Protest in Batticaloa demanding the removal of Sinhala settler cultivators
Protesters marched in the eastern town of Batticaloa demanding the immediate enforcement of a court ruling ordering the removal of all those engaged in farming activities in an illegally occupied grazing land.
On 1 April – which marked the 200th day of the indefinite protest launched by dairy farmers in Mailaththamadu, Mathavanai, demanding solutions to their issue – a group including the farmers staged a protest, according to local journalists.
In addition to the dairy farmers who are engaged in the ongoing protest, religious leaders, civil society activists, and also the residents of the area have expressed support to the protest.
The protesters, who marched from the Siththandi Vinayagar Kovil to the Siththandi School in Batticaloa, used slogans such as “enforce the court order,” “Mailaththamadu, Mathavanai are our resources,” “we want justice,” “do not kill dairy cattle.”
Regional reporters further said that the Batticaloa High Court has, on 8 November 2022, ordered the police, Mahaweli Development Authority, and the Forest Conservation Department to remove all settler cultivators in the illegally occupied land in Mailaththamadu, Mathavanai.
On 15 September 2023, Tamil dairy farmers launched the indefinite protest in front of the Siththandi School in Batticaloa following the Batticaloa District Secretary Kalamathy Pathmaraja claiming that she is unable to provide solutions to the said issue. She had made this statement during a farmers’ committee meeting held at the Batticaloa District Secretariat on 13 September 2023.
The dairy farmers point out that Sinhala farmers who initially occupied 2,500 acres of land for farming activities, had seized more land since the protest.
Viyath Maga activist Anuradha Yahampath, who had been appointed as Eastern Province Governor by former President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, has handed over the grazing land in Mailaththamadu, Mathavanai in Batticaloa to 150 recently settled Sinhala families in order to farm cash crops including corn. This had led to several clashes between traditional Tamil dairy farmers and Sinhala settler cultivators in the recent past.
Since then, the Tamil dairy farmers have been increasingly losing their livelihood.
President of Mailaththamadu, Mathavanai Dairy Farmers’ Association Seenithambi Nimalan alleges that within the 200-day period of the protest, more than 1,000 dairy cows have died due to the lack of food caused by Sinhala farmers’ use of herbicides in the said land and the burning of grass, and that more than 750 more have been killed by shooting, jaw bombs and electrocution.
They further claimed that 300 persons belonging to 160 Sinhala families are forcibly living in the said grazing land.
Court orders
On 13 November 2023, the Eravur Circuit Magistrate’s Court ordered 13 Sinhala individuals, who were engaged in farming activities in the land, to vacate the land.
Magistrate Anwar Sadath announced the verdict in a case filed on 22 September 2023 by the Mahaweli Development Authority with regard to a group of outsiders who have forcibly occupied the land owned by the Authority.
The Sinhala farmers failed to produce any document issued by any government authority to prove their ownership.
Regional reporters, however, note that despite the court order, the Sinhala farmers have not vacated the land.
Last year, member of parliament M.A. Sumanthiran had said that a case filed in the court of appeal seeking a remedy to the issues faced by dairy farmers was concluded in 2021 following an assurance the Mahaweli Development Authority. Nevertheless, that promise has not been fulfilled.
who joined
Following a meeting with the President at the Presidential Secretariat on 15 October 2023 to discuss the matter, Tamil Eelam Liberation Organisation (TELO) Secretary and Member of Parliament Govindan Karunakaram, told the media that President Ranil Wickremesinghe had instructed the Police and the Mahaweli Development Authority to seek judicial assistance to remove the farmers who are engaged in farming activities in forcibly occupied lands belonging to dairy farmers.
Although it is unclear whether a case being filed, when dairy farmers staged a protest demanding solutions to their issues during the President’s visit to the Eastern province, they were subject to police violence.
