Sugath Kulatunga

Sri Lanka Public Service (PS) is a massive organization with 1.3 million public servants in a ratio of 1to16 members of the population. It costs the government Around LKR 1 trillion annually on salaries and approximately LKR 300-400 billion annually on pensions. As a percentage of GDP Public sector expenditure represents about 10-15% of Sri Lanka’s GDP.

The largest service within the PS is the clerical service (CS), with 28,000 members which plays an important role in the PS by maintaining records and facilitating decision making. As subject clerks, they are the keepers of information.

The locus in which information is stored, analyzed, and decisions are recorded is the FILE, which is treated with reverence.

A file is like a book but with the difference that the first page of a file is the bottom/last page. On the left of a file are a few folios where minutes are recorded.  The standard procedure is when letters are received (called Tappal) the OA or the Chief Clerk distribute the mail to the relevant subject clerks.

In the olden days the subject clerks used to submit minutes quoting relevant rules and precedents and even pros and cons of a decision to be made. Most staff offifcers were over dependent on the recommendations of the subject clerks who were the jealous controllers of information leading to a tyranny of the subject clerks.

On the other hand, today most subject clerks submit files to staff officers with a perfunctory minute or the favorite submission of ‘for orders please’. At present minute sheets are not maintained, and endorsements are made on the letter received.

A popular criticism of the office procedure is that public servants are dictated to by the the contents in the ‘in-tray’.

The cyclic movement of Files are upwards for instructions and downwards for action.

In every office the daily attendance of personnel is recorded in an attendance register. Which is a farce. It is manipulated to accommodate late comers. It should be replaced with time recording machines. In city offices clock watching is a common practice towards closing times. Hardly any work is done during the last half an hour. In Colombo train times determine the office times of many public servants.

The average daily routine of many public servants is signing the attendance register, spending 10 minutes in the washroom, 20 minutes at breakfast in the canteen, another 30 minutes to browse through newspapers. These times may differ between males and females, but the fact is that they start work only after 40 to 60 minutes. There many exceptions.

The cost per hour of a public servant earning Rs 50,000 per month, works out to be

Rs 30 per hour or 50 cents per minute.

Can the public servants be blamed for this waste of time? Most of them who work in the City spend at least an hour on travel to office in jam-packed buses, perhaps standing. They do not have time in the morning to have breakfast at home. By the

time they come to office they are exhausted.

The urban travel time cannot be reduced due to traffic congestion which has no easy solution. The better answer is to decentralize the office system. There are two solutions. One is to move departments where the work is more relevant to a particular region to those regions. For example, Colombo District has no major irrigation works but this big department is located in Colombo. It can be shifted to Anuradhapura. The very large Department of Agriculture is in Peradeniya operating efficiently and effectively. This is necessary even as a measure of decentralized administration.

The second solution which becomes easier with digitalization is to establish satellite secretariats in the peripheral towns around Colombo. These can be located in towns which already have hospitals, schools and other facilities, like in Negombo, Minuwangoda, Homagama, Horana and Panadura. An example of such a possible set-up is given below. This will be a systems change to make the PS more effective and more public servant friendly.

Central Office:

1. Fiber optic line connects to a switch/router.
2. LAN devices (desktops, servers, printers) connect locally via Ethernet or Wi-Fi.
3. Satellite Office:
   • The other end of the fiber optic line connects to another switch/router.
   • LAN devices at the satellite office are integrated into the network.
4. Routing and Security:
   • A secure link (e.g., VPN or MPLS) ensures that data between the two offices is encrypted and safe.
   • IT teams might set up firewalls, VLANs, and QoS (Quality of Service) to prioritize traffic.

Where necessary CCTV cameras can also be installed for monitoring.

Sugath Kulatunga

London Talks

1971 මෙන්ම 1987 -1990 අතර කාලය ශ්‍රී ලාංකාවාසින් නැවත මතක් කරන්නට අකමැති මුසල දේශපාලකයන් මෙන්ම අවස්ථාවාදී මිනිස් වෙස් ගත් වෘකයන් ජිවත් වූ යුගයකි. අනෙක් අතින් සිය යුගයේ මිනිසුන්ගේ සහ ගැහැණුන්ගේ ජිවිත වලට යහපත් දවසක් උදා කිරීමේ හුදු අරමුණින් යුතුව සමාජ ශෝධනයක් සහ නව සමාජයක් උදෙසා සිය දිවි පරදුවට තබා සටන් වැදී මානව හිතවාදී, දේශ හිතැති, සිය ජිවිත මෙන්ම ඒ හා බැඳුනු සියළු දෑ අහිමි කර ගත් තරුණ පරපුරකි. එහෙත් අවි ආයුධ සහිත සහ ආරක්ෂක බල ඇණි සිය පාලනය යටතේ තමනට රිසි පරිදි මෙහෙයවා ගත් බල ලෝභී, කුරිරු, අධම කපටි දේශපාලකයන් ඔවුන් සතු බලය යොදවා උක්ත තරුණ නැගිටීම් අවි බලයෙන් මෙල්ල කලහ. එත් ඒවා තාවකාලික මෙල්ල කිරීම් වූ බව ඉතිහාසය මෙන්ම වතමානයද සාක්ෂි ගොනු කොට ඇත. 1971 මෙන්ම 1987-90 කාලයේදී සිය නිර්ධන පන්තියේ මිනිසුන්ගේ අයිතීන් රකින්නට තමනට ගෙවන්නට හැකිව තිබු සුඛෝපබෝගී ජීවිතය පවා අමතක කරමින් අධිටනින් කොට, ජේ ආර් ජයවර්ධනගේ රාජ්‍ය ත්‍රස්ත වාදී ආණ්ඩුවේ දැඩි උදහසට පත්වූ ඒ සුන්දර මිනිසා නමින් ප්‍රින්ස් ගුනසේකරය.ඔහු නීතිඥවරයෙකි වෘත්තියෙ වරයෙකි. ඔහු විසින් එංගලන්තයට පිටුවහල් කොට සිටියදී ලියන ලද ‘අහිමි පරපුර’ කෘතියේ දෙවන සන්ස්කරණය ජනගත කිරීම වෙනුවෙන් පවත්වන ලද සම්මුඛ සාකච්චාවකි. වැඩසටහනේ සම්පත්දායකයන්: ජ්‍යෙෂ්ට මාධ්‍යවෙදී, ගත් කතුවර නන්දන වීරරත්න නීතිඥ රන්ජිත් පනාමුල්ලේ ගාමිණි මුතුකුමාරණ වැඩ සටහන මෙහෙයවීම : හේම සිරිවර්ධන , හිටපු ජ්‍යෙෂ්ට කථිකාචාර්ය ජනමාධ්‍ය

By Nalliah Thayabharan

Canada’s deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance, Chrystia Freeland, quit her job, just before she was set to deliver the latest budget, like calling in sick before an important meeting that you know you can’t handle. The $62 billion deficit that was set to be announced – $22 billion more than finance minister Chrystia Freeland’s projected target – might have had something to do with it.

Chrystia Freeland claimed that she was pushed out first, though, writing in her resignation letter to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, On Friday, you told me you no longer want me to serve as your Finance Minister and offered me another position in the cabinet.”  Chrystia Freeland also informed that she rejected costly political gimmicks” like sales tax holidays and one time cash handouts, presumably, which she herself had spent months relentlessly promoting. Chrystia Freeland makes it sound like she was a sudden voice of reason, and referred to strenuous efforts this fall to manage our spending in ways that will give us the flexibility we will need to meet the serious challenges presented by the United States.”

The first person to descend at any random bus stop in Canada is about as qualified as Chrystia Freeland to manage Canada’s finances, and this would explain why inflation, cost of living, and unemployment have skyrocketed on her watch. But it’s really just a vibecession,” she recently suggested. Damn Canadians just need to shift their mindset and stop pretending that her economy sucks.

Canadians are always the problem for Chrystia Freeland, particularly when Canadians stand in the way of whatever agenda this World Economic Forum protégée and trustee is trying to force feed them. When Canadians pushed back against Covid jab mandates through the Freedom Convoy trucker movement, Chrystia Freeland ordered their bank accounts blocked.

Chrystia Freeland’s expertise seems to come from the financial journalism that she did, from Ukraine, where her grandfather once ran a World War II-era Nazi newspaper. Maybe she could just go be the finance minister there now, since the Ukrainian Canadian Congress just issued a statement calling her one of the key leaders in the G7 and international community in developing the plan to use frozen Russian assets to support Ukraine, she ensured continued and predictable support for Ukraine’s defense of the freedom of Europe.”

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz called for a no-confidence vote against himself on Monday, officially asking the parliamentarians of the Bundestag whether they might wish to do him the honor of taking a foot to his arsch – a case of political suicide-by-cop. Chancellor Olaf Scholz wanted them to put his current mandate out of its misery because he’s totally impotent, politically speaking. Why? Because the yellow light centrists of his traffic light coalition bailed on him and he no longer has the majority needed to ram things through parliament.

All this came about because Scholz’s finance minister, Christian Lindner, from the centrist Free Democratic Party, decided back in November that he wasn’t interested in a career as a magician attempting to work miracles with Scholz’s spending priorities. Germany virtue-signaled itself right into economic devastation following along with EU sanctions to impress their girlfriend Vladimir Zelensky. Then Scholz told his finance minister to just lift his foot up off the debt brake a bit so he can go on another €15 billion ($15.7 billion) spending joyride for Ukraine. And Lindner was like, nope, how about you just dust off some of those long-range Taurus missiles in the closet and give those to your girlfriend instead? Yeah, they’re dangerous, but they’re also just sitting there like an unused exercise bike with laundry hanging off it, so it’s a win-win – well, except for that World War III risk.

Chancellor Olaf Scholz didn’t want to do that because it would mean babysitting Kiev so it didn’t start a third world war against Russia. It would also mean sending German troops to Ukraine so Zelensky could sit on their lap and pretend to drive the Tauruses. And it’s never the toddler who gets blamed for those accidents.

So Scholz and Lindner had a falling out over a month ago that ultimately led to a breakup, with Lindner and his yellow light centrists walking away from Scholz’s coalition table like a teenaged clique in the school cafeteria.

German lawmakers welcomed the opportunity to kick Scholz in the lederhosen and out of the Biergarten. One down, one more to go. Because next up (probably) is Christian Democrat leader Friedrich Merz, currently topping the polls ahead of an expected February election. He seems keen on giving Washington and Brussels even more power over German decision-making. Yeah, maybe Washington can advise Berlin on nail placement for its economic coffin, too? As if that’s really Germany’s big issue right now – that it wasn’t sycophantic enough under Scholz, with Merz saying how it was embarrassing how Scholz acted in the European Union.” Scholz shrugged off Nord Stream being blown up, putting the German economy at the mercy of pricey American gas, and Merz doesn’t think Scholz was enough of a team player?

Ukrainians sound about as well-off now as a result of Chrystia Freeland’s efforts as Europeans are free,” so she’s clearly done a bang-up job on both fronts. Just like she has in Canada.

Next up to pop the escape hatch: Prime Minister Justin Trudeau himself. Maybe. He’s reportedly considering his options. Ziplining into oblivion behind Chrystia Freeland sounds like a good one. If all these globalists could please just form an orderly line for a permanent express checkout, they’d be doing their citizens and the entire Western world so much more of a service than their presence ever has.

The Western political establishment is in crisis. The dominoes are falling, and it’s the leaders who once championed the very agendas driving their countries into economic and political disarray who are now jumping ship. German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and Canadian Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland have already taken the emergency exits, leaving behind chaos and fractured coalitions. The big question now is who else will flee soon.

Western leaders are pushing the world towards a global economic collapse and military conflict which could cost millions of lives. In the Middle East despite overwhelming evidence of fundamentalism and genocide, and also deliberately antagonizing China into conflict through escalated militarization in the Pacific, South China Sea and Indian Ocean.

Because the Global South is unifying economically and strategically, and with time will challenge the Western dominance which enables it to extract wealth and resources from poorer nations like Sri Lanks. Western imperialism is threatened, and Western governments clearly see war as the means for maintaining the status quo. 

By Dimitris Konstantakopoulos .Courtesy defenddemocracy

In my previous article on Syria I argued that there is a Damascus-Tehran (not forgetting Lebanon and Palestine) train that is now preparing to depart”.

The ink on the article did not have time to ‘dry’, so to speak, since no ink is used anymore, and the train started to whistle for departure.

The Prime Minister of Israel himself, after congratulating himself for the triumph” in Syria, rushed to address a speech in English to the citizens of Iran, promising regime change” much sooner than he thought, with the help of Israel itself of course. Judging by what happened in Syria, we can imagine what fate awaits the Iranians and their country if these plans come to fruition. 

According to the Times of Israel, the Israeli armed forces have already begun preparations for an attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities, considering that, after the destruction of Syria, a window of opportunity” has been created. Netanyahu accused Iraq and Iran as early as 1992 (!) of being ready to build nuclear weapons, accusations that were never proven, rather the opposite, but served as an excuse for the US-British invasion of Iraq, of which he himself was the architect. In an attempt perhaps to restrain Israel’s hotheads, CIA chief William Burns stressed last October that there was no sign of a change in Tehran’s decision not to build nuclear weapons. Similar assessments have been made by the International Atomic Energy Agency and the US Pentagon. 

Of course Israel wants to destroy Iran’s nuclear programme. But as in the case of Iraq, the alleged existence or preparation to acquire nuclear weapons serves as a pretext. The real aim is to overthrow the regime in Iran, if not to dismember that country, in accordance with the Yinon and Cohen strategies and the neoconservative Middle East war programme drawn up under the supervision of the current Israeli Prime Minister.(see for example the important article by the distinguished Columbia University Professor Jeffrey Sachs, the article and Ekaterina Matoi’s article on the geopolitics of Zionism)

Besides, the constant aggression and threats against Iran tend to act as a self-fulfilling prophecy” that may eventually push Iran to build nuclear weapons.

The American factor 

Mr. Netanyahu knows, however, that Israel’s forces are not sufficient for such a purpose. Despite Israeli triumphalism, despite Israel’s great recent successes, Iran remains a powerful military force and a serious state. No one can be sure what an attack on it will mean and what the results of an attack on it will be. 

That is why Netanyahu wants both the approval and the assistance of the Americans. And because he has tried many times to get it, often by methods of deception and misinformation, he has created a kind of antibodies” inside the American state, especially in the armed forces, to some extent in the CIA, and even in part of the US political staff, despite its unprecedented dependence on the Lobby. 

But Netanyahu’s forces are already working in Trump’s environment to get the approval of the newly elected American President who, in his first four years of government, has more or less acted as a Netanyahu’s proxy. The assistance of Israel’s intelligence services also apparently played a decisive role in his election in 2016. Trump abrogated the international Iran nuclear deal that Obama had concluded, thus paving the way for the wars now being fought and the much larger ones that threaten to break out. 

After all, Trump himself urged Netanyahu last October to attack Iran’s nuclear facilities, either because he shares this goal or because he wanted to get more support from the Israeli lobby. Of course he did not say what America should do. He remembers and even said it once that he agreed with Netanyahu for a joint operation to assassinate one of Iran’s leaders, General Suleymani, but in the end Israel left him in the cold to carry it out on his own, causing a near war between the US and Iran. 

 Trump, of course, faces two problems. The first is that he was elected promising Americans to stop the wars, not start new ones, even if deception and promise reversal has now,  for structural reasons,  become the bread and butter of Western politics. All tendencies of the Western establishment make policies contrary to the expectations of the vast majority of citizens. Even if they don’t want to, most Western politicians are forced to lie. 

 When jihadist and Turkish forces invaded Syria, Trump said it was none of his business, it was a Syrian affair. Of course, the American, British and Israeli secret services have close ties with the jihadists, Turkey is a member of NATO, even NATO’s secretary Rutte was in Ankara on the eve of the attack on Syria, where the head of the Israeli spy agency, Shin Bet, also went. But in the absence of a direct, visible American involvement Trump could say it was none of his business. And the American magazine Time, which did a long interview with the new president made sure not to ask him anything about Syria. 

 The second problem Trump faces is that Iran is a critical strategic ally of Russia and China. He must be confident that these two states will not decisively assist Tehran in the event of an attack on it. 

To deal with the first problem, he has already begun to prepare public opinion. Speaking to Time, he did not rule out the possibility of the United States being at war with Iran, and the magazine itself helped him by raising the unsubstantiated, if not outrageous, theory that Tehran had tried to assassinate him. The whole interview, moreover, constitutes a statement of adherence to Netanyahu’s Middle East agenda, with Trump neither defending the long-standing position of two states in Palestine nor disapproving of the possibility of Israel’s annexation of the West Bank. At the same time, his transition team” staff leaked to the Wall Street Journal information that he is seriously discussing attacks on Iran’s nuclear facilities.

Stick to Tehran, carrot to Moscow. 

But Trump has also to calm down Moscow, if he plans an attack on Iran.  

In the same interview to Time, Trump decried Western long-range missile strikes deep into Russian territory and stressed the need to stop the conflict in Ukraine, even saying at one point that Kiev should back off a bit, but avoiding being even remotely specific about the kind of agreement he seeks and believes possible. Of course, the disapproval of the strikes came more than a month late and after Moscow responded with a warning military escalation. It is, after all, unlikely that Biden would not have briefed Trump in his meeting with him before the strikes were launched or that Trump would have strongly disagreed and not made his disagreement public in time. 

 Of course, what Trump will do about the Ukrainian issue after assuming the presidency remains completely uncertain. For now, what is certain is what is happening in the Middle East. 

The heart of the Empire—the true power behind the increasingly absurd Western governments—now appears to be divided into various factions. However, most of these factions share a common strategic goal: maintaining the West’s global dominance at any cost. This may involve instigating a world war while striving to avoid nuclear annihilation, though the likelihood of completely avoiding this outcome over the long term seems very improbable.  

There are of course serious tactical differences between the various sections of the ruling oligarchy in the West, including the choice of targets and the timing of the attacks. Some give priority to Russia, others to Iran, others to China. Those who may possibly realise that all this is dangerous and dead-end adventurism probably constitute a small and marginalised minority. Maybe some do understand that NATO is unable to realise its ambitions,  that it has already been defeated, and think it would be well advised to recognise reality and move on to other fronts, undistracted from Ukraine. But even them they would like before doing it to get as much as they can from Russia. Others consider probably a disaster to acknowledge reality, that is, defeat in Ukraine. We cannot know now which part will prevail.  

 Iran, key to the world situation 

The speed at which Netanyahu is moving, Palestine, Lebanon, Syria, Iran, with parallel strikes in Iraq and Yemen, is somewhat reminiscent of the lightning wars” that Germany waged between 1939 and 1941, occupying one after another European countries before taking by surprise the Soviet Union, which thought it had an alliance with it, in June 1941. 

It is also reminiscent of the period from 1989 to 1991, when one after another the Eastern regimes collapsed before the players had time to fully realise the stakes and organise their defences. 

The destruction of Syria is certainly a serious blow to the world forces resisting American-Israeli hegemonism and the quest for the reconstitution of a unipolar world, but it is also a great victory for the forces of Chaos and the Clash of Civilisations”  in reality the War against Civilization. It would not make sense to deny the reality. But the overthrow of the Iranian regime and the dissolution of Iran would be a world-class catastrophe. It would plunge the entire Middle East into chaos, torpedo all Chinese plans and Beijing’s access to essential energy resources, and turn it into a privileged base of aggressive campaign in the former USSR, Russia and China and elsewhere, while further encouraging a Western aggression already manifesting itself strongly and simultaneously from Moldova, Romania and Georgia to South Korea, Venezuela and Cuba. 

 Such an outcome would be an immense strategic victory of the collective West, which of course includes Israel to its rank and with a special leading” role. Of course, even is such a scenario will come true in the long and very long run the West (the Empire) does not have the ability to take over the whole planet. But it has the ability to destroy human civilization, as events in Syria prove.  

Instead of going to a world of cooperation, necessary to manage productive forces and technologies that can destroy life on Earth, we are going back to the mentality of Alexander the Great, the Roman Emperors, Napoleon or Hitler, which except of being morally reprehensive, are also unrealistic, they will get all of humanity to annihilation. If we want to save humanity, we must all mobilise to turn this page. 

Mankind may once again stand at a pivotal moment in its history, one potentially as significant as 1989, or at the very least, of great historical importance. We find ourselves at a new crossroads in world history, perhaps equally crucial to the transformative period of 1989–91. 

The outcome in Iran will decide the direction our world will take for decades. 

PS. One can’t help but wonder about China’s conspicuous absence during the Middle East crisis. Could Beijing have not extended even a modest form of financial aid to Syria, which was being bombarded by sanctions and airstrikes from all sides? What is China’s strategy in allowing others—many smaller nations in particular—to be crushed by the overwhelming force of Western military, economic, and political pressure, while it sits idly by, accumulating wealth, and in dollars at that? Is Beijing waiting for the U.S. to arrive in the Taiwan Strait or the Korean Peninsula before taking action? By then, it will be too late, and the costs will be far higher.

Now Iran’s turn. The spectre of a new “1989”

Judge Napolitano – Judging

Courtesy NewsIn.Asia

Dec 17 (NewsWire) – Sri Lanka has renewed its interest in joining BRICS, with President Anura Kumara Dissanayake conveying the country’s aspirations during his three-day state visit to India.

India’s Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri during a special media briefing on President Dissanayake’s visit said that Sri Lanka’s request however will be considered only when BRICS deliberates new memberships in the future.

Currently, there are no new members being considered by BRICS in addition to the ones that were already on the list since last year. But as and when there is a consensus within BRICS to start looking at new members, we will certainly take into account the interest expressed by Sri Lanka. This was something communicated to the Prime Minister by President Dissanayake,” Misri said.

BRICS, a forum for cooperation among emerging economies, currently includes nine members: Brazil, China, Egypt, Ethiopia, India, Iran, Russia, South Africa, and the United Arab Emirates.

Earlier this year, Sri Lanka formally applied for BRICS membership, signaling its interest in aligning with the bloc of rapidly developing nations.

By P.K.Balachandran Courtesy NewsIn.Asia

 Colombo, December 17: In much the same way as it wooed the pro-China Maldivian President Mohamed Muizzu, New Delhi is now wooing Sri Lanka’s new pro-Chinese President Anura Kumara Dissanayake with generous and timely financial grants.  

Many grants and big ticket development initiatives were announced by India during the talks between Dissanayake and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi held in New Delhi on Monday.

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Both sides candidly stated their interests and concerns, but at the same time agreed to work around the ticklish ones to put the relationship on a mutually beneficial and durable footing.  

Dissanayake and Modi had clearly struck a chord which was evident in their body language, with Modi putting his hand over Dissanayake’s shoulder in an easy manner as an elder would do to a younger person. The two were sporting broad smiles as they engaged in their one-on-one interaction.

The bonhomie appeared to emerge from the fact that both Dissanayake and Modi came from the same political stock. Both had humble origins, and had risen to the top from the grassroots level, honing their ideas and political skills in the course of a long and arduous political journey.

Mutual empathy and accommodation were evident in the joint communique issued at the end of the talks.  Being ardently and sometimes fiercely nationalistic, Dissanayake and Modi put forward their countries’ concerns and interests in a definitive manner, even as they compromised on some issues to find middle ground that will be a basis for building a sustainable relationship.

What came through from the Delhi parleys was that India and Sri Lanka were aware that their relationship was umbilical and that there was no way that they could discard, disregard or ride rough shod over each other.  

Historic Transition 

A few years back, such a scenario could not be imagined. The Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP), to which Dissanayake belongs, had built itself as an avowedly nationalistic force resolutely opposed to India’s Sri Lanka policy since the 1980s, seeing it as hegemonic.

But with Dissanayake’s ascendance to the leadership of the JVP and the JVP’s metamorphosis as the broad-based National Peoples’ Power (NPP), the equation with India changed almost radically.

In the guise of NPP”, the JVP acquired, within a remarkably short period, a wider social class ethnic, religious and geographic constituency. This propelled a small NPP with only three MPs, to the pinnacle of power in Sri Lanka, namely the Executive Presidency and a majority in parliament. These feats made New Delhi sit up and take notice.

The moment Dissanayake won the Presidential election against the predictions of conventional political pundits, Indian External Affairs Minister S.Jaishankar rushed to Colombo to congratulate him and made some irresistible offers to build friendship with the new kid on the block before rival China could do it. The fear in India and the West was that Dissanayake as a pro-China leftist would continue to be so.   

Dissanayake was receptive to Jaishankar, accepting most of the latter’s offers. He also assured Jaishankar that his government would not allow Sri Lanka to be used against India’s security. The allusion was to China’s bid to find a foothold in Sri Lanka with an intention to complete the encirclement of India. By assuring India on its security concerns, Dissanayake addressed New Delhi’s principal concern vis-à-vis Sri Lanka, which is its policy on China.      

Comprehensive Partnership

At the Delhi talks, Dissanayake told Modi that he deeply appreciated the unwavering support given by India during and after the unprecedented economic crisis in 2022. He added that he looked forward to India’s continued support. Prime Minister Modi, in turn, assured him of India’s full commitment in this regard.

The two leaders went further and affirmed their commitment to take the relationship to a mutually beneficial comprehensive partnership”.

An interesting new input in the joint communique was the call for increased political interactions” and the intensification of political engagements at the both the leadership and ministerial levels.” Seen against the India’s failure to foresee and forestall the recent catastrophic events in Bangladesh, where the friendly Sheikh Hasina regime was overthrown by a mass movement, the pledge to have and intensify” political dialogues with Sri Lankan parties makes sense. The joint communique said that the two leaders underscored the importance of regular parliamentary level exchanges to promote democratic values.”

Economic Assistance

Dissanayake appreciated India’s continued support for the implementation of projects despite the ongoing debt restructuring. He acknowledged India’s decision to extend grant assistance for projects that were originally undertaken through Lines of Credit, thereby reducing the debt burden of Sri Lanka.

The Sri Lankan President thanked Modi for India’s support in stabilizing the Sri Lankan economy through unparalleled and multi-pronged assistance including emergency financing and forex support worth USD 4 billion.” He acknowledged India’s crucial assistance in Sri Lanka’s debt restructuring process, especially as co-chair of the Official Creditors’ Committee (OCC).

The Lankan President thanked India for extending financial assistance of US$ 20.66 million to settle payments due from Sri Lanka for projects completed under existing Lines of Credit, thereby significantly reducing the debt burden at a critical time.

The Kankesanthurai harbour is to be modernized with a grant of US$ 66.5 million. The signalling system on Maho-Anuradhapura rail line is to be installed with an Indian grant. 

Investment-led Growth

Importantly, the two leaders agreed that a strategic shift from debt-driven models towards investment-led partnerships across different sectors would ensure a more sustainable path to economic recovery.

They took note of the success of the India-Sri Lanka Free Trade Agreement (ISFTA) that had enhanced the trade partnership between the two countries and called for an expansion of trade ties. Both agreed that it was time to start discussions on the Economic & Technological Cooperation Agreement. (ETCA). Previous Sri Lankan governments had negotiated about ETCA but only to drop it finally, fearing Indian domination. It remains to be seen if the Dissanayake government will be any different. 

It was also agreed to take forward Indian-Rupee-Sri Lanka Rupee trade and encourage Indian investments in key sectors in Sri Lanka to enhance exports.

Connectivity

Connectivity is the new buzz word in India, perhaps motivated by China’s successes in using connectivity projects in other countries to develop its geopolitical outreach. But the argument put forward by India to push connectivity in the Delhi talks was that it would help harness the complementarities between the two economies for mutual economic development.

In this connection, only the Kankesanthurai port modernization and the ferry service between Nagapattinam and Kankesanthurai were  mentioned. The proposal for a bridge and road link between India and Colombo  was not mentioned, though it had found a place in an earlier Indian communique in another context. In the past, Sri Lankan governments have consistently refused to proceed with India’s proposal for a rail and road link across the Palk Strait. In their view, it would impinge on their security from a more populous and powerful India.

India would also install, free of cost, the signalling system on the rail line between Maho and Anurdhapra

Energy Projects

India stresses a lot on energy production and trans-national energy connectivity for ensuring energy security. Dissanayake and Modi called for the implementation and expansion of the solar power project in Sampur in Trincomalee district;  the supply of LNG from India to Sri Lanka; the establishment of a high-capacity power grid interconnection between India and Sri Lanka; and cooperation between India, Sri Lanka and the UAE to build a pipeline from India to Sri Lanka. The UAE might supply expertise and/or finance, added  Indian Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri in a press conference. 

The Indian and Lankan leaders agreed on the joint development” of offshore wind power projects in the Palk Straits in north Sri Lanka, while prioritizing environmental protection including fauna and flora.”

 Environmental protection, now agreed to by India, is an important concession to Sri Lanka because the Dissanayake government had wanted Gautam Adani’s wind power project to be reviewed citing differences over the pricing of power and environmental concerns. However, the pricing issue, which concerns the Sri Lankan government most, does not find mention in the joint communique. This prompts the question as to whether Dissanayake had agreed to the price as decided by a different regime in 2022.

The two leaders decided to support the development of Trincomalee as a regional energy and industrial hub.” But this, like many other projects mentioned in the joint communique, is an old plan yet to be implemented.  

People-Centric Digitization

Modi’s India has been an ardent proponent of people-centric digitization, which has helped improve governance, transform  service delivery, ushered transparency, and contributed to social welfare. President Dissanayake conveyed his government’s interest in exploring the establishment of similar systems in Sri Lanka with Indian assistance. This is a new Indian and Sri initiative.

India also offered to help the Information Communication Technology Agency of Sri Lanka (ICTA), with mentorship for Sri Lankan start-ups.

Agriculture

Noting President Dissanayake’s emphasis on agricultural modernization, the two leaders agreed to establish a Joint Working Group to examine possibilities for a comprehensive development of the agricultural sector in Sri Lanka. Both leaders appreciated the ongoing collaboration in the development of the dairy sector in Sri Lanka to ensure nutritional security.

Security Assurance

Recognizing shared security interests, both leaders acknowledged the importance of a regular dialogue based on mutual trust and transparency and giving primacy to each other’s security concerns.”

Such an accommodative formulation should assuage the feelings of Sri Lankans may be apprehensive about the military asymmetry between Sri Lanka and India.

Dissanayake assuaged India’s fears about Sri Lanka’s becoming a cockpit for Chinese or Pakistani intrigue against it, when he stated that Sri Lanka will not permit its territory to be used in any manner inimical to the security of India and regional stability.

India’s fear is primarily over China’s efforts to expand its footprint in Sri Lanka and pose a threat to India’s southern flank.     

Defence Agreement

Importantly, both leaders decided to explore the possibility of concluding a framework Agreement on Defence Cooperation and  foster cooperation in hydrography.

Defence cooperation with India is welcomed in Sri Lanka in so far as it concerns training and joint exercises. But a defence treaty with mutual obligations is a different kettle of fish altogether. Sri Lankans are wary about being drawn into conflicts between other countries in which they have no direct stake. Having fought a 30-year war with the Tamil separatists and suffered economically, they dread being drawn into another war, especially not their own.  

Chinese Research Vessels

India had been raising the issue of visits by Chinese research” vessels to Sri Lankan harbours. To the Indians these are spy” vessels in disguise. In response to India’s concerns, Sri Lanka had put a year-long moratorium on visits by research vessels from all countries. But India wanted only Chinese vessels to be barred, putting Sri Lanka in an awkward situation vis-à-vis China, a major development partner and creditor.

Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri said that India raised this issue at the Delhi talks and the Sri Lankan side explained that they had some  issues that needed to be addressed (with China). India and Sri Lanka  finally agreed to continue discussions on the question.

The ball is now in Sri Lanka’s court to find a modus vivendi with China on this issue. However, it appears that India may not make it a sticking point in the relationship as Dissanayake’s had categorical assured that Sri Lanka will not allow itself to be used to harm the security of India. The underlying aim of the Delhi talks was to find common ground on various issues and build on them and not score points.                   

END

By P.K.Balachandran Courtesy NewsIn.Asia

Colombo, December 17: The Anura Kumara Dissanayake government in Sri Lanka, which was sailing smoothly despite unsolved economic issues, suffered the first jolt since coming to power, when parliament Speaker Ashoka Ranwala resigned on Friday amidst accusations that his Ph.D” was fake.

Urban Development and Housing Minister Anura Karunatilake and  Justice Minister Harshana Nanayakkara were also assailed for falsely  claiming that they had doctoral degrees.

Ranwala maintained that he had acquired a Ph.D, and said that he had no documentary proof of the doctorate. He said he would produce it on getting it from the Waseda University-affiliated institution in Japan he was registered with. In the case of Nanayakkara, it came to be known that it was the parliament’s fault. It had appended Dr” to his name deviating from the text he had given them.  In the case of Karunatilake, he was not a doctorate and yet was using the prefix Dr”. He said that he was a Ph.D student about to complete his programme. Because of the public exposure, all three dropped Dr” from their on-line platforms.

However, the squeaking clean image which the ruling National Peoples’ Power (NPP) government had, was sullied. The Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP) MP Namal Rajapaksa urged government MPs to resign if they failed to provide evidence of their educational qualifications. Taking to X, he criticised the NPP for misleading the people saying that they would give an honest and transparent government with people having good educational qualifications. People voted for the NPP in the Presidential and parliamentary elections this year impressed with the high” qualifications of the NPP candidates in contrast to their challengers, many of whom could have been mere high school graduates.

Root of the Problem

Fake degrees are not confined to Members of the Sri Lankan Parliament and pushy politicians trying to impress the public. It is widespread in society in Sri Lanka, South Asia and even in the UK and USA. In all these countries there are those who falsely claim they have a university degree. There are others who have a fake degree, and there are yet others who provide fake degrees for a hefty fee. There is also a tribe of ghost writers of Ph.D dissertations.   

The craze for fake degrees reflects the rarity or expensiveness of education in a society. A tight job market makes it necessary to have a degree, fake or real. Among a population of uneducated people, flaunting a university degree, whether real or fake, helps gain recognition and opens the doors to jobs when jobs are scarce.  

When politics became popular and intensely competitive in South Asian countries, politicians began to add educational qualifications, real or false, to their CVs as additional feathers in their cap. They also began to use their political clout in local universities to get honorary doctorates which they unethically deemed to be doctorates got after pursuing a rigorous doctoral programme.

The number of politicians getting such doctorates increased exponentially after universities, to curry favour with governments and politicians, starting giving doctorates to Chief Ministers, Ministers and other political bigwigs. The number of political doctorates in India ballooned with the politicization of the universities. Both state and private universities were in this racket as both needed State funds ad political patronage to conduct their educational business.”

All countries in South Asia developed economically, especially after they liberalized, but job opportunities did not grow commensurately. The new needs arising from a liberalized economy and the intense competition that the needs generated resulted in a craze for getting higher qualifications” no matter how dubious these qualifications might be.

Degree Shops

To meet the needs of these wannabes”, shops came up selling degrees from nice sounding but dubious universities, both local and foreign. In 2022, the Colombo-based Roar Media carried a story on the degree racket in Sri Lanka. It cited the case of the director of a sanitary ware company, who while scrolling through his Facebook page, saw a message from a local representative of a university based in the US.” The gent offered honorary doctorates for LKR 390,000 each.

Manav Bharti University was a private university in Himachal Pradesh state in India which had sold 36,000 degrees for US$1,362 each, South China Morning Post said. Offers of fake degrees came from the US and Nigeria also. The prices for a doctorate varied from USD 62 to USD 1400. Even convocations” were held in expensive places to impress the recipients and others, but at an extra cost of USD 626 per client.

Some of the known fake universities are: Indian Virtual University; Universal Tamil University, Chennai; Kings University, U.S.A.; International Peace University, Germany; International Tamil University; and University Asia, Kathmandu, Nepal.

The fake degree agents claim high connections. According to India Today, a Chennai man ran an International Coaching Centre under the auspices of the International Labour Organisation/United Nations Development Programme for getting Ph.Ds. MBAs and MBBS degrees from New York University and Stanton University

American fake degrees are, of course, the most sought after. The United States Education Foundation in India (USEFI), Chennai, run by the US Education Department, had said that most of the US universities” giving degrees” were fake. The list includes International University, California, Stanton University and City University of New York.

Some shops touting fake degrees really seek research work. One India-based entity gave a PhD certificate in 45 days for USD 1065 after a 250-page thesis was submitted. To help write Ph.D. dissertations there arose ghost writers.

In 2019, 11 professors at government arts and science colleges in Tamil Nadu state were suspended after their PhD certificates were found to be fake. The same year, the Education Ministry launched an investigation into six universities – including three public ones – that had been accused of selling fake degrees.

Fake Degrees in UK

In 2018, the BBC reported that one of its staff was offered a degree from the fake Nixon University for US$ 3,600. Thousands of UK nationals have bought fake degrees from a multi-million pound diploma mill” in Pakistan, a BBC Radio 4’s File on Four” programme investigation found. Buyers included National Health Service Consultants, nurses and a large defence contractor. One British buyer spent almost £500,000 on bogus documents.

Axact” which claims to be the world’s largest IT company”, operates a network of hundreds of fake online universities run by agents from a Karachi Call Centre. With names such as Brooklyn Park University and Nixon University, they feature stock images of smiling students and even fake news articles singing the institution’s praises.

In 2015, Axact sold more than 215,000 fake qualifications globally, through approximately 350 fictitious high schools and universities, making US$ 51 million that year alone.

According to documents seen by BBC Radio 4’s File on Four” programme, more than 3,000 fake Axact qualifications were sold to UK-based buyers in 2013 and 2014, including master’s degrees, doctorates and PhDs.

A trawl through the list of Axact UK buyers reveals various National Health Service clinical staff, including an ophthalmologist, nurses, a psychologist, and numerous consultants also bought fake degrees,” BBC said. Defence contractor FB Heliservices bought fake Axact degrees for seven employees, including two helicopter pilots, between 2013 and 2015

Extortion

Fake degree agents have also taken to extortion and blackmail. One could get a telephone call that looks like it’s coming from your embassy or local law enforcement, threatening to arrest or deport you unless you get some additional documents to help support the phony diploma you already have.

The BBC mentions the case of Cecil Horner, a British engineer based in Saudi Arabia, who kept getting threatening calls from Axact agents after paying nearly £500,000 for fake a fake degree. Sometimes, these fly-by-night operators would pocket the money and disappear without issuing a certificate.  

Rajib Ray, president of the Federation of Central Universities’ Teachers’ Associations, told South China Morning Post that most fake degree scams in India involved private institutions – a sector that has been booming since the 1990s following a surge in demand for IT and management courses.

END

Courtesy dd News

Sri Lanka has the potential to produce surplus energy and could export it to India and other neighbouring nations if new energy projects are initiated, Sri Lankan Foreign Minister Vijitha Herath said on Tuesday.

Speaking at the India Foundation Programme, Herath invited Indian companies to participate in the development of Sri Lanka’s energy sector. He said that while some energy projects are already underway, discussions are ongoing for others.

On India’s role in Sri Lanka’s energy security, Herath said, We have surplus energy power, we have wind power and solar power. If we can start new energy projects, we can export to India and all other neighbouring countries because we have the ability to produce surplus energy. Therefore, we are in stand with the support of your companies (the Indian companies) to develop our energy sector.”

He further added that proposals and projects are currently being discussed for regions like Sampur, Mannar, and Jaffna. Herath said, There are so many proposals out there, and we have already started some projects. We are talking with some projects because there are some technical issues in Sampur, Mannar and Jaffna. There are so many projects and proposals. Therefore, we need to finalise within a short period, and then after that, we can start those projects. After succeeding in those projects, I think, as a country we can share our energy with our neighbouring countries also. In that scenario, those projects are very valuable.”

On bilateral ties, Herath pointed to the strong relationship between India and Sri Lanka, highlighting Sri Lankan President Anura Kumara Dissanayake’s ongoing visit to India as a reflection of their shared ties.

The current visit to India of President Anura Kumara Dissanayake is his first visit and symbolizes the closely knit bilateral ties which our nations share. India-Sri Lanka relations are founded on historical, civilizational, religious and cultural bonds. These bonds go back to time immemorial, more than 2500 years the least,” Herath said.

He elaborated on the cultural and religious links between the two nations, noting the role of Buddhism and Hinduism. India had given us the gift of Buddhism, which gave rise to a flourishing Buddhist civilization in the island more than two millennia ago, and the influence of Hinduism was built into our socio-cultural fabric over the centuries of movement of people and interactions. Along with these religions, literature, languages, architecture, sculpture and agrarian economy, etc. developed in Sri Lanka.”

Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Sri Lankan President Anura Kumara Dissanayake held a meeting at Hyderabad House in Delhi on Monday.

Reported By : Madhuparna Das Courtesy news18

Sri Lanka’s new government is likely to discuss the projects under BRI with China and also talk about Beijing’s other commitments, including central highways. Additionally, there will also be talks around the lease of Hambantota Port, a proposed refinery, and other projects

The new government in Sri Lanka is likely to re-negotiate” China’s strategicBelt Road Initiative (BRI)projects in the 

island nation and recalibrate” its old commitments, foreign affairs minister Vijitha Herath told News 18 on Tuesday, signalling Colombo’s intent to maintain cordial diplomatic and financial ties while fostering relationships with Beijing as well as New Delhi.

Walking the tightrope between two Asian giants—India and China—the new government in Sri Lanka is now carefully crafting a balanced foreign policy. China is our friend, just like India is,” the minister said.

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Announcing that the delegation, including Anura Kumara Dissanayake, President of Sri Lanka, and the foreign affairs minister himself, would be travelling to China in January, Herath told News 18 that the visit will focus on renegotiating key Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) projects, including the Hambantota Port deal, apart from other projects, as the new government now seeks to recalibrate its economic commitments with China amid debt pressures and geopolitical sensitivities.

Recalibrating BRI deals with China

Sri Lanka’s new government is likely to discuss the projects under BRI with China and also talk about Beijing’s other commitments, including central highways. Additionally, there will also be talks around the lease of Hambantota Port, a proposed refinery, and other projects.

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At this point, we can now confirm that during our visit to China, there are certain plans to renegotiate certain Belt and Road Initiative projects. We have a few proposals too, Herath told News 18. He was speaking on the sidelines of a reception programme organised by the India Foundation, a think tank that specialises in geopolitical relations.

Discussions will include plans for building a central highway and reviving earlier commitments, such as the construction of a convention hall in the Port City, which was previously agreed upon as a grant. We aim to move forward on these projects with renewed focus,” he added.Talking about the new government’s policy towards China, Herath said, We hope to build strong and cordial relationships not only with India but also with China, the USA, Russia, Cuba, and even North Korea. As an 

island nation, it is crucial and very vital for us to engage with all countries to rebuild our country and grow. Our first state visit was to India, and next month, the President, myself, and our delegation will visit China to further strengthen ties.”

Ties with India

However, he reiterated that the new government is working on strengthening ties with India further. It is also going to announce visa-free access for 39 countries to boost tourism and seeks to have the same for Sri Lankans while travelling to India. Indians currently do not need a visa to travel to Sri Lanka.

Citizens across religious divides in Sri Lanka are eager to travel to India for several purposes, which include pilgrimage, education, and healthcare, but many, especially from underprivileged sections, cannot afford air travel. A proposal to construct a road bridge fromDhanushkodiin Tamil Nadu and Talaimannar on Mannar Island , an island off the northwestern coast of Sri Lanka. We need to study its feasibility,” he said.

Commenting on India’s security concerns over the foreign research vessels in Sri Lankan waters, Herath said, The current moratorium on research vessels ends in December. A special national committee has been appointed to review this and introduce a comprehensive national policy on the matter.”

Suhasini Haidar,Meera Srinivasan Courtesy The Hindu

Minister Vijitha Herath says rebuilding the economy is new government’s biggest priority as he calls for more tourism, visa concessions from India

After his trip to India, Sri Lankan President Anura Kumara Dissanayake will visit China next month, Sri Lankan Foreign Minister Vijitha Herath said, while adding that the newly elected government wants win-win” ties with all countries.

A day after Mr. Dissanayake’s talks with Prime Minister Narendra Modi, where the President said that he would ensure that Sri Lankan territory is not used in any manner inimical to the security of India as well as towards regional stability”, Mr. Herath reaffirmed the commitment. On Tuesday, Mr. Dissanayake travelled to Bodh Gaya to offer prayers, and returned to Colombo.

As a new government, we hope to have a good relationship with China also, as well as India. And also with other countries like U.S., Russia, Cuba and North Korea…,” Mr. Herath told an audience at an event organised by the India Foundation in Delhi.

 India, Sri Lanka decide to ramp up defence, energy, trade ties

After this first visit to India, our next visit is to China next month,” he said, indicating that the government would continue to seek support from both Delhi and Beijing, even as Mr. Dissanayake has clearly prioritised the Indian visit first.

On a visit to Jaffna last month, Chinese Ambassador to Sri Lanka Qi Zhenhong said that China welcomed” Mr. Dissanayake’s visit to India as it was a close neighbour” to Sri Lanka, adding that the visit by Mr. Dissanayake to Beijing would enhance [China-Lanka] traditional friendship, promote bilateral economic cooperation, and bring more benefits to our peoples”.

 Held fruitful discussions, says Sri Lankan President Dissanayake after meeting Jaishankar, NSA Doval

Responding to questions in Delhi, Mr. Herath said that Sri Lanka’s first priority was to shore up its economic situation, restructure its debt package with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank, as well as push for new tourism inflows.

Reviving tourism

Mr. Herath, who is also the Minister of Tourism, explained that after hitting a peak of 2.5 million tourists in 2018, the Sri Lankan tourism industry had been dealt three successive blows — the Easter Sunday terror attacks in 2019, Covid pandemic in 2020-21, and the economic crisis and debt default in 2022.

He announced that the Dissanayake government would soon issue a gazette notification making visas free of charge for nationals of 39 countries including India, and called for India to reciprocate the measure, and to increase tourism in both countries.

Foreign vessels

Responding to questions at the event, Mr. Herath gave no clear indication on whether Sri Lanka would continue to allow foreign research vessels, particularly Chinese ships, to berth at Lankan ports after a one-year moratorium on all such research expeditions expires on December 31.

The Sri Lankan Foreign Minister said instead that there was a need to build a national policy” on the issue, and that a committee had been set up to look into it. India has consistently objected to Chinese vessels on research visits to Lankan ports, as it says the ships have a dual purpose” to also collect sensitive, strategic data in the Indian Ocean, a charge Beijing has denied.

 Bottom trawling by Indian fishermen must stop: Sri Lanka’s Fisheries Minister

After the Modi-Dissanayake talks on Monday, Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri said that India had offered its own capacities and training to Sri Lanka to circumvent the need for other foreign vessels.

 It’s bilateral, says Centre on Tamil Nadu fishermen’s issues with Sri Lankan authorities

To a question from The Hindu after the event, Mr. Herath said that the  Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) government would consider” the situation of Sri Lankan refugees living in India. Many of the refugees fled violence in the 1980s, are ineligible for citizenship in India and are unsure of their future in Sri Lanka. He said that while there were procedures in place for their repatriation, not all of them wish to return to the island nation.

According to the India-based Organisation for Eelam Refugees’ Rehabilitation, there are approximately 57,000 displaced persons living in 104 camps in Tamil Nadu, while about 34,000 others are settled in various cities in the State, outside the camps.

Courtesy independent (UK)

Anura Kumara Dissanayake pledges Colombo’s commitment to India’s security interests amid rising Chinese activity in the Indian Ocean

Sri Lankan president Anura Kumara Dissanayake has assured Narendra Modi that Colombo will not allow its territory to be used in any way detrimental to India’s security interests.

The statement came during Mr Dissanayake’s first bilateral visit to New Delhi on Monday, amid growing concerns over China’s increasing influence in the Indian Ocean region.

I have given an assurance to the prime minister of India that we will not have our land… be used in a manner that is detrimental to the interest of India in any way,” Mr Dissanayake said after talks with Mr Modi at Hyderabad House.

The two leaders emphasised their shared commitment to ensuring regional stability and the security of the Indian Ocean, with Mr Modi stating: We both agree that our security interests are interconnected. We have decided to soon finalise the defence cooperation agreement.”

The assurance follows diplomatic tensions sparked by recent visits of Chinese military ships to Sri Lanka and China’s development of the Hambantota port in the island nation.

A joint statement from the two countries reiterated the importance of trust and transparency in addressing mutual security concerns and underscored their commitment to countering threats in the region.

India pledged continued assistance to strengthen Sri Lanka’s maritime and defence capabilities.

Mr Modi expressed hope for swift implementation of collaborative measures, including enhanced defence cooperation and capacity building. Both sides agreed to work on a framework for supplying defence platforms, conducting joint exercises, and expanding maritime surveillance.

On the contentious issue of Chinese vessels docking in Sri Lankan ports, Mr Dissanayake reaffirmed his country’s policy of prioritising India’s security interests, a position described as a trusted and reliable partner” in the joint statement.

Energy cooperation was another focal point of the discussion. Both nations agreed to establish electricity grid connectivity and develop multi-product petroleum pipelines to deepen their energy partnership.

India will also support Sri Lanka in enhancing renewable energy capacity, with projects such as the solar power plant in Sampur.

Mr Modi highlighted the broader economic partnership, which will focus on investment-led growth and connectivity” to facilitate development and reduce Sri Lanka’s debt burden.

Mr Dissanayake and his party have in the past been seen as more ideologically aligned with China.

After his win, analysts predicted that could mean drawing more Chinese investment, which slowed after the Sri Lankan government was blamed for taking on too many Chinese loans that added to the country’s debt as its economy collapsed in 2022.

Chinese money quickly became a cautionary tale in the country, while the economic crisis allowed India to gain some sway as it stepped in with massive financial and material assistance to its neighbour.

Just after Mr Dissanayake was sworn in, Beijing said it wanted to work with the new government on boosting development and cooperation in building China’s Belt and Road Initiative.

Under Mr Dissanayake, there’s a possibility of more Chinese money coming into Sri Lanka”, Happymon Jacob, founder of the New Delhi-based Council for Strategic and Defense Research, earlier told the Associated Press, adding that this could concern India. However, the newly elected president attempted to allay some of the fears, prior to his win.

As a neighboring country, we need to be concerned over India’s stability, national interests and national security when taking decisions”, Mr Dissanayake told the Associated Press in an interview a few weeks before the election.

Our main objective is the safety of the region and we will not allow any party to use our land, sea and air to create instability,” he added.

by Dr Upul Wijayawardhana Courtesy The Island

Asoka Ranwala

I continue to be amazed by the parallels in politics in the country of my birth and the country of my residence. But before going in to the latest developments in the field of politics, let me make a clarification regarding a response to my opinion piece What is in a title?” (The Island, 13 December). My grateful thanks go to Philosophiae Doctor (Canterbrigensis) for the tutorial on degrees (A degree is not a title! The Island, 16 December) from which I learnt a lot, but may I humbly point out a wrong assumption. Though in the said piece it is stated The learned physician who identified a Ph.D. degree as a title (The Island, 13/12/24) was wrong. The cardiologist had missed the heart of the matter.” What I stated in my piece was that ‘when challenged, among others, by the much respected and vociferous former elections chief, though the entry in the official parliamentary website dropped ‘Dr’ title and there had been a dramatic rewrite of his profile in the much-used people’s encyclopaedia, Wikipedia, he is yet to respond.” Obviously, What is in a title?” referred to was ‘Dr’, a title, not to the degree PhD!

Much more has surfaced regarding the former speaker since the publication of my piece. He has tendered his resignation, belatedly, from the post of the Speaker which has been accepted by the President; although he had no choice considering the circumstances. The excuse given, as I guessed in my opinion piece, is that he was looking for the documents but could not find them; an excuse nobody bar himself would believe! To make matters worse, he states that there is a likelihood of his obtaining the relevant documentation from the research institute affiliated to Waseda University. Surely, in this era of electronic communication such a feat does not need a gestation period!

As a trade unionist, Ranwala was the president of the State Medical Faculties’ Parents Association and spearheaded the 2018 protests against an attempt by Dr Neville Fernando’s pioneer institute SAITEM (South Asian Institute of Technology and Medicine) to award medical degrees locally. He claimed it was a ‘degree shop’ where a degree could be bought for money! The Sunday Times of 15 December has a photograph of him leading the protests and, more importantly, states that media reports, at the time, referred to him as ‘Prof. Ranwala! ‘Prof. Ranwala, who led the protests against private medical education in Sri Lanka now claims to have obtained a PhD from a private university in Japan! Is this not the height of hypocrisy? How come the JVP/NPP failed to detect these anomalies?

Another minister, who claimed to be a professor, turned out to be a person who had stagnated, for years, as a senior lecturer because he was not able obtain a PhD. He has said he will be submitting his thesis in three months! Perhaps, submission was delayed by all the planning and electioneering over the past few months and now that he has ample free time as a member of parliament, he can complete the thesis and be assured of acceptance as he is in the governing party!

Though some others have got ‘Dr’ titles removed hastily from the parliamentary website, the Minister of Justice has made a complaint to the CID, that parliamentary staff has wrongly called him ‘Dr’ in an attempt to discredit him. This action raises two questions. First, why did he take so long to note that mistake? Second, is it not more prudent to have an internal inquiry, led by the Secretary General of the parliament before contemplating police action.

True, the government is getting some results in some fields but it has lost the shine too soon, just like the Labour government did in the UK; which also came to power with a massive majority like the NPP. This becomes all the more significant as the NPP offered a change in political culture with honest, educated members of parliament but what has happened is just the opposite. It moved far too slowly over the speaker fiasco and the Speaker waited without any explanations, resigning only when he was left with no alternative. Attempts by NPP social media supporters to glorify the Speaker’s resignation as the actions of a transparent government are absurd.

As the saying goes, ‘coming colours no good!

Courtesy The Island

File photo of President AKD and Speaker Ranwala(Image courtesy Parliament of Sri Lanka)

‘To prove that degrees, per se, are worthless. Often, they are honorifics of true scientists or learned scholars or inspired teachers. Much more frequently they are false faces for overeducated jackasses.’ – Robert A. Heinlein 

It is the above quote that came to mind when witnessing the barrage of information coming out on the saga of the Sri Lankan parliamentary speaker Asoka Ranwala’s PhD qualification, or the lack of it. Of course, true to form, we have outdone ourselves – yet again. In Sri Lanka’s case, degrees are not only the false faces for overeducated jackasses”. Our people who often wear degrees like expensive jewellery are the worst of the uneducated louts, to put it mildly.  The fiasco surrounding former speaker Ranwala’s resignation has also brought to the fore one of the most serious ailments our society has been afflicted with for a very long time, i. e. false pretense for social recognition and/or profit, mostly by superimposing degrees or other perceived qualifications on one’s public persona.  This is not new, but the recent saga has invited a significant degree of prominence. This is not only due to Ranwala’s recently acquired status as the Speaker and the country’s third citizen but, more importantly, as a result of the moral high ground on which the NPP campaigned and was elected to Parliament with an unprecedented majority.

Soon after my undergraduate studies in the 1980s, I met a friend in Pettah who had studied history at the University of Colombo during my time, but was practising medicine in Tissamaharama.  Quackery is part of this same scheme and is better known though it is structurally part of the same cluster of scams. These scams involving non-existent degrees or inflated qualifications usually involve lying to the public. Quite simply, it is a matter of public dishonesty. But politicians and dubious characters affiliated with politics have been the worst culprits in this scam. Sajith Premadas’s bachelor’s degree from the London School of Economics has been an unresolved bone of contention for a long time, and has resurfaced again now. Similarly, Namal Rajapaksa’s Attorney-at-Law qualification (not a degree) from the Sri Lanka Law College after sitting for the final exams in restricted conditions by himself (easily doable under the Rajapaksas) is another well-known case, which also has become part of the debate again.  Ironically, both are now asking the present government to cleanse itself of false degree holders! The demand would have been more believable if the Opposition began its war cry by cleansing itself of its most obvious culprits.

The late Eliyantha Lindsay White, heavily sponsored by the Rajapaksas, who claimed to be a doctor with miraculous healing powers, and Viranjith Thambugala’s alleged PhD and teaching at well-known institutions, including at NASA, are among more recent cases.  None of these people – from Premadasa to Thambugala – have ever uttered anything sensible that can vouch for their alleged advanced formal training.  Nevertheless, they have been allowed to remain untouched, beyond short-lived public outcries, because such fakery is not a crime, but an ethical issue. More importantly, they had enormous political protection. Besides, ethics are of no concern for such people. This, however, was not possible for Ranwala.  The question is why not, and what feeds this ailment in our country.

The short answer to what feeds this ailment” is, because of the long-standing importance given to education in our country, in the context of which advanced education and university affiliations are taken very seriously beyond simple professional matters.  What these nefarious people from universities and outside are doing is to make use of this broad-based public interest and institutionalized respect, for their own private social and political gain.  Up to now, it has been a safe game to play.

Information available suggests that Ranwala does not even have the bachelor’s degree from the University of Moratuwa, which he had initially claimed.  In his resignation letter, which itself is a fascinating document, he has claimed that he had not been able to collect the paperwork pertaining to his PhD from Waseda University, Tokyo, but he nevertheless has the degree.  But this is late 2024 and not the 15th century.  One does not need to send a delegation bearing gifts to the Vice Chancellor of this Japanese university to get the transcripts and authenticated degree certificates pertaining to any former candidate in any degree programme.  All that was needed in this case was for Ranwala to make that request himself or otherwise authorize someone else to do it and make the required payment.  The information would have come via email in a few days if not a few hours. There is no indication this was ever attempted. If that was done sooner — if the former Speaker’s claims are true — this fiasco would not have reached the heights it did. It also would have saved the government needless embarrassment.

But this also opens another more important question.  That is, why did the NPP wait for so long to get their man to relinquish his duties as Speaker, and that, too, with a somewhat non-committal resignation letter, with its spokesperson Nalinda Jayatissa deliberately evading questions by journalists. Some of its Ministers, like Wasantha Samarasinghe and Deputy Minister Namal Karunarathna, went to the extent of issuing an unnecessary threat amidst much bravado that they have the numbers in place (which we the people had given them not too long ago) to defeat any no-confidence motion by the Opposition.  What this means is that the NPP was willing to compromise its own ethical standards for the protection of one person and his possible dishonesty. This was not merely a debate over a certificate.  More crucially, it is about lying in public to all of us and getting elected because some voters would have voted for him assuming him to be a learned man. I am sure it is this belief in the integrity and the perceived qualifications of its man that the JVP was moved to appoint Ranwala as the Speaker when there were many better qualified people in Parliament to hold that responsibility, but without such dubious baggage.

Ultimately, this is about the confidence in the man, others like him and by extension the government itself.  Not just this incident, but the lackluster way in which it was handled by the NPP and the way in which its JVP members at large justified Ranwala’s status publicly and vociferously have only done one thing: it has created a needless rupture in the moral high ground with which the NPP was ushered into power. All indications are, he was protected within the government until it was no longer possible (with an impending no-confidence motion and widespread bad press) because he was an important member of the JVP.  None of us are doubting the work he has done tirelessly for years for the betterment of the JVP in considerably difficult times and with risks to his life. But would the same position be adopted if the individual concerned was from another entity within the NPP?

It seems there are many more Ranwalas in Parliament now in the ranks of the NPP. Since the eruption of the Ranwala saga, their degree and professional claims on social media handles and platforms they control have disappeared, opening more questions about their integrity than any answers. These degree claims were also part of their campaign arsenal.

Again, the lead for this was provided by Ranwala himself by discontinuing his LikedIn page as soon as the fiasco emerged.

But to be clear, the incident has so far only dented the government’s moral high ground, and it has not been dismantled – yet.  But if the government is serious about maintaining this hard won moral high ground and the trust people had placed in them, then, it needs to clean shop right now.  People who have lied during their campaigns claiming for themselves degrees and qualifications they do not have, should be identified via a thorough disciplinary investigation and made to resign or be removed. But not only from their positions in the government but also as MPs. The same applies to Ranwala. After all, we did not vote for them to be Ministers, Deputy Ministers and Speaker, but to be MPs.  Needless to say, all this should also apply to similar dishonest people in Opposition if they have any interest at all in reinventing themselves within slightly higher moral standards.

There is no point in arguing as some in the JVP’s public and social media bandwagons have already begun that these are not crimes and others have done it before.  We know all this.  But we did not vote this government in for it to tread along the same dubious and treacherous path other worse culprits have tread before.  That moral high ground that the government once had, and which I think can still be retained, must clearly be retained if it is to do what it promised all of us. But it must be done with effort and sincerity and not with nonsense and bravado. And to do so, we must be shown the government is serious about corruption at all levels.  Public dishonesty is the worst form of corruption. This cannot be an excuse for any reason simply because some of the culprits might be their own. For us to be led by elected leaders, we have to have trust in their integrity.  If not, what would be the difference between this government and those who came before but were booted out decisively?

I hope the President was serious when he said recently in public that the government will deal with all people appropriately within its ranks if they have done anything wrong.  Public dishonesty is ethically wrong, Mr President; it is morally repugnant though it is not illegal. It cannot be an excused for leniency whatever the pressures within might be.

A former student told me recently I should not be too critical of the government as it is doing its best.  I damn well have the right and the responsibility to be exactly this: critical but with self-reflection.  I voted for the NPP and went public for the first time in my life asking people to do so, too, as we as a country needed serious change. But in that same address to the public, I also said that if the government deviated from its principles we supported, we also had the right to object, come to the streets and look for alternatives.  Hopefully, that future will not come.  Hopefully, another Gotabaya saga will not come, which fortunately is in the mind of the President, too, going by his many public statements since the parliamentary election victory. The only way to ensure that this government governs effectively and with dignity is to be honest in public, to be honest in private, to be honest in words, and to be honest in action. Personally, I still have considerable hope for this regime.  But it needs to call off its over-enthusiastic and unenlightened public bulldogs drunk with the power of victory and majoritarian euphoria and begin to grow up politically and morally and not be caught up in the corrupt politics of the past. They also need to realize, most of us did not blindly vote for the JVP but for the JVP-led NPP.  Erasure of this crucial fact would be a serious mistake from which neither the NPP nor the country would be able to recover.

උපුටා ගැන්ම  ලංකා ලීඩර්

රනිල් වික්‍රමසිංහ මහතා 2023 ජූලි 21 ඉන්දියාව සමග එකඟවූ එකඟතාවයේ දී එට්කා ගිවිසුම සම්පූර්ණයෙන්ම ක්‍රියාත්මක කර අවසන් කරන බව ප්‍රකාශකර තිබූ බවත්, මෙවර එකඟතා ප්‍රකාශයේ ද ඒ පිළිබඳව සඳහන්කර ඇති බවත් දේශහිතෛෂී ජාතික ව්‍යාපාරයේ මහ ලේකම් වෛද්‍ය වසන්ත බණ්ඩාර මහතා පවසයි.

එහෙත් අනුර කුමාර දිසානායක ජනාධිපතිවරයා ඔහුගේ කතාවේ දී ඒ පිළිබඳව සඳහන් නොකළ බවද, 13 වැනි සංශෝධනය සම්පූර්ණයෙන් බලාත්මක කරන ලෙස ඉන්දියාවේ අගමැති නරේන්ද්‍ර මොදි ප්‍රකාශ කර තිබුනත් අනුර කුමාර දිසානායක මහතාගේ කතාවේ දී ඒ සඳහා එකඟතාව පළවී නැති බවත් ඒ මහතා සඳහන් කරයි.

මේ බලපෑම්වලට යටත් නොවී අනුර කුමාර දිසානායක මහතා කටයුතු කරනු ඇතැයි බලාාපාරොත්තු වන බවත් සඳහන් කරන වසන්ත බණ්ඩාර මහතා, ජනතා විරෝධය හමුවේ හිටපු ජනාධිපතිවරු 8 දෙනෙකුටම 13 සම්පූර්ණයෙන් බලාත්මක කිරීමට නොහැකි වූ බවත්, ජනතාව අනුර දිසානායක ජනාධිපතිවරයාට බලය ලබා දී ඇත්තේ හිටපු ජනපතිවරු 8 දෙනෙකු නොකළ දේ කිරීමට නොවන බවත් සඳහන් කරයි.

සවිස්තරාත්මක වීඩියෝව නරඹන්න… 

Courtesy Adaderana

The year-on-year GDP growth rate for the third quarter of 2024 has been reported as 5.5 percent of positive growth rate, the Department of Census and Statistics indicated.

Accordingly, the GDP for the third quarter of 2024 at constant price (2015) has increased up to Rs. 3,151,941 million from Rs. 2,987,544 million which recorded in the third quarter of 2023.

The year-on-year GDP growth rate for the third quarter of year 2024 has been reported as 5.5 percent of positive growth rate, while the Agricultural, Industrial and Services activities expanded by 3.0 percent, 10.8 percent and 2.6 percent respectively in the third quarter of 2024, according to the department.

උපුටා ගැන්ම  ලංකා ලීඩර්

ඉන්දියාවේ සිට ශ්‍රී ලංකාව දක්වා තෙල් නළයක් ඉදිකිරීමටත් ඉන්දියාව හා ශ‍්‍රී ලංකාව විදුලි සම්ප්‍රේෂණ ජාලයන් මගින් සම්බන්ධ කිරීමටත්, දෙරට අතර වන එක්ටා ගිවිසුම ඉක්මනින් අවසන් කිරීමටත් ජනාධිපති අනුර කුමාර දිසානායක මහතා සමන්ග සාකච්ඡා කළ බව ඉන්දීය අග්‍රාමාත්‍ය නරේන්ද්‍ර මෝදි මහතා පැවසූ බව ඉන්දීය මාධ්‍ය වාර්තා කර සිටී.

දෙරටේ රාජ්‍ය නායකයින් දෙපළගේ හමුවීමෙන් පසුව නවදිල්ලියේ ‘හයිද්‍රාබාද් හවුස්’හි පැවති ඒකාබද්ධ මාධ්‍ය හමුව අමතමින් ඉන්දීය අගමැතිවරයා මෙසේ පවසා ඇතැයි ඉන්දීය මාධ්‍ය පවසයි.

‘අපිට සතුටුයි ඔබා ජනාධිපති වූ පසුව ඔබගේ පළමු විදේශ සංචාරය සඳහා ඉන්දියාව තෝරා ගැනීම සම්බන්ධයෙන්. ඔබගේ මෙම සංචාරය අපගේ සබඳතාවලට නව ජවයක් ඇති කරනවා. භෞතික ඩිජිටල් සහ බලශක්ති සම්බන්ධතාවය අපගේ හවුල්කාරීත්වයේ වැදගත් කුළුණු වනු ඇති. දෙරට අතර විදුලි බල ජාල සම්බන්ධතාවය සහ බහු නිෂ්පාදන පෙට්‍රෝලියම් නල මාර්ග ස්ථාපනය කිරීමේ කටයුතු ඉදිරියේදී ආරම්භ වේවි. සම්පූර්ණ සූර්ය බල ශක්ති ව්‍යාපෘතියට ජවයක් ලබාදෙනු ඇහ්ටි.ඒ වගේම ලංකාවේ බලාගාර වලට අප එල්.එන්.ජී. සපයනවා.

ද්විපාර්ශවික වෙළඳාම නංවාලීම සඳහා දෙපාර්ශ්වයම ’එක්ටා’ ගිවිසුම ඉක්මනින් අවසන් කිරීමට උත්සාහ කරනවා.අපේ දෙපාර්ශවයේම ආරක්ෂක අවශ්‍යතා එකිනෙකට සම්බන්ධ බවට අපි දෙදෙනාම සම්පූර්ණයෙන්ම එකඟයි.දෙරටේ අරක්ෂික සහයෝගිතා ගිවිසුම කඩනමින් අවසන් කිරීමට අපි තීරණය කර තිබෙන්නේ ඒ නිසයි. ධීවරයන්ගේ ගැටලු ගැනත් අපි සාකච්ඡා කළා. මේ කාරණය සම්බන්ධයෙන් මානුෂ්‍යයේ ප්‍රවේශයකින් ඉදිරියට යයුතු බවට අපි එකඟයි.ශ්‍රී ලංකාවේ ප්‍රතිසංස්කරණය සහ සංහිඳියාව සම්බන්ධයෙන් අපි කතා කළා. දිසානායක ජනාධිපතිතුමා එතුමාගේ මතය ඒ සම්බන්ධයෙන් මට පැවසූවා.ශ්‍රී ලංකා රජය දෙමළ ජනතාවගේ අභිලාෂ ඉටු කරනු ඇතැයි අපි බලාපොරොත්තු වෙනවා. ඒ වගේම ශ්‍රී ලංකා ආණ්ඩුක්‍රම ව්‍යවස්ථාව සම්පූර්ණයෙන්ම ක්‍රියාත්මක කිරීම සහ පළාත් සභා මැතිවරණ පැවැත්වීම සඳහා වන කැපවීම ඉටු කරනු ඇතැයි අපි විශ්වාස කරනවා.ශ්‍රී ලංකාවේ සංවර්ධනය සඳහා වන ඔහුගේ ප්‍රයත්නයන්හිදී ඉන්දියාව විශ්වාසදායක හවුල්කරුවකු ලෙස පවතින බවට මම සහතික වෙනවා.’ලෙස  ඉන්දීය අගමැතිවරයා පැවසූ බව ඉන්දීය මාධ්‍ය පවසයි.

Madyawediya

Madyawediya

Monara

by Garvin Karunaratne

On many an occasion on my never ending irrigation inspections in Kandy and Nuwara Eliya long ago I had to cling onto trees and, creepers to avoid being blown off by the power of the wind.

I enclose what I once wrote hoping that our new Government of Anura Kumara Dissanayake will somehow read through.

Speaking from my sheer experience in handling development tasks-

Building up Coop Crayon at Morawaka in 1971, done in three months, developing it to enable Minister Illangaratne to declare that all imports of crayons should be stopped, and 

again in Bangladesh, establishing the Youth Self Employment Programme in nineteen months- a programme that being implemented by members of the Bangladesh Civil Service, trained  by me, has by now guided over three million youths to become self employed, I submit:

It will be easier to build a few hundred wind turbines and enable Sri Lanka to produce all its electricity.

I submit  my Paper for kind reading by our new Ministers and our saviour Anura Kumara Dissanayake.  Dear Excellency, It is a task that can be done within three years.

Wind Power to our rescue

Posted on February 3rd, 2020 in Lanka Web

By Garvin Karunaratne

I bequeath to my readers the Conclusion of my book: Wind Power for Sri Lanka’s Power Requirements.

It in unfortunate that our authorities in establishing wind turbines in Sri Lanka have so far ignored  the mountainous areas where there is ample wind power. 

My mind travels to a book by John Perkins, Confessions of an Economic Hitman, where he confesses that as an expert he had written feasibility reports with fabricated statistics which when implemented by  the Government of Ecuador, became failures,  with  the loan as a debt to the country. Our country has been given the wrong advice. Go to Spain, to the USA the leading countries where wind power has been harnessed and they harness the wind on their mountains. It is only Sri Lanka that tries to catch the sea breeze.

In Sri Lanka we have failed to harness Wind Power which Mother Nature has bountifully provided to us.

Suffice it to state that Spain a country that was far behind in producing wind power has within two to three years spurted up the ladder to be the second country in the world. Travelling through the Pyrenees to Spain in my Motorhome I was surprised to see wind turbines perched all over even on makeshift angle iron posts, the type of things that I can myself make in a day(I am no engineer). Spain even sells power to France today.

On my last visit to venerate the Avukana Buddha, I spotted a canopy perched on very long concrete shafts constructed by the State Engineering Corporation. 

It is my humble request to our excellency the President of Sri Lanka to summon the engineers who built the concrete shafts to support the canopy, and request them to design and produce the posts that can carry the wind turbines. They can easily produce these. Then import the wind turbine mechanism and set them up in our hills. We will provide employment for a few thousands. We can invite a specialist of the caliber of  Paul Gipe, the mastermind of wind power in California. who actually constructed and guides the wind turbines in California today. This will provide all the power we need. I have no doubt about that. This task can be accomplished within a year at most. Considering the billions we spend to import coal and oil, we can easily make a saving.

That is the message in my book: Wind Power for Sri Lanka’s Power Requirements.

I enclose the Conclusion of my book in support for kind perusal.

10.Conclusion

I am pleased to submit the Papers I have so far written on Wind Power as a source of Energy, in a booklet in the sheer hope that someday this will be read by one of our leaders who will be convinced that Wind Power is the form of energy that Sri Lanka is blessed with in abundance and will get going all out.

In nostalgia, I can remember what did actually happen in Bangladesh in 1982, when I worked there as the Commonwealth Fund General Advisor on Youth Development to the Ministry of Labour and Manpower in Bangladesh., The Minister for Youth Abul Kasim  was arrested on the charge of harbouring a criminal in his residency. A day later, the Military took over the country in a coup de etat.  Immediately afterwards, the Military Government  in a high powered conference chaired by Hon Aminul Islam, the Minister for Labour and Manpower assessed the programmes of the Youth Ministry. That included imparting vocational training to 40,000 youths a year. The Minister  was not totally impressed with the work done. Suddenly realizing me as the only outsider, I was confronted:

”What is the contribution you can make for Bangladesh?”

 I replied: It would be ideal to have a self employment programme to enable the 40,000 youths that are being trained every year to be guided to become entrepreneurs. Most of them are in the ranks of the unemployed even after training, today. ”

 My reply created an uproar. The Secretary to the Treasury, the highest official in the land objected on the grounds that such a self employment creation programme can never be achieved. He added that the ILO had in the preceeding three years tried to establish a self employment programme in Tangail, Bangladesh and spent a massive amount of funds all in vain. I  argued with the Secretary to the Treasury for over two hours, quoting definite instances where I had successfully established self employment projects for youths in Sri lanka.  It was an intense battle between me and the Secretary with the Hon Minister intently listening.  Finally the Minister stopped our battle. He immediately approved my establishing a self employment pogramme.  The Secretary to the Treasury stumped with the words, that he will never be providing any funds for this wasteful task. I replied that I will find savings within approved training budgets which was approved by the Hon Minister.

I got cracking with the officials of the Youth Ministry and the Lecturers of the Vocational Training Institutes that provided the vocational training, providing them with a basic knowledge of national planning to identify  areas within the economy where there was a propensity to create employment opportunities and training them in economic endeavour-structuring projects for self employment on a small scale-even with a cow or a dozen chicks and developing the enterprise. My task was to establish the self employment programme and to train the staff to continue after my two year consultancy ended. To a man the officers responded and today this Youth Self Employment Programme has by February 2011 guided  over two millions to become self employed  and it is an ongoing  programme that trains and guides 160,00 youths a year to become self employed. Today, it is easily the premier programme of employment creation  the world has known.

This experience of mine itself indicates that though wind power for the task of creating power is at an infancy today, we can easily develop it.

Let me hope that the contents of these papers which prove beyond all doubt that Wind Power can offer all the energy that Sri Lanka needs will someday find a Minister Aminul Islam” who will authorize it. I am certain  that the administrators and engineers who will toil till it is a success can easily be found.

Firstly, the country will not depend on the supply of coal and oil for power plants and the country can save all the millions and billions  being spent today to import oil and coal.

Secondly it will provide employment for thousands in erecting the turbine towers, in establishing the wind turbines and in the manufacture of the turbine mechanism itself at the later stages. In my travels in France, Spain and Portugal I have seen workers making  the towers, blades, transporting them in long trucks, erecting the towers and maintaining them. That is no difficult task for our engineers and workers.

 One of my readers happened to be an engineer, Mr Kanaga. who was involved with establishing the five wind turbines at Hambantota, the first to be built in Sri lanka. What is most interesting in his comment which I have totally enclosed in this book, is that the  environmental lobby had decided that the turbines should only be erected on the coasts and not in the mountains where there is ample wind force.

It is sad that the environmentalists were silent when the entire Kotmale Valley was denuded of people and their activities all to create 200 MW of power. That could have been easily achieved with fifty wind turbines scattered within Kotmale itself and the inhabitants and the economy would have been spared extintion. The entirety of Kotmale is dead today.

Currently the Kitulgala Valley is being destroyed to build a dam to get some 38MW of power and the entire Kitulgala Valley for miles will face destruction. Why were the environmentalists silent when these two projects were approved and implemented? 

Kanaga, that engineer supports my recommendation that  we should use the wind in our mountain area to provide the energy we need.

To my mind it is a crime not to use the wind power available and to spend millions and billions to purchase oil and coal.

I am convinced that there is an Oil Lobby and a Coal Lobby well financed to prove that wind is not a dependable source.

Many opine that wind is undependable.  To them my answer is that the wind is an utterly dependable source of energy. Spain has gone all out to build wind turbines and even sells power to France.

Thanks are due to engineer Kanaga for his comments which are immensely valuable so that I have quoted them as an attachment to my paper.

A reader of my Papers, Susantha Wijeytileke has even commented that once at Madugoda he saw a cyclist being blown off the road by the power of the wind.

I must mention that I am not alone in advocating the siting of wind turbines in the mountainous areas of Sri Lanka.

In Windfair, on line  editorial journalist  Trevor Sievert  quotes Lakshman Guruswamy, Sri Lanka has the potential to generate 24,000 MW electricity from wind.” (http://w3.windfair.net/wind-energy/news/1q543-sri-lanka-high-wind-energy-potential) Professor Guruswamy further states that studies have shown that nearly 5000 square KM of windy areas are available for potential wind power generation in Sri  Lanka.” (Dated 12/04/2018.)

In  www.windpower.lk, it is stated that in wind power the potential for Sri Lanka  is 20,740MW”

Wind Power in Sri Lanka,a publication by The Asia Business Office (//www.asiabiomass.jp/English/topics/1601_04.html) states that the wind potential in Sri Lanka is 20,740 MW. In  its words there is strong potential for wind power in the North Western coastal regions of Northern Province, the highland areas of the Central Province, Sabaragamuwa and Uva.”

  In Sri Lanka Wind farm Analysis and Site Selection Assitance,  M. Young and R Vilhauer of The Global Energy Concept, Kirkland, Washington state:

Sri Lanka has considerable available land with wind resource potential sufficient for development. However, the  wind power capacity expansion is limited by the electricity transmission infrastructure. CEB estimates that the grid cannot accommodate additional wind capacity more than 7% of the peak load. The CEB estimates that  installing more than 20MW of wind capacity in any given region may adversely impact local grid instability and power quality.

This Study  states that the windy land   can provide 50,000 MW.”

It is important to note that it is not the lack of wind power that holds up the utilization of wind power to produce electricity. Instead it is the grid capacity. Tackling the grid capacity is another kettle of fish. This is an area that has to be addressed. I will not be surprised if our  experts who yet think that wind turbines should be built to harness the sea breeze and not the wind power in our mountains  will come up with another cock and bull story stating that a grid cannot be built.

In the construction of the wind turbines at the Senok Wind Farm in Puttlam, where four wind farms established have a capacity of 40MW, it was found that the existing port facilities in the main port of Colombo and the road network was found wanting for the import of the turbine towers and blades. Instead these had to be obtained through barges from India.  The maximum height of the turbine tower is 90 meters and each blade is 50 meters in length. I have seen long towers and blades being transported by road in France and Spain. This needs special transport. In the hilly areas in Sri lanka it will be more feasible to construct the towers and blades on site. These are areas that have to be addressed in any development. Where there is a will, there is also a way.

My thanks are also due to the Editor of the Sunday Observer.lk who in Let there be Light” (Sunday Observer:06/09/2009) commented that my suggestions are very valuable. Referring tro my suggestion that the wind power in the Central Highlands should be harnessed says, This is a timely and valid proposal and the authorities should take  appropriate action to locate wind turbines in  areas which will enable them to reach their maximum potential.”

I am also thankful for Noor Nizam for his Wind Energy Electricity generation is a reality” (Sri Lanka Guardian:27/08/2009)  In his words, Garvin should be commended for his boldness to take to task the lethargic and selfish bureaucrats on this issue of renewal energy development of electricity energy in Sri Lanka…. His message should be well taken  by others too handling  national planning and development strategies  to assist the little island of 21 million to come out of the rut of poverty, misery, the destruction of the civil war and the dependence on foreign powers.”  He adds in the affirmative, As Garvin Karunaratne  wishes Wind Energy Electricity Generation  will be a reality in Sri Lanka for the next generation”.  It is my fervent hope that this will be realized.

The last paper  states of how the new owner of the Hambantota Port has insisted on a massive payment as ground rent for the five wind turbines. The CEB has decided to dismantle the five wind turbines.  This is a sad epitaph for wind power use in Sri Lanka.

However the contents of this book convinces any sane thinking person that wind power can be harnessed. We have to learn from mistakes, not make the mistakes rule us. As a country we have to find ways and means of forging ahead,  heedless.

This study proves  beyond all doubt that there is ample wind capacity in Sri Lanka for self sufficiency in our power requirements through harnessing the wind.. There is no question about this. However, as in any field of development, be it agriculture or industry, there are problems that have to be surmounted.  As stated the national grid has to be developed to carry the power from areas where it is generated to the areas where the power is consumed. Perhaps there can be local grids to carry the power generated from  a local wind farm to a local district capital. For instance if wind farms are located in Dela on the Kirigalpotta hillock, a grid can carry the power to the town of Ratnapura.

Sri Lankan engineers have in ancient times done wonders. The gradient of the Jaya Ganga that carried the waters of the Kala Weva to the tanks in Talawa and Anuradhapura has been constructed at a gradient of six inches in a mile, a gradient that baffles the irrigation engineers of today.

I am dead certain that Sri Lanka can become self sufficient in all its power requirements not for its present stage but also for its future development through using wind power. The wind power in the Central and Sabaragamuwa Hills is vast. Methods and systems have to be found to harness this energy. However as long as we build wind turbines on the coastal areas and ignore the areas where there is real wind power and satisfy ourselves with studies of the difficulties and constraints,  our attempt will be like  that of a squirrel trying to empty the water in the ocean , carrying a bit of water on its tail,  endless.

THE  END

Garvin Karunaratne Ph.D. Michigan State University

Author of How the IMF Ruined Sri Lanka & Alternative Programmes of Success(Godages:2006), How the IMF Sabotaged Third World Development(Kindle/Godages:2017)

ප්‍ර සමරසිංහ

ඝන ප්ලාස්ටික් ෆයිල් කවරයක් හමාරක් නොගන්න තරම් පරිසර සංවේදී නම්, අඩුගානේ ජනාධිපති තුමාගෙන්, අර තියෙනවා කීව කාඩ්බෝඩ් ෆයිල් වලින්, පරණ වුණාට කමක් නෑ ෆයිල් කවරයක් ඉල්ලගන්න. දැන් නම් එතුමා බොහෝ වෙලාවට ඒ ඔක්කොම වුනත් මදේ අහක් කරලා ඉල්ලන පරක්කුවට දෙන්නත් පුළුවන්.

දැන් ඒක ඇතුලට ඔය ජීවිත කාලෙදි ලැබිච්චි සහතික කරදහි අනුපිළිවෙලට දා ගන්න. 

ඕ ලෙවල් වි බාගේ සමත් අසමත් සහතික කරදහිය, 

ඒ ලෙවල් වි බාගේ සමත් අසමත් සහතික කරදහිය, 

ලෝකේ පිළිගත් විස්ස විජ්ජාලයකට ගියා නං, ඒ පාඨමාලාව හරියට සම්පුර්ණ කරල අවසන් මහ වි බාගේ සමත් වුනා නං, ප්‍රථම උපාධි සහතික කරදහියක් හම්බ වෙනවාම තමා, ඒ කරදහිය, 

ලෝකේ පිළිගත් විස්ස විජ්ජාලෙක ශාස්ත්‍රපති උපාධියක් (Master Degree) කරා නං, ඒ පාඨමාලාවත් හරියට සම්පුර්ණ කරලා නිබන්ධනයකුත් ලිව්වා නං ඒක එම ආයතනය පිලි ගන්නවා නම් ශාස්ත්‍රපති උපාධි සහතික කරදහියක් ලැබෙනවාම තමා, ඒ කරදහිය, 

ලෝකේ පිළිගත් විස්ස විජ්ජාලෙක දර්ශන ආචාර්ය උපාධියකට (PhD) පෙනී උන්නා නං, බොහෝ වෙලාවට පර්යේෂණ පත්‍රිකා 1-2ක්වත් ලෝකේ පිළිගත් ඒ විෂයානුබද්ධ සඟරාවක දෙකක (දෙස්/විදෙස්) පල කරන්න වෙනව ( සල්ලි අරගෙන පත්‍රිකා පල කරන අවර ගනයේ දෙස් විදෙස් සඟරා වලට අහු නොවීමට වග බලා ගන්න ඕන ), ඒ වගේම විශේෂිත විෂය කරුණක් ඔස්සේ නිබන්ධනය ලියල ඒ කරුණුවල නිරවද්‍යතාව තහවුරු කිරීමේ වාචික පරීක්ෂණයකට (Viva එකකට) විනිශ්චය මඩුල්ලක් ඉදිරියේ පෙනී සිටින්න වෙනවා. එය සාර්ථකව වුනාට පස්සේ දර්ශන ආචාර්ය උපාධි සහතික කරදහිය ලැබෙනවාම තමා, ඒ කරදහිය, 

ඔය අතරතුරේ ආසාවට දකින දකින නා නා විධ ඩිප්ලෝමා කරා නං ඒවටත් ලැබෙනවා සහතික කරදහි, ඒ කරදහි,

සහතික කරදහි 50ක් 60ක් කොහොමටත් එක ජීවිත කාලයකදි ලැබෙන්න විදියක් නෑ- ඒ නිසා පිළිවෙලට ඔය මුල් පිටපත් 5-6 ඔය ෆයිල් කවරේ අඩුක් කර ගත්තම, කව්රු හරි සහතික ඉදිරිපත් කරන්න කියල කිව්ව සුනංගුවට ඉදිරිපත් කරන්න පුළුවන් බොහොම පහසුවෙන්.

ඒ සහතික ප්‍රින්ට් කරන්න කියල කල් ගන්න කාරණාවක් ඇත්තෙම නෑ, හේතුව මුල් පිටපත දෙනවම තමයි. මුල් පිටපත වෙනුවට ඒකෙ කොපියක් සහතික කරලා තියා ගත්තොත් තවත් ලේසියි. එහෙම බලාපුවම වැඩිම වුනොත් ඔය ෆයිල් කවරේ අස්සේ තියෙන්න පුළුවන් කරදහි 10ක් 12ක් විතරයි. 

කොච්චර අධ්‍යාපන සහතික කරදහි තිබුණත් වැඩක් නෑ පිළිවෙලක් රටාවක් නැත්නම්. අරහේ මෙහෙ දාල පිස්සාගේ පළාමල්ල වාගේ තියා ගත්තොත් කවදාවත් ඕව හොයනව බොරු. කොහොම හරි ඔය ඔක්කොම එකතැනක තියල කරුමෙට ගේ ගිනි ගත්තොත් හරි ඉරිසියාකාර හොරෙක් ඇවිත් ෆයිල් එකම අරං ගියොත් කියන බය සංකාව තියෙනව නං සහතික වල ෆොටෝ අරගෙන ඒවත් සත්‍ය පිටපත් කියල සහතික කරව ගෙන pdf එකක් වශයෙන් තියා ගන්නත් පුළුවන් කොම්පියුටරේක.

දැනුම ලබා ගන්නවට, ඒ දැනුමෙන් යම් ‘හරවත් දෙයක්’ ඉදිරිපත් කරනවට සහතික කරදහි ලැබෙනව, ඒවා පරෙස්සමෙන් තියා ගන්නත් හිතෙනවා කාපු කට්ට කොතරම්ද කියල තමන්ම දන්න හන්දා. හැබැයි, තමන්ගේ නම ඉස්සරහටත් නමේ පිටිපස්සටත් අක්ෂර එකතු කරන අරමුණෙන් බොරු කිරීම කවුරුවත් අනුමත කරන්නේ නෑ. කවුරු හරි රවටන අරමුණෙන්, කාව හරි බය කරන අරමුණෙන්, තමන්ගේ උද්ධච්චකම පෙන්වන්න, කවදාවත් අහු වෙන්නේ නෑ කියල  හිතාගෙන පතාගෙන  නම ඉස්සරහට/ පස්සට ලබා නොගත්ත අක්ෂර ලබා ගත්තා සේ එකතු කරන්න යෑම තරම් මෝඩ තකතීරු වැඩක් ඇත්තේ නෑ. 

රටවැස්සන්ට අවංකව සේවය කරන්නන්ට වුවමනා කරන්නේ සාමාන්‍ය බුද්ධියක්, හැකියාවක් හා කැපවීමක් පමණක් වන අතර, මේ කරදහිවත් අක්ෂරවත් අත්‍යවශ්‍ය අංග නොවන වග බොහෝ දෙනා පිලි ගන්නා කාරණාවක්. 

දේශීය ජාතිකත්වය නැවත නගා සිටවූ දිවංගත ආචාර්ය නලින් ද සිල්වා මහතාට දේශනාවන් සඳහා ආරාධනා කෙරූවන් ඔහුගේ නමට මුලින් ‘මහාචාර්ය’ ලෙස යෙදු අයුරුත් ඒ හැම අවස්ථාවකදීම තම දේශනාව කිරීමට මත්තෙන්, එතුමන් නොපැකිලව එම වරද නිවරද කල අයුරුත් සිහිපත් වේ. ”තමන් කැලණිය විශ්ව විද්‍යාලයෙ මහාචාර්යවරයෙකු සේ සේවය කර විශ්‍රාම ගත් පසු, සම්මානිත මහාචාර්ය ලෙස ගෞරව ප්‍රධානයක් ලංකාවේ විශ්ව විද්යාලයකින් නොලද හෙයින් තමන් තව දුරටත් මහාචාර්ය නොවන වගත්, ඒ ලෙස හැඳින්වීම  වරදක්” බවත් ප්‍රකාශ කලේ ඉතාමත් ආදර්ශමත් ලෙසින්ය. මෙතුමන්ගේ මේ අනතිමානි ගුණයේ සහ ආදර්ශමත්බවේ  පිහිටීමට තරම් මුහුකුරා ගිය බුද්ධියක් ඇති ලක්වැසියන් බිහි වෙන්නේ කවදාදැයි හිතෙන වාර ගණන් විශේෂයෙන් මේ දිනවල බොහෝය. නැති දේවල් නැති ලෙසට ගත යුතුය, එය කිසිසේත්ම ලජ්ජාවට හෝ බියට කාරණයක් නොවන්නේය.

By Dr . Wasantha Sena Weliange Dr. Upali Peris Dr. Manoj Fernando Dr. Ruwan M Jayatunge

Youtube Link ;

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IeS1RBhyp1E

උපුටා ගැන්ම ලංකා සී නිව්ස්

ඉල්ලා අස්වූ කතානායක අශෝක රන්වල මහතාගේ අධ්‍යාපන සුදුසුකම් සම්බන්ධයෙන් මතභේදාත්මක තත්ත්වයක් ඇතිවීම මත ජාතික ජන බලවේගය හා ජනතා විමුක්ති පෙරමුණේ ප‍්‍රබලයන් අතර යම් මතගැටුම්කාරී ස්වභාවයක් ඇති වී තිබේ.

ජාතික ජන බලවේගයේ ප්‍රබල ක්‍රියාකාරිකයකු වන ආචාර්ය නිර්මාල් රංජිත් දේව සිරි මහතා සහ ජනතා විමුක්ති පෙරමුණේ ප්‍රබලයකු වන ජානක අධිකාරිය මහතා අතර සමාජ ජාලයන්හි මෙවන් එක් සංවාදය ඇති වී තිබේ.

ජානක අධිකාරි මහතා තම සමාජ ජාලයේ අශෝක රන්වල මහතාට පක්ෂපාතිව පළ කළ සටහනකට නිර්මාල් දේවසිරි මහතා සඳහන් කරන්නේ ජනතාවට පක්ෂයෙන් සත පහක වැඩක් නැති බවත් පාර්ලිමේන්තුව පක්ෂයේ බූදලයක් නොවන බවත්ය. 

උපුටා ගැන්ම ලංකා සී නිව්ස්

ඉන්දියාව හා ශ‍්‍රී ලංකාව විදුලි සම්ප්‍රේෂණ ජාලයන් සම්බන්ධ කිරීමටත්, ඉන්දියාවේ සිට ශ්‍රී ලංකාව දක්වා තෙල් නළයක් ඉදිකිරීමටත් දෙරට අතර වන එක්ටා ගිවිසුම ඉක්මනින් අවසන් කිරීමටත් ජනාධිපති අනුර කුමාර දිසානායක මහතා සහග සාකච්චා කල බව ඉන්දීය අග්‍රාමාත්‍ය නරේන්ද්‍ර මෝදි මහතා පවසයි.

නවදිල්ලියේ ‘හයිද්‍රාබාද් හවුස්’ දෙරටේ රාජ්‍ය නායකයින් දෙපළගේ හමුවීමෙන් පසුව පැවති ඒකාබද්ධ මාධ්‍ය හමුව අමතමින් ඔහු මෙසේ කියා සිටියේය.

‘අපිට සතුටුයි ජනාධිපති වූ පසුව ඔබගේ පළමු විදේශ සංචාරය සඳහා ඉන්දියාව තෝරා ගැනීම ගැන. මෙම සංචාරය අපගේ සබඳතාවලට නව ජවයක්.

භෞතික ඩිජිටල් සහ බලශක්ති සම්බන්ධතාවය අපගේ හවුල්කාරීත්වයේ වැදගත් වැදගත් කුළුණු වනු ඇති.

දෙරට අතර විදුලි බල ජාල සම්බන්ධතාවය සහ බහු නිෂ්පාදන පෙට්‍රෝලියම් නල මාර්ග ස්ථාපනය කිරීමේ කටයුතු ආරම්භ වේවි. සම්පූර්ණ සූර්ය බල ශක්ති ව්‍යාපෘතියට ජවයක් ලබාදෙනවා.

ඒ වගේම ලංකාවේ බලාගාර වලට අප එල්.එන්.ජී. සපයනවා.

ද්විපාර්ශවික වෙළඳාම නංවාලීම සඳහා දෙපාර්ශ්වයම ’එක්ටා’ ඉක්මනින් අවසන් කිරීමට උත්සාහ කරනවා.

අපේ දෙපාර්ශවයේම ආරක්ෂක අවශ්‍යතා එකිනෙකට සම්බන්ධ බවට අපි දෙදෙනාම සම්පූර්ණයෙන්ම එකඟයි.

දෙරටේ අරක්ෂික සහයෝගිතා ගිවිසුම කඩනමින් අවසන් කිරීමට අපි තීරණය කර තිබෙන්නේ ඒ නිසයි.

ධීවරයන්ගේ ගැටලු ගැනත් අපි සාකච්ඡා කළා. මේ කාරණය සම්බන්ධයෙන් මානුෂ්‍යයේ ප්‍රවේශයකින් ඉදිරියට ආයිත් බවට අපි එකඟයි.

ශ්‍රී ලංකාවේ ප්‍රතිසංස්කරණය සහ සංහිඳියාව ගැනත් අපි කතා කළා. දිසානායක ජනාධිපතිතුමා එතුමාගේ මතය ගැන මට කිවුවා.

ශ්‍රී ලංකා රජය දෙමළ ජනතාවගේ අභිලාෂ ඉටු කරනු ඇතැයි අපි බලාපොරොත්තු වෙනවා. ඒ වගේම ශ්‍රී ලංකා ආණ්ඩුක්‍රම ව්‍යවස්ථාව සම්පූර්ණයෙන්ම ක්‍රියාත්මක කිරීම සහ පළාත් සභා මැතිවරණ පැවැත්වීම සඳහා වන කැපවීම ඉටු කරනු ඇතැයි අපි විශ්වාස කරනවා.

ශ්‍රී ලංකාවේ සංවර්ධනය සඳහා වන ඔහුගේ ප්‍රයත්නයන්හිදී ඉන්දියාව විශ්වාසදායක සහ විශ්වාසදායක හවුල්කරුවකු ලෙස පවතින බවට මම සහතික වෙනවා’

By Rezaul H Laskar Courtesy The Hindustan Times

The Indian assistance ranged from supply of LNG for power plants to grants for upgrading railways and a port and the launch of a new ferry service

New Delhi

India on Monday unveiled a slew of measures to boost development and physical and energy connectivity with Sri Lanka, with Prime Minister Narendra Modi assuring President Anura Kumara Dissanayake of continued support for Colombo’s economic stabilisation efforts.

The Indian assistance, ranging from supply of LNG for power plants to grants for upgrading railways and a port and the launch of a new ferry service, were announced following talks between Modi and Dissanayake, who is on his first foreign visit since becoming president in September.

The moves signalled continuity under India’s Neighbourhood First” policy for Sri Lanka, which has been one of the largest beneficiaries of New Delhi’s development cooperation programme. Besides being Sri Lanka’s largest trade partner, India also continues to be the country’s largest source of tourists and biggest source of investments.

We shall work towards establishing electricity grid connectivity and multi-product petroleum pipelines between both nations. The Sampur solar power project shall be accelerated. Additionally, LNG shall be supplied for Sri Lanka’s power plants,” Modi said at a joint media interaction, speaking in Hindi. He added both sides will also work towards finalising a trade deal.

Dissanayake thanked India for its support in stabilising the Sri Lankan economy through unparalleled and multi-pronged” assistance, including emergency financing and foreign exchange support worth $4 billion.

We faced an unprecedented economic crisis some two years ago and India supported us immensely to come out of that quagmire. It has also helped us immensely after that, especially in the debt restructuring process,” Dissanayake said.

A joint statement said the two sides will work together for the timely completion of ongoing India-backed projects, such as Phase III and IV of the Indian Housing Project, the Islands Hybrid Renewable Energy Project, and community development projects. Besides, they will identify new projects for development partnership in line with the priorities of the Sri Lankan government.

In the energy sector, the two sides will continue discussions on supply of LNG from India to Sri Lanka, establishment of a high-capacity power grid interconnection, and trilateral cooperation with the United Arab Emirates (UAE) on building a multi-product pipeline from India to Sri Lanka for supply of affordable and reliable energy. Officials said this proposal envisages technical and economic support from the UAE in constructing the pipeline.

In the context of ongoing cooperation for developing the Trincomalee Tank Farms, Modi and Dissanayake decided to support the development of Trincomalee as a regional energy and industrial hub, the joint statement said.

In the field of connectivity, the two sides expressed satisfaction at the resumption of the passenger ferry service between Nagapattinam and Kankesanthurai and agreed to revive the passenger ferry service between Rameshwaram and Talaimannar. India will also provide a grant of $14.9 million for the signalling system of the Maho-Anuradhapura railway line.

Foreign secretary Vikram Misri told a media briefing that India remains involved in Sri Lanka’s financial stabilisation efforts following the economic crisis of 2022 through its engagement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and in its role as co-chair of the Official Creditors’ Committee.

Our support has been timely, swift and, most importantly, unconditional, underlining our position as a responsible and friendly neighbour of Sri Lanka,” Misri said. As part of these efforts, India has converted repayments worth

$20.66 million for seven line of credit projects into a grant. India will also provide a grant of $61.5 million for rehabilitating Sri Lanka’s Kankesanthurai port, a project that was earlier to be done under a line of credit.

Modi also reaffirmed India’s continued support for Sri Lanka’s economic stabilisation efforts, Misri said. He assured President Dissanayake that India’s approach would be investment-based and grant-oriented to reduce the debt burden on Sri Lanka and to assist them in generating economic opportunities that are long-term and sustainable,” he said.

The two sides also signed a protocol amending the agreement for avoidance of double taxation to prevent fiscal evasion with respect to taxes on income, and a memorandum of understanding (MoU) for training 1,500 Sri Lankan civil servants over five years at India’s National Centre for Good Governance. India also announced a financial assistance scheme for 200 students from the University of Jaffna and Eastern University.