The Tamil parties are mounting pressure on the UPA Government to take steps to resolve the ethnic conflict in Sri Lanka. On Monday, PMK founder S Ramadoss went a step further and demanded India’s intervention similar to what it did to liberate Bangladesh and in the case of Tibet.

A staunch supporter of the LTTE, Ramadoss said the creation of a separate Tamil state is inevitable and claimed that Tamil Tigers were not terrorists. He said New Delhi should exert more pressure on Colombo to announce a ceasefire and to spell out the political settlement that it did not make public for the past 50 years. “The liberation of Tamil Eelam is definitely going to happen. Tamil and Sinhalese are quite different; their race, religion, language and culture are different,” he said.

Asked how India can intervene in the internal affairs of another country, he shot back, “What about Tibet, there is a Government in exile here. What about Bangladesh? India cannot give up its responsibility by saying that it cannot intervene in the internal affairs of another country as it did intervene to help the people of East Pakistan create Bangladesh. India never bothered about the mighty China when it decided to lend a helping hand to the Dalai Lama and his supporters.”