An earlier attempt to acquire the land in March this year was suspended by President Chandrika Kumaratunga after Tamil parties protested against the move.

However, the Gazette Extraordinary of June 8, which was released to subscribers only on August 28, 1999, states that 397 allotments of land measuring 261.8 hectares will be acquired under section five of the Land Acquisition Act.

The proposal made by the then acting Land and Agriculture Minister Salinda Dissanayake adds that ‘the land is needed for a public purpose.’

The All Ceylon Hindu Congress on August 31, wrote to President Kumaratunga urging her to stall the move once again. “We are perturbed and shocked to note from the Gazette Extraordinary No 1083/9 of 8th June 1999 (which was received by subscribers only on Saturday 28th August, 1999), that declaration under Section 5 of the Land Acquisition Act has been gazetted by Your Excellency’s Acting Minister of Agriculture and Lands.”

“We note that the Minister’s declaration is dated 28th February 1999 and it might have been gazetted by an oversight after Your Excellency’s Government’s announcement in March 1999 that the proposed acquisition in respect of the areas in Palaly including Maviddapuram Kanthaswamy Kovil and Keerimalai Nagaleswarar Kovil is not be proceeded with”, the letter states.

The Congress’s main contention is that the earmarked land includes two temples with historic value and another place of worship. It is at the Keerimalai Kovil that the Aadi Amavasai festival is observed.

The letter, signed by the General Secretary of the Congress, Kandiah Neelakandan has reiterated that it was shocked at the gazetting.

In another letter sent to the president on the very day, the Congress has appealed that the armed forces be withdrawn from the North and East and to begin talks with the LTTE.

The letter also alleges the humiliation of the chief priest of Sithhandy Sri Sithiravelauntha Swami Kovil in Batticaloa on August 24, during the Rajagopuram festival.

Armed forces personnel had also walked in the temple compound with their shoes on.

“We had occasion to bring to Your Excellency similar incidents in the past. It is unfortunate that the armed forces appear to sometimes chose to indulge in acts of insult to Hindu Temples and Priests’, the second letter observed.

Despite the District Coordinating officers apologising after the Batticaloa incident, the Congress has opined that the repeated acts followed the apologies and inquiries thereafter will not appease the Hindu population.

When contacted by The Sunday Leader, a high ranking army officer denied that they were acquiring land. ‘We are annexing land,’ he said. The army is to give out land to a school in the area as well, he added.

The officer told The Sunday Leader that they planned to cultivate vegetables in the land around the Palaly base.

The base with its airfield serves as the most convenient and quickest means of connection with the South. During the past 16 years the airfield is the only portion of land in the peninsula that never fell under LTTE control, despite their laying siege several times and shooting down airplanes from and to Palaly.

In the present security context, the base’s safety becomes imperative with the attacks on civilian ships. The airforce only recently recommenced civilian air travel to and from Palaly since the suspension after the shooting down of the Lion aircraft in last October. Even after the peninsula fell under government control in 1996, the army has maintained an extensive buffer zone between the base and civilian settlements. No civilians are allowed in to the two kilometre zone without strict security checks.

The whole base is regarded as a high security zone due to the airfield. None of the buildings that are located inside the buffer zone have been allowed to be reclaimed by their owners and no civilians are allowed to settle in the zone. Security forces maintain a strict security cover inside the zone.

Despite the army’s claim that they are not acquiring the land, defence observers claimed that they might want to annex the land at least temporarily to increase security on the base. As always, it is the civilian population that has to bear the brunt of the security arrangement.

No compensation has been forthcoming for those who have property inside the buffer zone and it is their movements that are being restricted by the arrangement.