Bearing Witness

Interview with   SAKUNTALA SACHITHANANDAN

Published in Ceylon Today

1.      Several of your poems offer insight into the daily distresses experienced by the most dispossessed members of our society. Could you tell us of your contact with these groups and individuals? How,  and in what contexts,  did you get to know them, and see them 'close up'?

I have always been “notorious” in my milieu, for sympathizing with the underdog. I used to see suffering where it seemed to be overlooked by others. In Hatton where I went upon getting married, I used to meet many destitute people thrust upon the streets by the Land Reform law coming into operation, as illustrated by my poems. I also found that, in the main, any and every Tamil labourer on the estates was considered beyond the pale and beyond redemption: it was thought they deserved to live  as they did, bullied, underpaid and deprived of the basic amenities. I remember a lady I knew, who, when told about the Tamil labourers travelling to Colombo who had been dragged out of buses and killed during the race riots of 1983, commented dismissively – “Oh, but they were only coolies!”

My eyes were well and truly opened when I joined the  Janatha Estates Development Board. Coming from the more cosmopolitan, egalitarian milieu in which I’d lived thus far in Colombo, I was amazed to observe the highly stratified nature of estate society. The “Management”, consisting of the Superintendent and his Assistants, were almost always Sinhalese coming from the “good” Colombo schools. More often than not, they were unqualified beyond GCE O/Levels, but they had the right background and the right English accent. The “Staff”, such as the Chief Clerk and the Factory Officer,  were (more often than not), of Jaffna Tamil origin. They looked down their noses at the labourers who were of poor Indian Tamil stock. The Superintendent and his Assistants looked down upon them all.

I met all of these gentlemen both in my husband’s office, where they consulted him on Labour Tribunal cases, and in the JEDB  office, where they came for  routine advice, letter-drafting and conferences with the  Management and the Labour Unions. I developed a rapport both with the Management officials, the estate superintendents and the Union officials. However, I found it difficult  to reconcile the harsh attitudes of some of  the officials of the JEDB and my own.  From time to time I told  my husband I wanted  to resign, for at times I could not bear  to see the injustice meted out  to the Labour.

I was presiding on one occasion at a conference on an important issue between the JEDB  official in charge of a particular estate, the Superintendent of the estate and the officials of the Labour Union representing the labourers of the estate. A crowd of labourers were seated outside on the pavement  – squatting – minding their own business,  quietly awaiting the outcome. The JEDB  official, seeing them through the window, crossed his knees and declared huffily, “In MY day,  when I was Superintendent, I’d have SHOT  them all!” Needless to say I felt 'shot down' myself – thank goodness “HIS” days were long past!

2. While legislation and public initiatives operate to remedy social distress in the public sphere and at a national level, do you think poetry, with its capacity to convey intense human feeling, has a special role in raising socio-political awareness on a personal level?

Poetry is a powerful instrument which could change people’s attitudes to social situations they have always overlooked, as being unworthy of even thinking about. At times people cannot be expected to know that various types of social problems even exist, as they are busy living their own lives, doing what they consider important, blissfully ignorant of anything that did not connect with their own existence. I remember that “On The Streets”, a poem in my last book of poetry, a certain lady of my acquaintance was moved to remark that she’d never considered prostitutes in a sympathetic light nor understood the tribulations they had to undergo until she read my poem.

On the other hand there are some thick headed people who ask me – “Aiyo why are you writing so much about estate labourers,  men?” I think this is due to some folk not even knowing there’s a vast body of  people on the estates and have been, for many many years, eking out an existence. They are a very important  section of our people,  earning a good part of our foreign exchange. (To most, that part of society is only a source of domestic aid.)

      

3. Your poems dealing with social issues deal with big issues such as poverty and political inequity, and do so by showing people's interactions at flash points in their everyday cultural existence: signing forms, for example, in government offices, where their language cannot  be used, and their right to understand is not recognised. In these instances, the poem is more than an incident report. You are bearing witness to human indignity and humiliation, aren't you? How important is that role in our society, today?

Every such poem is a  result of  the shock I have felt in being witness to a situation and is not, of course, merely reportage. This sort of thing is very important to me. I find it disheartening that these indignities meted out to innocent people do not matter at all to a lot of people with whom I associate on a daily basis.  Being married to a Tamil has of course opened up a vista of perceptions and experiences which may not have stirred my emotions, had I stuck to my original Sinhala background throughout.

I think it is very important to be sensitive to what happens to others and to act upon such situations and not be complacent within your own class and milieu,  sticking to  mere traditional roles and religious observances where the stanzas chanted daily  do not seem to awaken one's conscience in real life situations.

4. Many people (particularly younger poets) believe poetry's subject matter is most properly romantic love! Would it be true to say that your subject matter in these poems is motivated by humanitarian love? How do your spiritual and social beliefs influence your subjects and the way you portray them?

It is as  wrong to say that the subject matter of poetry should be romantic love alone as it would be wrong to surmise that all prose should be thus confined, too. Poetry is but a form of writing and one is free to express one’s ideas and emotions either in prose or in poetry. I guess my  inclination is to write a poem no sooner something important catches my attention. Some very famous poets have written both on love themes and also on others – my favourite poet D.H.Lawence was one such poet. He wrote deeply moving love poems as well as social commentaries such as “How Beastly The Bourgeois Is” and also poems on animals such as “Tortoise Family Connections”  and “Mosquito” and on memories of  his childhood such as “Piano”.

Having been born into a Buddhist family, and having attended a Buddhist school such as Visakha Vidyalaya,  I imbibed Buddhist values, taking everything preached seriously, and questioning the hypocritical distortions of Buddhist practices all around me. This being an undeniable basis for my attitudes, as a young adult, I was also influenced by a wide range of subjects on which I read, including socialist thought. I am glad I attended Sri Lanka Law College where I made many Tamil and Muslim friends  (and  two dear Gujarati  ladies who are still my close friends). These associations widened my outlook immensely. Well,  I suppose you could call my brand of love expressed in this volume “humanitarian love”!

5. You have been described as having 'a de-colonised mind and heart', because of the sense of social justice and awareness of human rights that is evident in your poetry. Is that not, in your view,  one of the greatest accolades a writer in a former colonised country can receive? (That’s a leading question, I know! What I mean is, how do you interpret this tribute?)

When I saw this comment I too sought clarification! What Haig said, was, that writers in Sri Lanka,  especially those of a certain class in Colombo did not write anything other than matter  deliberately and  unmistakably tinged with their own “English – educated” backgrounds  and could not disentangle themselves from a “Colonial” outlook or influence. I suppose,  in my case,  I have moved from such a background to another after marriage, and even in Hatton was not confined only to the “Planter society”, but sniffed around  all over questioning all that seemed strange and interesting  to me. Also, both my husband and I being lawyers, we were more aware of injustices and their ramifications over there. I  have actually seen people dying by the road side – not through violence, but of starvation, which maybe most men and women of my acquaintance have not. I met many displaced people who came begging, carrying their children.

Actually, I saw too many tragedies being enacted right under my very nose to be interested in writing imaginary tales based in foreign countries. Yes, I appreciate Haig’s comment, although, prior to his making it, I certainly did not see myself in that light!