On being the son of an activist

By P. Ramesh Kumar

How did it feel to be the son of an activist academic? Well, there are no simple answers. Today I recall with pride that my late father, Prof P. Balasubramanian, staged an (indefinite) hunger strike for the Sri Lankan Tamil cause that lasted about 10 days in April 1985.

It appeared crazy in the distant past but, over the years, I could see my own perception change into a kinder and positive one. I could see that my father, by being proactive, was different from so many other people who choose to go with the flow.

I was then working as a sub-editor with an English-language newspaper, ‘Newstime’, in Hyderabad on my first job. Sitting (working in my first job) miles away from New Delhi, I did not have daily updates on Dad’s health or the response to his fast at a time that predated mobile phones and social media. He did call me on my office landline a day before he began his hunger strike and I expressed my strong reservations about his getting entangled in a complex international political problem. In keeping with his nature, he stuck to his guns as he had already made up his mind.

From the word go, I was deeply concerned about his health and its impact on my mother. His demand was the Indian Government should pay attention to the plight of the Tamils who were bearing the brunt of the then raging ethnic conflict in Sri Lanka. I was told that hardly any of the visitors (mostly Sri Lankan and Indian Tamils) who had come over to show their solidarity actually fasted for the few hours they were in the tent. That meant Dad was genuinely fasting regardless of uncertainty about a response from the government.

What I remember mom and others telling me is Rajya Sabha Member of Parliament Vaiko (V. Gopalsamy), who had visited Dad’s tent at Boat Club earlier, and another MP, Jaipal Reddy, were among Opposition MPs who persuaded him to end his fast on Day 10, by which time there was a visible impact on his health. They promised to raise the matter in Parliament and kept their word …

In the wake of the fast, LTTE leader Velupillai Prabhakaran and three other Tamil militant leaders hosted a tea party at Ambassador Hotel, Khan Market, in honour of Dad and Mom.

As a coincidence, my annual vacation started after Dad’s hunger strike ended. The day I met him, we had an argument that ended in my packing my bags and getting ready to leave the house. My mother, who was in tears, persuaded me to stay put and avoid arguing with Dad.

Incidentally, in keeping with certain SOPs, Dad was under Intelligence Bureau surveillance for a year since then.

About a year after the 1985 hunger strike, Prof Balasubramanian distanced himself from the Sri Lankan cause following Prabhakaran’s ruthless killings of numerous non-LTTE militants and Tamil civilians on the pretext of their being “informers” in his battle for supremacy. In course of time, he arguably became the face of the Eelam cause, which in turn led to the cause losing much of the earlier sympathy across the world.

In the meantime, I learned about the history of the Sri Lankan Tamil problem by interacting with Chennai-based Jaffna Tamil Refugee Representatives such as Mr S.C. Chandrahasan, lawyer and refugee rights advocate, and Dr Vigneswaran, a Colombo University professor, at our Delhi residence during my visits from Hyderabad. Apart from my conversations with them and some literature I got from them, I got to read about the history from independent sources.

That in turn yielded my first Editorial Page article exploring Indian military intervention to stop the genocide in Sri Lanka. I was 25 when it was published in ‘Newstime’, where I was a sub-editor. Knowledge of Sri Lankan Tamil history also made me excel in my job interview with the then Hindustan Times Editor, Mr N.C. Menon, in June 1986. The topic became the highlight of the interview when the Editor compared the Jaffna Tamil issue with the Punjab problem, which was also a raging issue those days. I refuted his comparison and he heard me out with interest. I also had to clear an editing test before getting my offer letter.

Supporting Report: From the Rajya Sabha records

 Read also: I had differences with my father but he remains my role model