The situation in Sri Lanka is becoming graver day by day. All semblance of a peace process or political initiative to end the conflict between the Sri Lankan government and the LTTE has been abandoned.

The Rajapaksa government is pursuing an all-out military offensive against the northern region which houses the headquarters of the LTTE. It refuses to acknowledge that the northern region is the home of lakhs of people, and is treating it instead as just another military target.

The residents of the Vanni region which is the current frontline in the military conflict have been callously ordered by the Rajapaksa government to leave, without any efforts being made to organise an orderly evacuation. Voluntary agencies that had been looking after the needs of the local people have also been ordered to leave, without any government agencies stepping in to take their place. All reports testify to the panic and suffering being borne by the people in this area.

Over the years thousands of people from the embattled northern region have fled south, with a number of them making their way to the capital, Colombo. Now they are being treated as unwanted aliens in the city. At the beginning of September, the government took the blatantly unjust and discriminatory step of ordering all Tamils who have migrated to Colombo from the northern region to register with the police authorities, giving them hardly any notice and only one day to complete the process.

To make matters worse, the Sri Lankan Defence Minister, who is President Rajapaksa's brother, declared that all such people who did not have legitimate business in the capital should leave! This only shows the fascist attitude of the authorities towards their own people.

In this situation, it has come to light that the Indian government has been quietly giving military assistance to the Sri Lankan government's military offensive. This came out when two Indian radar operators were wounded in combat operations in the Vavuniya area in the north. A significant number of Indian technical personnel and air force personnel are actively participating in the war effort.

The Indian state's renewed involvement in the military conflict in Sri Lanka, 18 years after the IPKF had to pull out of that country, is a dangerous development. The Indian people and Parliament have not been taken into confidence about a measure that has serious implications for peace and security in the whole region.

The working class and people of India should demand that the Indian government immediately pull out all its forces, whether military or technical, that are involved in the conflict in Sri Lanka. This is an internal affair of the people of Sri Lanka, which they must settle by themselves through political means keeping the interests of all sections of the people in Sri Lanka in mind.