Country: Sri Lanka
Group: Nalavar
Date Finalized: 3/18/2024
Team: David Hammerle (lead), Nichole Dahlen, Lacey Hurst, Evelyn Annelo, Madison Chester
Content Warning: physical violence, war, ethnic discrimination, homelessness
Approximate Time Period: 1983 – Present
The Nalavar is a caste among the Tamil in Sri Lanka that traditionally had the job of toddy tapping (McGilvray, 1974). Toddy tapping involves climbing palm trees and extracting the sap to make an alcoholic drink called “raa” (Diethelm Travel, n.d.). They are considered Panchamars, a group which had the lowest position in the caste hierarchy (Samarakoon, 2022).
There was a civil war in Sri Lanka from 1983 to 2009 between the Sri Lankan government and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). The LTTE wanted to create an independent Tamil state. The war internally displaced many people, as many as 800,000 by 2001 (United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, 2013). Among these internally displaced persons (IDPs), the war displaced a disproportionate number of Panchamars, including the Nalavar (Silva, 2009). One researcher found only one welfare center with a significant population of people other than Panchamars and found that all four welfare centers in the town of Mallakam only had Nalavar and Pallar people remaining in them (Silva, 2009).
There are several reasons that the war disproportionately displaced the Nalavar. First, they didn’t generally own much land to begin with and they often couldn’t return to those lands because the government labeled those areas high security zones. Second, they didn’t have enough money to buy land or build shelters (United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, 2013). Moreover, other castes wouldn’t sell them land because they didn’t want to intermingle with the lower castes (Silva et. al, 2009). Lastly, they wanted to live in communities with each other for mutual security and support and this was often easier in the IDP camps than if they left (Silva, 2009).
This is a clear case of forced away because the war disproportionately internally displaced the Nalavar and the government and other Tamils disproportionately made it difficult for them to leave the IDP camps.
Today, Nalavar are not just toddy tappers, they often have other jobs (Yann Picand, n.d.). Family that have migrated to other countries facilitated some of this by sending money home (Madavan, 2011). Some Nalavar have become more upwardly mobile by converting to Christianity (Kuganathan, 2014).
Data Quality: We give this a data quality of 2/3 because there are significant scholarly sources supporting forced migration of Nalavar in Sri Lanka, but all are taken from a single group of authors (Silva, K. T., Sivapragasam, P. P., & Thanges, P.).’
Sources
1. Samarakoon. (2022). Caste system in Sri Lanka. Mondo Internazionale. Retrieved February 22, 2023, from https://mondointernazionale.com/en/caste-system-in-sri-lanka
2. Diethelm Travel, (n.d.). Witness toddy tapping in Galle. https://www.diethelmtravel.com. Retrieved February 26, 2023, from https://www.diethelmtravel.com/witness-toddy-tapping-in-galle/
3. Kuganathan, P. (2014). Social Stratification in Jaffna: A survey of recent research on Caste. Sociology Compass, 8(1), 78–88. https://doi.org/10.1111/soc4.12101
4. Madavan, D. (2011, March 2). Socio-religious desegregation in an immediate postwar town. Carnets de géographes. Retrieved February 22, 2023, from https://journals.openedition.org/cdg/2711?lang=en
5. McGilvray, D. B. (1974). Tamils and Moors: caste and matriclan structure in eastern Sri Lanka (Doctoral dissertation, The University of Chicago).
6. Silva, K. T., Sivapragasam, P. P., & Thanges, P. (2009). Caste discrimination and social justice in Sri Lanka: An overview. Indian Institute of Dalit Studies.
7. Silva, K. T., Sivapragasam, P. P., & Thanges, P. (2009). Casteless or caste-blind?: Dynamics of concealed caste discrimination, social exclusion, and protest in Sri Lanka. International Dalit Solidarity Network.
8. United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. (2013, April 29). Global overview 2012: People internally displaced by conflict and Violence – Sri Lanka. Refworld. Retrieved March 25, 2023, from https://www.refworld.org/docid/517fb0516.html
9. Yann Picand, D. D. (n.d.). Nalavar. Nalavar : definition of Nalavar and synonyms of Nalavar (English). Retrieved February 22, 2023, from http://dictionary.sensagent.com/Nalavar/en-en/