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| INTRODUCTION |
Karthigesu Indrapala, a Sri Lankan Tamil, had his early education in Jaffna and later joined the academic staff of the University of Ceylon, Peradeniya, in the late fifties after obtaining a Honours Degree in History from the same University. In 1965 he was awarded the Ph D by the University of London, for his research on "Dravidian Settlements in Ceylon and the beginnings of the Jaffna Kingdom", which he did at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS). The choice and approval of this subject was based on the fact that no reliable research had been done on the Dravidian/South Indian migrations to Sri Lanka before the tenth century.
Non-academic Tamil historians such as C Rasanayagam, C S Navaratnam and Fr Gnanapragasar who has written on the Jaffna Kingdom, which emerged in the twelfth century had made unhistorical assumptions of the period before that date based on the early legendary and mythical sections of the Tamil YalpanaVaipava Malai, which traces the origins of the Tamils in Sri Lanka. On the basis of these writings Tamils believe that we were in occupation of the Jaffna peninsula before the time of Vijaya, the legendary first Sinhalese king of Anuradhapura.
Karthigesu Indrapala's thesis, which was supervised by Dr. J G de Casparis, Reader in History of South and South East Asia, has conclusively contradicted on the basis of historical evidence the commonly held views regarding the origins of the Tamils (in SL), and provided an accurate picture of the Dravidian settlements during the Anuradhapura kingdom till the tenth century.
His research reveals that up to that date Dravidian settlements were few and scattered and concentrated mainly at the ports. The Jaffna peninsula and the Eastern littoral were occupied by the Sinhalese as proved by numerous remains of Buddhist Viharas and original (now Tamilised) Sinhala place names in the Jaffna peninsula. The Dravidian settlers, as mentioned in his thesis, were not only Tamil but perhaps mostly Malabars from Kerala whose presence is largely ignored. These early settlers were mainly traders and sometimes mercenary soldiers who continued to remain in the country. The kings at a different level maintained contact with royal families in South India through marriage and as belonging to a common Kshatriya royal class. There were occasional invasions from South India due to rivalry among royal families. But these did not have any impact on the Anuradhapura Kingdom which including the Jaffna peninsula remained a Sinhala Buddhist country. The imperial ambitions of the Cola kings of the tenth century led to the invasion and occupation of the Anuradhapura Kingdom from 993-1070 AD which was then defeated and the kingdom was then reorganized from Polonnaruwa. But this period of occupation led to increased numbers of settlers from South India.
But this total and political structure remained unchanged, according to the findings in this thesis, and the Jaffna peninsula was retained as a part of this kingdom. However, the invasion of Margha in 1215 AD marks the end of the Anuradhapura/Polonnaruwa kingdom and the destruction of viharas and monasteries and royal places. The Jaffna Kingdom emerged from this date. Dravidian settlements during the eleventh and twelfth centuries took a different character and after Margha's invasion considerable migration took place particularly to the Jaffna peninsula and sometimes these took the form of organised colonization from Tamil Nadu.
Two points dealt with in the thesis need to be mentioned. First, not sufficient attention has been given to the fact that a large number of the settlers up to the tenth century were Malabars and they were more numerous that the Tamils due to Kerala being the trade route between West and East. Tamil settlers would have increased in number after the tenth century and Jaffna became the centre for tamil migration after the establishement of the Jaffna Kingdom in the thirteenth century.
Second, Malabar presence continued in the Puttlam area and in Batticoloa and Eastern littoral even up to the present day. One significance between the Tamils and the Malabars is the partrilineal and martrilineal social structures. In Jaffna the difference has been eliminated by the Sawalami law which has been established there. It does not have legal validity in Puttlam and Batticaloa areas where the tamils (Malabars) consider themselves distinct from Tamils of Jaffna.
On his return to Sri Lanka Indrapala was appointed
to the academic staff of the History Department of the Jaffna campus. When the
substance of his thesis regarding early Dravidian settlements came to be known
from his lectures, talks and articles, he became very unpopular with the Tamil
extremists and non-academic Tamil historians. It is probably for this reason
that he left the University and migrated to Australia, and it is also why this
valuable thesis remains unpublished.