ESCAPE FROM CIVIL WAR:
SRI LANKAN REFUGESS IN TRICHY, INDIA

Every time I leave a group of children, like the nearly 700 I met in a Sri Lankan refugee camp in Trichy, India, they ask if I will write my name on their notebooks. Perhaps it is the only permanent evidence in their lives that someone visited them and that someone cared- if only for a day.

Escaping decades of civil war raging in the North East of Sri Lanka was not an easy decision for any one of the recent 15,000 refugees to cross the Palk Strait. It first required that each family of farmers or small business owners with an average income of 300-400 Rupees a month ($30-$40), accumulate 6,000 Rs ($600) per individual for the services of an illegal boatman to brave the choppy waters and the Sri Lankan navy. Once landing on the shores of India at Rameswaran, not only is the future ahead of them filled with uncertainty, their hearts are heavy with the loved ones they left behind.

The Refugee Relief group that has been operating amongst camps now swelling to nearly 200,000 total refugees, has found effective and innovative responses to the struggles faced by this migrant population with only minimal resources available. The group providing the services is comprised entirely of refugees, trained to be directors of Women’s Empowerment, Emergency Relief and Micro-credit programs among others. The group ensures that all children in the camps study Sri Lankan history and has created nearly 400 Self Help Groups (SHG's) comprised entirely of women to create small-scale savings/loans programs based on a communal assessment of needs.

As the new refugees struggle to adapt to life in India, away from their native land...Operation USA is happy to help this group in providing a solid support system and empowering refugees through self-sustaining development programs. This group has also become a powerful force in advocating for the needs of a population which much of the world has forgotten in the years following the devastating tsunami of December 2004.

Nimmi Gowrinathan
Director, South Asia Programs
Operation USA
3617 Hayden Avenue, Suite A
Culver City, CA 90232
(310) 838-3455
ngowrinathan@opusa.org

To view a slideshow of a recent OpUSA visit to Sri Lankan refugees, please click here.

To join others in the call to ensure humanitarian aid reaches refugee populations in Sri Lanka, please click here.

12/2006