There are few real heroes in a Greek tragedy. They are usually brutal men who rape and enslave women and murder small children in war. The Sri Lankan tragedy is worthy of Aeschylus, who wrote the trilogy Oresteia on the Trojan War. The murder of 12-year-old Balachandran Prabhakaran by Sri Lankan soldiers has a numbing resemblance to the end of Astyanax, son of prince Hector.
After the Trojan war, defeated men were put to the sword and women were taken as slaves or concubines. Children were thrown off the cliffs. After Achilles kills Hector and Troy is conquered, his son Neoptolemus orders Astyanax to be flung into the abyss, to prevent Hector’s son from seeking vengeance. Hector’s widow Andromache utters the immortal lines, moments before Astyanax’s death. “Your head is a garden where I plant my kisses”. When Balachandran’s mother Mathivathani stood at the precipice of premonition during the Sri Lankan army’s advance, did she know her prayers wouldn’t prevent her son’s body from becoming a garden for murderers?
Velupillai Prabhakaran was a visionary but a ruthless leader, who sent hundreds to their deaths, including innocent civilians. To most Tamils, he is a demi god, who fought to create a new nation. To the rest of the world, he was a terrorist. Just like in Afghanistan, Iraq and Kashmir, one man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter. But Balachandran Prabakaran was no terrorist. He was not even like one of those Ugandan child soldiers. He was a little boy seen in photographs cutting a birthday cake, watched over proudly by beaming parents. He was a small kid posing with his sister Duwaraha and flanked by his parents. The Sri Lankan Army wiped out Prabhakaran’s entire family: Madhivadhani, Dhuwaraha, Balachandran and Charles Antony were all shot dead. The Sri Lankan government said, “On the battlefront one cannot blame soldiers.” But Balachandran, his mother and sister, did not fall in battle. They were murdered.
Murder will out. The ekkyklêma in Greek tragedy is a concealed mobile platform rolled out from behind a screen to display the aftermath of a savage murder that went un-witnessed by the audience. The intent is to portray the horror and brutality of the act; in Aeschylus’ Agamemnon, the king’s mutilated corpse is wheeled out on an ekkyklêma. The Channel 4 documentary, titled Sri Lanka’s Killing Fields is Balachandran’s ekkyklêma. Callum Macrae, who made the film, describes the scene where the boy was found, “A 12-year-old boy lies on the ground. He is stripped to the waist and has five neat bullet holes in his chest. He has been executed in cold blood. Beside him lie the bodies of five men, believed to be his bodyguards… further evidence suggesting the Sri Lankan government forces had a systematic policy of executing many surrendering or captured LTTE fighters and leading figures, even if they were children.”
We do not live in Agamemnon’s times, where children are thrown off cliffs. We have the Geneva Convention. We have the International Court of Justice. UN resolutions alone are not enough. India has to rise above both Tamil politics and Indian Ocean geopolitics and seek justice for a murdered child. And the murders of his sister and mother. India should pressure the Sri Lankan government to reveal the identity of the killers in uniform and put them on trial, like America has put on trial Staff Sgt Robert Bales who went on a shooting spree in Afghanistan, killing men, women and children.
The ghosts of millions of children who have perished in thousands of wars haunt history. By bringing closure to Balachandran’s death, India may help heal more than just fissures in coalition politics.
ravi@newindianexpress.com