The JVP Leader, who is also the leader of NPP, Mr Anura Kumara Dissanayake, made a highly controversial statement during one of his political meetings held on 26th February 2024.
The front-runner candidate for Sri Lanka’s presidency recently met India’s Minister of External Affairs, Mr S. Jaishankar, in New Delhi during what he claims to be an official visit made on the invitation by the Indian Government.
The Marxist-Leninist JVP leader was seen for the first time wearing a European-style suit with a red tie for this meeting.
The historically anti-Indian JVP’s visit to India caused much debate and satire among the Sri Lankan society.
JVP’s infamous 88-89 terrorist attack against the Government of Sri Lanka started as a resistance against the Indian military intervention in 1987.
JVP’s armed rebellion took some 60,000 lives during one of the world’s worst human rights violations, which had gone unresolved to date.
“Indian Expansionism” has been one of the five tenets against which the JVP ideology has been propagated, mainly among the uneducated youth in Sri Lanka.
Therefore, this sudden 180-degree shift of policy was seen as a shameless betrayal of principles, especially by the hardcore JVP members who took part in the 88-89 atrocities.
Perhaps it is their internal pressure which made the JVP leader cleverly degrade the meeting with Jaishankar by comparing it to a “dog race”.
In his speech, Mr Dissanayake tells a story when the former Prime Minister of Sri Lanka, Mr S. W .R. D. Bandaranaike, wore a European-style suit to watch a “dog race”. And when asked why he wore a suit, Bandaranaike had replied, “To a dog race, one must wear a dog suit.” said the JVP leader. Did he make that comparison to say that he too, wore the same suit because he considered the meeting with Indians a “dog race”?
One wonders what desperation caused Mr Jaishankar to officially meet with members of a terrorist group that killed Indian soldiers on foreign soil. The JVP rebels made planned attacks on the Indian army, not much different from the Pakistani terrorist attacks.
Did Mr Jaishankar, who frequently speaks against Pakistani terrorism, forget their bloody history with Sri Lanka’s JVP?
The JVP played a key role in the 2022 violent uprisings in Sri Lanka, where hundreds of houses were looted and burned, thousands of innocent civilians attacked, and a member of parliament brutally murdered in broad daylight.
One wonders if the Indian opposition too, has forgotten this history because we did not hear a word from them against India’s top diplomat entertaining a terrorist group that had killed Indian soldiers.
It seems that historical amnesia is well-shared between the people of India and Sri Lanka. India seems to be making serious errors in their foreign relations in the Indian Ocean.
First, they failed to control the 2022 regime change in Sri Lanka, and then they lost to the Chinese in Maldives. Perhaps it was this desperation which made the Modi Team entertain JVP, which called the Indian army the “Monkey Army”, a derogatory reference to the Hindu God, Hanuman.
Nevertheless, the JVP leader’s attempt to dodge the internal resistance against their newfound Indian relationship and the public humiliation of wearing the European-style suit for the first time is rather clever.
He not only downplayed his unfitting attire but also reduced his meeting with Mr Jaishankar to a dog race.
It is no surprise to us that Mr Jaishankar was treated by the JVP so caninely.
Let us remind Mr Jaishankar of the old adage, “sleep with dogs, wake up with fleas.” May The Dharma Guide Your Way!
Eranda Ginige
(The writer is a social entrepreneur and former presidential advisor. He can be reached at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.)
