Malayagam Canada (also known as MC200) is a registered not-for-profit organization in Ontario, Canada. We advocate human rights and equality for Malaiyaha Tamils, also known as Up-Country Tamils, in Sri Lanka.
The Malaiyaha community’s origins date to 1823. This was when British colonialists first brought agricultural workers from south India, to work on privately owned plantations, in the island of Ceylon (now Sri Lanka). Over the last 200 years, this community has responded to discrimination and hardship with courage and resilience.
In the decades before Ceylon’s independence from Britain, the vibrant Malaiyaha community engaged in politics, organized strong labour unions, and secured voting rights for both women and men. After independence, most of this Tamil-speaking community was reduced to statelessness. Their voting rights and citizenship were formally removed by Parliamentary means in 1948 and 1949, not to be completely restored until 2003.
A UN agency recently assessed current challenges for the community to include modern slavery and landlessness. Women workers have borne an especially difficult share of this legacy, including abuses against their reproductive rights.
Yet, since arriving on the island, Malaiyaha Tamils have contributed significantly to the backbone of the Sri Lankan economy: through labour on tea estates, and through foreign remittances. Here too, women make fundamental contributions, along with their male counterparts. The community retains a unique sense of collective identity, preserved in folk songs and poetry.
Our NGO was founded in Toronto, Canada in 2023 as “Malayagam Canada 200.” Its original purpose was to solemnly commemorate the 200th anniversary of the Malaiyaha Tamil community’s arrival onto the island of Ceylon.
After this significant occasion had passed, the organization began to refer to itself as “Malayagam Canada” or “MC200.” Membership has now expanded to include people residing in Canada, the UK, and Sri Lanka.
Our mission is to create the economic and social conditions for the Malaiyaha Tamil community to empower itself. This is done through fostering entrepreneurship, providing support for education and health, and conducting international advocacy.
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