Rumour mongering is a habit that is endemic to Sri Lanka. How are false rumours spread? The process begins with one individual who has a grievance with the world. He plants the rumour, and goes away. The juicier the rumour, the faster it spreads. But no one will ever know who started it first. There is a story in Aesop's Fables of a monkey who was asked where it got its fleas from. He pointed to the next monkey.

In fact, Sri Lankan history has many instances of how false rumours have cost lives. During the anti-Tamil riots of 1958, some vicious character started a rumour that a Sinhalese woman teacher from Panadura teaching in Batticaloa was murdered by Tamils and had her breasts cut off. The rumour spread like wildfire, and the immediate result was a Brahmin priest of the Hindu temple in Panadura was seized by a violent mob, petrol poured over him and he was burnt to death. On later enquiry, the Education Department confirmed that there was no Sinhalese woman teacher in the whole of Batticaloa.

There are two reasons why a false rumour spreads fast. One: there are interested parties who want to believe it and therefore pass it on to the next man. Second: as the saying goes, there is a sucker born in the world every minute. Suckers are people who have no mind of their own. They are prepared to swallow everything that is fed to them.

The recent vicious instance of rumor-mongering was the spread of false rumours reporting the death of Tamil leader Velupillai Pirabakaran. Reports of the "death" of Mr. Pirabakaran are nothing new. But what is surprising is the number of people in high places who have been deriving a morbid pleasure in wishing that Mr. Pirabakaran were dead.

Who are these people in high places? The President of Sri Lanka, Madame Chandrika for instance. The Chief of Defence Staff of the Sri Lankan armed forces, Vice Admiral Daya Sandagiri, who was quoted by the Sri Lankan Broadcasting Corporation as saying that Mr.Pirabakaran may be dead, was another. Later, both the admiral and the SLBC went back on their statements after their initial stupidity. At a time when the whole of Sri Lanka was reeling under the biggest disaster the country had known, when the smell of death had yet to leave the country, when 30,000 human lives were snuffed out in a matter of twenty minutes, how did these people occupying such seats of responsibility lose their sense of humanity to relish the prospect of the Tamil leader’s death, even it were the 'dreaded' Pirabakaran?

The case of the editor of a leading Indian newspaper – The Hindu – Ram by name, is even more shameful.

The dictionary defines the word ram, as an "uncastrated male sheep" (The New Penguin English Dictionary). Although it happens to be his name, with a capital R, there is no question that he needs some form of assistance to make him a more professional editor and a better human being. No sooner than the wishful conjecture of Mr. Pirabakaran’s death spread in Sri Lanka and in the West, Ram jumped on the bandwagon. "Where is Prabakaran?" was the title of his editorial on January 11, as if that was a fit subject for an editorial in a reputed Indian newspaper, at a time when both his country and Sri Lanka were reeling under the tsunami tragedy. It was very obvious that the poor man was wishing that Mr. Pirabakaran was dead, from the kind of doubts he raised in that editorial about the Tamil leader being alive. What a disappointment for him to find Mr. Pirapaharan is very much alive.

It must be remembered that this is not the first time The Hindu has "killed" Mr.Pirabakaran in its columns.

Fifteen years ago, in 1989, in its issue of July 24, The Hindu ran the following headline - PRABHAKARAN REPORTED KILLED IN LTTE SHOOTOUT. The paper went on to report that Pirapaharan had been killed by his deputy "Mahattaya." That was after India’s disreputable intelligence agency RAW spread that diabolical lie, taking All India Radio, Doordashan, Lalith Athulathmudali in Colombo and many others for a merry ride.

Another Brahmin-owned Tamil newspaper called the Dinamalar took the cake in its reporting at that time. It ran a screaming 8-column headline on its front page with three double column photos of the "deceased" Pirabakaran, the "assassin" Mahattaya and the other "deceased" Kittu. The paper gave graphic details of how Mr. Pirabakaran was "killed," how his body was being kept at a place called Anandaperiyakulam, 15 miles from Vavuniya, how according to "authoritative sources" the body was being taken to his home town, Valvettiturai, for burial and so on, and so on....So much for Brahmin journalism in Tamil Nadu.

As for that racist Colombo newspaper, The Island, the less said the better. It spread a canard in its Sunday edition of January 9 by headlining –"Prabhakaran’s non-visibility fuels speculation" and on the following Sunday, the 16th, ran the headline "Prabhakaran-Norway meeting to nail canard"!

It is a pity there are Tamils themselves who are gullible enough to fall for such obvious mischief.