By Rohana R. Wasala Fears have been expressed by concerned groups and individuals that the special place now enjoyed by Buddhism in the Constitution is likely to be done away with as part of the reforms proposed by the experts appointed to advise the government based on public representations. But government ministers confidently dismiss such concerns […]

By Rohana R. Wasala What appeared to have happened on the Jaffna University campus on July 16, 2016 (as judged from newspaper reports, electronic and social media, personal communication, etc) was an unprovoked attack by some racist Tamils (both students and outsiders representing perhaps a minority of hardcore separatist sympathizers) on a troupe of  Kandyan dancers […]

By Rohana R. Wasala Apropos ‘Perahera through the eyes of elephants’/Opinion/The Island/August 9, 2016, written by ‘Concerned Citizens of Sri Lanka’ on behalf of ‘Sentinels Against Wildlife Crime’ (SAWC). Their motto seems to be ‘Say No to Cruelty to Our Elephants of Sri Lanka’. A very laudable objective. The concern they show about cruelty to wildlife […]

By Rohana R. Wasala One’s own self-worth is tied to the worth of the community to which one belongs, which is intimately connected to humanity in general. What happens in Darfur becomes an assault on my own community, and on me as an individual. That’s what the human family is all about.-Wole Soyinka (b. 1934), Nigerian […]

By Rohana R. Wasala It goes without saying that the lives (meaning the future) of the students of the South Asian Institute of Technology and Medicine (SAITM) at Malabe and of the students agitating against the private institution are infinitely more important than the government’s policy decisions on education or its own survival. If necessary, policy […]

By Rohana R. Wasala Now is the winter of our discontent Made glorious summer by this sun of York.–          Opening lines of the Shakespeare play ‘Richard III’ uttered by (the Duke of) Gloucester who later became King Richard III ‘Listening to discontent’ by Sanjana Hattotuwa (Sunday Island/June 26, 2016) attempts an answer to the writer’s own […]

By Rohana R. Wasala (Courtesy The Island)   And we shall play a game of chess, Pressing lidless eyes and waiting for a knock upon the door.  From ‘A Game of Chess’( the second canto of The Waste Land” by T.S. Eliot) Meaning of the epigraph These lines from Eliot contain an allusion to the comedy A […]

By Rohana R. Wasala The armed terrorist struggle for creating a separate state in Sri Lanka was decisively defeated in 2009. But the separatist ideology is still very much alive and there are signs of it flourishing again. According to the US State Department the LTTE fronts active in that country continued their collection of funds […]

By Rohana R. Wasala According to the last census (2012), the total population of Sri Lanka is 21 million; the Sinhalese account for 75% of it, Tamils (+ Indian Tamils) 15%, and Muslims 9%. In terms of religion, the percentages are as follows: Buddhism 70%, Hinduism 13%, Christianity 8%, and Islam 10%. (To get these percentages, […]

By Rohana R. Wasala Courtesy The Island The recent furore over eastern province chief minister  SLMC provincial council member Ahmed Nazeer’s outrageously humiliating treatment of the commanding officer of the Sampur navy camp Captain I.R. Premaratne during a function at Sampur Maha Vidyalaya in Trincomalee presided over by the provincial governor Austin Fernando and graced by the […]

By Rohana R. Wasala (This article was recently published in two parts in The Island daily (Sri Lanka) under the title ‘Carlo Fonseka’s ESSAYS OF A LIFETIME” – A personal appreciation’ as a tribute to the distinguished Sri Lankan  it is about. I am happy to share it with Lankaweb readers, under a new title as […]

By Rohana R. Wasala Following is a slightly edited version of a ‘letter to the editor’ that I sent to the under-mentioned recipient. Since s/he seems to have found it too long to accommodate in the valued columns of that paper, I decided to seek the indulgence of the Lankaweb. Editor Daily News Sir/Madam, This refers […]

By Rohana R. Wasala When I recently watched the You Tube video of the launch of the book To End a Civil War: Norway’s Peace Engagement in Sri Lanka” at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London held on October 28, 2015, I felt sorry for British  ‘writer, researcher, and consultant’ Mark […]

By Rohana R. Wasala Courtesy The Island That ‘Old soldiers never die, they just fade away’ was the wisdom that General Douglas MacArthur (1880-1964) of World War II fame had acquired about the common but uncommonly honourable fate of a retired soldier. He distinguished himself as an army officer in both World Wars fought in the last […]

By Rohana R. Wasala Courtesy The Island Thou dost conspire against thy friend, Iago, If thou but think’st him wronged and mak’st his ear A stranger to thy thoughts. – Othello , the eponymous hero of the Shakespeare play of the same name The political stability that Sri Lanka enjoyed for a brief five years after the conclusion […]

By Rohana R. Wasala Let’s go invent tomorrow rather than worrying about what happened yesterday. –Steve Jobs The political stability that Sri Lanka enjoyed for a brief five years after the conclusion of the civil conflict in 2009 brought about tangible economic development and social progress in a nationally secure, peaceful environment. Of the economic growth […]

By Rohana R. Wasala Untouchable Woman’s Odyssey (‘2014, Nalanda Publishing Canada. ISBN 978-0-9867198-0-6.), a novel by Suwanda H.J. Sugunasiri, a Canadian of Sri Lankan origin, is a story set against the socio-political background of southern Sri Lanka. The novel was first published in 2010. It covers an eventful period in the island nation’s recent history from […]

By Rohana R. Wasala Courtesy The Island Anagarika Dharmapala (1864-1933) is arguably Sri Lanka’s greatest national hero that emerged between 1815 – the year that the kingdom of Sinhale was brought under foreign imperial rule in its entirety for the first and the last time in its more than two thousand years of unbroken existence – […]

By Rohana R. Wasala Let us never forget that government is ourselves and not an alien power over us. The ultimate rulers of our democracy are not a President and senators and congressmen and government officials, but the voters of this country.” Franklin D. Roosevelt, the 32nd American president (1933-45) (This is an ordinary citizen’s personal […]

By Rohana R. Wasala Courtesy The Island Ven. Galaboda Atthe Gnanasara Thera, General Secretary of Bodu Bala Sena, who had been charged with contempt of court, was arrested and remanded on surrendering to the Homagama magistrate’s court on 26 Tuesday. Some young monks of the BBS behaved riotously trying to prevent their leader from being taken […]

By Rohana R. Wasala Courtesy The Island Rushdie is a perfect master of his medium and his message. The two elements define and shape each other. Those who attack the work purely on religious grounds totally miss the point, for they trivialize the book’s meaning to the point of absurdity. The real importance of the novel lies […]

By Rohana R. Wasala Courtesy The Island ‘A poet’s work. To name the unnameable, to point at frauds, to take sides, start arguments, shape the world and stop it from going to sleep.’ Nonconformist satirical poet Baal, a character in The Satanic Verses The publication of Salman Rushdie’s fourth novel The Satanic Verses very nearly cost […]

By Rohana R. Wasala Courtesy The Island I heard about the novel Siddhartha and its author Hermann Hesse for the first time when it appeared in film version in 1972. Watching the film prompted me to read the book. It is claimed that the book enjoyed the highest global popularity it ever achieved during the period 1960 […]

By Rohana R. Wasala Courtesy The Island The German-born Nobel Prize-winning Swiss novelist, poet and essayist Hermann Hesse (1877-1962) is well known to most Sri Lankan readers of English literature as the author of the classic novel Siddhartha (originally written in the German language, but later made available in English translation). American Independent  film maker Conrad Rooks […]

By Rohana R. Wasala Courtesy The Island To be free of attachment and so also of anger, fear, and pain. Eat me, Professor Solanka silently prayed. Eat me, America, and give me peace. Salman Rushdie in his novel ‘Fury’ (2001) The Island editorial of November 24, 2015 entitled Power Play” about Samantha Power’s Sri Lanka visit provided […]

By Rohana R. Wasala This article was written on July 24, 2014 in reply to one of Mr Izeth Hussain’s articles in The Island a few days before that date. Mr Hussain wrote under the title Making Sense of Bodu Bala Sena”; the title of my article was a play on that. But my article was […]

By Rohana R. Wasala Courtesy The Island About a month ago, that is, around early September 2015, Prime Minister Narendra Modi of India described Bodh Gaya as the land of enlightenment”, when he visited the Buddhist shrine there, the Mahabodhi Temple. It was a happy coincidence, as he noted in his speech, that he got to visit […]

By Rohana R. Wasala Courtesy The Island Time will say nothing but I told you so Time only knows the price we have to pay; If I could tell you I would let you know. W.H. Auden If I could tell you” At long last, Sri Lankans may be arriving at the moment of truth in the […]

By Rohana R. Wasala Where national leadership is concerned, Mahinda Rajapaksa is a diamond; he may be a slightly flawed diamond, but he is the only diamond we have. The bitter lessons he has learned will help him to change himself into a polished gem of enhanced value. (These ideas are entirely my personal opinions. Readers […]

By Rohana R. Wasala We are familiar with the case of individuals who become obsessed with some project, plan or ambition and who devote themselves to it with great enthusiasm only to give up disheartened after a short period of focused engagement with it. I think it’s a fairly common experience among people. The Japanese have […]