The Prabhakaran Saga: The Rise and Fall of

an Eelam Warrior 2012th Edition

By S. Murali

This is the story of the man who defined the armed struggle for an independent Eelam for over three
decades and who lived by the gun and died by the gun–Velupillai Prabhakaran. The book is a first-person
account by the author based on his innumerable visits to Sri Lanka during its turbulent years. He looks at
the Prabhakaran era, a critical phase in the country's history, objectively, without being judgmental.
Editorial Reviews

Review
<p style="text-align: justify;">[The book] offers an easy narration of the complex history of the rise and
fall of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, through the multiple axles of politics and violence in Sri
Lanka, India and the Sri Lankan Territories occupied by the Tamil Tigers. The Chronological account of the
ethnic conflict in Sri Lanka is the core of the book. The unfolding of events is presented with
comprehensive details so that even a novice in the subject can become quite well versed in the same.

--The Financial Express, 12 August 2012

<p style="text-align: justify;">The chronological coverage of melange of conspiracies and assassinations,

politics and perfidy, and the tragedy of mindless violence enables the reader to understand the
complexities of war and its root causes. Written in journalistic style, factual account has all the
ingredients of a fictional one...the book is full of interesting first-hand-anecdotes and vignettes of
backroom political machinations that went on in Sri Lanka, India and elsewhere...the book also covers
critical developments in Sri Lanka to broaden the understanding of the issue. The author s observation
on events as they unfolded before him make the book useful for students of contemporary history...the
book, besides outlining the history of Lanka s Tamil problem, provided a few lessons on how to handle
insurgencies and their aftermath. A good buy.

--The Pioneer, 15 July 2012

About the Author

S. Murari started his career with The Indian Express and, after a 17-year stint in the paper,
served as the deputy news editor in the Chennai and Bangalore editions. He joined the Deccan
Herald in 1984 as special correspondent in Chennai covering Tamil Nadu. Over the next two
decades, he made innumerable visits to Sri Lanka and interacted with both Sinhalese and Tamil
leaders. He covered the ethnic conflict, the first round of peace talks between the LTTE and the
Sri Lankan government, in Thailand, and covered all the elections from 1987 to 2010, including
the last presidential election. During his stint at the Deccan Herald, he also covered several
international events, including two SAARC summits, the Mumbai blasts of 1983 and has also
visited Kashmir in 1994 at the height of the militancy to interview JKLF leader Yasin Malik. He
retired in 2009 as the associate editor of Deccan Herald.

Product Details
 Paperback: 392 pages
 Publisher: SAGE Publications Pvt. Ltd; 2012 edition (June 5, 2012)
 Language: English
 ISBN-10: 8132107012
 ISBN-13: 978-8132107019
  Product Dimensions: 5.4 x 0.9 x 8.4 inches

Top Customer Reviews

4.0 out of 5 starsStory of the unresolved saga of Sri Lankan Tamils

By Raghu Nathan on February 6, 2013

Format: Paperback
Whenever an ethnic struggle erupts on the issue of self-determination of
nationalities within a nation state, I often found I did not really know the complex
details of the history of that problem or the melange of various players in the
struggle and their often conflicting goals. The ethnic struggle of the Tamils in Sri
Lanka is one such. Though I am an Indian Tamil, I felt the need to educate myself
much more than the line that political democracy encouraged Sinhalese
chauvinism and tried to subjugate the Tamil minority aspirations through Sinhalese
majoritarian arrogance. Murari's book, therefore, is a much-needed welcome
addition to throw some more light on this subject.

The book shows how the democratic struggle of the Tamils in the 1960s morphed
into militant extremism from the 1970s and eventually took a developing Sri Lanka
down into the abyss of violence for nearly 30 years. It is a chronicle of the
conspiracies of the Sinhalese politicians who seem to have often put their political
games above the interest of their nation, of the perfidy of the LTTE in engaging in
talks only to regroup later to carry out high-profile assassinations of both Sinhalese
leaders as well as Tamil rivals and wage war, of India getting caught in the middle
without much leverage over either warring group and above all, mind-numbing
violence by both Tamil militants and the Sinhalese army. The author has spent 22
years covering the conflict from 1987, when the Indo-Sri lanka accord was signed,
till 2009, when the LTTE was finally vanquished militarily by the Sri Lankan army.
Though an Indian Tamil himself, he has brought a dispassionate look at all the
events and players and provided an account which rings authentic. He is not in awe
of the LTTE and has given praise where it is due and criticized where criticism is
due. The same goes for his treatment of Sinhala politics and politicians. As the
book's dedication says upfront, it is written in honor of the thousands of innocent
civilians of Tamil, Sinhala and Muslim roigin, who have so far died in the still-
unresolved conflict.

The author starts by giving a fair account of the three years that IPKF (Indian
Peace Keeping Force) remained in northern and eastern SL. He goes on to say that
there were two opportunities between 1987 and 2003 for the Tamils to get much of
what they fought for. The first one was when the peace accord was signed with
India in 1987. The second was during Chandrika Kumaratunga's reign, when
substantial devolution of powers were on the table. But LTTE was interested only
in a separate homeland and not in a solution within an united SL. It is also sad to
see a Sorbonne-educated liberal like Chandrika gradually slipping down to less and
less democratic means of actions as the crisis in Sri Lanka became more and more
intractable.

According to the author, Prabhakaran, the LTTE chief, made two monumental
blunders. The first one was to assassinate Rajiv Gandhi in 1991, thereby losing the
goodwill and support of India as well as Tamilnadu's Tamils forever. The second
one was to underestimate his own vulnerability in going to war against the SL
army in 2006, especially after his own senior leaders like Karuna had defected to
the govt. Like all [all??? Was Hitler, Mussolini waiting for India to come and
save them???] fascist leaders, Prabhakaran was deluded till the end that India
will be forced to come to his aid because of pressure from Indian Tamils. Little
did he realize that Indian Tamils had moved on ever since he killed Rajiv.
Regarding the SL army, he gives credit when they tried to protect civilians and
hammers them when they behaved like a fascist force, be it in the way they dealt
with JVP, the Sinhalese's own armed movement in the south or towards Tamil
civilian populations in the north as well as eastern Sri Lanka.

Murari seems to have had a warm friendship with Anton Balasingham, the
ideological confidant of Prabhakaran. He believes that Balasingham was likely not
to have been 'in the know' about LTTE's plot to assassinate Rajiv Gandhi. Had it
been so, then 'Bala' would have tried hard to dissuade Prabhakaran from killing
Rajiv, according to him. Murari also says that Bala was mostly supportive of the
Rajiv-JRJ accord for a peaceful solution to the Tamil aspirations and believed that
it was a good starting point for the Tamils to gradually get control of their destiny
within a united Sri Lanka.

The final chapters deal with the decimation of the LTTE militarily and otherwise.
What is sad for me to read is that the 'top guns' of LTTE were prepared to surrender
in the end and save their own lives and that of their families, contrary to what the
Tamil politicians in India would have us believe. It is shameful that they sent so
many thousands of young Tamils to death through suicide bombing, war and
cyanide poison in the cause of an independent homeland. But when it came to their
own lives, they were prepared to save it at any cost, even surrender. It is another
story that the Sri Lankan govt didn't respond to the offer. The other important thing
that the author says is that Prabhakaran's body has still not been found, contrary to
propaganda otherwise. But he believes that he was killed on May 17, 2009 during
the assault on Mullivaikkal, where the top brass of LTTE was holed up in a small
area of a few sq.kms. The human rights abuses during the final stages of the war
resulted in 40000 Tamil civilians being killed with both the Sri Lankan army and
LTTE committing gory atrocities against them. This is the tragedy of every armed
liberation movement. When the chips are really down, they remain fundamentally
fascist and fight NOT for 'their people' but for their own survival.

I felt rewarded reading the book and found it very educational. It is a pleasure to
see such competent and quality journalism in India.