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For decades thousands of Sri Lankan Tamils have lived as refugees in India, their pleas for citizenship rebuffed by a country they embraced to escape violence in their land. Now, a prominent Sri Lankan leader has called for a referendum to decide once and for all if they wish to remain in India or return to Sri Lanka.

Mano Ganesan, an outspoken opposition leader who heads the Tamil Progressive Alliance (TPA), said the issue of refugees has remained unresolved since 1983 when the first boatloads fled to India following anti-Tamil violence in the island nation.

Illustration: Pariplab Chakraborty.

“The refugee population in India, including those who have lived there for generations after migrating from Sri Lanka, many of whom are of Indian Tamil ancestry, face an uncertain future,” the MP said. “Their lives and citizenship cannot continue to be determined by the political whims of politicians on either side of the Palk Strait.”

This is the first time a leading Tamil leader has advocated a referendum among the estimated 89,000 Tamil refugees in Tamil Nadu, the bulk of whom live in more than 100 designated camps spread across the southern state.

Ganesan, whose forefathers hailed from India and who champions the interests of the so-called ‘Indian Tamils’, underlined that the refugees, almost 40 per cent of whom have been born on Indian soil, must be given the right to choose between Indian and Sri Lankan citizenship.

The problem, he said, “must now be settled once and for all through a humanitarian, rights-based and mutually agreed process…

“A free, fair and independent referendum should be........

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