A large number of Sri Lankans of all backgrounds - Sinhalese, Tamils and Muslims - gathered on Saturday 24th April at the Korean Cultural Centre in Toronto for the 2nd annual "Celebration of Sri Lankan Solidarity" to mark the occasion of Sinhala Tamil New Year.
The highlight of this year's program was the inclusion of performances from Indian, Bangladesh, Chinese and African backgrounds in addition to Sinhala and Tamil artists - a multicultural event in the true Canadian sense.The Canadian Democratic Tamil Cultural Association is a community organization working to promote democracy and pluralism in the Tamil community in Ontario and to foster friendship and understanding with other Sri Lankan communities and the Canadian mainstream.
Its objective is to help build a new Sri Lanka based on pluralism where all communities can live in peace and amity. One of the ways by which it tries to achieve these objectives is to hold cultural and community events to bring all Sri Lankans together in a spirit of harmony and goodwill.
Another important aspect of this program was the eschewing of stereotypical conventions observed in most Sri Lankan functions in the Diaspora. The CDTCA had diligently avoided any political symbolism that invokes tensions that is natural to any multiethnic country such as Sri Lanka.
The emphasis was on the solidarity of all Sri Lankans based on what they share rather than the distinctions based on their secondary affiliations such as language and religion.
The president of the association Sam Rajendran drew attention to this aspect of their program in his welcome address: " ... we have broken with many conventions in the way we are conducting this program. Because in our view, conventions, unfortunately, highlight the divisions rather than the things we share.
They bring memories of the bitterness we experienced in the public realm, rather than reminding us of the pleasant relations that we have across ethnic, religious and linguistic barriers in our day to day, personal lives.
Moreover these conventions smack of cold official reality rather than the warmth of people coming together as individual human beings. We do it all the time in small, private settings. But the challenge is to do it on a larger scale – in public life, in public space – without the intrusion of the divisive symbols of politics, history and the state.
This is the only way we can hope to transcend the politics of identity that enemies of Sri Lanka are trying to revive even after the horrendous experience of the 30 year war due to narrow nationalisms.”
People who attended the program appreciated the manner in which it was put together and urged the organizers to have more such non-partisan and non-sectarian events that reflected the diversity and pluralism in Sri Lankan society.
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