Abstract:
The internal civil war had taken place in Sri Lanka for last three decades which was resulted
in numerous human civilian casualties in the country. It was ended with the military defeat
of LTTE in 2009. The fundamental reason for this ethnic conflict was an ideology of ethnicity
or misunderstanding of ethnic phenomena, and, which was the huge challenge for the
sovereignty of the country. In Sri Lanka, there are many ethnic groups namely Sinhalese,
Tamil, Muslims and Burgers and so on who determine their identity and solidarity in various
levels. In the early period, these ethnic groups maintained their separate ethnic identities as
well as they were living together in their common social life. In past history, Tamils, Sinhalese
and Muslims were maintained their rigid relationship and they were fighting as unity for the
independent of Sri Lanka against British colonial masters. Then, ethnic relationship was
broken by some collection of incidents in the past. In this context, this study attempts to
emphasis the concept of ethnicity, ethnic relation, and the nature of ethnic relationship
among ethnic groups those are living in the south eastern region of Ampara district in the
post-war context consequently. The key objective of this study is to conceptualize the idea of
ethnicity and ethnic relation and to understand the ethnic relationship in the south eastern
region of Ampara district through the history. Further, this study examines the current progress
of ethnic cohesion among Tamils, Sinhalese and Muslims in the area of research. This is
primarily a qualitative study. The study shows that the ethnic relation in the study area was
strengthened in early period, and it collapsed during the war time and, after 2009 again they
are maintaining the rigid relationship within the ethnic groups. But, pathetically, the new era
of resettlement activities of the government and the emergence of Buddhist movements
highlights as crucial issue to re-raise the same ethnic misunderstanding (prejudice) and
discriminations as they had earlier during the war period. So, this situation has to be mitigated
by the government and civil society organizations in order to ensure the democracy and the
peaceful environment by considering all ethnic groups in the study area as well as in Sri
Lanka.
