Dr. Sunil J. Wimalawansa (Professor of Medicine, Endocrinology, & Human Nutrition)

Summary:
This is the story of a nation that traded its strategic resources and large potential for global prosperity for a misguided, large-scale relocation and small-scale agrarian fantasy. Political greed led to rural colonization, environmental ruin, and the rise of predatory cartels. Fragmented land, debt cycles, and ecological collapse replaced innovation and trade. What could have mirrored Singapore became a cautionary tale of manufactured economic self-sabotage. Reversing this trajectory demands urban resettlement, development of infrastructure and utilities, power grid, dismantling corrupt monopolies (especially rural), and holding leaders accountable. Until then, the myth of development” will continue masking a deliberate assault on prosperity, ecosystems, environment, and the future. Sri Lanka was once poised to become the Singapore of the Indian Ocean. It has excellent resources, including excellent weather, water, climate, and a trainable workforce, and is devoid of major natural disasters. With strategic location, geographic advantages, world-class harbors, a profitable national airline (then), and vast coastal and deep-sea territories for fishing and energy generation, the nation had every advantage. Its natural assets—pristine beaches, lush rainforests, water heritage, diverse climates, and rich history and cultural heritage—offered immense potential for high-end tourism, medical travel, and hospitality-driven industries.

Introduction

Once poised to become the Singapore of the Indian Ocean” under the Colombo Plan, Sri Lanka held every conceivable advantage: a strategic location astride vital shipping lanes; deep-water harbors and international airports with the potential to be regional hubs; a profitable, state-owned national airline; vast coastal access and exclusive deep-sea territories; and unparalleled potential for high-end tourism—blending pristine beaches, lush mountains, rainforests, rich cultural heritage, and world-renowned hospitality.

The island also possessed fertile ground for knowledge-based growth. With minor reforms, Sri Lankan universities could have opened their doors to fee-paying international students, generating foreign exchange while fostering cultural diversity, intellectual exchange, and long-term business and research collaborations. Add to this its ancient civilization, abundant inland water resources for agriculture and renewable energy, a literate English-speaking workforce, and the potential to be a thriving regional financial hub—an idea that, ironically, Singapore borrowed from Sri Lanka’s own Colombo Plan blueprint seven decades ago.

However, instead of embracing urban dynamism, industrial expansion, and value-added manufacturing, Sri Lanka’s leaders chose a different course: rural colonization of previously uninhabited jungles. Families—mainly from the south—were relocated to the North Central and Eastern dry zones without the essential infrastructure to sustain life: safe drinking water, electricity, sanitation, education, or healthcare.

A Case Study from the Region to Illustrate Systemic Neglect―Chronic Kidney Disease of Uncertain Origin:

The emergence of chronic kidney disease of uncertain origin (CKDu) in Sri Lanka is not a medical mystery—it is a consequence of decades of political failure and environmental mismanagement. Poorly planned settlements in the dry zone, populated by subsistence farmers feeding urban elites while living in deprivation, became breeding grounds for disease and despair. These communities endured not only poverty and malnutrition but also the trauma of a thirty-year civil war that claimed thousands of civilian lives. Despite repeated warnings, successive governments failed to implement basic public health interventions, allowing CKDu to spread unchecked (click the links below).

[Wimalawansa, SJ, Dissanayake, CB, Factors affecting the environmentally induced, chronic kidney disease of unknown aetiology in dry zonal regions in tropical countries—novel findings. Environments, 7(2), 1-26, 2019; DOI: 10.3390/environments7010002  https://www.mdpi.com/2076-3298/7/1/2

Wimalawansa, SJ, Dissanayake, CB. Nanocrystal-induced chronic tubular-nephropathy in tropical countries: diagnosis, mitigation, and eradication. European Journal of Medical Research, 28, 221 (2023).  DOI: 10.1186/s40001-023-01162-y  https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1186/s40001-023-01162-y.pdf ]

The crisis escalated in the 1990s with the introduction of thousands of tube wells and agro-wells, which drew groundwater contaminated with calcium salts and fluoride ions—compounds known to crystallize in the kidneys and cause irreversible renal damage. By the time CKDu reaches Stage IIIB, recovery is impossible. Nevertheless, early-stage intervention with clean water could have reversed the damage and saved lives. This voiceless population is subjected to major socio-economic problems in the entire region, but no government has taken tangible steps to mitigate these. Even today, less than 40% of the affected population has access to potable water. Families have lost their livelihoods, children have abandoned education, and many have fled south to protect their children from the same fate.

Instead of addressing the root cause—access to clean water—governments have invested in renal hospitals and dialysis units, a reactive and costly approach that could have been avoided entirely. These facilities are monuments to the failure of the lack of preventative efforts, not progress. They failed to act to prevent this calamity via public education and the provision of potable water to the regions. Instead, it continues to focus on having renal dialysis units and building a renal hospital in Polonnaruwa. Prevention is the cure, not treatment. Meanwhile, regional intermediaries exploit farmers, and the state refuses to regulate market abuse or purchase rice directly, paralyzed by conflicts of interest. This is not a tale of oversight—it is a calculated abandonment of national potential. CKDu stands as a tragic emblem of how political expediency and economic sabotage can devastate communities and squander generations of promise.

The Agricultural and Agrochemical Myth: Political Theater and Its Lasting Damage

Migration of large number of families with false promises without providing basic necessities to previously uninhabited regions that led to thousands of premature deaths and provided dark future, can be considered as a crime against humanity. In these Mahaweli development areas, irrigated water alone could not have transformed isolated settlements into thriving towns. With eight virtually rainless months each year in CKDu-affeced regions, thousands of relocated families lived in fragile environments without access to clean water, relying on subsistence farming and daily wages. These hardships perpetuated poverty and poor health, resulting in many premature deaths. Malaria was once rampant, but other public health measures were almost nonexistent. Children’s education stalled, and economic mobility was all but impossible.

The injustice deepened with the rise of CKDu, a scourge that has devastated entire family clusters since the mid-1990s. The disease—linked to prolonged consumption of groundwater contaminated with calcium salts, fluoride, and sometimes pesticides or heavy metals—spread rapidly after the proliferation of tube wells and agro-wells, which over-extracted and concentrated these toxins. Without intervention, Stage IIIB renal failure becomes irreversible, and death is inevitable. However, consumption of clean water halts and even reverses early kidney damage; yet, only about one-third of households in the dry zones have access to safely managed drinking water sources. Although 94% of households have basic sanitation, just 3% are connected to proper piped sewerage systems—a gap that requires attention.

The injustice deepened with the rise of chronic kidney disease of uncertain origin (CKDu), a scourge that has devastated entire family clusters since the mid-1990s. The disease—linked to prolonged consumption of groundwater contaminated with calcium salts and fluoride—spread rapidly after the proliferation of tube wells and agro-wells, which over-extracted and concentrated these toxins. Without intervention, Stage IIIB renal failure becomes irreversible, and death is inevitable. While clean water can halt and even reverse early damage, less than 40% of residents have access to it even after three decades. In addition, not having a national water plan, notably, about 95% of households still do not have sanitary toilets/disposal system. 

With human encroachment of the jungle, wildlife habitats have reduced. Human‒elephant confrontation and associated deaths, escalated. Water tables collapsed needing inhabitants to dig deep tube wells to extract naturally contaminated ground water. The habit of consuming less water due to hardness caused chronic dehydration.

The consequences have been catastrophic: loss of breadwinners, deepening poverty, malnutrition, school dropouts, and whole communities sliding into despair. Local produce from these hardship-hit regions is routinely exploited by unscrupulous middlemen, while the government—citing conflicts of interest—refuses to purchase directly from farmers. This is more than a story of squandered opportunities. It is a record of deliberate neglect and economic sabotage—one that has denied generations their rightful share of Sri Lanka’s promise.

The Missed Urban Miracle: What Could Have Been

Had officials adopted a broader vision, shown empathy, and conducted thorough ground-level assessments—including water quality testing, drainage planning, soil studies, and health and safety evaluations—before relocating families, the outcomes could have been far more positive. With its prime geographic position on major trade routes, the nation had the potential to develop a modern, service-driven economy—importing affordable food while exporting innovation, advanced services, and high-value products.

Strategic investment in infrastructure, healthcare, education, and research could have attracted global capital, transforming these regions into hubs of trade, finance, technology, and tourism, like Singapore or Hong Kong. This approach could have lifted millions out of poverty through meaningful employment and entrepreneurship. Instead, leaders clung to outdated, subsistence-based policies driven by short-term political gain, neglecting opportunities to modernize and prosper. The result has been decades of lost potential, entrenched poverty, poor health, and immense economic loss—an enduring cost of choosing subsistence over strategy. Instead, successive governments chose subsistence over strategy.

A Blueprint for Recovery: What Must Be Done

Reversing this decades-long trajectory of stagnation and exploitation requires more than superficial policy adjustments—it calls for a complete transformation of the national development model. Urban resettlement must be pursued with dignity, ensuring that relocated rural populations gain access to quality education, modern healthcare, and meaningful employment opportunities. Simultaneously, the protection of fragile ecosystems must be prioritized by revoking licenses for industrial agriculture in ecologically sensitive areas, preventing further environmental degradation and safeguarding natural resources for future generations.

This overhaul must also address the entrenched structures of exploitation that have fueled inequality. Assets accumulated through systemic abuse and corruption should be confiscated and redirected toward public welfare and national development. Equally critical is the demand for political accountability—investigating, exposing, and prosecuting those responsible for decades of economic mismanagement. Only by dismantling these corrupt foundations and replacing them with transparent, equitable governance can the nation break free from its cycle of underdevelopment and build a sustainable, inclusive future. In Sri Lanka, to date, there has been no political or economic accountability for any of the failed large projects. An impartial, independent commission must investigate and hold leaders responsible for decades of economic mismanagement.

Call It What It Is: The Silent War on Economic Stability

Framing the Crisis: Economic decline is rarely accidental: not them, not now. What we are witnessing is not a natural downturn or an unfortunate misstep—it’s the result of deliberate (false)choices, entrenched policies, and systemic neglect, obtaining commission-driven contracts and loans. From underfunded healthcare systems to exploitative labor structures, an inferior education system with little potential for growth, and widening wealth gaps, the architecture of economic collapse has been carefully laid brick by brick. To call it anything less than economic assassination is to ignore the precision with which livelihoods are dismantled, and futures are stolen.

The Call to Action: This should have been a wake-up call some time ago. We must confront the forces that have normalized inequality and institutionalized suffering. Calling the crisis economic assassination” shifts the focus from observation and sympathy to resistance and compassion. It demands accountability, reform, and a collective reimagining of systems that prioritize human dignity over profit. The time for euphemisms is over; clarity is the first step toward justice.