Dispute over Kinthusity Cemetery as caste issue surfaces

• Published date: 08 February 2023
• Publication title: Daily Mirror

Velayuthan and his family live next to the Kinthusity Cemetery in Kalaimathy, off Puttur in Jaffna. Every day when they wake up, they worry about the possibility of smoke drifting over from the open-air cemetery and the risk to their health of inhaling it. He and his family have joined the rest of the villagers in nudging the authorities to close down the cemetery land in question.

Kalaimathy is home to 1500 families of the Pallar caste. It's an agricultural community which has inhabited the land since the civil war. The thirty-year ethnic conflict displaced many communities in Jaffna, but in the post-war situation they have returned and settled on once-abandoned lands. The dominant Vellala caste has claimed ownership to a majority of lands and has deprived oppressed-caste communities of their rights to access land.

The cemetery land in question comes under their purview and this has led to conflict between two castes and the tug of war between the two factions eventually ended in court; putting a stop to both factions cremating their bodies at the closest possible site.

Situation in Kalaimathy

During the height of the ethnic conflict Kalaimathy was a forested area. But 30 years later it is home to a thriving village.

The cemetery land in question was abandoned for over 30 years until March 9, 2017, when a few villagers from Siruppidy, a neighbouring village, made an attempt to cremate a body there. 'Even though they have other lands to cremate bodies at, they are trying to bring bodies to this site,' said Selvam Kadirkamanathan, Member of the Valikamam East Provincial Council.

Back in 2017, villagers from Siruppidy claimed that the wife of the deceased too was buried on this cemetery land in question. 'But people haven't been using this cemetery. It is said that bodies were cremated in this site some 30 years ago. But when a cremation took place those people would leave their houses and return once the cremation is completed and there was no smoke being emitted,' said Ponnan Murugesu, social activist and member of the Marxist-Leninist party.

A death certificate issued in 1977 where a body of the deceased was cremated at the cemetery land in question

One of the concerns raised by the villagers is with regard to the smoke emitted when bodies are being cremated. The half-acre land is an open area which has now been surrounded by a wall constructed to a height of 11-feet following orders from the magistrate, and has been permanently padlocked. 'The houses are in...