The third edition of Kerala Literature Festival on its third day witnessed a talk on the phenomenal subject ‘Sinhala Tamil War.
Famous Srilankan poet Cheran Rudramoorthy and Tamil poet /short story writer Perumal Murugan engaged the session with their views. T D Ramakrishnan moderated the session.
The resistance put by the present political friends on the literary world and the condition of ‘Ezham’ a novel by Cheran was the debut question for which Cheran replied ‘I resist I exist’. Though being a Srilankan he was forced to live in exile. The changes came with the language in 1986 Srilankan language ‘Sinhala’ were the only official language of the country. This totally closed the ownership of Tamil speaking people. The state itself has become a racist authoritarian state. Tamil speaking people were oppressed and alienated, hence led to the rise of still being militarize authoritarian state”.
Perumal Murugan said, he supported that we have this “limited freedom of speech”. The 90’s biggest problem is that every word written, every word said need to be thought about twice. The freedom of free thinking exactly from one’s mind can lead to a controversial issue. He had debated about ‘Internal censorship where writers are forced to change the style of their writing.
The discussion was entertaining and active response from the gathering made this session a great success.