Lest We Forget

Lest we forget – Massacres of Tamils 1956 ­2002
Parliament, Sarath Muthugama, spoke about this massacre in the parliament. All
those efforts were of no avail. There is no justice here. No compensation was paid
either to members of the family of the victims or to us who were raped by the
soldiers.”
38. Vayaloor massacre ­ 24.08.1985
Vayaloor is situated in the
Amparai district. Valayoor,
Sagamam was a colony of the
landless poor who were settled in
1972 under the government’s plan
to give “the highest priority to the
development of land for the
production of food and other
crops”. To reach Vayaloor, one has
to travel eight miles on foot as
there is only a jungle path leading
to the village. There were 200 families living in the village and they had no access
to clean drinking water, no shops and the nearest government dispensary was 10
miles away. Yet they continued to stay and cultivate crops like maize, kurakkan,
manioc, yams and other vegetables, depending on rainwater. Traders from distant
places went there in bullock carts to collect agricultural produce from the chenas.
The people built their homes with poles and mud, thatched them with either coconut
cadjan, or grass.
After the attack, which occurred during a ceasefire period, the settlement was
deserted and now the land has been taken over by the jungle. When people left
Valayoor, they did not carry any of their belongings. They fled with what they were
wearing. They had lost all their possessions including animals, crops and savings.
The attack on the people at Vayaloor started in the early hours on the 24th August
1985. S.Vijeya widowed by the Vayaloor attack, is a mother of five. She says,
“It was about 6 o’clock in the early house of the day: I was at the hearth trying to
light the fire to prepare the tea. All of a sudden I noticed that there were a number
of men in army fatigues carrying guns standing around our hut. I was terrified –
much afraid of the visitors. I began to tremble.
The soldiers found that I had seen them and observing my nervousness, approached
me with a volley of questions, (in Sinhala), which I did not understand. Just then my
husband walked in and the soldiers spoke to him and through friendly gestures and
show of hands asked him to join them with the bucket we use for drawing water
from the well. My husband was asked to follow them and I joined them too. The
soldiers rounded all the males above 18 years from the huts but allowed the aged,
the sick and the weak to remain. They took all the able bodied youths with them.
Even woman were taken along. We walked through the jungle path towards the
East.
Report by NESOHR,
Information Collected by SNE
32