Suthanthirapuram village is situated in the Mullaithivu district. Although it was sparsely populated in the early days the population shot up in 1996 as refugees came in.
On 03.11.1999, the Sri Lankan military stationed in Elephant Pass and Ampahamam camps carried out bombing and shelling into the civilian’sareas in Palinagar from 9.15am till 11.30am. Since the people were taken unawares, they could not seek safer places.
25 people died and 50 people were injured. Hundreds of thousands of rupees worth property was damaged.
Ravichandran’s account is as follows:
“Around 11 o clock a Kfir was seen in the air. We were at school at the time. As we left and were walking, the Kfir dropped the first bomb. SK, a boy working with my brother, was injured and taken to hospital where he died.
When the second bomb was dropped, I was hiding in an outdoor bathing tub. Pratheep was also hiding there with me. He was injured in the stomach. He was taken to the hospital by tractor. He died there. 7 people were injured and 4 died.
This happened between 11 and 11:30am. As this was peak time, people were at the markets and at school. After the first bomb hit, parents and others rushed to the school to make sure that the children were ok. Then the second bomb was dropped. 2 school children died. The SLA hit this place twice to ensure that people would definitely be killed. This had to have been a planned attack.”
Available names of victims (name, occupation, age)
1. Perumal Sureshkumar, Student, 18
2. Veeraiya Thurairasa, -, 55
3. Thamotharampillai Krishnaraja, -, 60
4. Vaithilingham Suthakar, -, 17
5. Krishnaraja Jeyaseelan
6. Kumaravelu Punniyalingham, -, 41