ABSTRACT
Broadly Arend Lijphart’s four principles of consociational democracy were vaguely discernible in the inter-elite workings of Sir Lanka’s political processes in the pre- and immediately post-independence phases, viz., the grand coalition, mutual veto, proportionality and segmental autonomy. A farseeing liberal Sinhalese political elite could have, in ‘Lijphartian’ style sought an overarching accommodation with their Sri Lankan Tamil counterpart so as to avoid confrontational politics. In addition, the government of Sri Lanka is promoting the concept of Sri Lanka as a multi-ethnic democracy, no longer the monopolistic Sinhala Buddhist state that it was claimed to be in the past. India will therefore, despite Sinhala suspicion and even opposition, continue to be involved in Sri Lanka’s affairs for a considerable length of time. The leaders of the Sinhala demotic polity could not provide the much needed start. Furthermore the Indo-Sri Lanka Accord compelled Sri Lanka to agree to Tamil and English as official languages in addition to Sinhala.
