeneca – only to be informed by many providers that they did not have the supply. Then within that reality we put ourselves through stricter measures.

In the case of the above young employee – the employment was cross cultural and hence the risk of unjust discrimination was very high. It is now common for young ones from that community to work as frontline service providers within the health industry. Many use agencies and hence are protected. Likewise, in Singapore also young ones work as housemaids through agencies. Many are from remote areas of Sri Lanka. They learn to protect themselves through regulated employment. More formal education did not cure the men. Why would it protect the females to protect themselves? In a nation where murders and rapists are pardoned the cultural protection weakens towards the level where they are ‘right’ as per the conscience of the nation.  Then such acts are brought within the law.