Chennai, Dec 1 (IANS) Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J. Jayalalithaa has charged the Centre with being hand in glove with the Sri Lankan government, and working against the interests of Indian fishermen and against the Tamil minority in the island nation.
Expressing her dismay at reports of the Indian Navy’s offer to train Sri Lankan naval officers, offering them the four-year Bachelor of Technology course, Jayalalithaa said: “It is learnt that this announcement followed a meeting between the Chief of Naval Staff and Mahinda Rajapaksa, president of Sri Lanka. This has come as a great shock to the people of Tamil Nadu.”
In a letter to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh sent Saturday, the text of which was released to the media Sunday, she added: “The commitment made by the government of India is tantamount to actively working with the Sri Lankan regime and providing them with the necessary wherewithal to act even more strongly, not only against the Tamil minority in Sri Lanka, but also against the poor Indian fishermen who regularly bear the brunt of the brutal attacks of the Sri Lankan Navy.”
Jayalalithaa said the entire fishermen community in Tamil Nadu was agitated over the indiscriminate abduction of Indian fishermen on high seas.
She added that the Tamil Nadu assembly in March this year had urged the central government to stop terming Sri Lanka a friendly nation.