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Conferring Honorary Titles- To Honour or Serve An Ulterior Motive?

By Ramani D.Wickramaratne

Email messages which end up in the Spam Mail eventually can be very intriguing and also tempting to a person who is desperate to become an accepted personality in society. An example of emails that come into one's mailbox on a daily basis trying to sell university qualifications and diplomas without one having the basic academic qualifications, is stated below just to show the readers how cheap and insulting education has become today. Money can do almost anything even for an "empty head" & "Hey Presto!" he can add BA/Dip./Ph.D or MBA behind his name and feel so good about it.

Quote:
"Not able to get a high pay job due to "NO" University Degree/Dip1oma? You can buy it now..."

Erna Melinda to me
Would you like to:
Increase Your Salary?
Increase Your Ability to find other work?
Increase Your Marketability?
Increase Your Desirability?

Please call:
1-718-989-5740 [Inside USA]
+1-718-989-5740 [Outside USA]

Is an University Degree/Dip1oma holding you back? Kindly call us To inquire about Our degree programs.

Whether you are seeking a Diploma, Bachelor, M B A/ P h D We can Provide you credentials to get you Better Career
No Study, Exam, test, or course works required

Please call:
1-718-989-5740 [Inside USA]
+1-718-989-5740 [Outside USA]

Please leave us your "Name, country & phone no. with Country code" - Our staff will call you back soon
(End Quote)

How very tempting! Such mails arrive in email mailboxes by the dozen each day.

For whatever reason best known to those who have earned such cheap qualifications, issuing such qualifications must be an extremely lucrative business which can earn you quite a lot of US Dollars, if you have the proper channel to process it. In a materialistic competitive world such businesses must be thriving and highly lucrative.

During the last decade or so, in Sri Lanka it has become a highly fashionable trend and a money spinner for bogus institutions to confer Honorary Doctorates & Titles to murderers, thugs & mafia gang leaders, self-seeking egoistic politicians without academic qualifications and "school drop-outs" for them to be accepted in society and be called "Dr……..", be photographed receiving their bogus certificates wearing the Cap & Gown and reported in the local newspapers to gain publicity. From then on, erudite scholars who have excelled in their academic careers and laboured for years to write their Doctoral Theses before gaining their hard earned Diplomas, Degrees, MBAs and Ph. Ds are required to address the other category that "purchased their qualifications" as "Dr…….!"

In bygone days, learning was considered as a Noble Human Endeavour and it was with a sense of pride and dignity that one strived to obtain educational qualifications through hard work. The Convocation Ceremony was a milestone in one's life & thenceforth one endeavoured to live up to the high ideals of one's profession. Today, the educated in Sri Lankan society are being ridiculed and side-tracked and the way is paved for money and thuggery to rule the day.

Similarly, it used to be that only a highly educated personality who served his profession and society with academic achievements, dignity and decorum and earned high accolades both locally and internationally that was conferred with Honorary Titles to appreciate the services rendered and the respect and reputation brought to one's Motherland -Sri Lanka. The entire country would raise their hats to such personalities.

In a bid to further insult society, a new trend seems to have emerged where religious groups especially Buddhist Sects or Nikayas where the Nayake Theros are being pressured into demeaning themselves by conferring Honorary Titles to politicians who are not even Buddhists or social workers who have served our country honestly, loyally and with commitment. They have been known to be scrounging & running behind our Maha Nayakes and the four main Nikayas begging for Honorary Titles- we could certainly name quite a few who qualify and fall into this category which is an absolute insult to the entire country. Certain universities have also conferred such Honorary Titles on well known business magnates purely to boost their egos. There seems to be absolutely no guilt in the minds of these recipients that they are not only fooling themselves but also ridiculing the entire country as well as the highest institutions of education in this country making it a mockery.

Until recently this game has been played only with our local citizens but there seems to be some NGOs which are now planning to insult Sri Lanka internationally by coming forward to confer Honorary Titles on foreigners and for this, they feel no shame at using Buddhist organisations and Buddhist Prelates as the "front" for their covert operations. Some of these NGOs have been working vehemently to destabilize the sovereignty of Sri Lanka and working tooth and nail to give legality and credibility to terrorist groups in Sri Lanka such as the LTTE which is world renowned to be the most brutal terrorist set up in the world! Innocent and unsuspecting Buddhist Monks in our country have been lured with sweet words, into joining the leaders of such NGOs. Quickly coined "bogus" organisations are formed, with fairly well known Buddhist Monks given the opportunity to play pivotal roles in order to invite internationally known personalities who have supposedly championed the cause of "peaceful co-existence" or become peace promoters with hidden agendas. During the past 6 months or so, one NGO leader has been writing articles even to the local newspapers extolling the virtues of The Buddha and Mahatma Gandhi with the intention of ridiculing Sri Lanka because it is noted as being an important Buddhist country in the world more so in South East Asia. Terrorism was not extolled either by The Buddha or Mahatma Gandhi and there is no need whatsoever to drag these names into one's dirty game of international politics and furtherance of terrorism.

It was rather disturbing to learn that a Buddhist Organisation or seemingly so, is organising a ceremony under the auspices of "International Network of Engaged Buddhists" with their contacts in Grandpass-Colombo 14. Even the Letterhead is only a computer designed one. We are hearing this name for the first time in this country and without a doubt, it is one of these "quick sprouting mushroom organisations" with ulterior motives with the hidden hand of a powerful foreign backer. The fact that this is a quick shot is quite obvious because the invitation letter sent out states in the middle of the invitation in Sinhala, that the ceremony will be conducted at 4.00 p.m. on 29th November 2008 at the Bandaranaike International Memorial Conference Hall(BMICH) but a special reception for special invitees for a cordial discussion at Renuka Hotel-Colombo 3 will be held on 29th November 2008 from 10.00am to 1.00 p.m. The normal practise is that one has the main function followed by a reception at one and the same venue! The special event on this day according to the invitation letter is to confer and Honorary Title from the Amarapura Maha Sangha Sabha on 2 erudite scholars, one from Thailand named Prof. Sulak Sivaraksa and the other Prof. Rev. Dharmachari Lokamitra a westerner based and working in India. It seems that these two erudite scholars are specialists in the field of NGOs and peace processes!

We certainly hope that Sri Lanka is not insulting such personalities by inviting them to this country without informing them of any hidden agendas of the organising group. It is also of interest to know whether or not these personalities have been working closely with the Amarapura Maha Sangha Sabha before and for how long, as well as what their contributions have been towards our Sri Lankan Buddhist community because Conferring Honorary Titles must never be treated lightly and we should not in any way show our disrespect to foreign personalities who are being invited to be recipients of such titles.

Let us hope that these erudite dignitaries are not being invited to Sri Lanka, to advocate the virtues of the "non-violent path of negotiation" with an extremist group of terrorists, which has been tried on several occasions during the past 25 years and proven to be totally ineffective, resulting in more death and destruction in the country. Let not the Amarapura Maha Sangha Sabha be taken for a ride!



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