Piramanthanaru massacre 02.10.1985
Piramanthanaru Village, Kilinochchi is an agricultural area and many people who have settled here came through a scheme set up in the 1950s to provide land for people from poor families. They were innocent people working hard to earn a living.
In the early morning on 2nd October
1985, five helicopters landed on the bund of the tank with around 200 SLA personal. Some of the army hid in the bushes until 3pm in the afternoon and captured and tied up passing villagers. Others went into the Piramanthanaru Village and shot people. They destroyed agricultural products and burnt the houses. Many of the villagers were injured by the army as they were hit with the butt of rifles or kicked with the army’s heavy boots. Some were even tied upside down whilst water was poured down their nose. Some
villagers were interrogated as to their connections with the LTTE.
Thurairasa Saradha Devi’s brother, Ponnuthurai Pakiyanathan, was massacred on that day. She says,
“Early in the morning at 7am on 2nd October 1985, I was preparing breakfast. My husband had gone to Pulliyampokkani to buy paddy. Suddenly one helicopter came and landed by the side of my house. We ran into the house and hid. The army surrounded my house. They ordered us to come out and kneel. There was another child with us who also knelt on the floor. They captured my brother and tied his hands. They took him by the side of the helicopter and gave him a rifle to hold and took video footage and a photo. Afterwards they brought my brother to the house and asked me if he was an LTTE man. I denied this and said ‘he is not an LTTE man – we are farmers – we are poor people doing farm work here only. We don’t know about LTTE movement.’ But the army said that they had a photo with a weapon – so how could we say that he was not a terrorist.
We were hit by guns and boots. They threatened me saying they were going to shoot us and therefore we should tell the truth. They said that my brother was LTTE and that they had a photo of him with a gun. The army threatened that if we did not agree with them, they would kill us and all the children. With that they burnt our house down. We were all shouting and begging them for mercy. They took my brother with them. I followed them and cried and asked the army several times to release him. One army member kicked me with his boots and I fell on the floor. After sometime I opened my eyes. I did not see my brother. Our house and other houses were burnt. There was smoke everywhere. My children and I went to Pulliyampokkanai and returned the next morning. We saw so many dead bodies but could not find my brother. We went to Mullaithivu and asked the army commander about my brother. He denied any knowledge of my brother. Finally somebody told us that my brother’s body was in the forest. We immediately went there and saw the body. They had stabbed and pushed him from the helicopter. All his bones were broken. We burnt his body at the site.”
Kathirgamarasa a resident says,
“I had many friends in the area where the helicopters were flying low. We wanted to go there, but it was impossible. The helicopters landed a quarter of a mile from my home. My brother-in-law (Sakthivel alias Mahan) was living in a house one mile from my home. For two hours the helicopters were flying and there were gun shot sounds. When the activities of the army appeared to have stopped, a friend and I started walking that way.
We saw another friend, 22 year old Rasan, returning after tapping toddy with his vessel. His home was in the area where the helicopters had landed. I told him it is not safe to go. He did not listen to me and proceeded towards his house. The army shot him on his way to home. He must have been the first to be shot by the army. Rasan is originally from Nunavil and his wife is from Piramanthanaru. I saw Rasan’s vessel by the side of the road. I could also see the shoe marks of the army (no one in the village wore covered shoes like the army). I became suspicious. I saw Rasan’s body in front of a temple among the bushes.
We saw shoe marks walking in both directions and we concluded that the army must have gone back. We started to walk towards the 40th Canal. We saw bodies of Sivapatham, Kamini, Sathyalingam, Kanesamoorthy, Selvarasa, Ramasamy, and Yogarasa as we walked. We walked on to inform the families. They would not come out due to fear.
I wanted to go and see my brother-in-law, Mahan, but there was some suspicion that the army may have camped there. I hesitated for a while about what to do next and then I proceeded towards my brother-in-law’s house. I met Anton on the way. Anton told me what had happened. Mahan was working in a joint farm with three others, Nagappar Sathyalingam (Kanna), Vallipuram Ganesamoorthy (Appan) and Vallipuram Vivekananthan (Ananthan). Appan and Ananthan are brothers. All four of them were living in one house and doing farming. They were all dead. We both walked on.
We saw a house that had been burnt together with the vehicle parked inside. We saw two more bodies. One was that of Sathyaseelan and I cannot remember the name of the other one. The army had arrested a person named Pakyam and was taking him with them. When they had come across Sathyaseelan, they had taken two-thousand rupees from his pocket and his expensive (to Sathyaseelan’s means) wristwatch and chased him away. Sathyaseelan being poor and unable to accept the huge loss decided to go back to ask for his possessions from the army. The army shot him dead. They shot Pakyam and left his body in the forest. No one knew until people started looking and the smell of the decaying body became noticeable.
I took a tractor machine belonging to one of the villagers to move the bodies to their family home. One man Peran was badly wounded. We changed his clothes and gave him first aid. Then Anton and others carried him home to Yakkachchi twenty miles away by foot through lakes. I gave the bodies to the families and finally took the body of my brother-in-law, Mahan, home.”
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