The Narrowing Timeline — 22 steps of resolution-path exhaustion (1948–2026)

Twenty-two cumulative legislative, judicial, administrative, and international moments that, taken together, constitute the empirical record of foreclosure of constitutional remedy for Tamil political demands within a unitary Sri Lankan state. Each step is sourced to a Tier-A external citation (DeVotta, Tambiah, lawnet.gov.lk statutory text, OHCHR resolutions, UN PoE 2011, OISL 2015). Steps 1–7 are the upstream foreclosures that made Vaddukoddai 1976 (step 8) necessary; steps 9–22 are the downstream attempts at remedy that have, in their turn, also exhausted. The narrowing is the empirical predicate for the Quebec/Kosovo/Aaland remedial reading in /case/law.