“On 10th August 1990, from 10am that morning,
Doctor Shanmuganath and his wife Rani and I,
went to see my son who had been captured at
Karathivu Shanmuga School. In town they stoppedmany people and left. They returned after sometime and told us to separate into Muslims andTamils. The Muslims left soon after. They called the men in one direction. We were
wondering where they were taking us. They told us to go into a room. We were scared. The Doctor’s wife ran into the room and pleaded with the army to not hurt the Doctor. She was dragged away. There was a man
standing there with a knife. – But I did not know this. He grabbed my hair –
because I had oil his hand slipped. He had tried to cut my head, but because
his hand slipped, he cut my neck. I fell to the floor. I thought I would die,
that’s how badly I was hurt.
Dr Shunmuganathan and a few others were cut and killed. As I was lying
there, I could hear all the screams and violence. It was unbearable. But I had no other choice.
After some time, a lady was brought in shouting. She seemed
young. Her sari had already been removed in another room. An army
took her inside a room and raped her. She pleaded to be let go and
that she would not tell anyone what happened. Another army ordered that she be cut. I don’t know what
they did – but I heard no sounds thereafter. Then he left.
I could not bear to be there. I kept hearing awful noises of people being tortured. As I was thinking what I was going to do – the army returned withweapons and killed anyone who was breathing or making a slight noise.
They put oil or it may have been kerosene on everyone and burnt them. The
fire jumped to my legs. I tried to pat the fire out but couldn’t. I could not stand up or lift my leg. Eventually I lifted my head up with my hands and managed to crawl into the room where they had taken the girl.
I just sat there thinking for some time. I could hear all the plane sounds. I
saw the ladies sari just on the floor. I tore it in half. I tied it on my head and
covered my face and neck. Outside the fire was burning above my head.
There were arms, legs and heads everywhere. But I had to keep going. So I
just climbed over all of them and left.”