Vaddakandal massacre ­ 30.01.1985

school.

While this killing was going on, the military also attacked people working in the fields and people on the street. This attack went on for six hours. At 2.00pm the military ordered the people to load the military vehicles with the dead bodies and took the bodies to the Thalladi military camp. 52 people died in this massacre and 40 were injured.

Mayilvahanam Mohan’s account of what happened is as follows,
“The SLA from Thalladi Army Camp surrounded the following 3 villages, Palaperuman Kattu and Vaddakandal and Parapankandal. Around 1.00am, we heard vehicle noise. We had no idea they were coming or what they would do. At about 5am in the morning – we heard gun fire from all directions. People woke up and started running everywhere. There was a helicopter in the air which started firing.

They did not worry about a person’s age. Young or old – they were all shot and killed that day. They went into the paddy fields and picked up people with both hands, held them up and shot them for others to see. This is the first time we saw this happen. 35 people were shot in the fields, 15 people were shot in town.

At the school there were about 250 children studying. They dragged the principle and all the teachers out, tortured and shot them in front of the villagers. They were all asked to stand in a line – when they were shot. A few people escaped. I was one of them. 18 people were shot there.

Mayilvaganam Ganesh was made to shoot his cousin and asked to drink his blood. He was beaten severely. Every time he refused to drink the blood – they hit him some more. His legs were broken.

After all of this happened, the Army brought a villager’s lorry. Three of us had been captured and not yet shot. They made us put all the bodies in the lorry and took us with them. A little while away – they told us that since we had helped them, they would spare us our lives. We ran away and escaped. They took some of the bodies to Thalladi Army camp and took some to Mannar Hospital. The Grama Sevakar helped the villagers to carry out the investigation.

Beside this village there was a Muslim village – but nothing happened to them. Three days later, there were funerals happening in every house. The army returned and surrounded the forest. At that time we did not have any associations with the LTTE. They may have been there, but we did not know where they where. The SLA kept coming back after that and tormented all the villagers who had to live in constant fear.”