September 2025 - Jaffna Monitor

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Translated from the original Tamil short story ticaikaḷ (திசைகள்) from his 1992 collection of short stories by S.L.M. Hanifa. The original collection is available at noolaham.org. If you have any questions, please contact ez.iniyavan@gmail.com. Co-translators: eḻuttukkiṉiyavaṉ and Fasmila Raviraj. Māntarāṟu river rampaged with full ferocity, like a stampede of elephants in musth. Manikkam’s eyes were fixated on the treacherous maelstroms appearing here and there on the river’s surface, only to

Story September 2025

Eḻuttukkiṉiyavaṉ

Sep 17, 2025 — 6 min read

JVP Still Denies the Tamil Ethnic Question: Sharika Thiranagama Speaks to Jaffna Monitor

Photos by A. Priyakumar It feels like yesterday. As a student, I remember flipping through Amuthu, a Tamil-language magazine published by Lake House. One day, I came across an article about Dr. Rajani Thiranagama—her brilliant career, and how she was cowardly and mercilessly assassinated. More than the tragedy of that brave woman, what seared itself into me was the image of her two young daughters standing beside their mother. Even as a boy, I felt a deep and overwhelming compassion for them. T

Interview September 2025

Kaniyan Pungundran

Sep 16, 2025 — 28 min read

Neelan Unsilenced : The Life and Death of a Pluralist in a Divided Sri Lanka

“The way for emancipation is to renounce language pride, national pride, religious pride, and caste pride.” – Periyar. Neelan Tiruchelvam – Unsilenced Directed by peace activist and filmmaker Pitasanna Shanmugathas, Unsilenced revisits the life and assassination of one of Sri Lanka’s most courageous liberal thinkers. The documentary traces Neelan’s relentless commitment to pluralism, constitutional reform, and democratic values at a time when both state repression and militant authoritariani

Article September 2025

Chinniah Rajeshkumar (Ragavan)

Sep 16, 2025 — 11 min read

Dreaming to Fly in the Wrong Land, with the Wrong Ethnicity: An Exclusive Interview with Deluxion Mohan

Imagine a prodigy: blessed with immense talent, relentless hard work, and unshakable grit. He sets out to build an aircraft—perhaps the first of its kind in the country. Not with imported technology or expensive gadgets, but using only the raw materials at hand. Motorbike engines, makeshift components, and pure ingenuity. Against all odds, he was on the verge of success. In most countries, such brilliance would have been celebrated. He would have been hailed, encouraged, and supported. The gove

Interview September 2025

Our Special Correspondent

Sep 16, 2025 — 16 min read

When the Rajiv Gandhi Assassination Case Almost Pulled Me In

May 21, 1991, was one of the busiest and most sensation-filled days in my journalistic career. That night, former Indian prime minister Rajiv Gandhi died a horrific death when a suicide bomber blew him up at an election rally near Chennai. The news excitement dragged on for days as Indian investigators began to piece together the numerous fragments of the jigsaw puzzle to get to the bottom of who had ordered the high-profile assassination of a member of the Gandhi-Nehru family. I was in the AF

Guest Column September 2025

M.R. Narayan Swamy

Sep 16, 2025 — 5 min read

Ranil on Nepal: Buddha’s Teachings Abroad, Forgotten at Home

Sri Lanka’s former President Ranil Wickremesinghe issued a strongly worded statement this week on the unfolding crisis in Nepal. He condemned the police shootings in Kathmandu, the killing of the former Prime Minister’s wife, and the burning of Parliament and court buildings by Gen-Z protestors. He also warned of the role of American-owned social media platforms like Google and Facebook in destabilizing governments. Most strikingly, Wickremesinghe ended his statement by invoking the Buddha: “N

Opinion September 2025

K.S. Lakshmi

Sep 16, 2025 — 2 min read

Blood, Spice, and St George’s Cross

There’s a smell to fear when it stalks a neighbourhood. It isn’t always gunpowder or petrol bombs. Sometimes it’s vinegar-soaked chips from the corner chippy, gone cold in a greasy paper bag carried by men who march with the St George’s Cross. A flag that, to some, means football and cheap lager; to others, a symbol that says: you don’t belong here. The red cross on white cloth has always carried more than patriotic cheer. Its origins lie in the Crusades of the twelfth century, when European ar

Opinion September 2025

Che Ran

Sep 16, 2025 — 4 min read

No Divides in Our DNA: Dr. Maanasa Raghavan on Sri Lanka’s Shared Ancestry

A recent study on Sri Lankan populations, published in Current Biology (June 2025), goes beyond science: it challenges long-held assumptions about population origins and rewrites our understanding of Sri Lankan genetic history. Dr. Maanasa Raghavan led this research alongside Dr. Niraj Rai of the Birbal Sahni Institute of Paleosciences and Dr. Ruwandi Ranasinghe of the University of Colombo. Dr. Maanasa Raghavan is the Neubauer Family Assistant Professor of Human Genetics at the University of C

Interview September 2025

Our Reporter

Sep 16, 2025 — 11 min read