In Pictures: Tamils of Dharavi protest Sri Lanka onslaught
Tamil residents of Dharavi – in Mumbai, demonstrated and shouted slogans against the Sri Lanka military onslaught and forced eviction of Tamils from their homes on April 25th. They burned posters of Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa during the protest.
[in Dharavi, Mumbai April 25, 2009-Reuters pic]
[Tamil residents of Dharavi, shout slogans during a protest against Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa]
[A Tamil resident of Dharavi, burns a poster of Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa during a protest in Mumbai April 25, 2009]
According to A Ganesh Nadar of Rediff.com, “Dharavi’s main population consists of Tamilians who’ve migrated to Mumbai from their home state. These Tamilians have imported their village atmosphere into their new place of residence. Dharavi is a closed society. Even the non-Tamilians have learnt to speak Tamil to survive here. There are some Tamilians who have been here for years and still don’t know a single word of Hindi. They don’t need to know. They live and work in Dharavi where the national language is Tamil.”
“Tamil” is described as the “National language” of Dharavi, an urban slum ward in Mumbai.
