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VAVUNIYA — Fifty-three couples of former Tamil Tiger rebels were married Sunday in a colorful mass ceremony at a government camp in northern Sri Lanka with a Bollywood star as witness.
Some of the brides and grooms had trained or fought together during the island's quarter-century civil war that ended last year.
They are among thousands of rebels who surrendered to the government and are still interned at a rehabilitation camp near the northern town of Vavuniya.
Some of the couples had already been living together without being legally married — socially unacceptable in Sri Lanka. Others had only taken a vow at Hindu temples and exchanged flower garlands, according to an ethnic Tamil tradition.
Government ministers attended Sunday's ceremony, signing the marriage certificates and giving gifts to the couples.
Bollywood heartthrob Viveik Oberoi also attended and joined camp inmates in a dance to a popular Tamil song from a south Indian movie. Oberoi had come came to Sri Lanka for an Indian film awards earlier this month and visited the camp at the government's invitation.
During the ceremony, brides dressed in bright red or yellow sarees and with artificial flowers in their hair stood beside grooms in white shirts with sacred ash on their foreheads. Hindu priests chanted prayers and drummers and pipers played.
Grooms tied a saffron-colored thread with a pendant around the brides' necks as relatives threw flowers. The couples then exchanged flower garlands and shared a cup of milk and fruit to symbolize sharing.
Sivapathasundaram Kavithas, 29, had been a fighter for nine years. He met his wife Bhavani, 28, a fighter for 12 years, when they went for weapons training together.
"He was a well-mannered man and I thought he will be suitable for me," Bhavani said.
The couple exchanged garlands at a Hindu temple and made a vow of marriage with family blessings in 2006, seven years after they met.
Kavithas said he was pleasantly surprised that his marriage was now formalized but said he still longed for freedom from the camp to look after his sister who lives alone. Their parents and two brothers were killed in the last stages of the fighting, he said.
"We will live the same restricted life, difference is we will be living together again," said Bhavani.
The couples will be provided separate tents in the camp.
Brig. Sudantha Ranasinghe, in charge of the rehabilitation of former rebels, said they will not be free until the government feels they are "ready to join the society." He said that would not be a long time off, and that the inmates would not be prosecuted for their roles in the war.
The camp houses some of the 10,000 men, women and children who gave themselves up to the army as having had links to the Tamil Tiger rebels soon after fighting ended in May 2009.
Ranasinghe said 3,000 have already been released.
