Jaffna review
Historically, Jaffna has been a contested city. It was made into a colonial port town during the Portuguese occupation of the Jaffna peninsula in 1619 who lost it to the Dutch, only to lose it to the British in 1796. And during the post-Independence civil war the rebel Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) occupied Jaffna in 1986. The Indian Peace Keeping Force (IPKF) briefly occupied the city in 1987. The LTTE again occupied the city from 1989 until 1995, when the Sri Lankan military regained control.
The majority of the city’s population are Sri Lankan Tamils with a significant number of Sri Lankan Moors, Indian Tamils and other ethnic groups present in the city prior to the civil war. Most Sri Lankan Tamils are Hindus followed by Christians, Muslims and a small Buddhist minority. The city is home to number of educational institutions established during the colonial and post-colonial period. It also has number of commercial institutions, minor industrial units, banks, hotels and other government institutions. It is home to many historical sites such as the popular Jaffna library that was burnt down and rebuilt and the Jaffna fort rebuilt during the Dutch colonial period.
Etymology
History
Pre-history
Excavations that were conducted by Sir Paul E. Pieris during 1918 and 1919 at the ancient Jaffna capital of Kandarodai and Vallipuram, a coastal town six kilometres (3.7 miles) from Point Pedro, revealed coins called "puranas", and "kohl" sticks that dated back to 2000 BCE similar in style to the sticks used to paint pictures in Egypt, suggesting that the Northern part of Sri Lanka was a "flourishing" settlement even before the birth of Prince Vijaya, the legendary founder of the Sinhalese.[7]
Early historic period
In the chronicle Mahavamsa, around sixth century B.C, there are descriptions of exotic tribes such as the Yakkhas strictly inhabiting the centre of the island, and the Nagas who worshiped snakes inhabiting the northern, western and eastern parts of the island, which was historically referred to as "Nagadipa".[8]
The 6th century CE Tamil epic Manimekalaispeaks of the prosperous Naga Nadu and Manipallavam.[9] According to Schalk, Naga Nadu was a not an independent kingdom, but a Tamil Buddhist fief[10] in the North of Sri Lanka.[10]
Medieval period
During the medieval times, the Kingdom of Aryacakravarti came into existence in the 13th Century as an ally to the Pandyan Empire in South India.[11] When the Pandyan Empire became weak due to Muslim invasions, successive Aryacakravarti rulers made the Jaffna kingdom independent and a regional power to reckon with in Sri Lanka.[12] Nallur a suburb of Jaffna served as the capital of the kingdom.
Politically, it was an expanding power in the 13th and 14th century with all regional kingdoms paying tribute to it.[12] However, it met with simultaneous confrontations with the Vijayanagar empire that ruled from Vijayanagara, southern India, and a rebounding Kotte Kingdom from the southern Sri Lanka.[13] This led to the kingdom becoming a vassal of the Vijyanagar Empire as well as briefly losing its independence under the Kotte kingdom from 1450 to 1467.[12] The kingdom was re-established with the disintegration of Kotte kingdom and the fragmentation of Viyanagara Empire.[14] It maintained very close commercial and political relationships with the Thanjavur Nayakar kingdom in southern India as well as the Kandyan and segments of the Kotte kingdom. This period saw the building of Hindu temples in the peninsula and a flourishing of literature, both in Tamil and Sanskrit.[13][15][16]
Colonial history
The Portuguese established Jaffna city in 1621 as their colonial administrative center.[17] Prior to the military capitulation to the Portuguese Empire in 1619, the capital of the local Jaffna Kingdom, also known as the Kingdom of the Aryacakravarti was Nallur,[17]which is close to the city limits of Jaffna.[18][19] The capital city was known in royal inscriptions and chronicles as Cinkainakar and in other sources as Yalpaanam in Tamil and Yapaapatuna in Sinhalese.[20]
Entrance of Jaffna Fort, which the Portuguese built, and which the Dutch renovated in 1680.
From 1590, Portuguese merchants and Catholic missionaries were active within the Jaffna kingdom. Impetus for a permanent fortified settlement happened only after 1619, when the expeditionary forces of the Portuguese Empire led by Filipe de Oliveiracaptured Cankili II, the last native king.[21] De Oliveira moved the center of political and military control from Nallur to Jaffnapatao[22](variously spelt as Jaffnapattan or Jaffnapattam), the Portuguese rendition of the native name for the former Royal capital.[23] Jaffnapatao was attacked number of times by A local rebel Migapulle Arachchiand his allied Thanjavur Nayakarexpeditionary forces attacked Jaffnapatao a number of times, but the Portuguese defence of the city withstood the attacks.[24]Jaffnapatao was a small town with a fort, a harbour, Catholic chapels, and government buildings.[25] Portuguese merchants took over the lucrative trade of elephants from the interior and monopolised the import of goods from Colombo and India, disfranchising the local merchants.[24] The Portuguese era was a time of population movement to the Vannimais in the south, religious change, and as well as the introduction to the city of European education and health care.[24][26]
Bird's eye view of the city of Jaffnapatnam in 1658 [27]
In 1658, Portuguese lost Jaffapatao to the Dutch East India Company (VOC) after a three-month siege.[20] During the Dutch occupation, the city grew in population and size. The Dutch were more tolerant towards native mercantile and religious activities than the Portuguese had been. Most of the Hindu temples that the Portuguese had destroyed were rebuilt. A community of mixed EurasianDutch Burghers. The Dutch rebuilt the fort and expanded it considerably. They also built Presbyterian churches and government buildings, most which survived until the 1980s, but suffered damage or destruction during the subsequent civil war.[28] During the Dutch period, Jaffna also became prominent as a trading town in locally grown agricultural products with the native merchants and farmers profiting as much as the VOC merchants.[29]
Great Britain took over the Dutch possessions in Sri Lanka from 1796.[30] Britain maintained many of the Dutch mercantile, religious, and taxation policies. During the British colonial period, almost all the schools that eventually played role in the high literacy achievement of the Jaffna residents were built by missionaries belonging to American Ceylon Mission, Weslyan Methodist Mission, Saivitereformer Arumuka Navalar and others.[31][32]Under British rule, Jaffna enjoyed a period of rapid growth and prosperity,[30] as the British built the major roads and railway line connecting the city with Colombo, Kandy and the rest of the country. The prosperity of the city's citizens enabled them to underwrite the building of temples and schools, and the library and museum.
Post-colonial history
After Sri Lanka became independent in 1948 from Britain, the relationship between majority Sinhalese and minority Tamils worsened. Residents of Jaffna city along with the rest of Tamil population of Sri Lanka were in the fore front of the political mobilisation behind Tamil nationalist parties. After the Tamil conference incident in 1974, the then mayor of Jaffna Alfred Duraiappah was assassinated by the leader of rebel LTTE, Velupillai Prabhakaran in 1975. Following further deterioration of political discourse, the Jaffna library was burnt down in 1981 by Police and other miscreants. Failure of the political class to find an adequate compromise led to full-scale civil war starting in 1983 soon after the Black July pogrom.[33] Sri Lankan military and police were using the Dutch era fort as their encampment which was surrounded by various Tamil militants groups. Bombardment from air and land of the city led to damage to civic and civilian properties, death and injury to civilians and destruction the economic potential of the city. In 1986, the Sri Lankan military withdrew from the city and it came under the full control of the LTTE. In 1987, the Indian forces brought to Sri Lanka under the auspicious Indo- Sri Lankan peace accord led an operation to take the city from the rebels. It led to incidents like the Jaffna university hellidrop and Jaffna hospital massacre in which patients and medical workers were killed by the Indian Army.[34] More than 200 civilians were also killed during attempt to take the city over by the IPKF.[35] After the departure of the Indians, the city came under the control LTTE once more, but were ousted in 1995 after a 50-day siege. The economic embargo of the rebel controlled territories in general also had a negative impact in Jaffna including lack of power, critical medicines and food. During the period of LTTE occupation, all Muslim residents were expelled in 1990 and forced evacuated all residents in 1995.[36]Since the end of civil war in 2009, refugees have begun to return and visible reconstruction has taken place. The Sri Lankan Tamil diaspora and business interests from Colombo has invested in commercial enterprises. Countries in Europe, US and India have shown an interest in investing in infrastructure projects and other economic activities.
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