Congress president Ms Sonia Gandhi, sharing a platform with the Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi on Sunday said: "Our government had done everything possible to bring an end to the hostilities and it was due to our resolute efforts that Sri Lanka announced conclusion of combat operations and people moved to safer places," PTI quoted Ms. Gandhi saying. Meanwhile, the same day has seen a massive massacre of civilians in the no-fire zone by the Sri Lanka Army using all kinds of heavy weapons and aerial bombing. Around 1200 bodies were counted so far and 1125 injured managed to reach the makeshift hospital.
"Our ultimate goal, as Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had said and as has been the stand of the Congress in the last 30 years, is to secure for the Tamils equals rights and status within the framework of the 1987 Indo-Sri Lanka accord," she was also quoted saying by the PTI.
The obvious stance she was sharing with Colombo in camouflaging the war and the insistence of the failed Accord of Rajiv Gandhi as solution for Tamils, are likely to backfire seriously on her election ally, Karunanidhi, political observers in Chennai said.
The congress-led government is widely seen as the war partner of Colombo.
In the meantime, whether Colombo calculated Sunday’s attack to discredit Congress in the elections is a question widely asked in the political circles. Mahinda Rajapaksa government can get rid of all secret protocols for political solution obligations with the Indian Establishment, if Congress doesn’t come to power.
However, it seems the war in Sri Lanka is more important to the Congress Establishment than the elections in India, the observers said.
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