Meera Srinivasan Courtesy The Hindu

Sri Lankan PM tells inquiry panel that he was not informed about the terror threat despite prior intel

I am yet to get a satisfactory response on why I was not briefed about the Easter Sunday terror threat,” Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe has said, suggesting that the Sri Lankan government may still not have identified the reasons for the security lapse, over three months after the bombings shook the country.

Neither he nor his security division was informed about the terror threat, despite prior intelligence being available with senior security officials, Mr. Wickremesinghe on Tuesday told a parliamentary panel probing the Easter bombings. I went to Nuwara Eliya [Central Province] for a few days, but I was in the country. No one informed me about the [possible] attacks,” he said.

The Prime Minister is so far the highest official to testify before the Parliament Select Committee (PSC) that President Sirisena has accused of endangering national security”. However, resisting the pressure, the panel has continued inquiring top security officials, politicians, bureaucrats and religious leaders.

Extremist activities

Queried about his knowledge of extremist” activities in the country, Mr. Wickremesinghe said while he had received reports earlier of extremist groups that had embraced IS ideology”, he did not receive any specific information on terrorist” activity in the past. We only received reports of a person [Sri Lankan fighter] killed in Syria and intelligence agencies were instructed to investigate.”

Following the public fallout between the President and the Prime Minister last October — when Mr. Sirisena controversially sacked PM Wickremesinghe and later reinstated him — the PM had not been invited to the national security council meetings chaired by Mr. Sirisena.

The last [NSC] meeting I attended was in October 2018,” Mr. Wickremesinghe said.

To members’ questions on why he didn’t raise the matter, he said: There was one meeting in February that I learnt about later. When I enquired, I was told the council meetings weren’t going to be held thereafter.”

On whether his being kept out of the crucial meetings was a consequence of the differences with the President, he said: no,” adding that it would be difficult to conclude so.

Asked if he was aware of reports about Zahran Hashim, the alleged mastermind of the terror attacks, Mr. Wickremesinghe said reports with authorities indicated that the radical preacher Zahran had been absconding. There was one analysis that he could have gone to India by sea via Mannar, but no specific information about terrorist activities in the country.”

Further, admitting to a serious lapse” in the security apparatus, Mr. Wickremesinghe said the current structure, tuned to fight the LTTE, needed to be revamped to tackle the new phase of terror”. Mr. Wickremesinghe also called for legislation to combat hate speech, information sharing and biometrics. Not just ISIS, every religion or ethnicity has extremist activity, we need a separate team to monitor that. The Internet poses a further challenge,” he said.

Sandun A Jayasekera Courtesy The Daily Mirror

The Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) stance on the presidential election will be decided after the second round of discussions between President Maithripala Sirisena and SLPP and Opposition Leader Mahinda Rajapaksa, SLFP General Secretary Dayasiri Jayasekara said today.

The two leaders met on Monday night. I can’t disclose what transpired at the discussion because they are expected to meet again shortly. I believe the two parties will be in a position to come to an understanding on the position to be taken on the presidential election,” he said. “The talks held between the SLFP and the SLPP have made steady progress. The SLFP Central Committee has requested them to have another discussion before finalizing a common programme.”

The MP said SLFP members would never join the SLPP and that the SLFP had several alternatives other than the SLPP and UNP. “The SLFP is not me or someone else. We have a huge membership. Any political party which needs our support must agree to our policies and work programme,” he said. We cannot win the presidential election only by fielding a candidate. We need to pool the support of all anti-UNP forces and minorities. The SLFP is not a racist party which has been formed by uniting all communities.”

MP Nimal Siripala De Silva said the SLFP would not support the UNP nor any candidate linked to it but support the candidate who contests against the UNP. The SLFP would disclose a few important decisions on September 3 at its annual convention at the Sugathadasa Indoor stadium.

We will never support the UNP. However, we are concerned with the current political situation in the country and will take a pragmatic decision,” the MP said.

Responding to a journalist, he said the SLFP had not received an invitation to participate in the SLPP convention. (

Rosie Spinks, Courtesy Skift

n the wake of a tragedy, destinations are hugely beholden to the public perception of how safe it is to travel there, regardless of the reality on the ground. But the United States — which has experienced more mass shootings than there are days in 2019 — is unfairly exempt from that struggle.— Rosie Spinks

If you type in the phrase Is it safe to travel to…” in the Google search bar, it’s instructive to see what countries come up in response: Sri Lanka, Turkey, Hong Kong, Tunisia.

Unsurprisingly, these are all destinations which have, in recent weeks or months, experienced some kind of civil unrest or terrorist incident. Whether or not these locations pose any material threat to travelers is somewhat irrelevant. In the wake of terror incidents or civil unrest, their SEO becomes their destiny.

But perhaps what’s more instructive is what doesn’t show up on that list. Rarely are you likely to find a country like the United States. A country where, according to the Gun Violence Archive, there have been 253 mass shootings in the country since the beginning of 2019. That’s more shootings than days. Two of those occurred over the weekend in less than 24 hours, first in El Paso, Texas followed by Dayton, Ohio, leaving 31 dead.

Of course it’s true that sometimes, destinations truly are unsafe to visit and officials should warn accordingly. But much of the time, rebounds in tourism after a tragedy are dependent not on conditions on the ground — but rather the perception of that destination’s safety. That is largely shaped by news reporting on local officials’ guidance, but increasingly, by social media as well. And yet even in our thoroughly globalized world, there is an inherent unfairness in how we determine what countries are safe” to visit in the wake of a tragedy.

Take the Dominican Republic, which, after a slew of incidents where American tourists have died in hotel accommodations in the past year, has had to fight hard to remind travelers that there has not yet been any connection established between their deaths. When the FBI releases its forthcoming findings on the nature of those deaths, it may be the case that the destination suffered a drop in flight bookings due to nothing more than confirmation bias. By then, though, the perception of its danger level may already be set.

Or take Sri Lanka, where 250 people died in a horrific terrorist incident in April. With tourism down 57 percent in June year on year, the industry is taking steps to rebound its industry, including implementing visas on arrival. And thankfully, it seems to be working. But its recovery has still been dependent on downgraded threat levels from officials and the tone of international reporting (which, unsurprisingly, hasn’t always given the full picture). It’s hard not to notice that it’s a place fighting against a perception that others don’t have to face.

Indeed nowhere is this seemingly infinite benefit of the doubt more evident than in the U.S. It’s a useful thought experiment to imagine what the State Department, which doles out travel advisories for seemingly minor threat levels (including a level two warning for much of western Europe due to terrorism), might say about the threat level of visiting the U.S. after a weekend where there were two mass shootings in 24 hours — and another just a week before.

Unlike, say, an advisory for Turkey — which, at level three, advises travelers to reconsider travel” and stay away from regions near the Syrian and Iraqi border — there is no rhyme or reason to where the threat of a mass shooting in the U.S. lies. The consequences of America’s failure to end gun violence can manifest anywhere, at any time. And sure, while the statistical likelihood of a traveler being caught up in a mass shooting in America is low, is it any lower than that of a terrorism attack in Turkey or western Europe?

It’s true there have been some acts of diplomatic resistance in the wake of the weekend’s shootings. In what are perceived to be somewhat retaliatory moves, Uruguay and Venezuela both warned their citizens about travel to the U.S. It’s also true that U.S. is currently losing market share of global travel under the Trump administration, though the causes of that loss are less down to a perception of safety, and more down to conscious policy decisions that some foreigners perceive as actively unwelcome.

So who is to blame for all this? Of course, there are legions of Americans who desperately want stricter gun laws, and the State Department is not in the business of issuing travel alerts for its own nation. But to be an American is to indulge in a kind of identity-forging belief that it is the greatest country in the world” — even when, say, it’s the only country in the world that suffers mass shootings to this degree. Our failure as Americans to grapple with that, to hold ourselves to the same standards that we hold other countries when deciding what’s safe” — and perhaps even inject a hearty dose of humility into that calculation — is where we fall short.

On a global scale, the unfairness — and indeed, the subtle racism — of what destinations we deem unsafe” is a huge political force in the world of travel today. It means some destination marketers have to battle against travel warnings and sensationalist reporting, while others simply don’t. As the journalist Lisa Ling wrote on Instagram over the weekend, Americans who expressed concern about her choice to bring her young daughter on a trip to Guatemala should hear what Guatemalans think about the safety of taking their children to a public event in the U.S.: They never fear that their kids are going to be shot up at a mall or festival.”

Courtesy Inquirer.net

The Island/Asia News Network

COLOMBO — The first ever Sri Lankan nano satellite, RAAVANA-1 launched into an orbit 400 km away from earth on June 17, sent the first picture of earth.

RAAVANA-1 is a research satellite built by two Sri Lankan engineers, Tharindu Dayaratne and Dulani Chamika, from the University of Peradeniya and the Arthur C. Clarke Institute for Modern Technologies.ADVERTISEMENT

The satellite is expected to fulfil five missions including the capturing of pictures of Sri Lanka and its surrounding regions.

The satellite was designed and built at the Kyushu Institute of Technology in Japan and is 1,000 cubic cm in size and weighs 1.1 kg. It was officially handed over to the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency on Feb 18.

It was successfully launched into space at NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility on Wallops Island, Virginia on April 18. The satellite was boarded to the Antares rocket carrying Cygnus cargo spacecraft and reached the International Space Station the following day.

Read more: https://technology.inquirer.net/89676/sri-lankan-built-satellite-sends-first-picture-of-earth#ixzz5vr1GgD9q
Follow us: @inquirerdotnet on Twitter | inquirerdotnet on Facebook

Sulochana Ramiah Mohan Courtesy Ceylon Today

Turkey’s Ambassador to Sri Lanka Tunca Ozcuhadar alleged that the Easter Sunday suicide bomber Zahran Hashim and his group were mere ‘foot soldiers’ who carried out an attack planned by someone else.

Ozcuhadar clarified that he is not a security expert but said the logic behind the systematic bombings shows that organising simultaneous attacks are a difficult task without proper logistical and financial support.

It does not look like a home-grown terrorist group to me. The interesting part is that Zahran got himself killed, which is awkward for a leader to do. It was a very short-sighted action, hence, there is a mastermind behind all the planning and executing of the bombings. Zahran and whoever next was not the leader but a foot soldier. If he was the leader, he should be alive and this was most likely operated from outside the country. This is my view,” the Envoy said.

He added that two Turkish engineers died in the bomb blast at Shangri-La hotel on 21 April and that a couple of days later, the members of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) visited Malcolm Cardinal Ranjith, who said that people know that the attacks had nothing to do with Muslims nor Islam, instead there are big powers using radicals for their own power struggle. Islam has nothing to do with IS (Islamic State)… whoever interprets the Quran for a political agenda is not Islamic,” he noted.

Turkey is already fighting IS fighters and are determined to eliminate the terror corridor from its borders.

Condemning the racial attacks on Muslims in the aftermath of the bombings, the Ambassador noted it was difficult to understand why all Muslims were blamed and said it was not the first time where Muslims have come under attack.

Ozcuhadar said that the OIC represents 57 predominantly Muslim countries representing 1.5 billion people and each of these countries has good links with Sri Lanka. Everybody is cooperating with Sri Lanka and none of those countries have an agenda.” He noted that the OIC wants peace to remain in the country and the welfare of its Muslims is a concern to them. Safety and security should be provided to all communities in the country and perpetrators and provokers should be brought to justice. We can only express our concerns.” He said Sri Lanka should grow economically and tourism should pick up and that the country should not ‘shoot itself in the foot’.

He also noted that they did not find a single Sri Lankan going to Syria en route in Turkey to fight for IS.

Turkey issues roughly 1,000 visas for Sri Lankans annually.  

The Ambassador also noted around 3,000 Turkish nationals visit Sri Lanka annually and their National Carrier Turkey Airlines flies  90 percent of the tourists to Sri Lanka.

Dr. Sudath Gunasekara 

A people’s Manifesto for the next Presidential/General Election. ?

Fifty Demands for all political Parties and aspirant leaders who intend contesting next Presidential/General Election

Introduction

It is a foregone conclusion that there is no Government in this country today, in spite of the fact that there is a President, a Prime Minister,  9 Governors in the nine Provinces, nearly 157 Ministers (112 Central Government (until recently), and 45 Ministers with 5 Chief Ministers in the Provincial Councils, nearly 700 PC Members, and 336 Pradesiya Sabhas with 8825 Members,  maintained at enormous cost, bleeding the nation, with facilities and privileges not heard or given to politicians anywhere in the world. Moreover it is said that for every 16 people in this country we have 1 public servant (1/16) and for every 2235 people we have 1 politician (1/2235) all serving themselves and not the people who maintain them.

Thus we have the top heaviest and most corrupt political machinery and an inefficient, lethargic and servile public service for any country in the world, that has no concern for the country or the people who maintain all these wasteful institutions and parasites, plagued with thousands of liars and thieves.

Isn’t this total anarchy and naked day light gang robbery of a nation by corrupt politicians and their supporters, with impunity?

Furthermore even the Judiciary, the machinery of Public Service (except the Armed forces)   too has failed to win the confidence of the general public due to serious politicization. So much so today this country has almost become a failed State where top anarchy reigns.

In fact this had been the state of governance ever since this Government was installed in power in January 2015. The so-called Public Service today also has got reduced to the level of a domestic service of the political party in power, with very few exceptions found once in a blue moon. The situation is getting aggravated every day as all political parties are concerned only in vote hunting to remain in power.

Therefore the crying need to seriously address and arrest this grievous national problem immediately and find a lasting solution before the country collapses completely beyond redemption.

In order to achieve this noble objective, which, I consider will be a historic land mark in the political history of this country, I propose below a comprehensive list of 50 steps needed to be taken immediately to arrest this appalling situation and make this country once again the Pearl of the Indian Ocean, as it had been in the past, by converting it to a dynamic, vibrant and prosperous status. For this we need a strong and patriotic government that can fulfill the native people’s aspirations. With this objective in view, using the 1956 experience, I present the following proposal for all patriotic people to think seriously.

The following recipe is based on burning aspirations of the native Sinhala majority who has been discriminated and sidelined by all political parties for 70 years since the dawn of so-called Independence in 1948. It is a complete departure from the conventional manifestoes of political parties presented by them to grab people’s votes only to fulfill their own vicious and selfish ends. It is a people’s manifesto, prepared after consultation with a wide cross section of people.

In this proposal the people demand and command the politician and political parties for the first time in the history of elections, in this country since 1956, to accept and publicly agree to fulfill the people’s demands, if they want their votes. That is the fundamental difference between all previous election manifestoes and this. I hope this will also provide a precedent for all future elections in this country to lay a firm and solid foundation for democracy in this country. No political party or individual that cannot comply with this National agenda is qualified to aspire to govern this country in future or ask for a mandate from the people to do so.

The Blue Print of a People’s Election Manifesto for the next Presidential/General election

Objective

(These objectives are tailored to cover all fields like political, economic. social and cultural in nation building)

1 To replace an utterly corrupt, disastrous, treacherous and non-functioning government, by the politicians, for the politicians and of the politicians and their families, cronies and their government servants, with a “True Yahapaalanaya” by the people, of the people and for the good of the people and to set up a Civilization State” as Martin Jacques  proposed in his When China Rules the World” (2009), based on our own indigenous systems of governance headed by an honourable set of Statesmen headed by a strong patriotic Sinhala Buddhist leader and a set of True Public Servants”, who love the country, its people and their culture than their own self interst.

2 To take the reins of power of Governance in to the hands of 75% Sinhala majority, consolidate their rights as the Bhumiputras of the land and end the tyranny of minority politics in this country, which has ruined this country since 1948 while ensuring the reasonable rights of minority communities and their due place in this country within the framework of a Sinhala Buddhist State.

3To restore the name of the country as Sinhale, Sinhala Language as the State Language, Buddhism as the State religion, the national flag that was there in 1815 and the status of the total land of the motherland free from all encumbrances to restore the sovereignty, territorial integrity, independence, freedom and the cultural heritage of this great Sinhala Buddhist country and the nation as it existed for 2500 years at the time of ceding to British I n 1815. (In fact these are things that should have been done in 1948 but never done by any Government for 71 years up to date)

4 To enact a new Constitution based on the roots of the nation as embedded in its history, traditions of state craft, legal systems, the cultural heritage and the 2500 year old civilization, to lay a solid and firm foundation for nation building to make this country a vibrant, dynamic and prosperous nation.

5 To ban all Political Parties named after ethnic, religious, regional or divisive basis like Federal, TNA, TELO, SLMS, TC and EPRLF or any other like who go against the Non-negotiable conditions of the Sri Lankan State. (See Annex 1)

6 To end the conventional practice of keeping everything in the hands of corrupt politicians by getting them to implement an election manifesto prepared by the people like in 1956, instead of hitherto prevailed practice of politicians imposing their election manifestos to get the votes and get their things done, while ruining the country.

7 To get all people to give up their kepuwath, meruwath UNP/ SLFP/ JVP type of blind party political affiliations, which has divided the Sinhala people and made the minorities the King makers, and to organize the Nation as a ‘We Sinhala Movement’ as one mighty patriotic force that will put the country before the party and all other petty considerations like religion and caste to unite the nation as one formidable and undefeatable ‘Force’ and to end the minority power of hijacking the  Sinhala Buddhist nation in to political wilderness. United we stand and divided we fall. Our failure to understand this simple gospel truth and getting blindly trapped in the divisive noose of party politics set by the colonial British to ruin this country.                    

8 To restore the lost heritage of the Sinhala nation and the main aspects of their Independence and identity, starting from 1505 to date, which the politicians of this country have miserably failed to do during 71 years of so-called Independence (See Mahanuwara Charter 2019 for details).Re-starting teaching of true history of this country  should commence immediately in all schools as a compulsory subject for all citizens to differentiate between fact and fiction.

9 To scrap the Indian imposed 13th Amendment and Provincial Councils, a white elephant and a curse imposed upon us by force by India, that has completely destabilized the once effective and less costly District Administration and Governance in this country, by multiplying and duplicating public institutions, number of parasitic politicians and public servants, dividing the country in to 9 semi-federal units paving the way for permanent division of the country in to a no return situation, wasting billions of public funds with zero benefit to the country, that could otherwise have been gainfully spent on the development of the country. Concurrently the abolition of Rajiv/JR Accord of July 29th 1987 that gave birth to PCC and many other serious political disasters, like 1) the acceptance of  a Traditional Tamil Homeland in the North and East, 2) granting Official status to Tamil Language in this country (when it is not given even in India where over 70 million Tamils live) and 3) granting Citizenship to all Indian Estate labour on the plantations on an affidavit from a JP, also has to be removed forthwith.

8 To punish all involved in the CB mega Robbery starting from Ranil Wickramasinha, the chief conspirator-cum schemer and the first accused ending in recovering the total loss to the country, life imprisonment, confiscation of property and ending in death penalty for those found guilty.

9 To cancel all disastrous agreements entered in to by this Government with Foreign countries to sell or lease out the nation’s assets and making prior Parliamentary approval mandatory before signing any international agreement in future.

10 To declare all land 5000 feet above sea level as strictly reserved forests as in the days of the Sinhala Kings to protect the country’s geographical Heartland that provides the source for all rivers in this country which in turn determines and dictate the entire life system and the civilization in this Island nation: limit all human settlements to areas below 3500 feet, to protect the physical stability of the central hill country” of the country, thereby increasing the water resources for agriculture, hydro- electricity, industries and domestic use.

11 To restore all lost rights of native Kandyan Sinhalese who fought for 443 years against three enemy invaders Portuguese, Dutch and British to protect this nation for us.

12 To set up a separate Ministry for Kandyan Peasantry rehabilitation, the Authority and the Institutions recommended by the Kandyan Peasantry Commission of 1951, to rehabilitate them immediately to rectify the historical injustices done to them and to abolish the newly formed Hill country Tamil (mono) Village and Infrastructure Development Ministry and all so-called development programmes started under it with ADB assistance by this Government that will ultimately lead to the formation of a permanent Indian enclave right at the centre of this country. (These people were brought by the British after 1840, as slaves who worked for the British to enrich the British Treasury. While toiling for their British masters they earned their living and transferred all their savings to India annually up to 1948).

13 To restore all lost rights of native Kandyan Sinhalese who fought for 443 years, from 1505-1815, against three colonial enemy invaders Portuguese, Dutch and British to protect the motherland and this nation for us.

14

a)To abolish the newly formed Hill country Tamil (mono) Village and Infrastructure Development Ministry and stop all the institutions and International  assistance that will ultimately lead to the formation of a permanent Indian enclave right at the centre of this country. (These people were brought by the British after 1840, as slaves who worked for the British to enrich the British Treasury. While toiling for their British masters they earned their living and transferred all their savings to India annually up to 1948). My question to Ranil and his government and all politicians who pamper these alien people is, as to why they are giving these lands outright and privileges to decedents of an alien slave force, while the Kandyan Peasants, the real owners of these lands are being blatantly discriminated and not restored with an inch of their ancestral land.

15 To drastically reduce the number of politicians and institutions at all levels starting from Parliament and Ministries to the village level to an economically viable level the country could afford. (155 Members of Parliament, 15 Ministries)

16

a)To limit granting Citizenship to Plantation sector Indian Tamils only according to Nehru-Kotalawala Agreement of 1954 and annul all Citizenships given under any other politically motivated treacherous agendas since 1954; even among them only those who renounce all their connections both physically and mentally with India for good and accept this country as the land of the Sinhala nation and agree to integrate with the native Sinhala people as it has always happened in history shall be qualified to get citizenship under this. Others have to leave either to India or Britain as they were British citizens on Feb 4th 1948. They also should agree to abide by the 15 non-negotiable conditions given in Annex 1. In addition to fulfilling the conditions laid down in the N/K Agreement it should also be made compulsory for them to pass an examination in Sinhala and Sri Lankan history before they are qualified to receive citizenship.

b) To limit granting citizenship to all other categories and to enact strict laws on giving citizenship to foreigners; only to persons who accept the 15 non-negotiable conditions listed in the Mahanuwara Charter 2019 and who accept and respect this country as the land of the Sinhala nation and agree not to challenge this inalienable status at any date even in future. (Please see Annex1).  They also have to pass an examination in Sinhala language and history of this land.

17 To take immediate steps to restore and protect the ancient archaeological and historical monuments destroyed by Tamils and Muslims to protect the Sinhala Buddhist Civilization and culture all over this country together with the total land extend donated these institutions by the ancient Kings and pay special attention to restore all place names and names of rivers, given during the Portuguese, Dutch, British rule to their pre 1505 original status.

18 To allocate all employments under Government strictly according to ethnic ratios and have strict rules even in the private sector, to protect rights of Sinhalese.

19 To follow a Non-align Foreign policy protecting the Sovereignty, freedom and Independence of the country and to assert as an Independent nation without cowing and bowing down to anybody.

20 To make Sri Lanka  once again the Pearl of the Indian Ocean and the Miracle of  Asia by giving pride of place in the national economy to Agriculture, Livestock, Fishing, Export promotion, Shipping and Aviation as key sectors in the economy and thereby converting the nation’s economy to a dynamic, vibrant and strong status.

21 to stop all wasteful public functions such as foundation laying and opening petty projects at state expense and talking shops (meetings) organized by and for politicians with expensive flower decorations and also expensive pavilions etc. to exhibit their vanity, spending millions of public funds and wasting millions of valuable man hours and to compel the politicians to go for actions at least now and stop talking which they have done for the past 71 years and also stop forthwith all meetings organized to hand over appointments  etc and post all such letters by post to recipients as it was done in the past.  Display of politicians on Sign boards all over the country costing billions should also be banned.

22 To revise the pension scheme for all retired public servants so that every pensioner will be placed on the same pension salary point entitled to a person retiring from the corresponding post at present irrespective of the date on which the former has retired, in terms of the historic 1985 Indian Supreme court decision, in order to do justice to nearly 600,000 pensioners, who are struggling to keep their heads above water.

23 To Ban sending slave labour (especially women) to other countries including domestic servants to Middle East and to provide employment avenues for them locally to stop our cultural erosion, and to start a program of sending skilled professionals only, like Doctors, Engineers, Technicians and Managers etc enabling creation of jobs for those who pass out from our Universities and technical colleges as a major source of foreign exchange

24 To ban all Schools under the ‘International’ labels and extremist ideologies like Madrasa so that we will have only National Schools that will implement the national Education policy of Sri Lanka in this country in future, as only a broad based National Educational policy that suits the country in the context of the new world, could lay the sound foundation that could meet the challenges of this emerging world, for proper nation building. Make studying Sinhala compulsory for all Sri Lankan citizens

25 To Reduce annual Public holidays (currently in the range of 125 -135) to a number not to exceed 12 as it is accepted in most countries

26 To stop poaching and robbing all our marine resources in our territorial waters by any foreign country, including India that leads the game depleting our marine resources

27 To impose death penalty for all found guilty on all serious and anti-social crimes starting with narcotics

28 To lay down special qualifications for politicians. Things like impeachable character, a Clean record, minimum educational qualifications, reasonable assets, unassailable patriotism and character, etc + five years compulsory permanent residence in the electorate, unless he or she has birth right to that electorate for which he/she seeks nomination and an upper age limit of 75 years with recall provisions and finally to make the JRS once again the most august assembly in the country.

29 To have a strict code of ethics and conduct for politicians and public servants with clear and strict performance targets, including a ban on all politicians and public servants other than Cabinet Ministers and National level officers attending state functions outside their areas of authority unless the chief guest invites him/her for some special duty, as the present practices involves a wanton wastage of enormous amounts of public funds.

30 To demand that all politicians have to agree to work free for one year under the new system

31 To appoint a permanent commission to inquire in to malpractices of all politicians and high officials from 1987 and punish those found guilty with confiscation of property illegally acquired, removal of civil rights and any other punishment courts deem fit for the offences committed. 

32 To restructure the present system of Government Machinery with lesser number of 15   Ministries. Departments and Statutory Boards and institutions will continue as implementing agencies of policies and programmes of the Government.

33 To set up an independent professional Judiciary and a Public Service where all recruitments, placements and promotions will be purely made on merits based on competitive examinations. Meritocracy should be the hall mark in the seats of public service in all these fields including politics.

34Main features of the new Government under the new Constitution

A Central Government

1An Uttareetara Purohita Saba/ Advisory Council

An Uttareetara Purohita Saba of 17 members (see Sec.  05 of Mahanuwara Charter 2019 for details (Instead of one Purohita in the past) as stated in the Siya Panatha

2) Uttareetara Jatika Selasum Mandalaya/Permanent Supreme National Planning Council  consisting of 10 or 15 eminent persons in fields like Economics,  Law, Finance, Agriculture, Environment, Industry, Education, Trade and Commerce, History and Culture of this country etc, to prepare the overall National Plan so that politicians will have only to implement national policies after they get elected. This will also has to be regularly evaluated, monitored and corrective measures taken to get this programme and the broad work plan given in the Mahanuwara Charter 2019 to be implemented by the new Government to the end without flaws. This Council should be chaired by the Prime Minister.   

3 President

 An Executive President elected by all the people in the country who shall be the Head of the State, Head of the government and the Chief Commander of the Three Forces and restore his powers removed by the 19th Amendment. 

4 Prime Minister

Prime Minister; The Chairman of the 15 Executive Committee as stated in 6 below.

5 Jatika Rajya Sabhava

Jatika Rajya Sabhava JRS/ (Parliamentto be named as JRS) of Elected Members representing 198 electorates (Abolish National list MP, District MP, Proportional and Preference system) Five years permanent residence within the respective electorate for all candidates should be made compulsory to get nomination.

6)  Cabinet

JRS to have 15 Executive Committees whose Chairmen will form the Cabinet of 15 assisted by 15 Deputy Ministers, representing the 15 Districts that have not got a Minister. Of the 15 Chairmen one will get elected as the Chairman of the Committees (Cabinet) who will be appointed as the Prime Minister by the President. (For details see Towards a Government without Political Parties” mentioned in Mahanuwara Charter 2019)

7) State machinery

The present system of State machinery of Ministries and Departments with semi-government institutions will continue, of cause reduced in number.

8 New Constitution 

To enact a new Constitution base on our own civilization as more fully described in Mahanuwara Charter 2019.  The Constitution for any given country has to be formulated by the Bhoomiputras who have founded the land, made the civilization and lived there from inception of history of that land and who treat it as their only motherland unless it had been overrun and conquered by an alien power like in the case of   N&S Americas, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. No other outside party such as a foreign country or institution or an invader or labourers brought by them for their work and left behind when they left or left outs of invaders or itinerant seasonal traders and illicit immigrants who have their own true motherlands elsewhere, like Tamils and Muslims in this country has absolutely no right to take part in constitution making for this country. As such constitution making for this country is the non-negotiable prerogative and the birth right of Sinhalese Buddhists.

(No man or woman who is not prepared to agree to the conditions given in Annexes 1 &11 and Charter2019, even if he/she is a Sinhala Buddhist should be appointed as a Minister or a Deputy).

B

Local Government

9 To form

1) Grama Sabha,

2) Village Councils at Korale level for villages and,

3 Urban Councils and Municipal Councils for Urban centers. (Pradesiya Sabhas will be abolished under this system).

35 To restore former District and Divisional Agricultural and Coordinating Committees

to be presided over by District and Divisional Secretaries (Disapathi and Upadisapathi)

36 To completely reorganize and upgrade the present Grama Seva System with resident village level officers to be named Gampathi in place of present itinerant Grama Seva Niladhary system, transferable only within the respective divisions, transferable once in 5 years, as both the Village officer Gampathi and the Village formed the rock foundation of the effective administration in this country from the inception of history, at least from 307 BC

37 To divide the Island again in to Tun Rata with 10 districts for each totaling 30 for the whole country. Five new districts, Mahiyanganaya, Wellavaya and Seruwavila for Ruhunu Rata; Yapahuwa (kurunegala   for Maya Rata and Willpattuwa for Pihitirata)

38 To ban clergy of all religions from contesting elections to Jatika Rajya Sabhava or any other political body

39To ban appointing defeated politicians and members of politicians families to any post under government violating all recruitment procedures to government and semi-government institutions or local and foreign services.

40 To stop all special privileges to all politicians and public servants like Duty free and official vehicles and punish all those who have misused this facility by violating the PA circulars from 1987 as given in Siyapanatha item 88.

41 To abolish the of Pension rights politicians and convert it once again to an Honourable public service as it had been in the past and to end politics being pursued as a fraud and a big business

42 To disqualify politicians and all other persons including those found guilty of any treacherous action against the State or the country to hold any post in politics or public service.. Even those who are holding any public positions at the moment, that fall in to this category should also be removed immediately.  This should be followed by removing civil rights, life imprisonment and confiscating illegally acquired property in addition to any other punishment the authorities deem fit.

43 To stop all interference by foreign countries or any foreign organization in the internal affairs of this country and to govern only according to the wishes and aspirations of the Bhoomiputras of this country.  The age of Navi Pillay, Samantha Power, the British Prime Minister, Geneva and all other similar organizations like Amnesty International and UNCHR, ordering us what to do should be put to an end immediately.

44 To Terminate diplomatic relations with all countries that do not conform to these  Sri Lankan national policies and who consistently act against  the interests of the Sri Lanka Government and support the LTTE remnants  both at Home and abroad  and the so-called Tamil Diaspora  operating from New York and London  and many other countries.

45 To make the Secretary to the Treasury and the Ministry of Finance once again the Head of the Public service and the Secretaries to Ministries to be appointed only from the Secretaries Service (see Siya Panatha Sec.3 for details). This will insulate Public Service from political messing and restore independence, discipline and quality of public service and all recruitments to State jobs to be done through open competitive examinations and viva voce with no political interference. All Government institutions to have a fixed cadre

46 To resettle all displaced people due to LTTE atrocities or during the war in their original places within six months.

47 To ban all types of Communal segregations and make the whole Island open to people of all communities without any discrimination and to punish persons like Vignesvaran Sivajilingam, who openly preach and act against this principle.

48 All Universities to be made independent seats of higher learning catering to Economic. Social and Cultural development needs of the country, subject to the implementation of the Government’s National education policy. Ban all politically designed Student unions in Universities and also ban raging in all universities and Schools.

49 To Minimize foreign travel both for politicians and State Officials. Both politicians and State officials going on foreign study tours or training should submit their reports within one month after they return, as to what lessons they have learnt, that could be made useful to the country, to the JRS by politicians and by officials to the Secretary/Head of Department to the relevant Ministry/ Department.

50 Stop the present practice of allocation of public funds to politicians either by seats or through Decentralized budget invented for political bribing and to channel disbursement of all public funds through State Official as it was done in the past and to minimize financial mismanagement

(For details on each item please see relevant sections in the Mahanuwara Charter 2019).

(As no man or woman who is not prepared to agree to these conditions is fit to be a citizen of this country or to take to national politics or get appointed to public service in Sinhale, no such person should be elected or appointed to any public position).

Lastly, let there shall be no Ambalamas (stoppages) in this “Great National Leap Forward” until the final destination is reached!

Annex 1

The 20 non -negotiable conditions

1 Name of the country shall be Sinhale as it had been known at least from 543 BC up to 1972 (for 2515 years).

(All historical and literary sources have referred to it as Sinhale, Sinhala Dveepa or Seehala Deepa, Lakdiva or Lanka, but never as EELAM. Only ancient Malayalam people of South India had referred to this country as EELAM by which they simply meant the land of the Sinhala people. The country that was ceded to Britain in 1815 by the Kandyan Convention of 2nd March 1815 was Sinhale, translated to English as Ceylon, meaning the land of the land of the Sinhala people. All the 20 odd names used for this country except two means the land of the Sinhala people except two that is Taprobane (derived from Tambapanni) and Serendib (from serendipity). Therefore that original name of the country has to be restored. Note both Sinhale (Puraana literature) and Lanka (Ramayanaya) had been used synonymously from very ancient times to this country. The prefix Sri was added in 1972 Constitution when they named the country as The Republic of Sri Lanka and today it is known internationally as Sri Lanka and it has got permanently established by now. As such it could be called either Sinhale (lcally) or Sri Lanka (internationally) like Bhratdesh and India, if necessary after public consensus. Thereafter this country shall be known in all languages either as Sinhale or Sri Lanka. To call it by any other name like EELAM, Ilankai or Kalisthan thereafter will have to be declared as treason).

 2 Name of the Nation of this country shall be Sinhala as it had been in vogue at least from 543 BC up to 1948. But again the nation could be called either Sinhala or Sri Lankan for reasons given in item 1 above. Tamils or Muslims thereafter shall not be referred to or called as nations in this country any more. They shall be called minor communities only (Sulujana kotas not minorities which is erroneously translated as Sulu Jati).

3 Its Ratavesiyo (citizens) shall be known as Sinhala meaning the people of the Sinhale). Those who wish to be citizens of Sinhale should learn the Sinhala language, Take Sinhala names, renounce all allegiance to their country of origin and get fully integrated with the native Sinhala society as they did in Burma in 1947. None, other than honorary citizens, who will not comply with these requirements, shall be given full citizenship of Sinhale.

There shall be two category of Ratavesiyo under this scheme.

a) Ratavesiyo by decent or Bhoomiputrayo:  All descendants of those who were  Ratavesiyo of Sinhale before 1815.

b) Ratavesiyo by registration.

 This includes Ratavesiyo who are registered after accepting the conditions laid down in Annex 1 and 11 included here in, subject to the conditions prescribed in Mahanuwara Charter 2019 item 7 regarding Rtavesibhavaya.

4 Buddhism shall be declared the State Religion while freedom of practicing other religions, will be guaranteed with no right to manifest or propagate as it had been done from the beginning of history of this country up to 1815. Buddhism has to be accepted by people of all other religions asthe State religion of this country as it had been accepted by Kings and subjects alike in the past and even in contemporary times ‘as the main tree where all other religions are only small branches’ as Rev Malcolm Ranjith Malcom Fernando has aptly said.

5 There shall be one Law for the whole country for all Citizens as it had been up to 1815. Details have to be worked out by the Bhoomiputras, based on the traditional native laws. Simultaneously ethnic laws such as Thesawalamei (Law for Malabar inhabitants) and (for Muslims) introduced to this country by the Dutch and British to divide the Lankan nation shall be abolished and banned. Polygamy presently practiced by Muslims and Sharia marriage laws also should be scrapped along with this.

6 Sinhala should be made- The official language of the State as it had been from 543 BC. Both Tamils and Muslims can use their language. But all have to correspond in the official language with the Government as it was done before 1815. 

No one who does not know the language of the natives, that is Sinhala, shall be given full Ratawesibhavaya of this country

7 One country, One Nation, One National Flag and one National Anthem concept must be enshrined in the Constitution. It should be sung only in Sinhala as given in the Constitution.(This will enhance and consolidate the unity and patriotism as one nation)

8 This country shall be declared the Historical Maathrubhumi of the Sinhala race and all other communities have to accede to that non-debatable and non -negotiable fact of history.

9 Sinhala people also must have the right to live in any part of the country of their choice and have the right to have their religious establishments like temples and shrines just as the Tamils and Muslims currently enjoy. If anyone objects or refuses this condition then they should leave for their motherlands in India or Arabia.

10 Sinhala Buddhist culture has to be legally recognized as the national/dominant culture of the Sri Lanka nation, while the freedom of practicing their own cultures for all minor communities will be guaranteed.

11 The international community has to honour this Sri Lankan identity

 Discontinue diplomatic relations with all countries that do not agree to these conditions and deport their Diplomatic representatives immediately and terminate all relations with such countries until they agree to do so.

12 This country will not get aligned with any World power. We will strictly adhere to the Non-aligned policy as a free, Independent and sovereign nation and will have friendly relations with all countries. Any attempt by any country to interfere or intervene with the internal affairs of this country will be rejected and defeated.

13 No national asset within the Island and its territorial waters shall be sold to or otherwise divested in any foreign country or agency.

 (All these 13 conditions are nothing but the restoration of the legitimate rights of the Bhoomiputras of this Island as they were there at the time of ceding this country by the Kandyan Convention in 1815 and some of them like the place of Buddhism, machinery of administration and customs and Judicial practices were included even in the Kandyan Convention, although most of them were outlawed by the Royal Proclamation of Nov 21 1818 unilaterally and therefore illegally by the British. These conditions should have been restored in 1948 to make independence meaningful, but it was not done. Therefore none of them are new. Furthermore no Tamil or Muslim can challenge the imposition of these conditions as they themselves had been living within that very system prior to 1815 and all rights they enjoy today were given to them under suppression by the colonial powers against the will of the Bhoomiputras)

Additional Conditions

.

14 Under this proposal all Political Parties named after ethnicity, religion, region or divisive basis like Federal, TNA, TELO, SLMS, TC and EPRLF or any other etc, will have to be banned by law as they run counter to this principle.  Even the Marxist parties like LSSP, CP and JVP should be banned as their political ideologies do not suit this country. There is no need to talk about the UNP or SLFP as they are also now defunct and will die a natural death at the next election.

15 The President, Prime Minister, Chief Justice, Speaker of the Jatika Rajya Sabhava, IGP, and the Heads of the three Armed forces shall be always be Sinhalese and Buddhists both by convention and Law.

16 All recruitments to public service should be done strictly according to ethnic ratios (Please refer to Mahanuwara Charter 2019 and Siyapanatha for details)

17 Strict Programme of family planning to maintain demographic balance and  stop multiplying particularly by Muslims like rabbits

18 Ban ethnic and communal segregation

19 Ban Muslims marrying Sinhala women and polygamy

20 Ban Sending women slaves to Middle East etc. Provide employment for them at Home improving the home economy.

Annex 11 new Constitution

The New Sinhale/Sri Lanka Constitution should be based on the following historical foundation and premises.

1 Historically this country had remained the Traditional Homeland of the Sinhala Nation, at least from 543 BC up to date.

2 Since 307 BC it had been the only Sinhala Buddhist nation in the world.

3 Firstly, Sinhalese Buddhists were the people who found, developed and fostered the unique Sinhala Buddhist civilization on this Island. It was also they who protected it from all foreign devastations firstly, the Indians, more particularly, South Indians, starting in the 2nd century BC up to the 12th century AD (culminated in the barbaric Maagha devastation), who razed Anuradhapura and Polonnaruwa civilizations (that ranked among the best in ancient and medieval world) to the ground.

Secondly, it was virtually destroyed for 443 years from 1505 to 1948 by the Portuguese, Dutch and British invasions. In all these wars it was the Sinhala Buddhists who had to face the brunt of the invader and die in battle in millions in defense of their Motherland. Among the long list of brutal and savages atrocities carried out by these invaders, shooting all those who could not be arrested, hanging them then and there, burning down all fields, houses and barns and slaughtering all animals of the natives to feed the soldiers of the invader could be cited as few example of the cruel crimes carried out by these invaders.

4 The name of the country ceded to British in 1815 was Sinhale as given in the Kandyan Convention of March 2. 1815. Except Taprobane and Serendib all other names over 23 like Zeylan and Ceylon simply meant the Land of the Sinhala people. Even the Tamil word EELAM means the land of the Sinhalese. This clearly shows that, right throughout history it was the Sinhala imprint that has flourished on this land.

5 Sinhala Buddhists were the architects of the civilization in this country, who fought relentlessly for millennia against the South Indian and thereafter Portuguese, and British invaders from 1505 to 1948and died in millions in battle to defend their motherland in the savages and brutal 1818 and 1948 especially in Uva and Matale historic uprisings against the British. It was they who lost all their lands in battles fighting against the enemies to defend the motherland for posterity.

6 None of the Tamils or Muslim at any time has supported the native Sinhalese in these wars. Instead they took the side of the enemy and particularly the Muslims, both in the Uva and Matale freedom struggles who supported the British by transporting their provisions, guns and ammunitions from the harbours to the interior and by spying against the Native Sinhalese. When Muslims were brutally murdered by Portuguese in 1665 and when those who survived ran to the King in Kandy it was the Sinhala King who saved them and settled in the Panampatuwa (these are the ungrateful people now asking for a separate State in the South East)

7 In the period of early political agitations even Tamil scholars wrote on the Sinhala Buddhist civilization in this country and accepted that this had been the Land of the Sinhalese from the dawn of history and they were the architects of the unique civilization in this Island nation. See what P. Arunachalam in his Sketches of Ceylon History (1906) and Ananda Coomaraswamy in his classic Medieval Sinhalese (1905) wrote and concluded about the Civilization of the country. It is a tragedy and a pity too that the present day Tamil politicians don’t understand what these great Sri Lankans had said. I invite extreme communalists like Sambandan, Vignesvarana and Sumanthiram to read these books and find out as to where they should stand in this country. Instead today they all follow a Malaysian born Catholic Tamil Chelvanayagam, who had migrated to this country (around 1903) as a 4 year old boy who later became the Father of Ilankai Tamil Arsukachchi idea (1947) and Grandfather of modern Tamil extremism in this country.

8 Even as late as 1965 K. Indrapala professor of History in his PhD ‘Thesis Dravidayan settlement in Ceylon’ concluded that there were no Tamil settlements in the interior of this country until the 13th century and they were confined to a narrow coastal strip in the north and East. I am talking here on  Indrapala, who wrote  his PhD  Thesis in 1965 and not what he had said recently at LTTE gun point in his “The Tamils of Sri Lanka”: (300 B.C.-1200 A.D.)-

9 All minority races including Tamils and Muslims are thus only descendants of immigrants who had come to this country from time to time either as traders, invaders, slaves of colonial powers or illicit immigrants. Tamils in the North and East were brought as slaves after 1505 by the Portuguese, Dutch and British to work in their projects. There are very few who descend from those left behind by early invaders. The last category is the Estate Tamils who were brought as indentured labour by British to work on their Coffee and Tea plantations after 1840. Therefore they were British citizens who were left behind by the British when they left in 1948. As such none of these categories   has any legitimate right to call this country their motherland unless and until they become full citizens of this country after learning the Language and history of the land and integrate with the native Sinhalese. The irony is none of these people accept this country as the land of the Sinhalese. Instead they all want separate independent and self-ruling regions carved out from this Land. Some people like the LTTE and their proxies have declared even war against the natives claiming the land of the Sinhalese for 30 years. All native politicians who are supposed to have ruled this country since 1948 are responsible for this unfortunate situation.

Appendix 111

Process of elections

Selection and Election of Members to the Jatika Rajya Sabha and other Sabhas

 (see sec 12 Mahanuwara Charter 2019 )

 Candidates at different levels shall be first selected by the respective Councils on public consensus by Nomination by the Council or self- application, from among qualified and distinguished persons permanently resident within such electorates. (They also can hold a primary election to select them). They will be elected on a non-party basis as there will be no parties in this system, on the first past post basis on and electoral basis thereafter. The simple criterion for selection shall be all-round suitability to hold public position.  This system will see the real Mahasammatha principle in practice. (Since Elections to JRS, are conducted at District levels for the purpose of electing them, the District Council will submit the lists

There shall be 3 or 2 names for each electorate, for the JRS candidates from among whom the voters of the respective electorate will elect 1 for the JRS

Only persons with permanent residence within the electorate are qualified to be nominated for any given electorate.

The persons who come first in each electorate will go to the Jatika Rajya Sabhava.

At the conclusion of the Election the Commissioner of Election will announce the list of Jatika Rajya Sabha.

(Please see Towards a Government without Political Parties; Key to a New Political Culture in Sri Lanka for details). It may also be useful to refer to the election process adopted during the State Council days)

All these crazy people must learn the wisdom of Rev Cardinal Malcolm Ranjith (one of the greatest sons of Sri Lanka in modern times} latest statement where he said “Buddhism in this country is the big tree and other religions are only small branches of the big tree.’ In my opinion this is by far the best description of the Sri Lankan society made by any religious dignitary or a historian ever. The same thing could be said with regard to ethnicity as well. Accordingly, I will put it as “Sinhala race in this country is the big tree and other communities are only small branches of that big tree”.

Why can’t the Tamil and Muslim politicians, the treacherous NGOs, Colombian Sinhala politicians and the so-called International Community (the five anti Sinhala groups) also understand this all-time reality, and learn to live together without quarrelling with the Sinhala people who are the true Bhoomiputras of this land. Both Tamils and Muslim could be compared to ‘parasitic plants on a Sinhala banyan tree’ struggling to kill it and trying to be the banyan tree. Now the time has come for Sinhala Statesmen to compel these immigrants either to accept this gospel truth and try to live amicably with the native Sinhalese or leave for good for their own motherlands. 

If all these five categories could understand the wisdom of Rev Cardinal Malcolm Ranjith, the day they do so, on that day, ends the ethnic and religious clashes in this country.

                                                                The end 

‎5/‎8/‎2019    

Dr Sudath Gunasekara

Hanthana Pedesa Mahanuwara                  

ආචාර්ය වරුණ චන්ද්‍රකීර්ති

අම්මා තමයි අපේ ගෙදර බුදුන්. අපේ රටේ හැම ගෙදරක ම එහෙම තමයි කියලා අපි හැමෝ ම දන්නවා. ඉතින් අම්මා ගැන කියන්නේ නැතුව අපි ලොකු මහත් වෙච්ච විදිහ ගැන කියන්නේ කොහොම ද? අද මම කියන්නේ අපේ අම්මා ගැන.

අම්මායි මමයි ඉපැදිලා තියෙන්නේ එක ම දවසේ. හැබැයි අපේ අම්මා මට වඩා අවුරුදු තිස් තුනක් වයසින් වැඩියි. අපි දෙන්නා අතර තිබුණු කිට්ටු සම්බන්ධයට මේ එක දවසේ උපන් හේතුවට ඉක්මවා ගිය කරුණු කාරණා සෑහෙන ප්‍රමාණයක් බලපාන්න ඇති කියලා මට හිතෙනවා. ඒත් ඒ මොන මොනවා ද කියලා මම වෙන වෙන ම හිතලා නෑ. කොහොමත් අපි පුංචි කාලේ උපන් දිනය කියන්නේ ඒ තරම් වැදගත් කාරණයක් නෙවෙයි. ජීවිතේ මුල් ම වතාවට මගේ උපන් දිනය වෙනුවෙන් යාළුවෝ කට්ටියක් එකතුවෙලා සාදයක් පවත්වද්දි මට අවුරුදු තිස් තුනකුත් වෙලා!

මට වයස අවුරුදු තිස් දෙකක් වෙද්දි අපේ නංගිටත් පුතා හම්බවෙලා. ඒ පුතාට වයස අවුරුදු දෙකක් විතර වෙන කාලේ අම්මා නංගි එක්ක කතාවක් කිව්වා. ඒ කතාවට අදාළ අම්මයි මමයි දෙන්නා. අම්මා කිව්වේ වයස අවුරුදු එක හමාරක් දෙකක් විතර කාලේ මාව බලාගත්ත විදිහක් ගැන. මේක එක්තරා ආකාරයකින් අම්මා නංගිට ලබාදුන්න උපදේශයක්.

මට වයස අවුරුදු එක හමාරක් දෙකක් විතර කාලේ අම්මා කෑම උයද්දි මාවත් කුස්සියට එක් කරගෙන යනවලු. ඊට පස්සේ කෑම උයන වැඩේට සම්බන්ධ පොඩි පොඩි වැඩවලටත් මාවත් හවුල් කරගන්නවලු. මේ කාරණේ පැහැදිළිකරන්න ඒ හා සම්බන්ධ එක වැඩක් ගැන කියන්න පුළුවන්. අපි පොඩි කාලේ දැන් ලොකු ලූනු තිබුණේ නෑ. තිබුණේ රතු ලූනුයි සුදු ලූනුයි විතරයි. ඉතින් අම්මා උයන්න පටන්ගත්තා ම මට කියනවාලු මට ලූනු ගෙඩියක් ගෙනැල්ලා දෙන්න” කියලා. ඉතින් මම ලූනු ගෙඩියක් ‍අම්මාට ගිහින් දෙනවා. ඊට පස්සේ අම්මා කියනවාලු දැන් මට ලූනු ගෙඩි දෙකක් ගෙනැල්ලා දෙන්න” කියලා. ඉතින් මම ලූනු ගෙඩි දෙකක් ගිහිල්ලා දෙනවාලු. මෙන්න මේ විදිහට අම්මා මාත් එක්ක සංවාදයක යෙදිලා තියෙනවා.

මේ වැඩෙන් වැඩ ගොඩක් එකට කරන්න අම්මාට පුළුවන් වෙලා තියෙනවා. එක පැත්තකින් අම්මා මාව බලාගන්නවා. තව පැත්තකින් ගණන් කරන හැටි අම්මා මට කියලා දෙනවා. තවත් පැත්තකින් මට පුංචි පුංචි වැඩ කරන්නත් පුරුදු කරනවා. ඒත් දැන් කාලේ අම්මලා මේ ක්‍රම දන්නේ නෑ. ළමයා සාලේ මොනවා හරි පෙරලද්දි අම්මා කුස්සියේ! ළමයා ඌට ඕන ඕන විදිහට හැදෙනවා. අම්මායි ළමයයි අතර සම්බන්ධකම් වර්ධනය වෙන්නෙත් නෑ. අම්මා එක පැත්තක. ළමයා තව පැත්තක.

වයස අවුරුදු හතරක් පහක් විතර කාලේ ඉඳලා වෙච්ච දේවල් නම් මට හොඳට මතකයි. ඒ කාලේ නාද්දිත් මේ ගණන් සෙල්ලමට අපිව පටලවලා තිබුණේ. ඒ, මේ විදිහට. ඒ කාලේ අපි නෑවේ ඕවලාකාර විදිහට තහඩුවලින් හදලා තිබුණු පොඩි භාජනයකට වතුර පුරවලා. අපේ ගෙදර අය ඒකට කීවේ බාත් එක” කියලා. ඒකට වතුර බාල්දි හයක් හතක් අල්ලනවා. ඒ බාත් එකෙන් නාන්න අපිට තරමක් ලොකු කෝප්පයක් දෙනවා. මුලින් ම ඔළුවට නාන්න ඕන. හැබැයි ඒ වැඩේ කරන්න ඕනත් ගණන් මිනුම් ඇතුව. ඒ කියන්නේ, ඔළුවට සීයක් මුලින් ම නාන්න ඕන. ඊට පස්සේ ඉතිරි වතුර ටික ඇඟට නාලා ඉවරවෙලා තමයි සබන් ගාන්න ඕන. සබන් ගාලා ඉවරවුනා ම ආයෙත් පුරවලා දෙන බාත් එකෙන් හොඳට නාගන්න ඕන. ඒ වෙලාවට නම් ගණන් කිරිල්ලක් නෑ. කොහොම කොහොම හරි මේ වැඩෙන් හොඳට ගණන් කරන්න අපිට පුරුදුවුනා. මේක අදටවත් නවත්ත ගන්න බැරි පුරුද්දක්. දැන් වතුර මලෙන් නාද්දිත් මම සීයට ගණන් කරනවා!

දෙවැනි වතාවට අපි රූපහ ඉන්න කාලේ මගේ වයස අවුරුදු පහක් විතර ඇති. ඊට කලින් ගෝනබොක්ක කියලා ගමකත් හිටිය බව මට මතකයි. ගෝනබොක්කේ ගෙදරට යන්න ඕන ඇලක් හරහා දාලා තිබුණු ඒදණ්ඩකින් ගොඩවෙලා. මට කවදාවත් ඒ ඒදණ්ඩෙන් යන්න බෑ. පණ්ඩිතයාට ඒදණ්ඩේ යන්න බෑ කියන කතාව සහතික ඇත්ත. ඒ කතාව පැත්තකින් තියමු. රූපහ ඉන්න කාලේ අපේ අම්මා කරපු දෙයක් ගැන මම දැන් කියන්නම්.

මේකත් කුස්සියට සම්බන්ධ කතාවක්.

රොටී හදන වෙලාවට අම්මා අපි දෙන්නාවත් (අයියාවත් මාවත්) ඒ වැඩේට හවුල් කරගන්නවා. හොඳට පොල් දාලා අනපු පිටි ගුලි දෙකක් අම්මා අපි දෙන්නාට දෙනවා. අපි කරන්න ඕන තමන් කැමැති සතෙක්ගේ හැඩේට ඒ පිටි ගුලි දෙකෙන් රොටී දෙකක් වඩන එක. ඉතින් අලියෙක්ගේ හැඩේට, හාවෙක්ගේ හැඩේට වගේ එක එක හැඩවලට අපි රොටී වඩනවා. ඊට පස්සේ අම්මා ඒ රොටී පුච්චනවා. ඉතින් ඊට පස්සේ තම තමන් හදාගත්ත රොටිය ගැන පම්පෝරි කිය කියා ඒවා කන එක තමයි අපි දෙන්නා කරන්නේ.

මේ විදිහට දන්නේ ම නැතුව කුස්සියේ වැඩ අපිට පුරුදු කරවන්න අම්මාට පුළුවන් වුනා. පිරිමි ළමයි කියලා අපිව සාලෙන් තියලා සාත්තු සප්පායම් කරන වැඩේ අපේ අම්මා කවදාවත් කළේ නෑ. ඉතින් අම්මා උයන වෙලාවට කුස්සියට ගිහිල්ලා පොල් ගාලා දෙන එක, රතු ලූනු – සුදු ලූනු සුද්ද කරලා දෙන එක, තම්බපු අලවල පොතු අරින එක, කඳුළු පෙරාගෙන ලූනු – අමු මිරිස් කපන එක, මෑ – බෝංචි කඩලා දෙන එක, අම්මා කිව්වාම වළඳක් ඇතිලියක් හොදලා දෙන එක අපි කළා. මේ වැඩ කරද්දි කරන කතා බහත් එක්ක තමයි සම්බන්ධකම් මෝරන්නේ.

ගෙදර මොන තක්කඩි වැඩේ කළත් කුස්සියේ වැඩේ හරියට කරන්න මට පුළුවන් වෙලා තිබුණා. ඒ එක්කම කුස්සියට වෙලා අම්මාත් එක්ක කයිවාරු ගහන ලෙඩෙත් මට බෝ වෙලා තිබුණා. මේ වැඩේ සෑහෙන වාසි තියෙන කටයුත්තක්. ඔය කයිවාරු මැද්දේ මොනවා මොනවා හරි හදලා අම්මා මට කන්න දෙනවා! ඉතින් ඔය විදිහේ වරප්‍රසාදත් ලැබෙද්දි කුස්සියට නොයා ඉන්න මෝඩයෝ කොහෙද ඉන්නේ?

දන්න කියන කාලේ ඉඳලා ම තම තමන්ගේ රෙදි හෝදන්න කියලාත් අම්මා අපිට කිව්වා. අපි හෝදපු රෙදි අම්මා ආයෙත් හෝදනවා ඇති. ඒ ගැන නිනව්වක් අපිට නෑ. හැබැයි අදටත් මම හැම දා ම රෑ නාන්න කලින් එ දා දවසේ ඇඳපු කමිසයත් අනිත් පොඩි ඇඳුමුත් හෝදනවා. අතෙන් රෙදි හෝදනවා කියලා කියන්නේ භාවනාවක් වගේ වැඩක්. ඒක හරි ම සරල වැඩක් හින්දා ඔළුව එක්තැන් කරගෙන ඒ වැඩේ කරන එක හරි ම ලේසියි. දවස පුරා ම එක එක දේවල්වලට ඔළුව මහන්සි කරලා තෙහෙට්ටු වෙලා ඉන්න වෙලාවට ඒක ලොකු සහනයක්.

වයස අවුරුදු අටක් නවයක් වෙන කල් නුවරඑළියේ වලපනේ ජීවත්වුනාට තොප්පි දාලා, පාර්සල් කරලා බබ්බු වගේ අපිව හදන වැඩේට අම්මා යොමුවෙලා තිබුණේ නෑ. අම්මා නිතර ම කිව්වේ වැස්සට, පින්නට මිනිස්සු හුරුවෙන්න ඕන කියලා. ඉතින් අදටත් අව්වට, වැස්සට, පින්නට බනින්නේ නැතුව ජීවත්වෙන්න ඕන හැකියාව අම්මාට පින්සිද්ද වෙන්න අපිට ලැබිලා තියෙනවා.

ලොකු අම්මා (අම්මාගේ අක්කා) අපේ අම්මාට වඩා අවුරුදු විස්සකටත් වඩා වයසින් වැඩියි. ඒ හින්දා ලොකු අම්මාගේ ළමයි අපේ අම්මාගේ යාළුවෝ වගේ. අම්මාත් ඒ අය එක්ක ම තමයි ලොකු මහත් වෙලා තියෙන්නේ. ලොකු අම්මලාගේ ගෙදර තිබුණේ රිකිල්ලගස්කඩ කිට්ටුව තියෙන දෙණිකේ. ඉතින් අම්මා ඒ ගෙදර ඉඳලා හඟුරන්කෙතට ඉස්කෝලේ ගිහිල්ලා තියෙනවා. ඒ විදිහට ඉස්කෝලේ ගිහිල්ලා උසස් පෙළත් පාස්වෙලා විශ්වවිද්‍යාලයට යන්නත් සුදුසුකම් ලබාගෙන තියෙනවා. පනස් ගණන්වල මුල් කාලේ ඒ හපන්කම කළාට අම්මා විශ්වවිද්‍යාලයට ගිහිල්ලා නෑ.

ආච්චි (අම්මාගේ අම්මා) නැතිවෙද්දි මට වයස අවුරුදු හතක් විතර ඇති. ඒ කාලේ අපි හිටියේ හරස්බැද්දේ. ඉතින් ආච්චි ගැන වැඩි මතකයක් මට නෑ. ආච්චි නැති වුනාට පස්සේ පාර දිගේ මරණ දැන්වීම් අලවන්න ගිය එක නම් මට මතකයි. පොඩි පොඩි වෙදකම් කරන්න පුළුවන්කමක් අපේ ආච්චිට තිබිලා තියෙනවා. ඒ හැකියාව යම් පමණකට අපේ අම්මාටත් තිබුණා. ගෙදර කෙනෙක්ට බඩේ කැක්කුමක්, හිසේ කැක්කුමක් හැදුනා ම අම්මා කල්පනා කරලා පොඩි පොඩි දේවල් හදලා දෙනවා. ඒවා එක්තරා ආකාරයක ගොඩ වෙදකම් තමයි. ඒත් ඒ වෙදකම්වලින් අපේ ඒ අමාරු සනීපවෙනවා. ඒ මදෑ!

ඒ කාලේ අපේ කාගෙත් ගෙවල්වල බෙහෙත් කිරන පුංචි තරාදියක්, ඒකෙන් බෙහෙත් කිරන්න බරට දාන තඹ කාසි, ඔළිඳ ඇට වගේ දේවල් තිබුණා. බෙහෙත් ජාති හොයාගත්තේ අහළ පහළින්මයි. කඩෙන් ගෙනාවේ අඩුපාඩුවට ඕන දේවල් විතරයි. තඩි වෙනිවැල්ගැඩ කෑල්ලකුත් අපේ හැම ගෙදරක ම වගේ තිබුණා. පත අට එකට හිඳවලා කසාය තම්බන එක, ඒක දෙකට බෙදලා දෙවේලට බොන එක අපි කවුරුත් කළා. තිත්ත කසායක් බීවාම සීනි ටිකක් වැඩියෙන් කන්න පුළුවන්. තේ බොද්දි අල්ලට කන ප්‍රමාණෙටත් වඩා වැඩියෙන් සීනි හම්බවෙන හින්දා කසාය බොන වැඩේ ගැන අකැමැත්තකුත් අපිට තිබුණේ නෑ.

කල්පනා කරලා අලුත් අලුත් කෑම ජාති හදන්නත් අම්මාට පුළුවන්. මගුලාගමට ආවට පස්සේ ඒ පැත්තේ අයගෙන් අහලා ඒ විදිහටත් අම්මා එක එක කෑම හදනවා. ඒ කාලේ කැකිරි වෑංජනේට ලොකු තැනක් තිබුණා. පොල් බැදලා දාලා හදන ඒ කැකිරි වැංජනේ මස් කරියක් වගේ ඉහළින් පිළිගත්ත එකක්. පඬුවස්නුවර පැත්තේ මගුල් ගෙවල්වලත් ඒ කැකිරි වෑංජනේ හදනවා. අම්මාත් ඒ වැඩේ ඉගෙනගත්තා. කී රොටී හදන්නත් ඉගෙන ගත්තා. ඊට අමතරව වලපනේ ඉන්න කාලේ හදපු කෑමත් දිගට ම හැදුවා. ඉතින් හොඳ ආනමක් එක්ක තලප ගුලියක් කන්න ලැබෙන අවස්ථාත් ඕන තරම් අපේ ගෙදර තිබුණා.

2004 – 2007 කාලේ ලංකාවේ ඉගෙනගත්ත වියට්නාම් ස්වාමීන්වහන්සේ නමක් මාත් එක්ක හිතවත් වෙලා හිටියා. උන්වහන්සේ ශාස්ත්‍රපති උපාධියත් ආචාර්ය උපාධියත් කළේ කැළණිය විශ්වවිද්‍යාලයට අනුබද්ධව තියෙන පාලි හා බෞද්ධ අධ්‍යයන පශ්චාද් උපාධි ආයතනයේ. උන්වහන්සේ කාලයක් පෑලියගොඩ නැවතිලා හිටියා. පස්සේ කාලෙක නැවතිලා හිටියේ මීගමුවේ. ඒ දවස්වල උන්වහන්සේ මුණ ගැහෙන්න මම යනවා. එහෙම ගියාම උන්වහන්සේ ලියන පැවරුම්, නිබන්ධන බලන්න මට පවරනවා. ඉතින් මම ඒ වැඩේ කරද්දි උන්වහන්සේ උයනවා. ඒත් ඒ කෑම උයන්නේ කොහොම ද කියලා බලාගන්න මට වෙලාවක් ලැබෙන්නේ නෑ. හැබැයි ආපහු ගෙදර ආවම මම කාපු දේවල් ගැන අම්මාත් එක්ක කියනවා. අද මාළු උයලා තිබුණේ මේ විදිහට” මේ වගේ කතා තමයි මම අම්මාට කියන්නේ. දවසක් දෙකක් අම්මා මේ ගැන කල්පනා කරනවා. මෙන්න දවස් කීපයක් යද්දි අම්මා ඒ විදිහට මාළු උයලා!

අපි මගුලාගම ඉන්න කාලේ මෝලට ගිහිල්ලා වී කොටාගත්තාට කැවිලි හදන්න ඕන තෙත පිටි කෙටුවේ ගෙදර තිබුණු වංගෙඩියේ. දඹදෙණියේ මැටියගනේ පදිංචියට ආවට පස්සෙත් එහෙම තමයි. ඉතින් පිටි කොටන වැඩේටත් හවුල්වෙන්න අපිට සිද්දවෙනවා. දෙන්නෙක් එකට වංගෙඩියේ පිටි කොටන එක තරමක් අමාරු වැඩක්. පිටි කොටනවා, කැවුම් හදනවා වගේ වෙලාවට අහළ පහළ නැන්දලාත් ඒකට හවුල්වෙනවා. ඒ අයත් එක්ක හරි හරියට පිටි කොටන්න යකෙක්ටවත් බෑ. මීට අමතරව අපි කුරහන් ගලෙත් එක එක ඇට ජාති අඹරනවා. ඒ වැඩේට නම් පිට මිනිස්සු හවුල්වෙන්නේ නෑ. ඒවා අපි අපි ම කරගත්ත වැඩ.

අතිරහ හදන වෙලාවට ඒවා වඩන්නත් අපි හවුල්වෙනවා. මම ඒ කාලේ මේ අතිරහ වැඩිල්ලට විශේෂඥයෙක්. කොකිස් හදන්න දවුල් කුරුඳු කොල හොයන එක, හැලප හදන්න කැන්ද කොල හොයන එක අපිට පැවරිච්ච රාජකාරි. මේ වගේ වැඩ නම් ඒ කාලේ හිටපු හැම ළමයෙක් ම කරලා ඇති.

රස්සාවක් කරන්න නොගියාට අම්මා තාත්තාටත් වඩා හම්බ කළා කියලා තමයි මගේ කල්පනාව. ගෙදර වත්තේ එළවළු හදන එක, කුකුල්ලු හදන එක, හරක් හදන එක අම්මා කළා. කෝපි, ගම්මිරිස් වවන එකත් කළා. විකුණන්නත් එක්ක පොල් අතු විව්වා. තල කොළ පෙට්ටි හදලා දඹදෙණිය සංවර්ධන පදනමට වික්කා.

සල්ලි ඉතිරි කරන එකත් හම්බ කිරීමට ම අදාළ කාරණයක්. බත් මාළු පිණි ඉතිරි කරලා මුට්ටි පිටින් ඒවා කුණු ගොඩට හලන සිරිතක් ඒ කාලේ තිබුණේ නෑ. ඉතිරි වෙච්ච බත් අව්වෙත් දුමේත් වේලුවා. ඒවායින් අග්ගලා හදන එක, වෙන දෙයක් හදන්න වෙලාවක් නැති නම් මැටි කබලකට දාලා රත් කරලා සීනි ටිකක් දාලා හවස තේ බොද්දි කන එක අපේ ගෙවල්වල කළා. අටු කොස් ඇට, වැලි කොස් ඇට හදන එක, අටු කොස් හදන එක අපේ ගෙදරත් කළා. මඤ්‍ඤොක්කා අල පෙති කපලා වේලන එකත් කළා. බතල පිටි හදන එකත් කළා. මේ හැම දෙයක් ම අපේ අම්මා මුල්වෙලා කරපු දේවල්.

අපි සාමාන්‍ය පෙළ විභාගය ලියන කල් ම අපේ කමිස කලිසම් මැහුවේ අම්මා. අපි පොඩි කාලේ දැන් වගේ ඕන තරම් ඇඳුම් අපිට තිබුණේ නෑ. ඇඳුම්වලට අණ්ඩ දාලා අඳින එක අපේ ගම්වල හිටිය හැමෝ ම වගේ කළා. මේ දේවල් කරන විදිහ අපි අම්මාගෙන් ඉගෙන ගත්තා. කතිර මැස්ම, දම්වැල් මැස්ම, මාලු කටු මැස්ම වගේ දේවලුත් අපි ඉගෙන ගත්තා. ඇඳුමක බොත්තමක් කැඩුණා ම ඒක අල්ලගත්තේ අපිමයි. බොත්තම් කාස මහන වැඩෙත් අපි කළා.

ඉගෙනගන්නවා කියලා කියන්නේ පොත් පාඩම් කරන එක විතරක් නම් නෙවෙයි කියන එක අපේ අම්මා හොඳින් ම දැනගෙන හිටියා. ඉතින් මොන හදිසි තත්ත්වය ඇතිවුනත් පණ ගැට ගහගන්න අපිට පුළුවන් වෙලා තියෙනවා. දැන් කාලේ ඉන්න අම්මලා තමන්ගේ ළමයින්ට ආදරේ නෑ. ඒ හින්දා තමයි උන්ට මේ ලෝකේ දෙයක් උගන්නන්නේ නැත්තේ. පොත් පාඩම් කළා ම, ටියුෂන් ගියා ම ඔක්කොම හරි යයි කියලා ඒ අම්මලා හිතාගෙන ඉන්නවා. මේක ළමයින්ට කරන මහ හතුරුකමක්.

විශ්‍රාම ගිහිල්ලා තාත්තා දඹදෙණියේ පොත් කඩයක් දාගත්තාට අම්මා තමයි ඒ කඩේ වැඩි වෙලාවක් හිටියේ. තාත්තාට හරියට සමාජ සේවා වැඩ තිබුණා. ඉතින් වෙළෙඳාම් වැඩවලටත් අම්මා පුරුදුවුනා. දවල් ඉස්කෝලේ ඇරුණට පස්සේ ඇතුළේ පාරවල්වල යන බස් එන කල් හුඟක් ළමයි හිටියේ අපේ කඩේට වෙලා. ඒ අය අම්මාගේ යාළුවෝ වගේ. කඩේ ආව ගිය වැඩිහිටි යාළුවෝ මහ ගොඩකුත් අම්මාට හිටියා. ඒ මිනිස්සුන්ට දෙන්න දේවල් අම්මා ගාවත් තිබුණා. ඒ අයත් අම්මා බලන්න ආවේ හිස් අතින් නෙවෙයි.

හැම වයස් මට්ටමක ම අයත් එක්ක විහිළු තහළු කරලා හොඳින් සම්බන්ධකම් පවත්වාගෙන යන්න අම්මා පුරුදුවෙලා හිටියා. වචනත් එක්ක සෙල්ලම් කරන හැකියාවකුත් අම්මාට තිබුණා. මේ හැකියාව අම්මාට ආච්චිගෙන් ලැබිච්ච එකක් කියලා මම අහලා තියෙනවා. දැන් ඒ හැකියාව එක්තරා විදිහකට මටත් උරුමවෙලා. හැබැයි මම වැඩියෙන් වචන හරඹ කරන්නේ ලියද්දි.

අපේ අම්මා යකෙක්ටවත් බය නැති කෙනෙක්. තරුණ කාලෙත් එහෙමයි කියලා මම අහලා තියෙනවා. 1977 ඡන්දේ ඉවරවුනාට පස්සේ හරස්බැද්දේ අපිට චණ්ඩි පාට් දාපු අයත් එක්ක අම්මා එකට එක කියනවා මට තාමත් මතකයි. ගෙදර අල්මාරියේ බැඳලා හිටපු මී මැසි පොදියක් අම්මා කළයකට දාපු හැටි ගැන මම කලින් කිව්වා. අම්මා බය නොවුනේ පිටස්තර දේවල්වලට විතරක් නෙවෙයි. ලෙඩට දුකටත් අම්මා බය වුනේ නෑ.

2002 අවුරුද්දේ මම මුල් වතාවට ලංකාවෙන් පිටට ගියා. ඒ මාස දහයක කාලයකට. ඒ මාස දහයෙන් වැඩි කාලයක් මම හිටියේ කොල්කතාවේ. මාස දෙකක් විතර නව දිල්ලියේත් තවත් මාස දෙකක් විතර බැංගලෝර්වලත් මම හිටියා. කොල්කතාවට ගිහිල්ලා මාස කීපයක් ගතවෙද්දි මට ගෙදරින් අහන්න ලැබුණේ දරාගන්න අමාරු ප්‍රවෘත්තියක්. අම්මාට පිළිකාවක් තියෙනවා කියලා හොයාගෙන. ඒ වෙද්දි අම්මාව මහරගමට එක් කරගෙන යනවා. ඉතින් මේ ගැන දැනගත්ත ගමන් ම මම ආපහු ගෙදර එන්න හැදුවා. ඒත් අම්මා ඒකට විරුද්ධ වුනා. මේක මට විතරක් හැදිච්ච ලෙඩක් ද? ගිය වැඩේ කරගෙන මිසක් ගෙදර එන්න එපා” කියලා අම්මා මට කිව්වා. 2003 අවුරුද්දේ සිංහල අවුරුද්දට කලින් මම ගෙදර එද්දි අම්මා ඒ මහා ලෙඩෙත් සනීප කරගෙන!

හිත ශක්තිමත් කරගෙන ඉන්න එක හැම දේකට ම වඩා ලොකුයි කියන කාරණය තමයි අම්මා නිතර ම අපිට කිව්වේ. තමන්ට හැදිච්ච පිළිකාවවත් අම්මා ගණන් ගත්තේ නෑ. ඉතින් මූලික ප්‍රතිකාර ගත්තාට පස්සේ ඒකෙන් ගොඩ යන විදිහ අම්මා දැනගෙන හිටියා. මේ වෙලාවේ මට මතක්වෙන්නේ අපේ රටේ හිටිය බොහොම ප්‍රසිද්ධ කිවිඳියක්. තමන්ගේ ළමයෙක්ගේ ප්‍රශ්නයක් හින්දා එතුමිය මහ දුකකින් කණගාටුවකින් ජීවත්වුනේ. ඉතින් පස්සේ කාලෙක එතුමියට පිළිකාවක් හැදුණා. ඒ ගැන දැනගත්තට පස්සේ එතුමිය ජීවත්වුනේ එක සතියයි. ලෙඩට බයවෙලා ඒවායින් ගොඩ එන්න බෑ. මේ කතාවට අපේ රටේ ඉන්න විද්‍යාඥයෝ” හිනාවෙන්න පුළුවන්. ඒත් මම හිතන්නේ එහෙම. ඒක අපේ අම්මා අපිට කියලා දීපු පාඩමක්.

අන්තිමට 2012 අවුරුද්දේ අම්මා තදින් ම අසනීප වුනා. මම චීනයේ හිටිය හින්දා අම්මාවයි තාත්තාවයි බලාගන්න කෙනෙක් හොයලා දුන්නා. නංගියි, නංගිලාගේ ගෙදර කට්ටියයි දවල් රෑ නැතුව අම්මාවයි තාත්තාවයි බලාගන්න වැඩේට කැපවුනා. කොහොමත් අම්මා ඇඳට වැටුණේ නෑ. ගේ ඇතුළේ එහෙ මෙහෙ යන්න – එන්න, ඇවිදින්න පුළුවන්කමක් අම්මාට තිබුණා. 2013 අවුරුද්දේ ගිම්හාන නිවාඩුවට මම ලංකාවට එද්දි අම්මා සෑහෙන්න වෙනස්වෙලා. අම්මා ජීවිත කාලේ ම වැඩ කරපු කෙනෙක්. එහෙම කෙනෙක්ට වැඩ නොකර ඉන්න බෑ. ඉතින් අම්මා ඒ ගැන හිත හිතා වගේ තමයි හිටියේ. අගෝස්තු අන්තිමේ මම ආයෙත් චීනයට ගියා. ඒත් හරියට ම මාසයකට පස්සේ ඔක්තෝබර් මාසේ දෙවැනි දා මම ආපහු ලංකාවට ආවා. ඒ ඇයි කියලා නම් අහන්න එපා!

(කතාවේ ඉතිරි හරිය පස්සේ කියන්නම්)

ආචාර්ය වරුණ චන්ද්‍රකීර්ති

Dr. Sarath Obeysekera

Everyone talks about the garbage lying in the free trade zone . No one has any clue to get rid of it after courts prohibited moving them out I remember a solution I gave when I ran SLLRDC during the time of RP.

As an Anandian I was invited as the chief guest in a price giving ceremony in the College Principal was developing a playground in land acquired from Mcwoods.

A massive rock wad lying on the surface where the ground was built As we have many cranes, the school asked me to provide cranes to lift and remove it.

I went to see the location and decided to deploy two excavators and a bulldozer to dig 10 feet deep hole next to the rock Asked them to use the excess soil to prepare the ground.

Pushed the rick into the pit and covered with balance soil

Matter was solved

I suggest doing the same to garbage in FTZ

Dig a hole and bury them 

Natural decay will consume the garbage 

Dr. Sarath Obeysekera

by Saman Indrajith Courtesy The Island

The Parliamentary Select Committee (PSC) probing the Easter Sunday carnage has decided to summon the members of the Special Investigation Committee (SIC) appointed by President Maithripala Sirisena for the same purpose.

The PSC had informed the SIC members to be present to give evidence on Aug 8 at the Committee Room 1 of the Parliament complex, a PSC member said.

Headed by Supreme Court Judge Vijith K. Malalgoda, the SIC also comprised former IGP N.K. Ilangakoon and former Law and Order Ministry Secretary Padmasiri Jayamanne.

Former IGP Ilangakoon and Padmasiri Jayamanne once testified before the PSC on July 25.

The SIC members would be asked whether they had recorded a statement of Director State Intelligence Service Senior DIG Nilantha Jayawardena during their probe on the Easter attacks, the senior PSC member said.

He said that the PSC had recorded the testimony of SDIG Jayawardena on July 24.

Jayawardena gave a four-hour statement to the PSC at the former Agriculture Ministry.

The PSC members said: “During the four hours we repeatedly asked him whether he had conveyed the message of prior intelligence warnings of the attack to President Sirisena but he did not answer in the affirmative. We want to find out whether the SIC recorded a statement from the SDIG and, if so, whether he had admitted it there. If the SIC has not recorded his statement , then we need to know as to why.”

He said that the SIC appointed by President Sirisena on April 21 to conduct investigations into the series of attacks that carried out in eight places, commenced its work on April 22. The SIC recorded statements from many government officials including Defence Secretary Hemasiri Fernando and IGP Pujith Jayasundara.

The SIC had obtained statements from many persons and through advertisements published in several newspapers on April 25, requesting the public and institutions to submit their opinions and information in this regard to the committee.

President Sirisena on 01 May received an interim report of the SIC.

The PSC is expected to summon Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe, former Law and Order Ministers Sagala Ratnayake, Ranjith Maddumabandara and State Defence Minister Ruwan Wijewardene today.

The PSC member said that they thereafter would decide whether to request President Sirisena to appear before the PSC.

Courtesy The Canberra Times

 Ganeshamoorthy Thiyagarajah faces deportation to Sri Lanka after serving his sentence for murder.

Recruited as a child soldier at age 12 and later tortured by his enemies before fleeing by boat to Australia, Sri Lankan Ganeshamoorthy Thiyagarajah is now facing years behind bars for a “brutal” killing in Adelaide.

Thiyagarajah was found guilty recently of the murder in March 2017 of his housemate Mohammed Mansoor at their Penfield Gardens home.

In sentencing submissions in the Supreme Court on Monday, prosecutor Patrick Dawes said Mr Mansoor was “brutally and intentionally” killed by someone who was supposed to be his friend.

“He died without dignity in the doorway of his home, far away from his family,” Mr Dawes said.

Thiyagarajah, who pleaded not guilty to murder, tried to falsify the crime scene to make it look like others were involved and lied about Mr Mansoor trying to recruit him to join the terror group Islamic State.

The trial judge also rejected the defence argument that the 44-year-old had been provoked by comments the dead man made about his wife.

Mr Mansoor suffered more than 40 separate injuries including a large gaping wound to the neck which severed his carotid artery.

A victim impact statement read to the court on Monday said his family would continue to hurt until they had all “left the earth”.

They said Mr Mansoor’s children had lost their guardian, a loving soul and carer as they called for the maximum possible sentence for his killer.

The family also questioned what sin or injustice he could have done to warrant the taking of his life.

“What did he do to you for you to take his life away,” Thiyagarajah was asked.

In defence submissions, Bill Boucaut told the court his client’s background was “truly horrendous”.

He said Thiyagarajah had witnessed rioting and murders in the streets of his homeland and had been recruited as a child soldier when he was just 12.

Thiyagarajah had also been captured and tortured for several months before finally making his way to Christmas Island by boat.

But Mr Boucaut said his application for refugee status had been rejected and he faced the prospect of being deported once he had served his jail sentence

He told the court Thiyagarajah was also being kept in protective custody to avoid assaults in jail because he had tried to implicate others in his crime.

He said his client had a “deep sense of sorrow” over what he had done and was also suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder related to his earlier experiences.

Mr Dawes told the court that Thiyagarajah was considered an unlawful non-citizen and his last temporary protection visa had expired in September 2015.

As such, he would be taken into immigration detention once his non-parole period had been completed.

Thiyagarajah will be sentenced later this month.

By C.Y.P. RAM, UNP COLOMBO DISTRICT ORGANISER AND FORMER MEMBER WESTERN PROVINCIAL COUNCIL Courtesy Ceylon Today

Party leaders and Parliamentarians who represent the minority Tamil and Muslim communities have failed in their duty, which is to achieve the aspirations of the community they represent.

Plans to form a Tamil and Muslim conference by them is not going to serve the purpose of achieving the intended rights of the minority Tamil speaking community of our nation.

 The persons who had identified themselves as leaders of Tamil parties and the representatives of minority Tamil speaking community have been with the ruling party supporting it throughout for the last four and half years. They had all the opportunity to bargain with the ruling party and submit their proposals regarding the new Constitution, which they have failed to do so. But after wasting all these years, they are now talking about forming a conference to solve the aspirations of the Tamil community which seems to be a joke.

Today the masses are highly knowledgeable and groomed with their basic education and they are aware of what is happening in this country.

 Therefore, they cannot be fooled anymore and the representatives who represent the minority communities should be honest to their voters and if not they will have to face the consequences at the future elections. For many years they have been joining hands with the Government in power to promote and strengthen their political parties and also promote their personal needs and not the needs of the people, which the masses are aware of. 

All the parties, including the Tamil National Alliance (TNA), Sri Lanka Muslim Congress, Estate Workers Congress, Tamil  Progressive Alliance (TPA) had been supporting the present Government even at times when they were under pressure to overcome the No Confidence Motions, put forward by the Oppositions. While these representative were supporting the Government during bad times, they had enough opportunities to bargain with the Government to fulfil the demands of the minority communities in which they have failed.

 In a press statement, Tamil Progressive Alliance Leader Mano Ganesan has said that The United National Party and the Sri Lanka Freedom Party are the main reasons for stopping the making of this Constitution. His statement is not acceptable, and he cannot put the blame on the UNP alone and he should realise that he is also part of this Government. He has also stressed in his statement that TNA leader R. Sampanthan also had made a statement in this regard to the Government asking it to fulfil the promises given to the international community in regard and resume the formulation of the Constitution. These are only announcements made to please the innocent Minority Tamil speaking community.

Without accepting their lapses and setbacks, Tamil Progressive Alliance leader Mano Ganesan should not blame the UNP alone for these impediments. The leadership of TNA also should take the blame for not making use the opportunities they had to demand for the rights of the minority community. 

TNA only enjoyed all positions and perks and ultimately they could not even safeguard their opposition leadership as well, which is very sad and discouraging. Now it is too late and it has been the same story all the time and these representatives ultimately have failed to contribute productively taking into consideration the rights and needs of the community they represent.

 I am sure the masses will decide intelligently to elect the right leaders in the future to represent them and these politicians will have to pay for what they have done.

By C.Y.P. RAM, UNP COLOMBO DISTRICT ORGANISER AND FORMER MEMBER WESTERN PROVINCIAL COUNCIL

Courtesy Adaderana

Police have arrested three suspected members of the banned organisation, Jamathei Millathu Ibraheem (JMI), who had allegedly received training from terrorist leader Zahran Hashim in Nuwara Eliya and Hambantota.

Police Spokesman SP Ruwan Gunasekara said that they were arrested by Ampara Police today and that one of the suspects is a student of the South Eastern University in Oluvil.

One of the three arrested suspects has been identified as Mohamed Seifullah Haq, also known as ‘Abu Sahid’, who is a resident of Gelioya.

He had allegedly attended the sermons held in Nuwara-Eliya by National Thowheed Jamaath (NTJ) leader Zharan Hashim, the alleged mastermind of the Easter Sunday attacks.
 
An individual identified as Musthaq Ali Amher also known as ‘Abu Hind’, a resident of Walpoladenya in Mawanella, who had allegedly attended Zahran’s sermons in Hambantota, has also been taken into custody.

The other arrested suspect is Mohammadu Thahir Hidayathullah, also known as ‘Abu Thurami’, who had also allegedly attended Zahran’s lectures in Nuwara-Eliya.

This suspect is a resident of Mawanella while he is a student of the South Eastern University in Oluvil.

Courtesy Adaderana

Forty-seven people died and over 200,000 were infected by the dengue virus across Sri Lanka in the first seven months this year, government figures revealed on Monday.

Till the end of July, a total of 234,078 dengue cases were reported, with the highest number of cases reported from the Colombo district followed by Gampaha and Kalutara, reports Xinhua news agency.

The government’s Epidemiology Unit said it had identified five high-risk districts — Colombo, Gampaha, Galle, Kalutara and Ratnapura.

Medical experts have urged people to seek immediate medical attention if they suffered from high fever, uncontrolled vomiting, abdominal pain and dizziness.

All fever patients need rest and should refrain from attending work or school,” said epidemiologists. Dengue Hemorrhagic Fever (DHF) can be fatal.”

Medical experts have further urged pregnant women to seek hospital admission immediately on the first day of fever.

Last year, over 50 people died and over 48,000 were affected by the mosquito-borne virus in Sri Lanka, with the National Dengue Control Unit launching several programmes to eradicate mosquito breeding grounds in several districts of the island country.

-IANS

 අරවින්ද අතුකෝරල

පිවිතුරු හෙළ උරුමය මූලස්ථානයේ පැවති මාධ්‍ය හමුවේ දී එම පක්ෂ නායක නීතිඥ උදය ගම්මන්පිල මහතා මෙම අදහස් පල කලේය.

පාස්කු බෝම්බ ප්‍රහාරයේ සිදුවීම් සමග නම කියැවුණු එකම මන්ත්‍රිවරයා තමයි රිෂාඩ් බදියුඩීන් ඇමතිවරයා. එතුමා ගැන අපි පොලිසියට පැමිණිලි කළත් අඩුම ගණනේ පොලිසිය විසින් ප්‍රකාශයක් වත් සටහන් කර ගන්නේ නැතුව එතුමාව නිදහස් කළා. පොලිසියට අයිති දෙයක් නෙමෙයි කෙනෙක් නිදහස් ද නැද්ද කියන එක.

පොලීසිය කළ යුත්තේ විමර්ශණයේ තොරතුරු උසාවියට වාර්ථා කිරීමයි. උසාවියිය තීරනය කල යුත්තේ නිදොස්ද නැද්ද කියන එක. රිෂාඩ් බදියුඩීන් ඇමතිවරයාගේ කුණු සේදීීම සදහා බිහි කල කුණු ලොන්ඩරිය නමින් රට දන්නා තේරීම් කාරක සභාව සිය වාර්තාව දෙන්නත් කලින් එයාට ඇමති ධූරයකුත් ලැබුණා.

රිෂාඩ්ට එක නීතියකුයි අනිත් අයට තව නීතියකුයි තිබෙන්න බෑනෙ. ඒ නිසා කඩු බෙදා දීමේ ජාතික උත්සවයක් පවත්වලා, කඩු අත්අඩංගුවට ගැනීම ගැන සමාව අයදිමින් රට පුරා අත්අඩංගුවට ගත් කඩු තොග අයිතිකරුවන්ටම බෙදා දෙන්න කියලා අපි යෝජනා කරනවා.

ඒ වගේම අත්අඩංගුවේ සිටින ජාතික තහුහිඩ් ජමාත් සාමාජිකයන්ද ඇතුළු ත්‍රස්තවාදි සැකකරුවන් වන්දි සමග නැවත පවුලේ සාමාජිකයින්ට උත්සවාකාරයෙන් භාර දෙන්න කියලා අපි යෝජනා කරනවා.

වන්දි ගෙවීම සදහා දැන් හානි පූර්ණ කාර්යාලය කියල එකකුත් පිහිටුවලා තියෙනවානේ. එය යටතේ දැන් ත්‍රස්තවාදීන්ට වන්දි ගෙවීමද නීත්‍යනුකූල වී තිබෙනවා. ඒකත් මදි නම් පාස්කු ඉරිදා පල්ලි ගිය සියළුම දෙනා වැරදි වෙලාවේ වැරදි ස්ථානයේ සිටීමේ චෝදනාවට අත්අඩංගුවට ගන්නත් පුළුවන්.

අනුරුද්ධ බණ්ඩාර රණවාරණ මාධ්‍ය ලේකම් ජාතික නිදහස් පෙරමුණ

‘සහරාන්ගේ කල්ලිය’ වැනි තවත් ත්‍රස්ත කල්ලියක් ලවා මරාගෙන මැරෙන ප්‍රහාරයන් එල්ල කරවා රට තුළ හදිසි තත්වයක් ඇතිකොට ඒ තත්ත්වය යටතේ ජනාධිපතිවරණය කල් දමා, රනිල් වික්‍රමසිංහගේ ප්‍රධානත්වයෙන් භාරකාර ආණ්ඩුවක් හැදීම ඇමරිකානු එක්සත් ජනපදයේ අවසන් තුරුම්පුව වී ඇති බවත් ඒ නිසා ඉදිරි මාස කීපය ඉතාමත් තීරණාත්මක කාලයක් වනු ඇති බවත් ඒ තුරුම්පුව ඇදීමට ඇමරිකාවට ඉඩ නොදීම රටට ආදරය කරන කාගේත් වගකීම බවත් ජානිපෙ නායක විමල් වීරවංශ මහතා පෙන්වාදෙයි.

මහනුවර ශ්‍රී පුෂ්පදාන ශාලාවේදී පැවති STOP USA සංවිධානයේ දෙවන සම්මන්ත්‍රණයේ දී අදහස් දක්වමින් ඒ මහතා මෙසේ පෙන්වා දුන්නේය.

එහිදී වැඩිදුරටත් අදහස් දැක් වූ විමල් වීරවංශ මහතා මෙසේද සඳහන් කළේය.

ඇක්සා ගිවිසුම අනුව ඇමරිකානු හමුදාවන්ට හදිසි තත්ත්වයකදී ශ්‍රී ලංකාවට පැමිණීමට ඉඩ කඩ හදලා දීලා ඉවරයි. එසේම ඇමෙරිකානු ආරක්ෂක හමුදාවන්ට, නිලධාරීන්ට හා ඔවුන්ගේ කොන්ත්‍රාත් කරුවන්ට තම රටේදීවත් නැති වරප්‍රසාද ප්‍රමාණයක් ලබා දෙන්නයි දැන් සෝෆා ගිවිසුම අත්සන් කර ගැනීමට බලන්නේ. ශ්‍රී ලංකාවට වීසා නැතිව එන්න, බඩුබාහිරාදිය පරීක්ෂා කිරීමෙන් තොරව ගෙන එන්න, නිදහසේ ශ්‍රී ලංකාව තුළ සැරිසරන්න, අධිආරක්ෂිත කලාපවලට ඇතුළු වීමට, මේ ඇමරිකන් පුරවැසියන්ට සෝෆා ගිවිසුම අත්සන් කිරීමෙන් පසු ඉඩකඩ ලැබෙනවා.

‘ගිවිසුම් තුනකින් රට වැනසීම’

ඒ විදිහට සෝෆා ගිවිසුම අත්සන් කරගත් පසුව ශ්‍රී ලංකාව තුළ මේ ඇමෙරිකන් පුරවැසියන්ට පදිංචි වීමට අවශ්‍යයි. ආර්ථිකමය වශයෙනුත් මේ රට තමන්ගේ ග්‍රහණයට ගැනීම ඇමරිකාවේ ඊළඟ වුවමනාවයි. ඒ සඳහා තමයි මිලේනියම් චැලේන්ජ් කෝපරේෂන් ගිවිසුම ගෙන එන්නේ. ඒ ගිවිසුමට අනුව ශ්‍රී ලංකාවේ ඉඩම් වෙළෙඳපොළ සක්‍රිය කළ යුතුයි. ඒ සඳහා ඔවුන් යෝජනා කරනවා නව ඉඩම් පනත් දෙකක් ගෙන ඒමට. එකක් තමයි ඉඩම් සංවර්ධන (විශේෂ විධිවිධාන) පනත. එමගින් බලපත්‍රලාභී ඉඩම් හිමියන්ට සින්නක්කර ඔප්පු දෙනවා. පෞද්ගලික ඉඩම් ටික ඇමරිකානු සමාගම්වලට තුට්ටු දෙකට කොල්ල කා ගැනීමයි එහි අරමුණ. ඒ වගේම රජයේ ඉඩම් සියල්ල, රාජ්‍ය ඉඩම් බැංකු පනත යටතේ ඉඩම් බැංකුවකට පැවරෙනවා. අදාළ විෂය භාර ඇමතිවරයාගේ කැමැත්ත ඇතොත් අක්කර දහස් ගණනින් රජයේ ඉඩම් ඇමරිකානු සමාගම්වලට මිලදී ගත හැකියි.

‘ඉඩම් අක්කර 12,33,000ක්’

එක් පැත්තකින් ත්‍රිකුණාමල දිස්ත්‍රික්කයේ ඉඩම් අක්කර 33,000ක සංවර්ධන ව්‍යාපෘතියක් ඇරඹීමට නියමිතයි. එහි සුපිරි මහල්නිවාස සංකීර්ණ, සුපිරි වෙළඳසැල් ආදියත් විශාල වශයෙන් ඇතුළත් වෙනවා. ඒ පිළිබඳව විමසා බැලුවාම පෙනීයනවා ‘සෝෆා ගිවිසුම යටතේ එන ඇමරිකානුවන්ගේ පවුල්වලට දීර්ඝකාලීනව රැඳී සිටීමටයි මේ සුපිරි නිවාස සංකීර්ණ ඉදිවන්නේ’ කියා. ඒ වගේම ත්‍රිකුණාමලය සිට කොළඹ දක්වා දිස්ත්‍රික්ක 07ක් හරහා දිවෙන අක්කර ලක්ෂ 12ක් ඇතුළත් වන විශේෂ ආර්ථික කොරිඩෝවක් ඉදිකිරීමට මිලේනියම් චැලේන්ජ් කෝපරේෂන් ගිවිසුමින් ඉඩකඩ හදලා දෙනවා. ඉඩම් පනත් දෙක හදා දී මිලේනියම් චැලේන්ජ් කොපරේෂන් ගිවිසුමට අත්සන් තැබුවාම මේ රටේ පුරාවිද්‍යාත්මක උරුමයන් සහිත ඉඩම් අක්කර 12,33,000ක් ඇමෙරිකානු අධිරාජ්‍යවාදීන්ගේ ග්‍රහණයට නතු වෙනවා.

‘ආපදා අධිරාජ්‍යවාදය’

අමෙරිකා එක්සත් ජනපද අධිරාජ්‍යවාදය යොදා ගන්නා නූතන ක්‍රමවේදය තමයි ආපදා අධිරාජ්‍යවාදය. රටක් තුළ පළමුව ආපදාවක් ඇතිකොට එම ආපදාවට පිළියම් කිරීමේ මුවාවෙන් එයට රිංගා ගැනීම මෙහිදී සිදු කෙරෙනවා. ඇක්සා ගිවිසුම ගැහුවාට මදි. ශ්‍රී ලංකාවට රිංගන්න නම් ආපදා තත්ත්වයක් – හදිසි තත්ත්වයක් ඇති කළ යුතුයි. හදිසි තත්ත්වය හදන්න එදා ඇමෙරිකා එක්සත් ජනපදයට වේළුපිල්ලේ පිරබාහරන්ගේ කුලී සේනාංකය හිටියා. අද ඒ හදිසි තත්ත්වය හදන්න සහරාන්ලා වුවමනා වෙලා තිබෙනවා. සහරාන්ලා වහබි අන්තවාදයෙන් පිස්සු වැටිලා, මරාගෙන මැරෙනකොට ඇති ිවන මරාගැනිල්ල නිසා ‘ශ්‍රී ලංකාව තුළ හදිසි තත්ත්වයක් – වහාම මැදිහත් විය යුතුයි’ කියා ඇමරිකානු 07 වැනි ඉන්දු – පැසිෆික් නාවික බලඇණිය ඇතුළු ඇක්සා ගිවිසුමේ උපලේඛනවල සඳහන් හමුදා අනුඛණ්ඩ රිංගා ගන්නවා. ඒකයි ඇමරිකාවේ සැලසුම වුනේ.

නමුත් ඇමෙරිකාව බලාපොරොත්තු වූ සිංහල – මුස්ලිම් මරාගැනිල්ල ඒ ආකාරයට සිදු වුණේ නැහැ. ඒ නිසායි තවමත් ඇමරිකානු හමුදාවන්ට අපේ රටට රිංග ගන්න බැරි වෙලා තියෙන්නේ. තමන්ගේ සැලසුම ඇමරිකාව අතහරී කියා හිතන්න බැහැ. ඔවුන්ට තවමත් ආපදා තත්ත්වයක් – හදිසි තත්ත්වයක් අත්‍යවශ්‍ය වී තිබෙනවා. ඉදිරි මාස 03 – 04, මේ රටේ ඉරණම සමඟ ඉතා තදින් බැඳුණු මාස කීපයක්. ඇමරිකා එක්සත් ජනපදය, තමන්ගේ ‘රූකඩ බත්බැලයා’ වන රනිල් වික්‍රමසිංහගේ බලය ගිලිහෙන තෙක් නිහඬව සිටියි ගියා කිසිවිටෙක හිතන්න එපා. ඔවුන්ගේ අවසාන තුරුම්පුව තමයි ‘අප්‍රේල් 21’ සහරාන් ලවා හදාගන්න දඟලපු හදිසි තත්වය ‘තවත් සහරාන්ලා’ දෙතුන්දෙනකු ලවා හදා ගැනීම, ඒ හදිසි තත්ත්වය අවශ්‍ය මාත්‍රා ගණනට හැදුනාම ඒ තත්ත්වය මත ජනාධිපතිවරණය කල් දැමීම, ඉන්පසු හදිසි තත්ත්වය රතු පාවාඩ බවට පත්කරගෙන ගිවිසුමෙන් ලබාදී තිබෙන වරම අනුව ඇමෙරිකාවේ 07 වැනි ඉන්දු – පැසිපික් නාවික බලඇණිය ශ්‍රී ලංකාව තුළට කඩා වැදීම, ඉන්පසු අගමැති ලවා සෝෆා ගිවිසුම අත්සන් කරවා ගැනීම, රනිල් වික්‍රමසිංහගේ ප්‍රධානත්වයෙන් තාවකාලික භාරකාර ආණ්ඩුවක් පිහිටුවීම.

ඒ තුරුම්පුව මේ මාස 03-04 තුළ අදින්නයි හදන්නේ. ඊට එරෙහිව කළ යුතු සියල්ල අපි කළ යුතු වෙනවා. STOP USA සංවිධානය ගොඩනැගුණේ ඇමරිකානු ගිවිසුම් තුනකින් මේ රට වනසන එක නතර කිරීම සඳහා පුළුල් ජනතා බලවේගයක් ගොඩනැගීම සඳහායි. ඒ සඳහා එක්වන ලෙස සියලුදෙනාට ඇරයුම් කරනවා.”

Courtesy The Daily Reord

Thirty tons of clinical waste from Scottish hospitals was reported missing after the collapse of Lanarkshire-based disposal contractor HES last year.

The Scottish Government has been urged to investigate whether clinical waste including body partscould have been exported to Sri Lanka.

Labour MSP Monica Lennon has written to Health Secretary Jeane Freeman after 100 shipping containers from the UK containing toxic materials were discovered at the port of Colombo.

The sickening cargo is understood to have been mixed with legitimate recyclable material that had been sent to south Asia for processing.

About 30 tons of clinical waste from Scottish hospitals was reported missing after the collapse of Lanarkshire-based disposal contractor HES last year.

The company was stripped of its NHS contract in December after huge stockpiles built up at its base in Shotts.

NHS contingency measures have seen toxic material put into storage around the country as well as being sent to processing plants in England.

Shadow health secretary Lennon’s letter, which has also been sent to the SNP’s Environment Secretary Roseanna Cunningham, has called for action to establish whether any Scottish waste could have ended up leaving the UK.

It states: It is understood that Sri Lankan authorities discovered more than 100 shipping containers filled with hospital waste, body parts, mattresses and plastics originating from the UK and that some of the containers have been in the country for more than two years.

This is troubling news and the Scottish public would be horrified if clinical waste from Scotland has ended up in Sri Lanka, or indeed in any other country. I would be grateful, therefore, if you could confirm when the Scottish Government became aware of the Sri Lanka-UK clinical waste scandal, what information ministers have received and what action you and your officials have taken in response.”

HES collapsed with the loss of hundreds of jobs after the NHS pulled contracts it claimed the firm was failing to fulfil.

Spanish-based firm Tradebe has been lined up to take over the contract.

Workers in Sri Lanka first became suspicious after discovering strong smells from shipping containers that had arrived in Colombo. The Central Environment Authority said: The waste material brought to the country under the guise of mattresses from the UK is extremely hazardous.”

The UK Government’s Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs has launched an investigation.

The Scottish Government said: We have no reason to believe clinical waste from Scotland was disposed of in Sri Lanka. All health boards must handle all categories of waste in a safe and appropriate fashion.”

By Stuart Cosgrove Courtesy The National

Toxic waste, including diseased tumours and human remains, was dumped in Sri Lanka

SRI LANKA and its battered citizens no doubt imagined that they had lived through the worst that life could dump on them – a bitter civil war, a tragic Tsunami and most recently an unexpected terrorist attack on churches and tourist hotels – then the most putrid consignments arrived on Sri Lanka’s shores.

A UK based-company dumped 27,685 tonnes of hazardous waste in a processing zone to the south of the country’s main international airport.

The towering columns of putrid effluence stuffed into cargo shipping containers have become a national embarrassment and have triggered deep resentment across the island.

At the centre of the row is more than a hundred shipping containers, which appear to contain human remains which were criminally disguised on export licenses as recyclable metals.

Ordinary Sri Lankans are now casually using the term toxic colonialism” and the fingers of blame point in two different directions: firstly back to Britain, where the rogue consignment came from, and secondly to the Sri Lankan authorities, who seem to have been blasé about waste management.

Although this does not make pleasant reading it is important to understand what these rogue consignments contain: soiled mattresses stained in urine and blood, old medical waste including swabs, theatre gowns and stained bed sheets and, most repugnant of all, Britain has sent Sri Lanka, diseased tumours, cancerous growths and the human remains of either successful or possibly failed medical operations.

As the containers lie stinking in a Sri Lanka import zone, we can only speculate about the back narrative – that a company has realised it is cheaper to send hazardous waste abroad than dispose of it here; or that there is something seriously amiss in the way that health services dispose of their waste, or that in an increasingly profit-driven private health environment, too many corners have been cut to save cash.

The British consignments of cancerous waste are in clear breach of the so-called Basel Convention, or to give it its full title the Basel Convention on the Control of Transboundary Movements of Hazardous Wastes, which was agreed to prevent the transportation of hazardous waste from developed to less-developed nations.

The Sri Lankans have every right to reach for their Elvis Presley CDs and play Return to Sender.

Context has played a powerful role too. The discovery of Britain’s toxic waste comes in the aftermath of one of Sri Lanka’s most recent man-made disasters. The death of 32 people in the disaster at Meethotamulla in Colombo, Sri Lanka’s largest city, came as a devastating comment on the unrestrained pace of the city’s urban development. This was a very global tragedy, one of growth outstripping infrastructure and of foreign capital triumphing over local needs.

There can be no death as suffocating, as sad and as darkly reflective of the era we live in than dying in a mass of festering garbage as it engulfs your home. To be choked to death by old plastic bags, snagged in baby nappies and rotten food waste is in a very real and horrific sense death by consumption. This was like Aberfan but with mountains of garbage rather than coal slides.

The waste trade is hardly new but statistics confirm that the waste generated in high-income countries is often exported to less developed countries for recycling. The comparatively high cost of processing waste and tightening environmental laws has made it tempting to simply dump the problem on others.

Nor is the toxic colonialism” that connects Britain’s waste to Sri Lanka a unique story. The Philippines has started returning 69 shipping containers full of trash to Canada after a long-running row over waste exports that has not only strained diplomatic ties but has escalated into a full-blown international dispute, in part heightened by threats from Rodrigo Duterte, the Filipino president. Duterte has so far threatened to declare war on Canada, dump the trash in front of its embassy in Manila, or personally sail with the waste and dump it in Canadian waters.

THE horrific waste containers currently stuck in a Sri Lankan industrial zone have dominated the media there and opened up a major democratic debate about the country’s economy. This includes both its toxic colonial past with Britain and its current vulnerability as a nation seriously indebted to China and dependent for trade on the much-hyped new silk road” to Europe.

Once a British colony known as Ceylon, the tangled modernity of the island positions it geographically between two of the greatest superpowers of the current era – India and China. Britain is the past and a decreasingly relevant part of Sri Lanka’s national story.

Ironically, the noise, blame and even self-recrimination in the Sri Lankan media contrast with near silence here in Britain.

The Daily Telegraph has been the only newspaper that has devoted serious coverage to the story. Blindsided by Brexit and by the Conservative canonisation of Boris Johnson, the vast majority of media outlets have been distracted elsewhere. We can only hope that out there a serious investigative journalist with a passion for stories about the environment and globalisation is beginning to unravel the story back to its origins.

Unless there is a criminal gang performing crude cancer operations in a lock-up garage in Peckham then logic would point to the already compromised and commercially sensitive health trusts in the south.

There may be a surprise in there yet, but I would take a calculated guess that the story of toxic colonial waste is not good news for those politicians that put their ideological faith in private medicine and the vicissitudes of the free market.

Although it is entirely coincidental, the story of Sri Lanka’s toxic waste came in the week that First Minister Nicola Sturgeon was planning the TED Talk she delivered at the Edinburgh International Convention Centre.

The crux of Sturgeon’s short talk was the increasingly fashionable opinion that we should move away from the established metrics and conventions of growth – especially Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and embrace measurements that factor in well-being and sustainability.

She explained to the TED community the far-reaching implications of a well-being economy,” which places factors such as equal pay, childcare, mental health and access to green space at its heart, and shows how this new focus could help build resolve to confront global challenges.

It is fairly clear that taking responsibility for your own cancerous tumours would fall into that vision.

The Sri Lankan waste crisis plays directly to Nicola Sturgeon’s argument. The trade in exporting repellent hazardous and plastic waste is the inevitable sad song of the era of turbo-charged GDP growth, in which develop economies look for the least expensive ways to dump the residues of growth on others.

In a blistering editorial in Sri Lanka’s Daily News, British attitudes to the traffic of waste were savaged.

The appalling double standards of the most affluent Western nations in dumping their garbage on unsuspecting third-world countries in a cold, heartless and immoral manner, while preaching everybody about human rights, democracy, equality and moral high standards is indeed shocking,” the paper asserted.

There remains in Sri Lanka a deep resentment about being talked down to by its former colonial rulers and righteous anger against anyone from the British political system that tries to tell them how to run their lives.

We are best advised to learn a lesson this time – Sri Lanka is not a dumping ground nor is it a colony of Britain’s toxic problems.

Chandre Dharmawardana,

This is a very good analysis by Susantha Goonatilleke.

We should agree that Sri Lanka, even more than India, has a strong historical memory, and the Mahawamsa falls in line with the Gilgamesh, the Old Testament, and the writings of Herodotus. The Indian Epics like Ramayana and Mahabharata contain far more myth than history.

However, it is not clear if the modern Sri Lankans have any sort of historical memory or interest in it.

In fact, the modern public seems to be carried away by the nonsensical beliefs of there having been a hela civilization where they had flying machines, aerodromes and Ravana flying about in his private “dandumonaras”. The ignorance and uncritical mindset of our public is difficult to comprehend given that it is more literate than most south Asian countries.

The Mahawamsa content is mythical in referring to the early period because it was written in the 5th Century, and so, the material pertaining to the pre-5th-century era, and especially to times BC, the arrival of Vijaya, etc., would have been a great challenge for a writer 10 centuries later. Even in the 21st century, we are still not sure how John F Kennedy was killed!

And yet, except for the time periods of the early kings, much of the rest of the chronology is amazingly accurate and used by Indian historians to date their chronologies. What Ven. Mahanama had done is/was amazing, because he lived in an age when libraries, books, and records, or tools like the internet that we take for granted did not exist. Knowledge was mainly memorized and “recited”  knowledge.

In addition, Mahawamsa was probably an example of an early historical novel of epic proportions, where Dutugamunu was the hero, and there are clearly many sub-stories brought into the story from other sources and MADE part of the story to embellish the character of Dutugamunu. Thus the story that Elara had a bell to indicate injustice, and that a cow rang the bell to indicate that her calf had been killed by the king’s son or relative, etc., are also found in Indian texts and attributed to (other) an Indian Monarch or Rishi-rulers.

Lanka in the 5th century and Anuradhapura were famous international places and had the same status as Benares, Rome, or London. Benares was probably chosen by the Buddha as the preferred site for his first sermon because it was the crossroads junction of the Silk route (Est-West and North-South linking to the southern seaports like Mahatheetha (Mannar)). So Buddhism launched at the main carrefour of the Silk route was meant to go forth to the wide world.

Mannara and Anuradhapura  together on the Malwathu-Oya [a name now Tamilized to “Aruvi Aru” on our maps, see under Aruvi Aru in my compilation of place names:   https://dh-web.org/place.names/] connected with the silk road and the east-west sea route, and the Mahawamsa was a “top seller” text of the era, with the bookmaking its way to the East and West along the silk route. It was the first Pali Epic poem; monks and scholars learned the text in verse by heart and took it to other cultures. They adapted it into their own languages.

Instead of giving due credit to this great achievement of the Ancient Lankans, the text has been vilified, mainly by the political Tamil nationalists and even by Sihala writers who follow the lead of the Mahawamsa bashers and left intellectuals (Read Leslie Goonawardena’s “People of the Lion”).

In the 1930s, when the historicity of the Mahawamsa was attacked by Ponnambalam and others, Geiger himself came forward to write in support of the historicity of the Mahawamsa and its value as an independent source of Indo-Asian history. I think the article appeared in the RAS journal circa 1933. In the early  1960s, I saw a Sinhala adaptation of the article that my father had, published in a local tabloid.  He had worked with Baron Jayatilleke in the 1930s, and so much material  was known to an earlier generation which  had a better assessment of the Mahawamsa’s  place in

the context of world literature and world history.

Dr. Jane Russell in her truly valuable book on “Communal Politics under the Donoughmore commission, 1931-1948 mentions how Tamil politicians since the 1900s felt very badly that they lacked a similar Epic text as the Mahawamsa, and the historical disadvantage they suffered because of the Mahavamsa in their claim that the Dravidians were the rightful first settlers of the Land. Thus,  nationalist Tamils began an onslaught on the Mahawamsa, and the so-called  “Mahawamsa Mentality”.

Already in the 1930s, G. G. Ponnambalam and others attacked the Mahawamsa in a two-pronged way (i) they began to claim that the Mahawansa is a stupid document riddled with nonsense, and they would focus on the Sinhabahu and Lion story and the impossibility of the bestiality mentioned in the story. (ii) On the other hand, they also tried to claim that the Mahawamsa is actually a document adapted from a Tamil Ur-text where Vijaya was Tamilized to “Vijayan”, Kashyapa was “Kasi-Appan” etc., whereby a Tamilized historical narrative was brought in. This was linked to the claim that the North was a land of Tamil Buddhism but now masquerading as a part of Sinhala Buddhism. So history has become completely politicized.

In fact, a whole new version of Ceylon History was published by Tambimuttu in the early 1940s, and this greatly affected young S. J. V. Chelvanayagam who became a champion of the idea of Lanka as an ancient Tamil kingdom.

The first Sinhala-Tamil riot happened in August 1939 when G. G. Ponnambalam attacked the Sinhalese, as well as the Mahawamsa at a meeting in Nawalapitiya. He allegedly declared that the Sinhalese are a “mongrel”  race arising from Tamils who had bastard children with low caste women, and declared that the Mahawamsa was a fabrication.  He assumed that the audience was mainly Tamils from Nawalapitiya. When the audience rioted and attacked him, he realized that they were mostly Sinhalese. The riots spread like wildfire to other cities and even to Colombo when the British Raj clamped hard and stopped it in 24 hours, unlike the communal riots under SWRD or JRJ, when law and order were not restored and the mobs were allowed to do whatever they wanted.

The fact that G.G. Ponnambalam was one of the first instigators of racism and communalism, the fact that the first riots happened in 1939 etc., are suppressed in today’s narrative.  The narrative of the Eelamists and the narrative of the English speaking anti-Sinhala-language lobby have been that all the problems of Sri Lanka arose from the 1956 SWRD revolution. Bandaranaike’s mishandling of the language issue in an opportunistic way certainly contributed, but the root causes already existed, and the problems would have arisen  in the 1940s, if not for the intervention of World War II and the adroit and eminently practical-minded politics of D. S. Senanayake, as seen in the way he crushed Ponnambalam in the face of the Soulbury Commission, and then saved Ponnambalam from political oblivion, and also reconciling with the Tamil lobby by giving him a place in the cabinet. This also marginalized the fringe represented by SJV Chelvanayagam. SWRD reversed the situation and gave SJV a chance to become mainstream.

There is no translation of Jane Russell’s book into Sinhala, and the book is virtually never mentioned today as it is an irritant for the pro-Eelamist TNA-Ranil led political program and constitution-making a la Jayampathi. The book is out of print.

The current narrative attributes all evils to the “Mahawamsa mindset” of the “Sinhala Buddhists”. But the “Sinhala Buddhist” scholars have not made any attempt to correct this lopsided narrative. Actually, a Tamil writer, Sebastian Rasalingam had written more effectively than Sinhala- speaking writers! The narrative is as racist as claiming that all blacks are criminals or that all Muslims are jihadists. Instead, the self-anointed  “liberal-minded” Lankans and their leaders, as well as the “left intellectuals”  have embraced the aforesaid narrative.

The Leftist leaders suppressed the teaching of history in schools, and then, in more recent times,  Chandrika Bandaranaike and her lieutenant Mangala Samaraweera basically worked hard against the “Mahawamsa mentality”, creating the “Sudu-Nelum” program, etc. Chandrika appointed like-minded people to  Sri Lanka’s TV and Sinhala BBC etc. During Chandrika’s watch, the power brokers followed this ideology, and the same narrative is still alive and well today.  Strangely, the Jathika Hela Urumaya which fielded strongly nationalist monks to the Parliament, now personified by Champika Ranawaka, seems to have no problem in being part of the anti-Mahawamsa narrative, while Ven. Ratana plays an ambiguous role as he probably wants his perks of office through the UNP national list.

The externally funded NGOs of today, like those of Jehan Perera and Pakiyasoothy S, or the International Centre for Ethnic studies under its current leadership are pushing the same program forward,  probably with strong outside funding.

Since funding is crucial to everything, a future government must insist that all NGO funding must be channeled through the central bank so that there is financial transparency as to who is paid what. 
Of course, even that may not be sufficient, as one of the political

monks (See Shamindra Ferdinando; Secret ‘payments’ and financial scams)

http://slwaronterror.blogspot.com/2019/01/secret-payments-and-financial-scams.html

  The western funding is now being outstripped by pro-Sharia funding from the Middle East.  Shamindra Ferdinando’s account does not as yet include a discussion of this pro-Sharia funding.

Chandre Dharmawardana,

Dr. Sarath Obeysekera

Last few days America is going thru difficult times after many people died due to the shooting by white supremacists Some blame Trump for the massacre.

In Sri Lanka also had similar situations where Some extremist elements massacred innocent people.

Who did people blame?

Obviously the current leadership.

A few years back we had skirmishes in Aluthgama and Kandy

Again people blamed the leaders for going soft on extremism

Irrespective of whether extremists are Buddhist, Muslims or Christians it is essential that tough laws are applied again any mushrooming extremists

Releasing any of them to society after incarceration is not advisable 

Dr. Sarath Obeysekera

අර්ජුන රණතුංග 

ඉදිරි ජනාධිපතිරවරණයට තනි පක්ෂයක් ලෙසට ඉදිරිපත් වී ජයග්‍ර‍හණය කළ හැකියැයි එක්සත් ජාතික පක්ෂය සිතන්නේ නම් එය ලොකු මුලාවක් බව ප්‍ර‍වාහන සහ සිවිල් ගුවන්සේවා අමාත්‍ය අර්ජුන රණතුංග මහතා පවසයි.

එක්සත් ජාතික පක්ෂයේ තියෙන ප්‍ර‍ශ්න ඒ පක්ෂයම විසදගන්න ඕන. ඒක අපිට අදාල ප්‍ර‍ශ්නයක් නෙවෙයි මොකද අපි එක්සත් ජාතික පාක්ෂිකයෝ නෙවෙයි. මම එක්සත් ජාතික පෙරමුණේ ඉන්නේ. එකසත් ජාතික පක්ෂයේ තියෙන ප්‍ර‍ශ්නවලට අත ගහන්න අපිට අයිතියක් නැහැ. ඒ නිසාම එකසත් ජාතික පක්ෂය ප්‍ර‍ධාන පක්ෂයක් ලෙස දැන ගන්න ඕන ඔවුන්ගේ ප්‍ර‍ශ්න විසද ගෙන එන්න.  

අපි අවුරුදු දෙකක් තිස්සේ මේ සන්ධානය හදන්න අපි අගැමතිතුමත් එක්ක සාකච්ඡා කළා. අගමැතිතුමා එක්ක වගේම එක්සත් ජාතික පක්ෂයේ සියලු නායකයෝ ඒ කියන්නේ සජිත් හිටියා, රවි හිටියා, මංගල හිටියා, කබීර් හෂීම් හිටියා, මලික් හිටියා, මේ ඔක්කොම නායකයෝ එක්ක තමයි මේ සංධානය හදන්න අපි සාකච්ඡා කළේ. එය ඉදිරියට ඇවිල්ලා අන්තිම ටික තමයි තියෙන්නේ. නමුත් හැමදාම එක්සත් ජාතික පක්ෂය කලබල වෙනවා ඡන්දයක් එනකොට. නායකයෝ වැඩි වෙනවා. හැබැයි එක්සත් ජාතික පක්ෂය හිතනවනම් ඔවුනට තනියම ඉල්ලලා දිනන්න පුළුන් කියලා ඉතිං ඒක කළාට අපිට ප්‍ර‍්ශ්නයක් නැහැ.

සමහර පක්ෂවල ඉන්නවා හරි දක්ෂ කතා කාරයෝ. ඒගොල්ලෝ වැඩ නැහැ. එගොල්ල්ලෝ දන්නේ නැහැ ආණ්ඩුවක් දුවන්නේ කොහොමද කියලා. ඒක ආවාසනාවක්. එක්සත් ජාතික පක්ෂයේ සංධානයට විරුද්ධව ඔය කෑගහන පොඩි අය දැන ගන්න දින පනස් දෙකේදී අපි හතර පස් දෙනා අනිත් පැත්තට ගියානම් මොකද වෙන්නේ කියලා. ඒ ගොල්ලන්ට අද කෑ ගහන්නවත් ලැබෙන්නේ නැහැ. නමුත් අපි හතර පස්දෙනා තීරණාත්මකව හිටියා, අපි ප්‍ර‍තිපත්තියක හිටියා. නමුත් එක්සත් ජාතික පක්ෂය ඇතුළේ තියෙන ප්‍ර‍ශ්න ඔවුනට විසද ගන්න බැහැයි කියලා අපිට පෙනෙන්න තියෙනවා. යම්කිසි විදයකින් එක්සත් ජාතික පක්ෂයේ සමහර අය හිතනවනම් තනිවම දිනන්න පුළුවන් කියලා මං හිතන්නේ එගොල්ලෝ ලොකු කළුවර ගෙදරක ඉන්නේ. ගිය 2015 මැතිවරණෙදි ඔය මොන නායකයෙක් එක්ක හරි එක්සත් ජාතික පක්ෂය තනිවම ඉල්ලුවනම් අනිවාර්යෙන්ම පරදිනවා.

පසුගිය ජනාධිපතිවරණයේදී අපි මෛත්‍රිපාල සිරිසේන මැතිතුමා සමග චන්ද්‍රිකා මැතිනිය, දුමින්ද, අපි චම්පිකලා, රාජිතලා සියල්ලම එකතුවෙලා එලියට බැස්සේ පැවැති පාලනය වෙනස් කරන්න. එහෙම කරලත් අපි ඉතාමත් සුළු චන්ද ප්‍ර‍මාණයකින් දිනුවේ. හැබැයි එක්සත් ජාතික පක්ෂය හිතනවනම් ඒ අයට තනිවම දිනන්න පුළුවන් කියලා මං පුද්ගලිකව හිතනවා අපි පැත්කකට වෙලා එක්සත් ජාතික පක්ෂයට දිනන්න දිලා ඉන්න ඕන කියලා. එකයි මගේ පුද්ගලික මතය. මං සමහර වෙලාවට  ඒ වගේ තීරණයකට යන්න  පුළුවන්  ඉස්සරහට. ඒකොහොම වුණත් මම නැවත කියන්නේ එක්සත් ජාතික පක්ෂය මේ සන්ධානය එක්ක එකට එකතුවෙලා ගියොත් මේ ඡන්දය දිනන්න පුළුවන්. එහෙම නැත්නම් මං වගකීමකින් කියන්නේ, සන්ධානයේ ඉන්න අනිත් පක්ෂටික නැතුව එක්සත් ජාතික පක්ෂය දිනන්න පුළුවන් කියලා හිතනවනම් මං හිතන්නේ ඒක ලොකු මුලාවක්. එහෙම කරනවනම් ඒකේ වගකීම ඔය කෑගහන හ්‍රුගදෙනෙක් ගන්න ඕන. පැරදුනොත් මේ රටේ ඉන්න එක්සත් ජාකික පාක්ෂිකයෝ  සියලුදෙනාටම එගොල්ලෝ වග කියන්න ඕන….”යිද අමාත්‍ය අර්ජුන රණතුංග මහතා පැවසීය. ඔහු මේ බව පැවසුවේ අද (04) අත්තනගල්ල මන්දාරා ශ්‍ර‍වණාගාරයේදී පැවැති මව්රට ජාතික ව්‍යාපාරයේ වාර්ෂික සමුළුවට එක් වෙමිනි. ජාතික දේශපාලනයට බලපෑම් කරන නව පුරවැසි පෙරමුණක් ලෙසට සහ නව ජාතික දේශපාලන ව්‍යාපාරයක් ලෙසට මව්රට ජාතික ව්‍යාපාරය දියත් කෙරේ. මෙහි හඩපටය සහ මාධ්‍ය නිවේදනය අමුණා ඇත.

Dr Sarath Obeysekera

Elections are at the doorstep. Hardware shops are selling mamoties and masonry trowels ( made in China) like hotcakes. Computer suppliers are trying to supply state of the art tabs to the government to support the student communities to make them more involved in the web-based communication industry.

What is the secret?

Minsters of the government with leaders are attending placing of foundations for schools, temples, culverts. Mamoties are sold with a masonry trowel for the invited VIP to place the first brick during the eve of the election.

Good all day even prime ministers like Duddley and Premadasa got into paddy fields wearing G strings trying to prop up paddy cultivation because the price of rice decided the fate of the politicians at the elections.

Now different tools are used to prop up the image. Mamoty and masonry trowel are the symbols of the housing construction boom.

Tabs are given to children to have easy access to the web, which will be used to access facebook and other social media. Some parties will use social media to win elections. Some parties will use mamoties and masonry trowels.

Telecom and mobile operators will benefit by providing broadband access to tabs. They may even fund election campaigns so that they sell more webspace.

Only items missing are the hammer and sickle which was the symbol of development during the times of socialism at the forefront.

That is because front line leftist parties are spearheading disturbances in the urban area by organizing demonstrations throwing stones at the police.

Hammer and sickle which were the real symbol of working-class are  rusting in their memories,

Poor people in rural areas are suffering because of the spiraling cost of living.

Dr. Sarath Obeysekera 

By Dr Upul Wijayawardhana Courtesy The Island

“Justin, I cannot wait for the old boy to die” was the response my father had received from S. W. R. D. Bandaranaike, shortly before he crossed over to the Opposition, in July 1951, having resigned from the posts of the Leader of the House and Minister of Health & Local Government. My father, Justin Wijayawardhana, was an ardent supporter of SWRD and secretary of the Matara Branch of the Sinhala Maha Sabha, till it joined the UNP, and then was the secretary of the Matara Branch of the UNP. On learning of the possibility of SWRD’s crossover, he rushed to Colombo to request the latter not to do so. When my father pointed out that upon the retirement or death of DS, the Sinhala Maha Sabha faction would agitate and ensure SWRD would succeed, in spite of the mutterings that Lord Soulbury might nominate Dudley, he received the aforesaid response. In spite of the request, with incentives, from SWRD to join his party, my father remained with the UNP till death, probably because of his aversion to Marxists. Had he behaved liked the modern-day politicians, I may have earned the dubious distinction of being the son of a minister!

When my father related this story to us, I cannot remember; must have been after the landslide victory of SWRD in 1956, I must say that it took the glitter off the revolutionary hero image I had then of SWRD; after all, he gave pride of place to my native language or so I thought then, but it was a misjudgement of youth. Whether SWRD had a patriotic stance or exploited basic instincts to gain power is immaterial as, unfortunately, the result was a divided nation with continuing repercussions, even to date.

SWRD dissolved the Sinhala Maha Sabha and launched his new party, the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP), on 2 September 1951. It puzzles me, even to this day, why he used the term freedom, in the party name, when we had already got freedom (nidahasa) from our colonizer. Totally unexpectedly, just over six months later, DS died, on 22 March 1952, having fallen off his horse he was riding in Galle Face.

Maybe, even if SWRD had not crossed over, Lord Soulbury would still have appointed Dudley Prime Minister. He would then have had a much stronger case to resign and form a new political party. In fact, this seems to be the narrative of some SLFP bigwigs. I was taken aback when a senior member of the SLFP recently stated that on Dudley’s appointment as PM, by Lord Soulbury, as wished to by DS, SWRD had left the UNP to form the SLFP!

Though Dudley justified his appointment by winning, with a landslide, the election he called in May 1952, he resigned in August 1953, taking responsibility for the loss of 10 lives during the ‘hartal’ organised by the leftists. Sir John, who succeeded him called an election in 1956, prematurely. SWRD, the charismatic politician and the great orator, rallied the ‘Pancha Maha Balaewegaya’ to win a landslide at this election and the second force in Sri Lanka politics was born. Since then, the SLFP and UNP has ruled the country, alternately, sometimes helped by smaller parties.

On the assassination of SWRD, in September 1959, Wijayanada Dahanayaka became the PM. Though a man with total integrity, his term in office is better forgotten! The mantle of leadership of the SLFP fell on Sirimavo, who became the world’s first woman PM by winning the July 1960 elections. When she thought of retirement, the biggest quandary she faced was whether to pass on the mantle to her son or her daughter and, for reasons best known to herself, she passed it on to Chandrika; the more intelligent son, left confused, wasted his life without realising his full potential. Chandrika was PM for a short time in 1994, before becoming the first woman president of Sri Lanka in November 1994. Her presidency till 2005 is yet another era of SLFP, better forgotten.

Mahinda Rajapaksa became the President in 2005 and took over the SLFP leadership from the Bandaranaikes.

Maybe, the golden era of the SLFP was under Mahinda, mainly due to the defeat of LTTE terrorism. Based on astrological advice, when Mahinda called a premature presidential election in 2015, Chandrika struck. Unfortunately for her, the Yahapalanaya, she created and fostered, has turned out to be a mirage. The bond scams, perpetuated by an imported Governor and his son-in-law, were made worse by the attempted cover-up by her new friend,Ranil.

Clashes between Maithri and Ranil paved the way for the emergence of a new form of terrorism. As eminently pointed out by Malcolm Cardinal Ranjith, backboneless politicians are indulging in a battle of self-preservation at the expense of the security of the nation. Much to Chandrika’s disdain, all this has led to a Mahinda resurgence, if one were to take cognisance of cheers from the crowd at the sheer mention of the name, at the parting speech of Lasith Malinga, among many other things.

Mahinda’s other brother, another clever politician Basil, has been busy building a new party; the SLPP. In a short period of existence, the bud (pohottuwa) bloomed at the last local government elections; so much, so that the Yahapalanaya is finding every possible excuse to postpone elections. If the present trend continues the SLPP may well become the dominant party in Sri Lanka politics.

What is left of the SLFP seems to be dwindling by the day and the behaviour of the bigwigs is only second to the behaviour of the PM, who denies the existence of wattle and daub houses in Sri Lanka and thinks what villagers want is not food and clothing, but gym equipment!

As the race for the presidency hots up, the big decision for the few MPs, remaining in the SLFP, seems to be, which way to jump: some are attempting to polevault to the UNP whilst others are jump the SLPP bandwagon. Maithri, after flirting with Sajith , seems to be in discussion with the SLPP.

By Michael Gregson Courtesy Ceylon Today

Sri Lanka could soon be in for a windfall because of the worldwide surge in demand for electric cars. At least 125 million electric vehicles are expected to be travelling global highways by 2030, which means the world is going to need a lot more graphite in the coming decade and beyond. And Sri Lanka is sitting on heaps of the stuff.

Graphite mining dates back 200 years in Sri Lanka, peaking during the First and  Second World Wars, when production hit 35,000 tons a year.  Since then, the industry has been in steady decline on the island. By 2012, production had fallen by 90% to less than 3,500 tons. However, that could all be about to change.  That’s because graphite is essential for the lithium-ion batteries that power electric vehicles, not to mention the growing number of devices that use the same type of battery.

Earlier this month Ceylon Graphite Corp announced that it had discovered a large, wide crystalline graphite vein at its project in Sri Lanka.

The Vancouver-based exploration company found a 55-centimetre-wide vein at the H1 site in Meewitiya during the digging of a new shaft. The new discovery follows the recent find of another large crystalline graphite vein measuring over 30 cm in width.

The company is confident that these discoveries demonstrate that there is commercially mineable graphite.  Independent testing shows that the graphite is 99.9% pure. This makes it ideal for a wide range of products, including batteries.  We continue to find large crystalline graphite veins with purity that has not been seen elsewhere in the world,” said Ceylon Graphite CEO Bharat Parashar.

Prashar added that Ceylon expects to be in commercial production shortly.

Purest in the world

Graphite mined in Sri Lanka is known to be some of the purest in the world, but currently accounts for less than 1% of the world graphite production. Sri Lanka has the purest graphite on earth,” says Parasher. Unlike other places, which have flake and amorphous graphite, Sri Lanka has vein graphite. Vein graphite is like the veins in your body – its continuous flow, like a mini stream underground coming up from the core of the earth to the surface.”

Sri Lanka looks poised to benefit from the growth in demand for graphite as the world looks for alternatives to fossil fuels.  Demand is especially high in the US. With the growing number of EVs expected to drive lithium-ion battery demand. The Benchmark Mineral Intelligence agency estimates that the amount of graphite needed for lithium-ion batteries in America will rocket to 1.75 million metric tons by 2028, a nine-fold increase over 2017 levels.

Decarbonisation

Those who control these critical raw materials and those who possess the manufacturing and processing know-how, will hold the balance of industrial power in the 21st Century auto and energy storage industries,” wrote Benchmark’s Managing Director Simon Moores. The head of Ceylon Graphite agrees. Decarbonisation is taking place in a big way across the entire globe,” said Parasher. Decarbonisation is taking place not only in the electric vehicle space but also in energy storage in all forms of our daily life. We see graphite as the new oil.”

The Sri Lankan Government appears keen to boost graphite production, but red tape has been getting in the way.

I have been given to understand about some issues faced by the Sri Lankan mining sector. The mining licences issued have to be renewed every year, is one complaint. Annual renewal is maintained by the Government to safeguard our mining sector.

However, it appears that international investors welcome less frequent renewals. Global investors also welcome specialised mining licenses rather than general licences in Sri Lanka,” said former Industry and Commerce Minister Rishad Bathiudeen. Graphite, the dark grey to jet black material found in pencils, is an immensely valuable commodity and

Sri Lanka is uniquely blessed with an accessible and very pure supply. However, it is even more valuable for export once it has been processed and gains added value.  

One such product is graphene, a form of carbon consisting of planar sheets which are just one atom thick, with the atoms arranged in a honeycomb-shaped lattice. It is the thinnest and strongest material known and another
Sri Lankan Company, Ceylon Graphene Technologies is optimistic for the future.

 CT Web 02:00 AM Aug 05 2019

Courtesy Adaderana

The e-canvassing campaign of the Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna was continued today (04) for the second consecutive day.

SLPP yesterday (03) launched its island-wide pre-election campaign aimed at the presidential election.

SLPP has introduced e-canvassing in the country for the first time through their election campaign.

Using a mobile app called ‘V-CAN’, the SLPP promoted the party ahead of the upcoming election by visiting numerous houses across the country.

However, party representatives had charged that someone had launched a cyberattack on the ‘V-CAN’ app.

 lanka C news

එක්සත් ජාතික පක්ෂයේ නියෝජ්‍ය නායක ඇමැති සජිත් ප්‍රේමදාස උද්දච්ච මෝඩ පුද්ගලයෙක් යයි සිංහලේ සංවිධානය සඳහන් කරයි.

සංවිධානයේ ජාතික සංවිධායක ප්‍රදීප් සංජීව කොළඹදී පැවති මාධ්‍ය හමුවකදී මේ බව කියා සිටියේය.

සජිත් ප්‍රේමදාස මහතාට බි‍්‍රතාන්‍ය විශ්ව විද්‍යාලයකින් ලබා දී ඇති උපාධිය විභාගයට පෙනී සිටීමට නොහැකි බව දැන්වීමෙන් ලබාදෙන උපාධියක් බවද ඔහු සඳහන් කළේය.

ඒ අනුව සජිත් ප්‍රේමදාස මහතාට ලබාදී ඇත්තේ අසනීප වූ පුද්ගලයෙකුට ලබාගෙන සානුකම්පිත උපාධියක් බව ඔහු කියා සිටියේ එම විශ්වවිද්‍යාලයෙන් ගෙන්වා ගන්නා ලද විද්‍යුත් ලිපියක්ද උපුටා දක්වමිනි.

අදාල විද්‍යුත් ලිපියේ පිටපතක් මෙතනින්

SAJITH PREMADASA’S DEGREE QUALIFICATIONS vs OTHER POLITICIANS AND NATIONAL LIST

The prima facie case for India to interfere in Sri Lanka’s internal affairs is to cite that any instability happening in Sri Lanka becomes an automatic national security threat to India. While the argument definitely has merit, it begs to question how far India has chipped into aggravate Sri Lanka’s instability vis a vis helping regime change in 2015 & thus virtually inviting the enemy to Sri Lanka’s shores. While all countries do not have permanent friends but permanent interests, it is good for India to determine who the greater enemy is. To India’s surprise it should now realize India’s enemy is not China!

India & US

India was used as a key base during World War 2 against Japan. Ironically India was also the main US base for aid to China. Post-independence, India’s non-aligned policy was not regarded as ‘democratic’ by US.  Dwight Eisenhower became the first US President to visit India in 1959.

India was considered a strategic partner against Communist China during JFK’s Presidency & supported India during the Indo-Sino war of 1962. US supplied arms, ammunition & clothing to Indian troops. Following JFK’s assassination in 1963, President Lyndon Johnson began forging ties with Pakistan while President Nixon developed closer ties with Pakistan while Indira Gandhi began closer links with Soviet Union. It was no surprise that US went on to support Pakistan during the 1971 Indo-Pakistan war. Following Moraji Desai becoming Prime Minister, India’s relations began to improve though US barred exporting any nuclear material to India in 1978. With Indira Gandhi returning to power, India did not support US against Soviet Union in Afghanistan. However, PM Vajpayee authorized nuclear weapons testing which US imposed economic sanctions against India under President Clinton. Ironically only Japan joined US in imposing sanctions! In 2004 Pakistan was declared a Major Non-NATO Ally status to Pakistan & same status was offered to India but was turned down.

In January 2004, the US and India launched the “Next Steps in Strategic Partnership” (NSSP),

US & India signed a 10 year defense framework agreement in 2005 (lapsed in 2015) as well as the Open Skies Agreement. President Bush visited India in March 2006 and bilateral trade tripled. President Obama visited India in 2010 & again in 2015 & promoted India’s bid for a permanent seat in UNSC & US became one of the top 3 military suppliers to India (after Israel & Russia)

In 2010 leaked Edward Snowden documents revealed US intelligence agencies were spying on PM Modi. Wikileaks also disclosed how western NGOs and foreign aid workers are also being used for spying prompting India to monitor aid agencies operating across India.

It was also in 2010 that US-India re-engaged the US-India Strategic Dialogue declaring India as an ‘indispensable partner and a trusted friend’ which pledged to increase people to people, business to business, government to government linkages.

Despite public sentiments of how great Indo-US ties are in 2013 sough explanation from US for spying on Indian UN Mission in New York & Indian embassy in Washington.

We can recall the Devyani Khobragade incident in December 2013 where she was strip-searched and put in a cell. Though India demanded an apology from the US, the US declined to do so.

Narendra Modi became India’s PM in May 2014. Incidentally, the same US that revoked Modi’s B1/B2 visa in 2005 & refused to accept his application for an A2 visa is today the of pals with Modi! US Secretary of State John Kerry flew to Delhi in August 2014 & Modi visited India in September 2014. The Post-2015 Development Agenda featuring bilateral relations between India & US culminated in Modi’s visit to US is of importance to Sri Lanka vis a vis regime change of January 2015.

Noteworthy too is the visit of US Defense Secretary Ashton Carter to India in June 2015 becoming the 1^st US defense secretary to visit an Indian military command while M Parrikar visited US in December 2015 becoming the 1^st Indian defense Minister to visit US Pacific Command.

However, in March 2016 India refused a proposal by US to join naval patrols in South China Sea joining US partners Japan & Australia.

Modi was to visit US again in June 2016 and again in November 2017. Noteworthy is the US giving a grant of $500,000 to promote religious freedom in India & Sri Lanka. This is an indication of who would be used as mischief makers in the future!

However, when India signed a historic $5.43billion agreement with Russia in October 2018 to purchase the most powerful missile defense system in the world which ignored America’s Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act” CAATSA (a federal law imposing sanctions on Iran, North Korea & Russia – passed in July 2017) the US threatened sanctions against India. US also threatened sanctions against India for its decision to buy oil from Iran.

US has several agreements with its defense partners   

1. General Security of Military Information Agreement (GSOMIA), was signed in 2002 entails sharing of military intelligence to protect the other’s classified information
2. Logistics Exchange Memorandum of Agreement (LEMOA), was signed on 29 August 2016 – entails either military to use each country’s bases for re-supplying or carrying out repairs & requires individual clearance for each request.
3. Communications Compatibility and Security Agreement (COMCASA) signed in September 2018 – enables both countries to share secure communication on approved equipment during bilateral/multinational training exercises & operations
4. Basic Exchange and Cooperation Agreement (BECA) has not been signed yet – this permits exchange of unclassified & controlled unclassified geospatial, topographical, nautical, aeronautical data, products & services between US National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency & India

There are 2.4million Indian immigrants living in US either born in India or reported Indian ancestry – while the list of prominent Indians in US political & corporate scene are many, notable names include Democratic party senator and presidential hopeful Kamala Harris; former US ambassador to the United Nations and governor of South Carolina Nikki Haley; and former Louisiana governor and 2016 Republican presidential nominee hopeful, Bobby Jindal. Surveys show more than 65% of Indian Americans back the Democrats.

More than 196,271 Indian students attend US colleges & universities (2018) while 4,704 American students are studying in India.

US FDI inflow US$ 4.28 billion in 2001 it is now $42billion in 2018.

In August 2018, US granted India Strategic Trade Authorization-1 status.

US is India’s 2^nd largest trading partner while India is America’s 9^th largest trading partner.

US exported $33b worth goods to India in 2018

US imported $54b worth goods from India in 2018

India exported $58.9b worth goods to US in 2018

India imported $83.2b worth goods from US in 2018

In 2016, Washington designated India as a major defence partner”. Washington even changed the name of its Pacific Command to the US Indo-Pacific Command. Indian purchases of US military equipment are rising, and joint military exercises are growing in frequency.

The new love for India is to use India to balance power in the larger Indo-Pacific against Chinese & Russian presence. How far India’s own strategic objectives will cater to America’s geopolitical objectives is left in the hands of India’s policy makers, however, India must realize the dangers that comes with US presence & increased ties.

Indo-Sino Relations

Leaving aside the historical linkages, formal diplomatic relations began in April 1950 and 4 years later both signing an 8-year agreement on Tibet known as the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence (Panchsheel). Both countries unfortunately embroiled in artificial boundaries created by colonial British – McMahon Line is prime example and this resulted in a border war in 1962 and it is no surprise that China backed Pakistan during the Indo-Pak war of 1965. China sided with Pakistan during the 1971-72 war with India. It was in 1978 that India’s External Affairs Minister Vajpayee visited Beijing and diplomatic relations were re-established in 1979 and in 1981 China’s Foreign Minister Huang Hua visited Delhi. Rajiv Gandhi visited China in December 1988 (a year after signing the Indo-Lanka Accord with Sri Lanka). From 1990s regular visits to both nations by officials was frequent – Sharad Pawar became the first Indian Minister of Defense to visit Beijing in 1992 and that same year consulates were opened in Mumbai & Shanghai. The declaration by Indian Defence Minister George Fernandes in my perception of national security, China is enemy no. 1… and any person who is concerned about India’s security must agree with that fact” did not help relations a bit. In 2003 China recognized Indian sovereignty over Sikkim and by 2004 bilateral trade surpassed $10billion & $73billion by 2011. China was granted observer status in the SAARC – South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation while most members wish that status to be upgraded to a permanent membership. Border trade re-commenced after 44 years in 2006 with the re-opening of Nathula Pass. The same year conflict arose over claims on Arunachal Pradesh – which China claims is a territory of China.

The British via Simla Accord of 1913 claimed China had suzerainty over Tibet but not sovereignty. Britain reversed this on 29 October 2008 recognizing China’s sovereignty over Tibet & this position affects the rest of the Simla Accord where India claims North Eastern territories. But in 2009 ADB claimed Arunachal Pradesh as being part of India in approving a development loan and despite China’s insistence on ceasing the loan backing by US & Japan helped secure the loan for India.

Business relations increased with the arrival of 400 Chinese business leaders to India in 2010. Indo-Sino relations took a positive turn during the 2012 BRICS summit.

However, the artificial borders created by British still posed conflicts between the two nations.

India’s exports to China – $53 billion (2018)

India’s imports from China –  US$ 70 million (2018)

Chinese exports to India – $29.17 billion

There are close to 15,000 Indians studying in China

There are close to 7000 Chinese living in India

Issues between India & China

1. Border issue – artificial McMahon Line border created by colonial Britain. China claims Arunachal Pradesh is part of South Tibet.
2. Tibet – conflict persists though India has recognized Tibet as part of China
3. Water issue & diverting dams – 4 rivers descending from 4 directions of Mount Kailash in Tibet to Indian subcontinent (to Brahmaputra, Ganga, Sutlej River, Indus)
4. Dalai Lama – an unnecessary spoiler to relations between the two
5. India boycotted the Belt & Road Summit for the 2^nd time which aims to rediscover the ancient Silk Road to connect Asia to Europe and Africa involving massive investments in maritime, road and rail projects.

Issues between India & US

• In 2019 US suspended Indian trade privileges from GSP – 28 specified US imports to India are subject to higher rates to which India responding by increasing tariffs on US products to India.
• India purchasing oil from Iran was not well received by US
• procurement of the S-400 missile system from Russia inspite of veiled threats by US – India may become victim of Washington’s Countering America’s Adversaries through Sanctions Act (CAATSA), which threatens to impose sanctions on certain companies that cooperate with Russia
• Trump raising issue of Kashmir has not made India too happy

Killing Hope: U.S. Military and C.I.A. Interventions since World War II by William Blum presents 55 such US interventions with 22 countries invaded in last 20 years. US is the only country to have used the atomic bomb twice, US has invaded, occupied, bombed 14 Muslims countries,

According to an international survey, US is the biggest threat to world peace & stability. The U.S. leads the world in military spending, with more than US$7.6 trillion spent on the military and homeland security since 9/11. U.S. is the world’s largest incarcerator of people – 2.3m prison inmates of which 1m are Black Americans. Drug-war related violence across Latin America is also directly linked to US militarizing the region for drug wars!

US record list covers overthrowing democratically elected leaders (Chile, Iran,, Guatemala) imposing dictatorships (Congo), invading Iraq & Afghanistan on lies,

Al Qaeda, ISIS all trace to US and ironically wherever US wants to invade or strike its forced presence, Islamic jihadists ‘facilitate’ that project.

So, when Sri Lanka faced a regime change in 2015 installing US puppet and thereafter rolled out through them a series of pro-US initiatives that has culminated in the possibility of turning entire Sri Lanka into a US base with MCC project together with the privatizing of Land becoming further national security threats to Sri Lanka, the Easter Sunday attacks should have rang alarm bells to India’s policy makers that it has done a major faux pas in helping the 2015 regime change because all of America’s actions post Jan-Aug 2015 has come about leaving India in the cold. Other than the intel on the 21/4 attacks, India has been ignorant of America’s maneuvers vis a vis all of its initiatives in Sri Lanka and this should worry India. America’s constant use of faith-based organizations, NGOs, local stooges, paid media are all influencing local systems both in Sri Lanka & India. The break-up of India along the lines of Soviet Union & Yugoslavia has been given prior warning & the use of Sri Lanka for this initiative as well as an alternative to Diego Garcia to block Russia & China trade & military initiatives is something Sri Lanka’s policy makers & India’s policy makers in particular should worry about.

India may have had tiffs with China but the damage US is capable of doing to countries without remorse can be seen by its own record sheet of military invasions/interventions based on lies and the manner it has deposed elected leaders & placed puppets & despots. The manner that US has made inroads into Sri Lanka should by itself be a wake-up call to realize that it is not China that will become a national security threat to India.

All these years India has been parroting that Sri Lanka’s national security is important for India’s national security, well India better wake up to the fact that the enemy was invited to Asia by India & we now question what India is going to do about it before it becomes a menace to Sri Lanka, India, the region & entire Asian continent. We do not wish to have what happened to Latin America, Eastern Europe, Middle East & Africa to happen to Asia as well.

Shenali D Waduge

Courtesy The Island

“Going barefoot is the gentlest way of walking and can symbolise a way of living – being authentic, vulnerable, sensitivn to our surroundings; removing barriers between us and nature.
— Adele Coombs, “Barefoot Dreaming”

Just a comment to my son that with age unsteadiness when walking brought forth a barrage of advice and directions and an article I will be quoting. Barefoot walking connotes much

But first, instant first thoughts to the term ‘barefoot walking’ which flashed through my mind. Vijayatunge’s early novel “Grass for my Feet’ with its idyllic village; Tom Jones and his ‘Green Green Grass of Home’ though he was being brought home to be buried not having walked for long being a prisoner; as a teenager and young woman opting for pretty silver anklets to enhance bare feet dressed for weddings; walking barefoot on the luscious grass of the BMICH grounds.

As kids in my grandmother’s village we walked barefoot and were all the better for it: in the midula, along the paddy field niyaras and of course in the mahagedera. As a child living in Katukelle Kandy, four friends and three brothers went often to the school pitch (we called the netball court) to play cricket or to run around hiding and seeking. That was a gracious time when day scholars were magnanimously allowed in the school premises, in the evenings.

Article from the NY Times

The article sent me was titled ‘Born to Walk Barefoot’ and chronicled extensive tests and investigations carried out by Dr Daniel Lieberman, evolutionary biologist at Harvard University, with several colleagues in Boston and in Kenya. The article in The New York Times listed the benefits of walking with unshod feet.  I quote from the article: 

“Shoes protect our feet, but they also alter our strides and could increase the wear on our leg and ankles. Wearing shoes when we walk changes how our feet interact with the ground below us, according to a novel new study in the journal HYPERLINK “https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-019-1345-6″ Nature of shod and unshod walkers, the state of their feet and the extent of the forces they generate with every step. The study, which echoes some of the research that first popularized barefoot running, finds that walkers move differently when they are barefoot or shod and have differing sensitivity to the ground, potentially affecting balance and joint loading. The results intimate that there could be advantages to perambulating with naked feet, not the least of which, surprisingly, involves developing calluses. Today, many of us might consider such calluses unsightly and disagreeable. But Daniel Lieberman, who conducted much of the early research into barefoot running, began to wonder recently whether those calluses might have a hidden utility and beauty. Might they, he wondered, protect and guide feet during walking in ways that shoes cannot? And, if so, what does that tell us about walking and footwear? Such persistent impacts tend to move up and dissipate through our leg bones, ankles and knee joints, whereas the shorter, sharper jolts created when we walk barefoot are more likely to rise through our soft muscles and tendons, Dr. Lieberman says.”

I am aware that now the care and continued use of muscles is very important with attention given to them even superseding that given to bones. Consulting a rheumatologist, I was told that muscle care is of prime importance. Thus the benefits of yoga and the more strenuous stretch classes that are becoming ever more popular. To continue quoting the article on Dr Lieberman’s research:

“We humans are born to walk. Distance running during hunts may have been important for the survival of early homo sapiens, most evolutionary biologists agree. But our forebears almost certainly spent far more time walking than jogging, just as modern hunter-gatherers do.

“Shoes, though, are new to us. Archaeological finds indicate that humans first started wearing rudimentary sandals about 40,000 years ago, an eyeblink in our history as a species. Before then, nature seems to have deemed that our best protection for bare feet would be tough skin. So, people who walk without shoes develop hard, leathery calluses on the heels and balls of their feet that can reduce sensations of pain when they stride over small obstacles like gravel.

Results

“What these findings suggest, in aggregate, is that what we wear on our feet shapes the way that we walk, and that nature would make a fine footwear engineer, Dr. Lieberman says. Shoes protect our feet and sop up some of the slight pounding during a walk, he says, but they also alter our strides and could, over time, increase the pressure and wear on our leg joints. Meanwhile, calluses shield us from some of the discomforts and pointy objects we encounter while barefoot, but do not reduce our contact with and feel for the ground.

“So, the message of the study would seem to be that people who have concerns about their balance or their knees but not their pedicures might consider sometimes walking barefoot.” Apart from lack of steadiness when walking being directly proportionate to age, there are further impediments that the years bring to our feet. Many a dainty much admired foot turns queer with toes pointing this way or that, the commonest being the big toes moving towards neighbour toes. That definitely causes imbalance. A bony bump results below the big toe which cannot be hidden; thus open sandals are what we wear. We oldies shudder when we see young ones balancing on very high heels. Will they later have to pay a price for their youthful vanity and keeping up with fashion? 

The famed who walked

It is almost certain that the Buddha and his Sangha walked the length and breadth of Northern India barefoot. Walk they did, and most probably in unshod feet. Hence the custom, apart from the hygienic angle, of always entering a temple or grounds of a dagoba or sacred area discarding shoes at the entrance. Monks arriving for dane in people’s homes leave their chappals outside, if they were wearing them and have their feet washed before entering the home. Even a groom and his best men have water sprinkled symbolically on their pointy embroidered shoes when in the Kandyan mull anduma.

When my son sent me the article on the benefits of walking I was reading articles compiled in a book about German Ven Nanawimala Thera (November 10, 1911 – October 10, 2005) who was well known for his saintliness, spot on advice and his carikas – walking around.  Many a tale is retold about him – the several times he has refused lifts in vehicles while walking along – barefoot very probably. He would answer the invitation to take a ride by saying: “What are my legs for?” He very often walked from Dodanduwa to Colombo and from Vajiraramaya to the Island Hermitage.

He would walk in forest reserves and once while taking shelter for the night in a cave he had a bear suddenly darkening the entrance and moving in on its hind legs with claws outstretched. The monk narrated that he projected metta to the bear while looking him in the eye. After a while of indecision, the bear dropped to all fours and exited the cave.

Another time he had been walking through a deserted jungle for two days without any food, there being no persons to go to on pinnapatha for. On the third morning, he suddenly came upon a neat house with a woman dressed in white ready to serve him a specially cooked meal of rice and curry. “How did you know to expect my arrival?” had her answering him that a devattava had told her the previous night to have a meal prepared as a famished monk would pass that way. 

Maybe the pious monk, believed to have attained arahatship, overdid his walking. He developed hip trouble and spent his last years cared for by two monks in Nuns’ Island, Parappuduwa, which was built by Bhikkhuni Khema and when she left Sri Lanka given over to a group of women to manage the nunnery. Many years of strenuous effort failed to attract really dedicated nuns so Nuns’ Island was handed over to the Island Hermitage. It was heartwarming to the women who had worked hard to maintain the nunnery to know it was put to good use to make a last resting place for the monk who walked the length and breadth of Sri Lanka.

ආචාර්ය වරුණ චන්ද්‍රකීර්ති

මේ දවස්වල අපේ රටේ වැඩියෙන් ම කතාවට ලක්වුණු මිනිස් ඉන්ද්‍රිය ‍ෆැලෝපීය නාලය කියලා හිතන එකේ වැරැද්දක් නෑ. අපි හැම කෙනෙක් ම වගේ ඒ ගැන කතා කරලා තියෙනවා. මේ ලිපිය ලියන්නේ ඒ කතාවට අත්වැල් අල්ලන්න නම් නෙවෙයි. මේක රට කතාවක්. හැබැයි මේක එසේ මෙසේ රටක වෙච්ච කතාවක් නෙවෙයි. මේ කියන්න හදන සිද්ධිය ඇතිවෙලා තියෙන්නේ ඇමෙරිකා ජනපද සංගමයේ.

ඉන්දියානාව කියලා කියන්නේ ඇමෙරිකා ජනපද සංගමයේ ඊසාන පැත්තට බර ව මහා විල්වලට දකුණින් පිහිටලා තියෙන ජනපදයක්. මේ කියන්න සිද්දිය ඇතිවෙලා තියෙන්නේ ඒ ජනපදයේ.

1971 අවුරුද්දේ ජුලි 9 වැනි දා ඉන්දියානාවේ ඕර්බන් කියන නගරයේ ජීවත්වුනු අම්මා කෙනෙක් නඩුවක් පැවරුවා. ඒ නඩුවෙන් කියැවුනේ මෙහෙම දෙයක්.

මේ අම්මාගේ දුව තමයි ලින්ඩා කේ ස්පිල්ටර්. ඒ වෙද්දි ලින්ඩාගේ වයස අවුරුදු 15 යි. මේ ගෑණු ළමයා හොඳට ඉගෙනගත්ත කෙනෙක්. හැම දා ම පංතියේ හොඳට ලකුණු ගන්නවා. ඒත් ලින්ඩා නිතර නිතර වැඩිහිටි පිරිමි ළමයි එක්ක රස්තියාදුවේ යනවා. රෑටත් ඒ ළමයි එක්ක ඉන්නවා. ඉතින් අම්මා මේ ගැන වදවුනා. උඩින් කියපු නඩුව පවරන්න අම්මා තීරණය කළේ මේ කාරණය මුල් කරගෙන.

දුව බේරගන්න කියලා හිතාගෙන දාපු ඒ නඩුවෙන් අම්මා විසඳුමක් ඉල්ලලා තිබුණා. ඒ විසඳුම වෙන මොකක්වත් නෙවෙයි. අනේ නඩුකාර හාමුදුරුවනේ, මගේ දෝණියැන්දාව වඳ කරලා දෙන්න” කියන එක තමයි ඒ ඉල්ලීම. නඩුව අතට ගත්ත ගමන් ම දෙපාරක් නොහිතා හැරල්ඩ් ඩී. ස්ටම්ප් කියන නඩුකාරයා තීන්දුව දුන්නා. මේ තීන්දුව දෙද්දි නඩුවට අදාළ අනිත් පාර්ශ්වය (ඒ කියන්නේ ලින්ඩාව) උසාවියට කැ‍ඳෙව්වේ නෑ. ඇය වෙනුවෙන් පෙනී ඉන්න නීතිඥයකුට අවස්ථාවක් දුන්නේ නෑ. කොටින් ම නඩුවක් ඇහුවේ ම නෑ!

ඒ තීන්දුව දීලා සතියක් විතර ගත වෙද්දි (හරියට ම කියනවා නම් ජූලි 15 වැනි දා) ලින්ඩාව ඉස්පිරිතාලෙකට එක් කරගෙන ගියා. ඒ විදිහට එක් කරගෙන ගියේ ලින්ඩාගේ උණ්ඩුකපුච්ඡය අයින් කරන්න ඕන කියලා. ඉතින් ඒ ගැන වදවෙන්න ඕනකමක් ලින්ඩාට තිබුණේ නෑ. ශල්‍යකර්මය අවසන් කරලා යථා තත්ත්වයට පත්වුනාට පස්සේ ලින්ඩාව ගෙදර එක් කරගෙන ආවා.

මේ සිද්දියෙන් අවුරුදු දෙකකට පස්සේ ලින්ඩා විවාහ වුනා. ඒ, ලියෝ ස්පාක්මන් කියන හාදයා එක්ක. ඒත් ඊට පස්සේ (1975 අවුරුද්දේ දී) කරපු වෛද්‍ය පරීක්‍ෂණයක දී එළිදරව් වුනේ මහ පුදුමාකාර දෙයක්. කසාද බඳින්න අවුරුදු දෙකකට කරපු ශල්‍යකර්මයේ දී ලින්ඩාගේ ෆැලෝපීය නාල ගැට ගහලා. ඒ කියන්නේ ලින්ඩාව වඳ කරලා!

මෙන්න මේ වෙලාවේ තමයි නඩුකාරතුමා කරපු හපන්කම එළිදරව් වුනේ. ඉතින් දැන් මොකද කරන්නේ? අලුත් ජෝඩුව එකතුවෙලා නඩුකාරතුමාටයි, ලින්ඩාගේ අම්මාටයි, වැඩේට හවුල් වෙච්ච අනිත් අයට විරුද්ධව නඩු දැම්මා. මේ නඩුව ප්‍රසිද්ධ වෙලා තියෙන්නේ හැරල්ඩ් ඩී. ස්ටම්ප් ඇතුළු පිරිසට එරෙහිව ලින්ඩා කේ ස්පාක්මන් සහ ලියෝ ස්පාක්මන් (Harold D. Stump, et al. v. Linda Kay Sparkman and Leo Sparkman) කියලා. Stump v. Sparkman කියන නමෙන් හෙව්වත් මේ ගැන හොයාගන්න පුළුවන්.

නීතිය ගැන දන්න කියන අයට පුළුවන් මේ ගැන හොයලා වැඩි විස්තර අපිට කියලා දෙන්න. මට නීතිය ගැන තේරුමක් නෑ. ඒ හින්දා මට පුළුවන් විදිහට කතාවේ ඉතිරි කොටස කියන්නම්. වැරැද්දක් වෙලා තියෙනවා නම් නිවැරැදි කරන්න.

නීතිය නොදන්න මෝඩ අපිට තේරෙන විදිහට හිතුවාම නම් පේන්නේ මේ කට්ටිය එකතුවෙලා කරලා තියෙන්නේ මහා අපරාධයක් කියලා. ඒත් නඩුකාර හාමුදුරුවරු එහෙම හිතලා නෑ. මුලින් ම නඩුව ඇහුවේ දිස්ත්‍රික්ක උසාවියේ. ඒ උසාවිය කිව්වා මේ අම්මා ඇතුළු කට්ටිය අදාළ කටයුත්ත කරලා තියෙන්නේ නඩුකාර උන්නාන්සේ දීපු තීන්දුව මත පදනම් වෙලා කියලා. ඒ හින්දා ඒ අයට විරුද්ධව අදාළ නඩුව පවරපු එකේ තේරුමක් නෑ කියලා දිස්ත්‍රික්ක උසාවිය කිව්වා. එහෙම නම්, නඩුකාර උන්නාන්සේ? නීතියේ හැටියට නඩුකාර උන්නාන්සේ නඩු කටයුත්තක දී දීපු තීන්දුවකට විරුද්ධව නඩු දාන්න බෑ. ඒ හින්දා එතුමාත් නිදහස්!

දැන් මොකද කරන්නේ? ලින්ඩායි මහත්තයායි අභියාචනාධිකරණයට ගියා. ඒ උසාවියෙන් දිස්ත්‍රික්ක උසාවියේ තීන්දුව අනිත් පැත්ත හැරෙව්වා. ලින්ඩාගේ අම්මා පවරපු අර නඩුව අහද්දි හැරල්ඩ් ඩී. ස්ටම්ප් නඩුකාරයා නියම ක්‍රියා පටිපාටිය අනුගමනය කරලා නැති හින්දා උන්නාන්සේට නඩුවෙන් බේරෙන්න මුක්තිය අහිමි කරගෙන තියෙනවා කියලා අභියාචනාධිකරණය කිව්වා.

ඊට පස්සේ?

ඊට පස්සේ හැරල්ඩ් ඩී. ස්ටම්ප් නඩුකාර උන්නාන්සේත් සහචර පිරිසත් නඩුව ශ්‍රේෂ්ඨාධිකරණයට ඇරගෙන ගියා. 1978 මාර්තු 28 වැනි දා ශ්‍රේෂ්ඨාධිකරණයේ තීන්දුව ලැබුණා. ඒක පහට – තුන (5:3) විදිහට බෙදුණු තීන්දුවක්. ඒ තීන්දුවෙන් ස්ටම්ප් නඩුකාර උන්නාන්සේත් අනිත් කට්ටියත් නිදහස් කරලා තිබුණා.

ලින්ඩාගේ අම්මා පවරපු නඩුව අහද්දි හැරල්ඩ් ඩී. ස්ටම්ප් නඩුකාරයා අදාළ නීති පටිපාටිය අනුගමනය නොකළත් ඔහු කරලා තිබුණේ නඩු කටයුත්තක් හින්දා ඒකට විරුද්ධව කටයුතු කරන්න නීතියට බෑ කියලා විනිශ්චකාර මණ්ඩලයේ බහුතරය (ඒ කියන්නේ, පස් දෙනෙක්) කිව්වා. මේ නරුම වැඩේ මොන ම හේතුවක් හින්දාවත් නඩු කටයුත්තක් කියලා කියන්න බෑ කියලා සුළුතරය (ඒ කියන්නේ, තුන් දෙනා) කිව්වා.

ඉතින් හැරල්ඩ් ඩී. ස්ටම්ප් නඩුකාර උන්නාන්සේ නිදහස් වුනා. ඊට පස්සේ තව තවත් නඩු අහලා මිනිස්සුන්ට වෙච්ච අසාධාරණකම්වලින් ඒ අයව මුදාගත්තා!

(The Blanket She Carried කියන පොත ලියලා තියෙන්නේ Jamie Renae Coleman කියන ලේඛිකාව. ඒ ලේඛිකාවගේ මුල් නම දන්නවා ද? ඒක තමයි, Linda Kay Sparkman).

ආචාර්ය වරුණ චන්ද්‍රකීර්ති

Sri Lanka News

The Western province provides the highest contribution to the Gross Domestic Product contributing 41.2% of the Provincial Gross Domestic Product(PGDP) and has a nominal PGDP growth rate of 5.8% as of 2015. Agriculture only made up 1.7% of the GDP the lowest among the nine provinces while Industrial sector made up 34.6% the highest in the country and service sector represented 56.5%.^[19]

(Courtesy of Divaina)

The TNA MPs and some of their instigated supporters have created a rumpus, protesting and disturbing the duties of the Archeological department offices who visited the ancient Buddhist vihara, that has been declared an Archeological site, in the proximity of the hot water wells located in Kinniya, in the Trincomalee district. This was done by staging a claim that this site belongs to Hindus and what is there in that site is a Hindu Kovil.

In this, it is an accepted fact that once the Sinhalese Buddhist left this area during the terrorist disturbances,  during which village and villages of Sinhalese were slaughtered by the LTTE with the sole intention of declaring a homogenous state in the North and East of the country, some Tamils had erected an unauthorized Kovil in a makeshift hut in this premises. It is also a well-known fact that during those thirty years, the LTTE issued ‘tickets’ to the tourist and southerners who visited this extraordinary site and made money which they used for the purpose of waging a war against the state.

However, the fact of the matter is, when the site in which the remains of the dilapidated kovil was excavated, there emerged some unmistakable items of an ancient Buddhist temple that included a Sanadakada pahana(ancient threshold mat of a Buddhist temple)) and a base of a pagoda. Further the inscriptions unearthed during this excavation revealed in no uncertain terms that there had been a Buddhist temple in this site erected by King Bhathika Tissa between 143 – 167 AD.  This is not a myth or propaganda churned out by the Government or the Sinhalese but an indelible fact of history unearthed after 1900 years. Since this temple had been established parallel to the Wilgam Royal temple of the same era, located in the proximity, the Government had declared this site an archeological monument by gazette notification no. 1723 dated 9^thNovember 2011.

Thus,  it is in keeping with his duty, that the Commissioner General of Archeology had initiated conservation activity on this site as per the Archeology act. No. 9 of 1940.

However, in such a contest it is ironical to note the protests, and the disturbances to duty, carried out by the TNA and its supporters without a basis for such protests and also disregarding the agreements reached on this subject with the government at a prior instance.

This actions of the TNA and its supporters appear even more incongruous when viewed from the light that the Government had already issued permission for the Hindus to erect a Kovil at this site for their religious observances.

However, the issue at stake here is that it has become a pattern to construct Hindu temples and Islamic mosques on archeological sites all over the Northern and the Eastern provinces. What is happening today at Mullaitivu, Nayaru- Gurukande is another example that supports this high handed and unilateral activity. There, a Hindu kovil is being built on the ruins of a Buddhist temple, The dispute at Kuragal is another case in point. Therefore it is no longer possible to be silent in the face of such aggression and wonton actions that create religious and social antipathy in a pluralistic society.

Similarly, when it was very clear that the Buddhist heritage is evident at Guru kande, a Kovil had been built within the premises making it difficult to hold Buddhist religious rites such as Katina Pooja in the premises. Therefore it would be a matter of interest to inquire into the intentions of these persons who conduct themselves in such a way to provoke religious and communal disturbances in the country. It is unfortunate that the Human Rights groups are also choosing to remain silent in the face of such deliberate acts of aggression as it has always been the pattern in the past to earn propaganda mileage by these minority groups  ( often with the help of Human Right activists) when communal and religious disturbances occur as a result of these provocations.

In another instance. it is distressing to note that these ‘other religionist’ have come to control the Okanda Shrine at Panama that was patronized by the Buddhist in the area till recently. The Hindus in the area had systematically come into occupation of this shrine which belonged in the Muthubanda generation, upon the death of Muthubanda, his brother and the two sons. Today the massive residential halls erected by the Hindu priest who have come to possess the Okada shrine have even encroached on the Kumana bird sanctuary which is a sanctuary created under the Wildlife ordinance. Further they are erecting another place of worship close to the Kumbukkan Oya without obtaining permission for its construction from the authorities.  It is also leaned from responsible sources that in the guise of these religious activity some illegal human settlements are being erected within the Kumana sanctuary, just as it was done in the Wilpattu sanctuary.

It is indeed a national calamity that the country’s forest cover, in addition to Buddhist places of worship,  has been encroached upon by the Hindus and Muslims with political patronage dangling the carrot of ‘votes at the next election’, with absolute disregard to the country’s law and harmony. Thus, it is no longer possible for the media to remain silent in the face of these unilateral, illegal and provocative activities even though some vested interests in the society are attempting to interpret such exposure as ‘Racist’.  Therefore we will make it loud and clear to those vested interests that even though this paper, ‘Divaina,’ stands for national unity and reconciliation it’s stand against encroachment, provocation and destruction of the country’ heritage is equally steadfast.

Therefore, it is not necessary to stress any further the purity of Nayaru, Gurukande, Kuragala and Kinnya as places of Buddhist worship. The TNA MPs, the ‘Reconciliation’ Ministers and other Religious dignitaries should respect such factual exposures. Such comparisons and lines of understandings and respect for each other is especially necessary in the present context where the international is aiming to profit from our disunity.

Today, in a situation where the international powerhouses like America, Japan, China and India are aiming, with ulterior motives, to plant their presence in this country expressing unbridled love for the country’s people, it would be in the interest of every community, whether minority or majority, to ensure unity and corporation among the people of this country. It is indeed a fallacy to believe that these internationalist will love ‘one community more than the other’ and therefore any community that indulges in such delusions of grandeur will soon realize their mistake, albeit too late.