Fonseka arrest and the Govigama-Karawe caste equation in Sinhala society

by Lakruwan de Silva

I read with concern reports of the arrest of General Sarath Fonseka. As a Sinhala Buddhist, I had voted for Mahinda Rajapakse at the last presidential polls. Mahinda had after all done a commendable job at synchronizing the foreign policy, the military policy, the India policy and the domestic policy to ensure a complete route of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, something no president before him had accomplished.

I was also taken aback by Fonseka's war crime allegations against Gothabaya Rajapakse, the brother to the President and respected Secretary, Ministry of Defence. I viewed that as high treason, a betrayal of the Sinhala Buddhist cause where the Sinhalese had until the Rajapakse administration been isolated, marginalized and without friends in the international arena. We were the Serbs of Asia, misunderstood abroad and sidelined. Our victimhood at the hands of terrorism was never acknowledged overseas just as the Serb victimhood at the hands of a western conspiracy to fragement Yugoslavia was never conceded. Fonseka had done us a great disservice.

I was happy therefore that Mahinda had won the polls with a resounding victory. This said, the subsequent turn of events that included the harassment of the Fonseka family, the purge of military officials, including senior generals, and now the arrest of the erstwhile general himself on the eve of the dissolution of parliament saddens me. The grand war time alliance of Sinhala Buddhist interests appears to have unravelled. I attribute the bad blood between the Rajapakse and Fonseka camps to vendetta and revenge. This is largely a personal feud born of a sense of betrayal. However, I wonder whether the legacy of caste has had a tangential role in the matter after all. Rajapakse is the scion of an old southern Govigama family while Fonseka was a Karave general also from the south.

Let us explore the issue in some detail. Professor K.M. de Silva in his "History of Sri Lanka", refers to the migration of the Karawe, Salagama and Durawe castes from southern India to Sri Lanka between the 14th and 17th centuries AD. The Karawe, a maritime caste, appear to have had a disproportionate influence in the Sinhala military in medieval times. M.D. Raghavan's publication, "The Karave of Ceylon: Society and Culture" illustrates the cultural history in some depth. Michael Roberts also documents Karawe elite formation in his seminal publication "Caste Conflict and Elite Formation, the Rise of the Karave elite in Sri Lanka: 1500-1931".

Traditional Karawe surnames in the Sinhala language illustrate this military history. Patabendige means the local headman. Hewage translates as soldier.Hennedige means militiaman. Tantrige translates as the strategy expert. Vidanage means civil administrator.

Karave folklore describes the community as Kuru-kula i.e. the descendents of the famed Kuru or Kaurava dynasty in the classical Indian epic, the Mahabharata. The Buddha preached the Satipattana sutta, one of his two foremost sermons, the other being the Dhamma chakka pavatana sutta, to the people of Kuru when he visited that old Indian kingdom in the 5th century BC.

The Mukkara Hatana, an old palm manuscript currently in the British musuem, derives the name Kuru-kula from Kuru-mandala which was later anglicized to the Coromandel on the South Indian coast. Once again, the etymological links with the Kuru tradition of the Mahabharata are evident. The 17th century Sinhala chronicle, the Rajavaliya refers to the settlement of the Karava people in Kuru-rata which is today identified with the land between Kurunegala, Chilaw and Negombo. There is a persistent tradition that links the Karave with the Kuru of the Mahabharata. The Ceylon Tamil maritime castes share this Kuru-kulataar tradition.

Caste divisions are not unknown in Sinhala Buddhist history. The Govigama-Karave competition intermittently resurfaces in our history. The Govigama are the farmer caste akin to the Tamil Vellalar. The Govigama are perhaps 50% of the Sinhala population while the Karave are likely 10%. The Govigama unfairly dismiss the Karave as a fishing caste.

King Vijayabahu in the 11th century denied access to the so-called lower castes to venerate the Buddha's footprint at the summit of Sri Pada or Adam's Peak. These castes were confined to a lower terrace further down. This led to an immediate counter when a 12th century rock inscription of King Nissanka Malla warned that the Govigama caste could never aspire to high office. The 13th century Sinhala literary work, the Pujavaliya went on to assert that a Buddha would never be born in the Govigama caste.

The Govigama reaction was swift. Kandyan Buddhist civil law as later documented in the Niti Nighanduwa, placed the Govigama at the top of an elaborately ordered caste hierarchy. The Kandyan Buddhist clergy - the Siam Nikaya - denied entry into the Buddhist monkhood to the non-Govigama. They excluded the Karave. This led wealthy Karave merchants in the maritime districts to finance the journey of Ambagahapitiya Gnanawimala Thera to Amarapura in Burma for the ordination into the Buddhist monkhood in 1800 AD. While the newly founded Amarapura nikaya had 21 sub-sects defined on caste lines (i.e. Karave, Salagama and Durave), it nonetheless offered a rare opportunity for the Karave to join the Buddhist religious order. Other Karave abandoned Buddhism altogether and converted to Roman Catholicism to seek caste emancipation. 50% of the Karave caste might well be Christian today. At present, Karave Christian youth have the best education outcomes in Sinhala society.

Many of us were thankful that these caste divisions in Sinhala Buddhist society had ebbed. However, recent events indicate that this may not entirely be so. In the late 1800s, Charles Henry de Soysa, the foremost Karave philantrophist, had hosted a banquet to the Duke of Edinburgh in Colombo, an event boycotted by the Govigama political elite led by Solomon Bandaranaike. Dr. Marcus Fernando, a Karave leader of no mean accomplishment, ran for the Educated Ceylonese seat at the 1911 elections. The Govigama elite, led by the Senanayakes, successfully defeated him and ensured the victory of Sir Ponnambalam Ramanathan, a Tamil candidate, instead. The Govigama preferred Tamil leadership to that of the Karave Sinhalese. That was treachery on the part of the Govigama.

We now witness a situation where Rajapakse has literally crushed Fonseka. Let us not forget that all Sri Lankan heads of state, with just one exception, have been Govigama. Non-Govigama representation in Sri Lanka's legislature has declined since independence. And all three revolts against the post-independence Sri Lankan state were led by the Sinhala Karave or Tamil Karaiyar.

The feud between the President and the erstwhile General, while personal in nature, has now developed caste over tones. The President's camp was uncertain of victory in the run-up to the polls. Reports suggest that it deftly and subtly played the caste card within the military to deny Fonseka the military vote. The President succeeded. In the ensuing post-poll purge of the military, the Karave have disproportionately been targeted. Other Karave generals have been sacked from the armed forces. Karave Buddhist monks had been arrested. Much to my chagrin, caste may still be alive in Sinhala Buddhist society, albeit as an undercurrent.

The best the President can do to help heal the wounds, is to allow General Fonseka a quiet uncelebrated exile overseas. General Sarath Fonseka, despite what some consider to be his betrayal, is Sri Lanka's first four star general. He had won one of Sri Lanka's highest awards of military heroism - the 'Rana Wickrama Padakkama'. India's national security advisor had described Fonseka as the best army commander in the world. Its time he is set free. Let us close this unfortunate chapter in the run-up to the upcoming legislative polls in the interests of the hard won Sinhala unity.
- Transcurrents.com