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The Vavuniya High Court has sentenced former Senior Deputy Inspector General of Police (SDIG) Lalith Jayasinghe to four years of rigorous imprisonment for releasing a suspect in connection with the gang rape and murder of 18-year-old schoolgirl S. Vidya in Punguduthivu in 2015.
President Anura Kumara Dissanayake has emphasized in Parliament that investigations have disclosed that underworld activities have infiltrated certain individuals within official institutions responsible for public security.
He further stated that all necessary measures will be taken to completely eradicate the underworld in the future, while also acknowledging that this process will take some time.
The President made these remarks during the first meeting of the Ministerial Consultative Committee on Defence of the 10th Parliament, held today (20) in Parliament under his Chairmanship, the Department of Communications in the Parliament said in a statement.
During the discussions held regarding the security of court complexes in the country, Minister of Justice and National Integration, Attorney at Law Harshana Nanayakkara, stated that a proposal has been prepared regarding the security of the court complexes and in the future measures will be taken to increase the security of the court complexes by using modern technology by examining all the parties including lawyers.
Furthermore, Members of Parliament raised concerns regarding the release of lands in the Northern and Eastern provinces that are currently occupied by military camps, to their original owners.
In response, the Secretary of the Ministry of Defense stated that a reassessment or evaluation will be conducted not only for lands in the Northern and Eastern provinces but across the entire country occupied by the tri-forces, and appropriate decisions will be taken regarding their release.
The Members of Parliament also inquired regarding military-run businesses, including tourist hotels, and their potential for being directed towards more productive investments in the tourism industry. In response, the President stated that a study will be conducted in this regard, and appropriate decisions will be made to utilize these businesses to achieve economic benefits.
Moreover, the Members of Parliament stated that there is a possibility of some ethnic and religious divisions based on certain shrines established in the Northern Province. In response, the President emphasized that religious and ethnic extremism should be completely removed from politics.
He further stated that all such issues can be resolved based on the genuine aspirations of the residents of those areas. He also highlighted that certain groups seeking narrow political gains tend to turn such situations into political conflicts. Therefore, he affirmed that steps will be taken to ensure that no one is given the opportunity to incite ethnic or religious divisions for political advantage.
Additionally, the need to establish a Committee pertaining to National Disaster Management was also highlighted during the discussion. Accordingly, the President instructed officials to expedite the necessary processes to complete this task promptly.
Among those present at the event were the Deputy Speaker Dr. Rizvie Salih, Deputy Minister of Defense Major General (Retd.) Aruna Jayasekera, Ministers, Deputy Ministers, and several Members of Parliament. Also in attendance were the Secretary to the Ministry of Defense Air Vice Marshal (Retd) Sampath Thuyacontha, the heads of the tri-forces, officials from the Ministry of Defence and its affiliated institutions, as well as Chief of Staff and Deputy Secretary-General of Parliament Chaminda Kularatne, along with several other officials.
නඩු විභාග පැවැත්වෙන අතරවාරයේ නීතිඥවරුන් ලෙස සැරසී අවි ආයුධ හෝ වෙනත් දෙයක් සහිතව අපරාධකරුවන් අධිකරණ ශාලාවට ඇතුළු විය හැකි බවට මීට පෙර බුද්ධි වාර්තා ලැබී තිබූ බව හිටපු අධිකරණ රාජ්ය අමාත්ය අනුරාධ ජයරත්න අද (20) පාර්ලිමේන්තුවේදී අනාවරණ කළා.
එහිදී ඔහු සඳහන් කළේ, 2022 වර්ෂයේදී පාස්කු චූදිතයින් අධිකරණය හමුවට ඉදිරිපත් කරන අවස්ථාවේදී “අදාල නඩු විභාග අවස්ථාවේදී නීතිඥවරුන්ගේ ස්වරූපයෙන් සැරසී අවි ආයුධ හෝ වෙනත් දෙයක් සහිතව යම් පුද්ගලයෙකු අධිකරණයට ඇතුළුවීමේ හැකියාවක් පවතින බැවින්, නඩු විභාගය පැවැත්වෙන අවස්ථාවේදී අධිකරණ ශාලාවේ ආරක්ෂාව සම්බන්ධයෙන් තර්ජනාත්මක තත්ත්වයක් පවතින බව වැඩිදුරටත් පෙන්වා දී ඇත.”යනුවෙන් බුද්ධි අංශ වාර්තාවක සඳහන් කර ඇති බවයි.
ඔවුන් අධිකරණ අමාත්යවරුන් ලෙස කටයුතු කළ අවස්ථාවේදී එම සිද්ධිය වලක්වාගැනීමට හැකි වූ බවයි ඔහු පාර්ලිමේන්තුවේදී පැවසුවේ.
ඒ අනුව, බුද්ධි අංශ සඳහා ලැබෙන තොරතුරු ඔස්සේ ඒ සඳහා නිවැරදි පියවර ගැනීමට ආණ්ඩුව වැඩපිළිවෙලක් සකස් කිරීමක් සිදු නොකළහොත් මේ තත්ත්වය තවදුරටත් බරපතළ වන බවයි ඔහු සඳහන් කළේ.
The death toll in the Middeniya shooting incident has risen to three, as the 9-year-old son of the 39-year-old victim has also succumbed to his injuries while receiving treatment at hospital, police confirmed.
He had succumbed to gunshot injuries this evening while receiving treatment in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) of the National Hospital, Galle.
Police said that a group of unidentified individuals had opened fire at a 39-year-old resident of Galpotta, who was traveling on a motorcycle with his son and daughter, at around 10:15 p.m. last night (18).
Two including the father and his six-year-old daughter, were killed following the shooting near Kadewatta Junction in Middeniya.
The motorcycle rider was killed on the spot, while his son and daughter were admitted to the Embilipitiya and Tangalle hospitals, respectively, with critical injuries, police said.
However, the victim’s six-year-old daughter succumbed to her injuries shortly after while receiving treatment at Tangalle Hospital.
Police suspect that a T-56 assault rifle was used in the shooting, while investigations are ongoing to apprehend the suspects.
The suspected gunman who shot and killed notorious drug trafficker and criminal gang leader Sanjeewa Kumara Samararathne, also known as Ganemulla Sanjeewa”, inside the Hulftsdorp Court Complex this morning (19) has been arrested.
He has been arrested in the Palaviya area in Puttalam by Police Special Task Force (STF) personnel while fleeing in a van.
The arrested suspect has been identified as 34-year-old Mohamed Azman Sheriffdeen.
The infamous gang leader known as Ganemulla Sanjeewa” was fatally shot this morning (19) in the No. 05 Magistrate’s Court within the Aluthkade Courts Complex (Hulftsdorp).
Ganemulla Sanjeewa,” who was remanded in custody at Boosa Prison, was escorted to court this morning (19) by prison officials for court proceedings. He was a suspect in 19 murder cases, according to police.
Police have also discovered the revolver-type firearm which was used in the shooting inside the court complex.
According to police, the suspect had entered the court premises disguised as an attorney while the firearm used in the shooting, a revolver, was smuggled into the court premises by concealing it inside a hollowed-out book, with the pages cut out in the shape of the gun.
The suspect had managed to flee the scene following the shooting and investigations were launched to arrest the suspect.
Sri Lanka Police later said that they have also identified a woman who aided and abetted the shooting.
Speaking during a special press conference held in Colombo today, Police Media Spokesman SSP Buddhika Manathunga said that the suspected woman, who has also disguised as a lawyer and entered the court complex, has brought the gun which was used in the assassination, into the court.
He confirmed that the firearm used in the shooting, a revolver, was smuggled into the court premises by the suspected woman by concealing it inside a hollowed-out book.
Furthermore, the police spokesman clarified that several gates were available to access the court premises and that the assailant had fled the scene from a nearby gate while telling the other people that there is a shooting inside”.
He also explained that although the police immediately took action to close the gates and conducted a search covering the court premises, the suspect had already left the premises amidst the commotion that followed the situation, whereas the police were managing to ensure the security of the magistrate, prevent any escapes of other suspects within the court premises and several more procedures.
However, the Police Spokesman had mentioned that further investigations are carried out by the Colombo Crimes Division (CCD) with the assistance of the Criminal Investigations Department (CID).
The suspected shooter in the killing of Ganemulla Sanjeewa” is also believed to be the same gunman responsible for the recent double murder at Watarappala, Dehiwala.
Furthermore, it has been revealed that the woman who had brought the weapon used in the shooting is a suspected drug dealer from Negombo.
Meanwhile, Police Media Spokesperson SSP Buddhika Manatunga stated that in addition to prison officials, 12 Special Task Force (STF) personnel had been deployed to provide security to Ganemulla Sanjeewa” when he was brought to the Aluthkade Courts Complex from the Boossa Prison this morning.
‘අයි.එම්.එෆ්. මාර්ගෝපදේශ යටතේ ඉදිරිපත් කළ අනුර කුමාර දිසානායක ගේ අය වැය ව්යූහාත්මක, සංකල්පීය හා මෙහෙයුම් ක්රියාවලිය අනුව රොනී ද මෙල්, මංගල සමරවීර, රනිල් වික්රමසිංහ ගේ අච්චුවේ කැටයම් කැපීමක් බව හිටපු ආණ්ඩුකාර රජිත් කීර්ති තෙන්නකෝන් මහතා පවසයි. අද නාරාහේන්පිට දී පැවති ‘ආර්ථික යුක්තිය’ සංවිධානයේ පුවත්පත් සාකච්ඡාවට එක් වෙමින් ඔහු මේ බව පැවසීය.
මැතිවරණ පොරොන්දු නැවති සුරංගනා ලෝකයෙන් මිදිලා මහපොළෙවට පැමිණීමට ‘කොමන් සෙන්ස්’ පාවිච්චි කිරීම වත්මන් ආණ්ඩුක පියවර ගැනීම ඉතා යහපත් ප්රවණතාවයක්. තමන්ගේ ජනප්රියවාදී වාමාංශික හණ මිටිය බිම තියලා, නියෝ ලිබරල් ආර්ථික ප්රතිපත්තිය පිළිගැනීම ආර්ථික ස්ථාවරත්වයට වැදගත්වේවි.
අනෙක් අතට, මේ අය වැය අරගලයට පෙර බැසිල් රාජපක්ෂ මහතාගේ අවසන් අය වැය වගේමයි. මුදල් වියදම් කරන හැටි තියෙනවා. මුදල් හම්බකරන ක්රමයක් නෑ.
ඡන්දය ඉලක්ක කරගෙන දිළිඳු ජනතාවට ජයප්රිය අල්ලස් කිහිපයක් ලබාදී තෙයනවා. සමාජ ආරක්ෂණයට මුදල් වැය කිරීම හොඳයි.
අය වැයේ සමහර ගණන් හදලා තියෙන හැටි දැක්කාම පුදුම හිතෙනවා. තඹුත්තේගම දුම්රියපොළේ සක්යතා අධ්යායනයට රු. මි. 100 යි. සමස්ත කැලණිවැලි දුම්රිය මාර්ගයටම රු. මිලියන 250 යි. ගමට සලකන එක හොඳයි. ප්රමුඛත්වය තෝරා ගෙන කටයුතු කරනවා නම් ඊටත් වැඩ හොඳයි.
ජනාධිපති වැය ශිර්ෂය කපලා කියලා කියනවා. ජනාධිපති මන්දිර නඩත්තු නොකිරීම, විදේශ සංචාර විදයම් අඩු කරලා තියෙන බව ඇත්ත. නමුත් මුලිකවම වෙලා තියෙන්නේ ජනාාධිපතිවරයා ලඟ තිබුණ ව්යාපෘති අමාත්යාංශවලට බෙදා දීම.
හිටපු ජනාධිපතිවරුන්ගේ වරප්රසාද කපනවා කියලා කිව්වා. එක් කරන්න බැරිවුණා. විතරක් නෙවෙයි, මේ අය වැයෙන් රු. මිලියන 131 ක් හිටපු ජනාධිපතිවරුන්ට වෙන් කරලා තියෙනවා.
ජනාධිපති කාර්යාලයේ තිබුණු වෙනත් රාජ්ය ආයතන ටික වහලා දාලා, නැත්තම් පැවරීම් කරලා තියෙනවා. ඒ නිසා එතන වියදම අඩු වෙලා තියෙනවා.
ලෝක ආහාර වැඩසටහන 2024 විදයම, ‘0’ කරලා තියෙනවා හැබැයි ඒක වෙන අමාත්යාංශයකින් විදයම් කරනවා.
විමධ්යගත අයවැය මි. 13250 අයින් කරලා මේ අවුරුද්දේ එම ව්යාපෘතිය මුදල් අමාත්යාංශය හරහා වැය කරනවා.
ජ්යෙෂ්ඨ පුරවැසියන්ගේ ස්ථිර තැම්පතු සඳහා 3% ක අතිරේක පොලියක් ලබාදීමට කටයුතු කර තිබෙනවා. මේ සඳහා වසරකට රු. බිලියන 15 ක් වැය වෙතැයි අපේක්ෂා කරනවා. අමතක කරන්න එපා, මේ මුදල වැට් බද්ද 1% කින් වැඩි කිරීම මගින් උපයා ගන්නා ආදායම හා සමානයි. මේ වන විටත් රජය වානිජ්ය බැංකුවෙත රු. බිලියන 85 කට වැඩි මුදලක් පසුගිය වසරවල ලබාදූන් මේ 3% පොලිය වෙනුවෙන් ගෙවිය යුතුව තිබෙනවා. නව වැඩසටහන ආරම්භ කරන්නට පෙර එම මුදල් ගෙවීමට නම් අය වැය මගින් මුදල් වෙන් කරලා නෑ.
රාජ්ය සේවක වැටුප් වැඩිවීම
‘මිනිසුන් රැවටිය හැක්කේ ගණිතයෙන් නොව, සංඛ්යානයෙනි’ න්යාය අනුව තමයි රාජ්ය සේවකයින්ගේ වැටුප් වැඩිවෙලා තියෙන්නේ. සිසංඛානය කියන්නේ, ගණිතයෙන් පටන් අරගෙන අතරමැදදී, වංගුවක් ගහලා, අවසන් ප්රතිඑලය වෙනස් කරන විද්යාවක්. රාජ්ය සේවකයින්ගේ වැටුප් වැඩි කරලා තියෙන්නේ, ගණිතයෙන් නොව සංඛ්යානයෙනි.
රාජ්ය සේවකයින්ගේ වැටුප් වැඩි කරලා තියෙන්නේ ‘කියුබන් ක්රමයට’. ඉහළ සහ පහළ රැකියාවල වැටුප් පරතරය අඩු කරලා තියෙනවා.
ලඟම සතුරාට රෙදවීම තුලින් තෘප්තියක් ලබාදීමට තමයි මෙවර අය වැය මගින් කටයුතු සලසා තිබෙනවා.
උදාරහණයක් ලෙස මාණ්ඩලික නිලධාරීන්ට සතිඅන්ත හා නිවාඩු දිනවල සේවය වෙනුවෙන් දැන් ලබාදෙන මුලික වැටුපෙන් 1/20 ක දීමනාව, 1/30 ක් බවට පත් කර තිබෙනවා. මාණ්ඩලික නොවන සේවා සඳහා දැනට ගෙවන්නේ 1/30 ක් පමණයි. ලොක්කොන්ගේ දීමනාව පොඩ්ඩන්ගේ ගානට ගෙනල්ලා ආතල් එකක් දීලා තියෙනවා.
සෞඛ්ය සේවයේ වෛද්යවරුන්ට, හෙදියන්ට ගෙවන ඇතිකාල පැයකට ගෙවන දීමනාව පවා මෙයට සාපේක්ෂව අඩු වෙනවා. එය සෞඛ්ය කේෂ්ත්රයේ පහල සේවකයින්ට ආතල් එකක් දෙනු ඇති.
වෛද්යවරුන්ගේ අමතර රාජකාරි දිමනාව 1/80 සිට 1/120 ක් දක්වා අඩු වෙලා.
මාණ්ඩලික නිලධාරීන්ට ලබා දෙන වාහන බලපත්රය නැති කිරීමත් එවැනිම වැඩක්. අපිටත් නෑ, ලොක්කන්ටත් නෑ. සංකල්පය තමයි මෙතැන තියෙන්නේ.
ගුරු වැටුප – සුබෝධිනී අතුරුදහන් කිරීම
2023 අය වැයට පස්සේ මහින්ද ජයසිංහ බත්තරමුල්ලේ ලොකු උද්ඝෝෂනයක් තියලා රු. 20,000 ක් ඉල්ලුවා. ගුරු විදුහල්පති 2/3 ඉල්ලුවා. දැන් සුබෝධිනී වාර්තාව අතුරුදහන්. 20,000 වෙනුවට රු. 1,500 ක් ලැබිලා තියෙනවා. ඒ ලැබුණු ගාන නිල නිවාස, වැන්දඹු අනත්දරු වගේ දේවල් වලට කැපුනාම ආපහු රජයටම ලැබෙනවා.
විශ්වවිද්යා කථිකාචාර්යවරුන්ගේ අධ්යයන දීමනාව කපලා තියෙනවා.
ප්රධාන ව්යාපෘති මුදල් වෙන් කිරීම
අය වැය මගින් ප්රධාන ව්යාපෘති 37 කට මුදල් වෙන් කර තිබේ. මෙයින්, ක්ලීන් ශ්රී ලංකා ව්යාපෘතිය හා වඩ්ඩුවකල් පාලම (මුලතීව්) හැර අනෙකුත් ව්යාපෘති 35 ම පසුගිය රජය විසින් ආරම්භකර තිබූ ව්යාපෘතිව වේ. වඩ්ඩුවකාල් පාලම කියන්නේ ප්රභාකරන්ගේ මෘත ශරීරය අරගෙන ආපු පාලම වීම හැර නව ඉදිකිරීමට වෙනත් කිසිදු හේතුවක් නෑ. වැසි කාලයේ දී යම් ගමනාගමන අපහසුවක් පාලමේ පටු බව නිසා ඇති වන නමුත් එය උතුරේ සැබෑ ප්රශ්න සමඟ බැලූවිට ඉතාමත් සුළු දේවල්.
රාජ්ය අංශයේ වියදම් කළමනාකරණයට එක පැත්තකින් ප්රයත්න දරමින් තව 30,000 ක් ගන්න යන්නේ මොන අරමුණකින්ද පැහැදිලි නෑ. අර අසමතුලිත පිරමිඩය තවත් විකෘති වීම වළක්වන්නේ කොහොමද ?
පළාත් පාලන විෂයේ ඇති ලොකුම ගැටලුව කසළ කළමනාකරණය. මේ අයවැයෙන් හඳුනාගෙන තියෙන්නෙ අනුරාධපුරයෙ කසළ කළමණාකරණ ගැටළුව වීම ජාත්යන්තර විහිළුවක් වගෙයි. විශේෂයෙන් නොදිරන කසළ කළමනාකරණයට incinerators හෝ සනීපාරක්ෂක බිම් පිරවුම් කෙරෙහිවත් අවධානය යොමු නොකර ක්ලීන් ශ්රී ලංකා කරන්නෙ කොහොමද ?
උද්ධමනය ඉහළ යාම
මෙවැනි අයවැයකින් උද්ධමනය ඉහළ යාම වළක්වන්න බෑ. එය ආර්ථික ස්ථායිතාවයට බෙහෙවින් හානිකර වේවි. මේ අය වැය සකස් කර ඇත්තේම මේ වන විට පවතින අවධමන තත්වය වෙනුවට උද්ධමයක් ඇති කර ගැනීම සඳහායි. දැන් මාස 6 කට වැඩි කාලයක් පවතින අවධමනය අවසන් වී, අප්රේල් මාසයෙන් පසුව රට තුල බඩු මිල ඉහළ යමින් උද්ධමනය වැඩවීම අනිවාර්යයෙන්ම සිදු වනු ඇති.
නිෂ්පාදන ආර්ථිකය ගැන විශාල උනන්දුවක් පැවති නමුත්, නිෂ්පාදන ආර්ථිකයක් හෝ එවැනි නිෂ්පාදන සංස්කෘතියක් ගොඩනැගීමට විධිමත් වැඩපිළිවෙලක් අය වැය මගින් යෝජනා වී නැත.
ශ්රී ලංකන් ගුවන් සේවය වෙනුවෙන් රු. මිලියන 20,000 ක් වැය කිරීම වැටුප් වැඩිවීමට පසුව දෙවන විශාලතම වියදමයි.
විශ්රාමිකයින්ගේ දීමනා ගෙවීමට, නව සේවක බඳවා ගැනීම් සඳහා වන පිරිවැයට වැඩි වියදමක් ශ්රී ලංකන් සඳහා වැය කරනවා. දිස්ත්රික් සංවර්ධන වැඩසටහන් සඳහා වැය කරන රු. මිලියන 2000 වගේ 10 ගුණයක් ශ්රී ලංකන් සඳහා වැය කරන්න සිදු වෙනවා.
රජය ශ්රී ලංකන් සම්බන්ධයෙන් ගෙන ඇති තීරණය ආර්ථිකයට විශාල බරක් වන බව ඉතා පැහැදිලිය.
සමස්ථයක් ලෙස ගත් විට, මේ අය වැය මගින් ‘ආණ්ඩුවට රාජ්ය පවත්වාගෙන යාමේ නොහැකියාව පෙන්වනවා’ තිබෙනවා. මේ ආණ්ඩුවට රාජ්ය දරාගත නොහැකි තරම් විශාලයි. ඒ නිසා ආණ්ඩුව හා එහි නායකයෝ ‘රාජ්යය තමන්ගේ ප්රමාණයට කුඩා කර ගනිමින් සිටිනවා. ලංකාව කියන්නේ ක්ලෝඩියස් සීසර් තානාපතිවරු ජාත්යන්තර සම්බන්ධතා තිබුණු ආර්ථික වශයෙන් කොහොම වුනත් දේශපාලනික වශයෙන් බලවත් රාජ්යයක්.
එවැනි රාජ්යයක් ආණ්ඩුවේ තරමට පුංචි කර ගැනීමට අය වැය මගින් දරා ඇති උත්සාහය දීර්ඝ කාලීනව රාජ්යයට නරක බලපෑමක් ඇති කරනු ඇති.
රජිත් කීර්ති තෙන්නකෝන්
හිටපු ආණ්ඩුකාරවර
MADURU OYA SETTLEMENT PROJECT 1983
When work started on Maduru Oya Right Bank construction Mahaweli officials and engineers found that the Tamil Separatist Movement was quietly settling estate Tamils on the land intended for the new settlements. They were filling it up so that the Sinhalese could not get in. The UNP government of JR Jayewardene was allowing them to do so. The government was behaving as if the north was not a part of Sri Lanka. [1]
Two Mahaweli officers in particular, were very concerned about these encroachments. They were T.H. Karunatilleke, then Director, Planning at Mahaweli and B.H. Hemapriya, Consultant to the Media Unit of the Mahaweli Centre.
Karunatilleke was a career public servant. He had worked as a resident project manager In the Mahaweli scheme and knew Mahaweli like the back of his hand”. Hemapriya had been the media man for Mahaweli under three Ministers, CP de Silva, Maitripala Senanayake and Gamini Dissanayake. He had powerful contacts with the media. He ‘knew his Mahaweli’ and was ‘alert to every flash point in the Mahaweli scheme’ said Malinga Gunaratne.
Leelananda de Silva recalled that he had met B.H. Hemapriya when Hemapriya was Press officer, Ministry of Lands under C.P. de Silva. He was genuinely interested in the work he did and he had great knowledge of Sri Lanka’s history, specially of its irrigation works. Hemapriya was an honest and hard working public servant. He was not interested in making money, and his retirement years were not easy, concluded Leelananda. [2]
Karunatilleke and Hemapriya, who were friends, saw the significance of Maduru Oya for Eelam. Tamil settlements would strengthen Eelam. A Sinhala settlement there could puncture Eelam. They turned to Malinga Gunaratne.
Malinga Gunaratne had joined the Central Engineering Consultancy Bureau (CECB), a Department of the Mahaweli Ministry, in 1980 as Additional General Manager, on the invitation of Minister Gamini Dissanayake, Minister for Mahaweli. Malinga was put in charge of the high powered battery of media men at Mahaweli Authority.
Malinga had direct access to the Minster, Gamini Dissanayake, whom he seems to have known personally and to the Director General of the Mahaweli Authority, NGP Panditeratne. Gamini and Panditeratne hardly spoke to each other. Malinga conveyed their messages. Malinga also had complete freedom to enlist the support of any official in the Ministry from Secretary downwards to perform the tasks allotted to him. Malinga was therefore able to cut through red tape and get many things done at Mahaweli. Malinga, it appears, had some clout at Mahaweli.
Malinga met Hemapriya at the Media unit and the two developed a friendship outside working hours. Hemapriya briefed Malinga on how Tamil public servants were manipulating the Mahaweli water. Eelamists were at work at all strategic points in the Mahaweli Ministry and other organizations, using all sorts of tricks. Tamil separatists carried out their activities carefully, noted Gunaratne. ‘Their machinations were well calculated, well planned out and executed with clinical precision’.
The Tamil Separatist Movement was attempting to take Mahaweli waters to the north and east through clever stratagems. Kotmale water was going to the north east. Large tracts of land were called elephant corridors, forest reserves, national parks and no settlement was allowed in them. There are more elephant corridors and forest reserves here than in the rest of Sri Lanka, said Hemapriya.
Karunatilleke and Hemapriya briefed Malinga on the illegal Tamil settlements at Maduru Oya project. These illegal Tamil settlements were taking place with the active assistance of the Tamil administrators in Batticaloa. The Tamil public officers in Batticaloa out maneuvered and outflanked their complacent Sinhala counterpart with regard to work on Maduru Oya Right Bank which was close to Batticaloa. The Left bank was close to Polonnaruwa.
Malinga was concerned. They met regularly in Malinga’s office from April to June 1983. Hemapriya gave Malinga information on what the Tamil Separatist Movement was doing at Mahaweli and Malinga alerted the Mahaweli authorities. Malinga was receptive to what these two said because in 1980, Malinga had made a routine visit to Maduru Oya right bank when he assumed duties at Mahaweli Authority.
On that visit, the engineers at Maduru Oya had approached him and told him that the Tamil officials in Batticaloa were creating illegal Tamil settlements at Maduru Oya. These settlements were known to the Tamil politicians. Sinhala politicians in the government were also supporting. There will not be an inch of land left by the time the project is ready, they told him.
Malinga conveyed this to the Minister. Gamini responded immediately. He asked Malinga to contact Additional Defense Secretary-General Attygalle and get an army post placed there. The Maduru Oya engineers when they heard this wanted the army post created quickly, the situation was very serious, they said.
But Malinga was not prepared to phone General Attygalle directly. He conveyed the request to Panditeratne, who did nothing about it. Therefore a vital action that could have halted illegal Tamil occupation was not carried out, despite the fact that the Minister had requested it. Neither the Minister nor the DG, Mahaweli were prepared to take direct action on the matter. The illegal Tamil settlements continued without obstruction.
In early August 1983 Malinga received information of a massive encroachment of lands on the Right Bank. At that time Malinga says they were busy helping their Tamil friends who had been victims of the July riots. Malinga dispatched two of his officers to Maduru Oya to report. They were asked to visit the Batticaloa section of the Maduru Oya scheme and see whether unauthorized Tamil settlements were going on.
The officers reported that organized Tamil settlements were taking place around numerous small tanks in Maduru Oya. These settlements were made in a systematic and methodical manner. Houses were coming up overnight. Food was sent in to the settlers by an organized body. Villages were given Tamil names, district boundaries were altered. The Tamil government officials in Batticaloa were behind the activity.
When Panditeratne was informed of this, he immediately declared the Maduru Oya delta as a part of the Mahaweli scheme. The Government agent, Batticaloa no longer had authority over the area.
Right at this time, Dimbulagala Hamuduruvo stormed into the Mahaweli Centre and informed the DG, Mahaweli about the encroachments. Dimbulagala had come to complain about the Tamil encroachments from Batticaloa area on the right bank of Maduru Oya. There will be no land left for the Sinhala people. There is tremendous pressure for land from people in Polonnaruwa, Minneriya and Hingurakgoda. They are objecting to the Tamil encroachments, said Dimbulagala. Malinga was present at the discussion. Malinga informed Gamini Dissanayake.
Malinga Gunaratne told Gamini Dissanayake in July 1983, that there were unauthorized Tamil encroachments on Maduru Oya right bank. Tamils of Indian origin were encroaching on state lands in Vadamunai. Gamini Dissanayake had replied, Why you don’t settle some people unofficially in Maduru Oya.
Malinga wanted President Jayewardene informed before he took any action on the matter. Gamini Dissanayake assured Malinga that he had informed the President about the Maduru Oya project. N.G.P. Panditeratne, Director General of Mahaweli Authority also assured Malinga that the President would be informed.
Gunaratne then contacted Dimbulagala Hamuduruwo and asked him to settle Sinhalese at Maduru Oya right bank. Malinga told Dimbulagala that the project had the quiet support of the Minister and assured him of the Mahaweli Authority’s assistance. The priest acted on that assurance.
Hemapriya, Malinga, Dimbulagala, P. Pelpola and a Mr. X met at Mahaweli Centre and discussed the procedure. They identified suitable tanks for Dimbulagala to go and check out. Malinga released several public relations officers (PRO) from his Media unit to help Dimbulagala with the project. Dimbulagala wanted a vehicle, which was supplied.
Dimbulagala Hamuduruwo went back happily. He advertised in Riviresa that land was available for settlers. He planned to settle at least 500 Sinhala in Maduru Oya . the date was September 1, 1983. He had a good response. Sinhala settlers came in droves. Almost 3000 men had turned up at his temple, with cadjans, alavangu, mammoties and food stuffs to last for three months. Dimbulagala also had obtained a large stock of cadjans.
Before leaving with his convoy, on September 1st, Dimbulagala addressed the crowd. The settlement that you are about to start is a historic one, he said. We are being threatened on all sides by separatists, he told them. The separatists want continuous block of land in the east. You are going to break that. You are assembled here not only to get a piece of land. You are going to be the frontier men. You are not to return from this journey. Whatever happens, stick to your land. Proudly hold aloft the flag of Sri Lanka. Remember Dutugemunu. Now let’s go.” Sadhu, Sadhu, said the future settlers.
The convoy left for its destination at an auspicious time. Dimbulagala heading the convoy in a vehicle prominently flying the Buddhist flag and blaring pirith through a loudspeaker. He had obtained over 200 vehicles, vans, lorries, cars and motorcycles from rich mudalalies in Polonnaruwa for the project.
N.G.P. Panditeratne, Director General of Mahaweli Authority who knew of the project, initially had doubts about it ever happening. Panditeratne had told Malinga you wait and see what happens”. But when the settlement actually took place, Panditeratne released Rs 2 lakhs from Mahaweli funds for the project.
Officials at Mahaweli Authority welcomed a Sinhala settlement and supported the project whole heartedly. They were concerned about the unauthorized Tamil settlements at Maduru Oya Right Bank and the fact that the government was allowing it.
Mahaweli Authority officials, contractors and workers helped the project. Vehicles belonging to the Mahaweli Ministry were shown transporting men and materials. Its fleet of lorries transported the peasants from the Dimbulagala temple to the settlement site, said journalist T. Sabaratnam. [3]
The fleet ferried poles, tin sheets, cadjan and other materials needed to put up sheds to house the settlers. It carried stocks of cement and provisions needed for the settlers. The Mahaweli Authority’s tractors and bulldozers cleared the land needed to put up the sheds, Sabaratnam said.
The Tamil officials responded immediately. IGP Rudra Rajasingham reported to Mahaweli Chairman NGP Panditaratne that a massive convoy was moving towards Batticaloa, headed by Dimbulagala monk. K.W. Devanayagam, MP for Batticaloa protested.
Government Agent Batticaloa, M.Anthonimuttu, informed Secretary, Mahaweli, that there is large scale encroachment in System B in Meeradavillu .About 700 persons led by Ven. Seelalankara have come in a large number of vehicles and started clearing the land. Wadiyas have been put up Mahaweli authority officers were also there. We saw a Mahaweli authority jeep with Mahaweli officials in it. GA further reported that the police refused to evict Dimbulagala and his group because he had the unofficial backing of Mahaweli Minister Gamini Dissanayake and his ministry.
AGA of Koralai Pattu had complained to Antonimuttu that a Buddhist monk had led about 15 lorry loads and 10 tractor loads of people into Meerandavillu from Polonnaruwa distinct, with the intention of settling them on state land there. They were mostly from Aralaganwila, Hindurakgoda, Jayanthipura and adjoining areas. These new settlers had threatened the earlier settlers with bodily harm and chased them away. Those had been long standing settlers. Pillaiyar temple was damaged, moaned the AGA.
AGA said that when they went there, the monk was holding a meeting of a society he had formed. The monk and the settlers flatly refused to leave. If necessary they were going to occupy the land by force and will not withdraw under any circumstances. They were very emphatic about it and their utterances were marked by loud cries of ‘sadhu, sadhu’ reported the AGA. Ven. Seelalankara had flatly refused to leave. In 1972 when he had come with settlers to the area, he had been chased away by the MP, the GA and others. This time he was staying.
GA Batticaloa reported to Devanayagam on 15 September that the number had swelled to about 40,000. They occupied 3000 acres at Meerandavillu-Wadamunai area, 2,500 to 3000 acres at Mathavanai Mahaella area and 100 acres at Punani in Koralai Pattu, Batticaloa district.
KW Devanayagam MP for Batticaloa promptly responded. He made strong representation to the President and released press statements objecting to the presence of Sinhalese in his area. Devanayagam produced photographs which showed Mahaweli Authority officials, contractors and workers in action. lorries and other vehicles belonging to the Mahaweli Ministry were transporting men and material. A highly worked-up Devanayagam issued two warnings during the press briefing. He said if a Sinhala- Tamil clash is to be avoided, the squatters should be sent away.
The matter was taken up by the press. there was talk of intrusion into Tamil lands. Press statements were made not only by Devanayagam but also by Gamini Dissanayake and Dimbulagala Hamuduruwo. Controversy raged, there were accusations and counter accusations, recalled Malinga Gunaratne.
In the meantime, the Maduru Oya settlement settler project had acquired a momentum of its own. It was reported that more and more people were flocking toward the Right Bank. Dimbulagala told Riviresa later that people from all four corners of Sri Lanka had bundled up their belongings and come”. The movement of 40,000 person to Maduru Oya was something that we did not expect, said Malinga.
Tamil Separatist Movement had no intention of allowing a Sinhala settlement at Maduru Oya. They had known In August, even before the settlement started, that something was up. in mid August Tamil settlers at Meerandavillu had seen Dimbulagala Hamuduruwo come in a jeep, inspect the area and leave. Obviously a Sinhala settlement was being planned.
Tamil Separatist Movement promptly tried to prevent such a Sinhala settlement from taking place. They informed India In August 1983 .India responded. Prime Minister Indira Gandhi sent G. Parthasarathy to Sri Lanka as her personal envoy in August. This was a secret visit. the media were not informed. He met Gamini Dissanayake and discussed the issue of human settlements at Mahaweli. But Gamini did not give in and the settlement took place as scheduled on September 1st.
In September after the Maduru Oya settlement took place, the frantic Tamil Separatist Movement informed India again. TULF leaders who were in Chennai at that time alerted Indira Gandhi. Amirthalingam, who was in London, telephoned Parthasarathi and Indira Gandhi and drew attention to the Maduru Oya Sinhala invasion” which he said, was supported by President Jayawardene. Indira Gandhi was annoyed, Amirthalingam said.
India objected to the Sinhala settlement at Maduru Oya and told JR Jayewardene so. S.J.S. Chhatwal, High Commissioner for India in Sri Lanka, was told to meet President Jayewardene and convey India’s displeasure. Chhatwal told Jayewardene that India was worried and displeased with the Maduru Oya invasion. JR was also informed by Sri Lanka’s High Commissioner in India, Bernard Tilakaratna that that Indira Gandhi was angry.
Tamil Separatist Movement also alerted others. Tamilnadu newspapers took up the cry. They called it an invasion into traditional Tamil lands. Aid giving agencies started to make noises.
Jayewardene who had not objected to the settlement when told about it earlier, now got alarmed. he did not want a confrontation with India. He feared India. JR sent Ranil Wickremasinghe for a first hand report on ‘what the Dimbulagala priest is doing out there.’ Ranil reported that there were about 40,000 unauthorized settlers there.
Jayewardene held a series of high-level conferences with Mahaweli Authority officials. Panditaratne and other officials played down the invasion. They told President Jayewardene that the reports appearing in local, Indian and international media were exaggerated. Panditaratne said that Dimbulagala priest had taken the settlers there.
President Jayewardene was not interested in all this. He wanted the Maduru settlement completely dismantled. He asked Panditaratne to evict the settlers. Panditeratne told Malinga, we cannot allow these squatters to remain, at Maduru Oya. We must shift them. President is very angry, we must move them
Panditeratne decided to keep 500 families behind at Maduru Oya so that future encroachments from Batticaloa were halted. The rest would be sent to Trincomalee, Vavuniya and Mullaitivu. Instead of retreating Panditeratne was getting ready to penetrate even deeper into Eelam.
On the 10th of October Dimbulagala Hamuduruwo went to see Malinga at his residence. Mahattaya, tell me clearly, does the government want us to settle on the Right Bank or not,” he asked. He was told that the settlers had to leave. We plan to transfer them to Trincomalee, Vavuniya and Mullaitivu. Will you lead them there, asked Malinga. I will lead them to any part of Sri Lanka, replied Dimbulagala.
President Jayewardene however, did not want an embryo settlement left at Maduru Oya. He wanted the new Sinhala settlement at Maduru completely dismantled. He wanted a mass scale evacuation. Since Mahaweli Authority officials seemed reluctant to do so JR turned to UNP Minister Paul Perera, the invisible leader of the Gampaha underworld”.[4]
Paul Perera was quickly made Additional District Minister of Polonnaruwa and authorized to evict the settlers, using force if necessary. Col. Benedict Silva, a volunteer soldier from Katana, was appointed his assistant.
Dimbulagala Hamuduruwo tried to protect his settlement. He rushed to Colombo to meet Gamini Dissanayake and Panditaratne to get their assistance to press President Jayewardene to reverse his order. He went to the Mahaweli Ministry, but Panditaratne and Gamini Dissanayake declined to meet him
He visited all the newspaper offices in Colombo. He visited Lake House and met the Dinamina editor and the editorial staff. I was present at the Daily News office at that time, said Sabaratnam. The monk was fuming. He was shouting at the top of his voice. He charged that Paul Perera was indulging in anti-national and anti-Sinhala actions. He charged that Paul Perera was doing this because he was a Catholic. He raised his umbrella and said, if I see him I will hit him with this.
Dimbulagala then went to Independent Newspapers office. He told ‘ Weekend’ newspaper that his settlers could be evicted only if all illegal settlers of Indian origin were evicted from state land in Vavuniya, Trincomalee and Batticaloa .
He gave them information on Tamil settlements in Batticaloa area. There were large areas of barren land there. These lands have now been encroached on by Indian Tamils from the tea estates. They were illegal settlers. Nearly 15,000 acres have been colonized in this manner in Pullimalai, Unnichchai, Rugama and Pumnakuda. When Devanayagam heard this, he provided the usual counter argument. Batticaloa was part of the Tamil homeland. It is the Sinhalese, who are encroaching into Kalkudah, he replied.
Dimbulagala was unable to stop the dismantling of his Maduru Oya settlement. Paul Perera carried out JR’’s order and the smell of blood was everywhere”, said Malinga Gunaratne. The loquacious Gunaratne, whose book is full of irrelevant observations went silent at this point in his book, saying he did not like to besmirch his narrative with the methods they used .He should have done so. That information would have far more been useful than some of the trivia included in the book.
But Malinga does say atrocities were committed. There are living but lame witnesses in Nikawewa at Padaviya who will bear testimony to the atrocities committed. They were chased out with butt stroke and jackboot. The evicted settlers confirmed that their houses at Maduru Oya had been burnt. According to eye-witnesses, the encroachers were treated quite brutally, said Ajit Kanagasunderam. [5]The people who did the chasing were Sinhala, observed Malinga. They were chased away by Sinhalese, he said.
Medhananda corroborated. The settlers were assaulted and chased away, on JR’s orders, by Paul Perera, said Medhananda . [6] The houses of the settlers were set on fire. The settlers took refuge in Dimbulagala pansala. Maduru Oya and 20 other projects were closed down, reported Asoka Bandarage.
Maduru Oya settlers were resettled elsewhere, said Muggah. [7] Settlers were assembled in groups of between two and three hundred and resettled along a line from Padaviya to Nedunkerni in the Mullaitivu district with jungles being cleared and new roads being opened from Padaviya to Dollar Farm, Kumbakarna Malai, Ariyakundam, Kokkuchchankulam, Kokkuttoduwai and Veddukkan malai. The project was done with the resources and vehicles of the Army, Agrarian Services, Illmenite Corporation, Tobacco Corporation and Petroleum Corporation,said Wikipedia. [8]
To summarize, Dimbulagala was asked to send in some Sinhala settlers to Maduru Oya, to match the Tamil settlements there. He overdid it. Instead of doing it quietly and secretly as expected, Dimbulagala took his settlers in to Maduru Oya openly, with much enthusiasm . Tamil politicians complained, the government got scared, the Sinhala settlers were forcibly and brutally removed. The Tamil settlements continued undisturbed. (Continued)
[1] Malinga Gunaratne. For a sovereign state
[2] Leelananda de Silva. , The Long Littleness of Life island. 2022/08/14 https://island.lk/ministry-of-lands-irrigation-and-power
/
[3] www.sangam.org/articles/view2/?uid=626 T Sabaratnam
[4] Dharman Wickremaratne, https://www.lankaweb.com/news/items/2015/08/15/how-the-unp-gave-birth-to-underworld-rapist-gonawala-sunil-dies-under-a-hail-of-bullets/
[5] https://thuppahis.com/2017/01/14/gal-oya-addressing-errors-in-ajit-kanagasundrams-recollections/ GH Peiris
[6] Lakshman Kahatapitiya. Ellawela Medhananda hamuduruwo. P 314
[7] Robert Muggah 2008 https://dokumen.pub/relocation-failures-in-sri-lanka-a-short-history-of-internal-displacement-and-resettlement-9781350222250-9781848130463.html
[8] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weli_Oya
YAN OYA SETTLEMENT PROJECT 1983
The aborted Maduru Oya Sinhala settlement of September 1983 was part of a much grander Sinhalisation plan suggested by an officer at the Mahaweli Authority in 1983.T.H. Karunatilleke Director of Planning in Mahaweli [1] had studied the Eelam strategy and had come up with a plan to thwart it. The plan had two phases.
Phase one of Karunatilleke’s plan was to break the north- east Tamil settler continuum by creating three Sinhala settlements in the river basins of Maduru Oya, Yan Oya and Malwatu Oya. The Maduru Oya settlement (Mahaweli system B) would come between Batticaloa and Trincomalee districts. The Yan Oya settlement (Mahaweli system L) would be between Trincomalee and Mullaitivu districts. The Malwatu Oya settlement (Mahaweli system I) would prevent a connection between Mannar and Puttalam districts. [2]
The landsaround these three streamswere mostly jungle and sparsely populated. The plan was to settle at least 50,000 Sinhala families in each of these settlements, thus completely altering the ethnic composition of the population in these areas.
The Yan Oya settlement was the most urgent and most important of these settlements. Yan Oya is a fourth order stream with a drainage area of 1,551.3 km, and length of 142 km. The basin has seven sub-watersheds. It starts in the hilly areas of Dambulla and Sigiriya, and flows to the sea at Pulmoddai in the Trincomalee district.
Maduru Oya is a sixth order stream approximately 135 km (84 mi) in length. It meets the sea at Kalkudah. Malwatu Oya is a second order stream which discharges into Mannar Lagoon after passing through Anuradhapura, Vavuniya and Mannar districts. The Malwatu Oya segment selected by Karunatilleke for settlement is in the arid zone and its carrying capacity is low. Therefore the Malwatu settlement could be administered last, Karunatilleke said.
The second phase of the plan was to make use of the demographic change brought about by the Sinhala settlements and redraw the provincial map of Sri Lanka. The boundaries of the Northern, North Central, North Western and Eastern provinces would be altered and a fifth province created, North Eastern Province.
Northern Province would contain Jaffna, Kilinochchi and Mullaitivu districts. North Central Province will have Vavuniya, Anuradhapura and Weli Oya districts. Weli Oya would be made a new district thus reducing the area of the Mullaitivu district. North Western Province will contain Mannar, Puttalam and Kurunegala districts. Eastern Province will have Batticaloa and Ampara districts. The new province, North Eastern Province will contain Polonnaruwa and Trincomalee districts. [3]
T.H. Karunatilleke, B.H. Hemapriya and Malinga Gunaratne met to discuss Karunatilleke’s plan. This meeting was held in July 1983 days before the 1983 riots. Karunatilleke and Hemapriya had the sense to keep the plan secret, noted Malinga.
Malinga found the plan feasible. System M is adjacent to Padaviya on the north, to Trincomalee and Kantale on the south and Horowopotana and other Sinhala settlements on the west. The Sinhala settlements already in place were close to each other Weli Oya to Padaviya is 18.4 km and 27 minutes travel. Morawewa to Padaviya was just 15 minutes flying time. If you settle in Yan Oya, expand Padaviya and fortify Trincomalee, it is done, said Malinga.
Yan Oya and Maduru Oya settlements were discussed simultaneously, but Maduru Oya settlement was the first to be actually carried out by the group. The resulting Maduru Oya settlement fiasco” has been discussed. This essay looks at the settlement project planned for Yan Oya at the Mahaweli Ministry.
Karunatilleke had prepared a report for the Mahaweli Authority, titled Geo-political significance of developing Yan Oya, Mahaweli system M.” Yan Oya had approximately 40-50,000 acres of land, mostly un- utilized. We must develop this immediately, Karunatilleke said in the report. System M could be developed at low cost and within a short period of time. Excess water from the Mahaweli should be diverted to Yan Oya.
A new Sinhala settlement must be established at Yan Oya. This should be done straightaway he said. Yan Oya already had a predominantly Sinhala population at Huruluwewa. Upper region of the future settlement must therefore start at Huruluwewa. Karunatilleke also wanted small e also
farms created and given out to ex-servicemen. He wanted the outer perimeter of the settlement fortified with cadju plantations. There should be massive cadju plantations there, he said
Karunatilleke pointed out that at present the Eastern Province has small Sinhala settlements distributed over a wide area. These small settlements cannot survive on their own. They are too far apart, and since they depend on small tanks which do not give them sufficient water for assured cultivation, they are economically weak. They will be easy prey for Eelamists. For the continuous existence of these small settlements it is necessary to anchor them to large Sinhala settlements.
Yan Oya settlement will strengthen the already established Padaviya and Kantale schemes as well as small settlements like Morawewa and Mahadivulwewa in the Trincomalee district. When Yan Oya settlement links with Padaviya and Morawewa a large Sinhala area starting at Padaviya and extending to the eastern sea coast will be created Padaviya is narrow and surrounded by Tamil settlements, But when linked to the Yan Oya settlement, there will be a ‘large strong anchorage’. The Sinhala settlement must then move upwards from Padaviya into Mullaitivu district where there are sufficient natural resources to accommodate the increased population, said Karunatilleke.
Establishing small scattered settlements cannot solve the problem of Eelam. What is needed is a permanent solution, and that is to set up large Sinhala settlements. Small settlements can get wiped out but a large region of the magnitude planned at Yan Oya will not succumb. If these small settlements are anchored in this way, they will get firmly established and will help Sinhalise the Northern Province said Karunatilleke.
Malinga conveyed Karunatilleke’s plan to Gamini Dissanayake, Minster for Mahaweli. Gamini thought the proposal an excellent one. He would inform the President JR Jayewardene. He wanted to meet Karunatilleke and he wanted a paper prepared. Karunatilleke was very happy about his meeting with Gamini. He wrote up the report discussed above.
Around 23 July 1983, Gamini told Malinga that the President was in complete agreement with the plan. Malinga was told to go ahead with arrangements for Yan Oya. Malinga discussed the project with NGP Panditeratne, Director General of Mahaweli authority. Panditeratne was cautious. He said this Yan Oya proposal is not a new one. It had been there for some time. He okayed the project.
Malinga contacted the authorities at Central Engineering Consultancy Bureau. CECB was at the time attached to Ministry of Mahaweli Development and Environment. A.N.S. Kulasinghe (Chairman), G.G. Jayawardene and H.B. Jayasekera of the CECB were enthusiastic about the project when they heard that President had given approval. Karunatilleke and Hemapriya came in and briefed them
HB Jayasekera, deputy General Manager, CECB had fought many battles in Mahaweli to prevent the inequitable distribution of water to the north and east. He knew intimately, in detail and depth, how Eelam lobbyists had penetrated the Mahaweli nerve centers, said Malinga
Jayasekera visited Yan Oya and reported back that Yan Oya valley is a very fertile basin of 25-30,000 acres. Soil is very rich and any kind of crop can be grown. River flows through lush uninhabited country and into the sea. The valley is not inhabited but some Tamil settlements have come up in near the perimeter of Yan Oya close to the sea. They have seen the importance of this basin and these settlements appear to be illegal.
Jayasekera suggest advance alienation of the land to prevent Eelamists from grabbing the land. The Sinhala settlers should be given the land before the dam is built. They can do one cultivation with the monsoon rains and some of the settlers can be utilized for development of the project. State cadju plantations can also be started.
Mahaweli Authority wanted to test the political mood in the Yan Oya with regard to security for the settlers. Karunatilleke and Palitha Pelpola were sent to find out. They reported that that there was absolutely no problem in settling a Sinhala population there as there was a predominantly Sinhala population already in the upper reaches and that can be extended quietly.
Kulasinghe sent his officers to find a suitable location for the dam across Yan Oya. Once a location was found, Kulasinghe ordered a dam in Yan Oya. Dam could be thrown across Yan Oya in six months at cost of 300 million rupees, water sufficed for 30,000 people, reported Malinga in his book. There is no mention of this dam after that.
In August 1983, Gamini wanted to meet the key officers who would implement the Yan Oya project. Malinga was asked to organize the meeting. They decided it was best to meet at Gamini’s house and not the Ministry. At this meeting Gamini had outlined the plan for Yan Oya and Malwatu Oya settlements. He said that he had discussed this with the President and was now formally instructing his officials to go ahead with the plan. Kulasinghe spoke on the engineering aspects of the Yan Oya dam and Panditaratne stated that funds were available. Kulasinghe was instructed to go ahead with the dam and Malinga was asked to get suitable persons as settlers.
However, Panditaratne was not happy about the meeting.He told Malinga to ask Gamini not to arrange any further meetings of this sort, but to allocate tasks to persons, with Malinga monitoring them for the Minister. He was correct. The other officials in the Ministry objected to being left out and opposition to the project started building. Some tried to scuttle the project. No more meetings were held.
Malinga started to look for settlers. He instructed the Public Relations Officers in his Department to go out and select the future settlers. Choose able bodied men between 30-40 with an aptitude for farming, who will not look to the state for assistance. The PROs were not told where the settlers were going, only that it would be around Trincomalee. The PROs fanned out to the different parts of the island in search of settlers. We were going to do a massive settlement in system M of the Yan Oya basin.
In early October, 1983 Gamini Dissanayake assembled a group of business men at the home of Nawaloka Mudalali’s son to obtain financial support for future Sinhala settlements in the Eelam area. Malinga was present and wrote about it in his book. He said that about 15 were present including at least two MPs, GV Punchinilame and GM Premachandra. The business men included, H. K. Dharmadasa (Nawaloka Mudalali) and his son, S. D. Gunadasa (Dasa Mudalali), Chandra Hemachandra and his son. Chandra was a bus magnate owning one of Sri Lanka largest transport fleets.
This group were told about the illegal Tamil settlements in the Mahaweli system. Mahaweli officials explained the ‘secret plan’. Yan Oya and Malwatu Oya settlement plans were described. Gamini said he wanted the settlements in Yan Oya and Malwatu be done in the same style as Maduru Oya.
Gamini said that the state would not be able to undertake the plan as it would upset India. He suggested that a private fund be established to finance the project. Dasa Mudalali had his doubts about this plan. He wanted to know whether the President actually knew about this. Gamini said Yes, the President knows and I will get a contribution from Presidents fund for the purpose. The group then pledged sums of money totaling Rupees 3 ½ million. Malinga had noted down each sum. Nawaloka Mudalali was asked to find a name for the fund and an auspicious time to start it.
The inaugural meeting of the fund was held at Gamini’s house on 16 October 1983. Malinga was present. Nawaloka Mudalali handed over the first cheque at the auspicious time, followed by the others. The cheques were not cashed because the next day Jayewardene ordered the arrest of Malinga Gunaratne and other prime movers of the ‘secret plan’. At the same time, he also ordered the complete removal of the Maduru Oya settlement. That was the end of the Yan Oya project . (continued)
[1] Malinga Gunaratne. For a sovereign state
[2] www.sangam.org/articles/view2/?uid=626 T Sabaratnam
[3] www.sangam.org/articles/view2/?uid=626 T Sabaratnam
අගමැති හරිනි අමරසූරිය අධ්යාපන ඇමතිවරිය විදියට ඇගේ ලෙඩේ පාසල් දරුවන්ටත් බෝ කිරීමේ උත්සාහයක් නියැලෙමින් සිටින බව ජාතික නිදහස් පෙේමුණේ නායක විමල් වීරවංශ මහතා පවසයි.
ඊයේ (17) ජාතික නිදහස් පෙරමුණෞ මූලස්ථානයේදී පැවැති මාධ්ය හමුවකට එක් වෙමින් ඒ මහතා මේ බව පැවසීය. එහිදී වැඩිදුරටත් අදහස් දැක්වූ විමල් වීරවංශ මහතා මෙසේද පැවසීය.
”අපේ රටේ අගමැතිනිය, හරිනි අමරසූරිය මහත්මිය. එතුමියටත් ලොකු ව්යාධියක් තිබෙන බව පේනවා. එතුමියගේ මාධ්ය අංශයෙන් 2025-02-11 ලෝක බැංකුවේ නිලධාරීන් සමග සිදුකළ සාකච්ඡාවක වාර්තාවක් නිකුත් කරලා තිබෙනවා. එම මාධ්ය වාර්තාවේ කොටසක් මම කියවන්නම්”
” මෙම අතිරේඛ මුදල් යොදවමින් පාසල් දරු දැරියන්ගේ සෞඛ්ය හා ප්රතිශක්තිය වර්ධනය, පාසල් සංවර්ධනය සඳහා වැඩසටහන් ක්රියාත්මක කිරීම, නව අ්ධ්යාපනය සදහා ගුරුවරුන් පුහුණු කිරීම, ස්ත්රී – පුර්ෂ සමාජභාවය සහ සමානාත්මතාවය ඇති කිරීම. “
මොකක්ද මේ ස්ත්රී පුරුෂ සමානාත්මතාවය කියන්නේ මෙන්න මේ වගේ බර වචන දාලා තමයි මේවා හංගන්නේ යැයි ඔහු පැවසීය. මෙම මාධ්ය හමුවේදී 2025 අය වැය සම්බන්ධයෙන් සහ පොලීසියේ ජොබ් එක කරන පුනරුද රාළහාමිලා සම්බන්ධනේද ඔහු අදහස් දැක්වීය.
සම්පූර්ණ මාධ්ය හමුව පහළින්
The Governor of the Central Bank, Nandalal Weerasinghe, stated that it is the government’s responsibility to act in accordance with the parameters of the IMF’s overall macroeconomic stabilization program and that, in line with this, the current budget is a good one for the country.
Expressing his views on the budget in Colombo, he said:
**”Looking at the targets, this time we can place greater confidence in them. Although the expected revenue target is 5 trillion rupees and the primary surplus is anticipated to be 2.3%, based on my expectations, the performance may even surpass these figures.
Furthermore, implementing safeguards to absorb the short-term pressures on government securities is crucial. This would allow us to maintain stable interest rates in line with our monetary policy.
If we talk about an ‘IMF budget’ as some suggest, as someone who has been involved in discussions with the IMF for many years, I can say that the commitments made to external stakeholders for achieving overall economic stability as a country have remained unchanged. Even if there is a change in administration, it is reassuring that the direction of macroeconomic policies has not shifted.
In my view, this is something that must necessarily happen. Acting in accordance with the IMF’s overall macroeconomic stabilization framework is not only the government’s responsibility but also a positive sign. As I see it, this is not an ‘IMF budget’ but a budget that is good for the country.
ජාත්යන්තර මූල්ය අරමුදලේ සමස්ත සාර්ව ආර්ථික ස්ථාවරකරණ වැඩසටහනේ පරාමිතීන් අනුව කටයුතු කිරීම රජයේ වගකීමක් බවත් ඒ අනුව මෙවර අයවැය රටට හොඳ අයවැයක් බවත් මහ බැංකු අධිපති නන්දලාල් වීරසිංහ මහතා පවසයි.
අයවැය සම්බන්ධයෙන් කොලඹදී අදහස් පල කරමින් ඔහු මෙසේ පැවසුවේය.
ඉලක්ක දෙස බැලුවාම මේ වතාවේ ඒ පිළිබඳ වැඩි විශ්වාසනීයත්වයක් තැබිය හැකියි. රුපියල් ට්රිලියන 5ක ආදායම් ඉලක්කයක් සහ 2.3%ක ප්රාථමික අතිරික්තයක් අපේක්ෂා කළත්, මගේ අපේක්ෂාවන් අනුව එය ප්රමාණය ඉක්මවා ගිය ක්රියාකාරීත්වයක්.
ඒ වගේම රජයේ සුරැකුම්පත් සඳහා වූ කෙටිකාලීනව පැන නගින පීඩනයන් අවශෝෂනය කරගැනීම සඳහා ආරක්ෂණ යෙදීමද වැදගත්. එමගින් අපේ මූල්ය ප්රතිපත්තිය අනුව ස්ථාවර පොලී අනුපාත පවත්වාගෙන යාමට හැකියාවක් ලැබේවි.
ඇතැමුන් කියන විදියට IMF අයවැයක් ගැන කතා කළොත්, වසර ගණනක් තිස්සේ IMF සමග සාකච්ඡාවලට සහභාගී වූ අයෙකු විදියට මට කියන්න පුළුවන් මේ වතාවේ රටක් විදියට සමස්ත ආර්ථික ස්ථාවරත්වයක් උදෙසා නිවැරදි මාර්ගයේ ගමන් කිරීම සඳහා බාහිර පාර්ශ්වකරුවන්ට ලබාදී ඇති ප්රතිඥාවන් වෙනස් වී නොමැති බව. පරිපාලනයේ වෙනසක් සිදුවුවත් සාර්ව ආර්ථික ප්රතිපත්තිවල දිශානතිය වෙනස් නොවීම සතුටට කරුණක්.
මගේ අදහස හැටියට එය අනිවාර්යයෙන් සිදුවිය යුත්තක්. ජාත්යන්තර මූල්ය අරමුදලේ සමස්ත සාර්ව ආර්ථික ස්ථාවරකරණ වැඩසටහනේ පරාමිතීන් අනුව කටයුතු කිරීම රජයේ වගකීමක් වගේම එය සුබවාදී ලකුණක් හැටියටයි මම දකින්නේ. මම දකින විදියට මේක IMF අයවැයක් නොව , රටට හොඳ අයවැයක්”
Colombo, Feb 18 (Daily Mirror) – The Colombo High Court today granted bail to Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP) Parliamentarian Namal Rajapaksa after serving him with indictments in connection with the controversial Krrish deal case.
Colombo High Court Judge Manjula Tillekaratne ordered Namal Rajapaksa to be released on a cash bail of Rs.100,000 with two sureties of Rs. 10 million each.
The court further ordered that his fingerprints be obtained to ascertain any previous criminal records.
Meanwhile, the court fixed the pre-trial conference for March 27.
The Attorney General filed criminal proceedings before the High Court against Namal Rajapaksa over the alleged misappropriation of Rs. 70 million belonging to Krrish Company.
The indictments were filed before the Colombo High Court by the Attorney General, alleging the misappropriation of Rs. 70 million provided by the Indian real estate company Krrish Lanka Pvt. Ltd. for the development of rugby in Sri Lanka.
Colombo, Feb 18 (Daily Mirror) – Considering the benefits provided to state sector employees in the 2025 budget, doubts arise over the effectiveness of decisions made regarding the public service, United Postal Trade Unions Front (UPTUF) Co- convener Chinthaka Bandara said.
Addressing the media, he said this budget can be described as one that creates a problematic situation in terms of people’s expectations.
“This budget will determine how the public service will be implemented in the country. We do not see any significant benefits for the people from this budget. The salary anomaly issue in the education sector remains unresolved. It is clear that the current government will not address the salary issues of state sector employees even within the given three years. The budget only included a Rs. 15,750 salary increment for state sector employees,” he said.
Therefore, state sector employees are not satisfied with the proposed salary increments in the budget. Nothing was provided to support the cost of living for the people, and no tangible benefits were offered, he added.
“As trade unions, we hope to be directly involved in the budget process,” Bandara said.
Colombo, Feb 18 (Daily Mirror) – The All Island Canteen and Restaurant Owners’ Association (AICROA) has decided to increase the prices of all canteen and hotel food items from midnight today.
Association Chairman Harshana Rukshan said that the price of a cup of plain tea will increase by Rs. 5, a cup of milk tea by Rs. 10, a plate of fried rice and kottu by Rs. 30, and the prices of short eats by Rs. 10.
Addressing the media, he said that no concessions were provided for canteen and restaurant owners in the recent budget.
“Even though the price of a packet of salt has increased to Rs. 200, the price of an egg has risen again to Rs. 35, a kilogram of chicken costs more than Rs. 1,000 and the price of coconuts has reached a maximum of Rs. 220, we did not request the President to reduce the prices of any of these items.
“Unfortunately, no support has been provided for the protection of canteens and restaurants in the country,” he added.
Colombo, Feb 18 (Daily Mirror) – Ceylon Teachers’ Union (CTU) Secretary Joseph Stalin claimed today that the government has not addressed the issue of teachers’ salaries in the recent budget.
Addressing the media, he said that both the President and the Prime Minister had assured that the existing salary issues would be resolved in the 2025 budget.
He reminded that state employees staged protests demanding a Rs. 20,000 salary increment, while principals and teachers protested for the remaining two-thirds of their salary anomalies to be rectified according to the Subodhini Committee report. However, according to the budget, the salary increase has only been planned for three years, suggesting that there will be no budget allocations for 2026 and 2027.
With the reduction of the Rs. 7,500 allowance, there will only be a Rs. 6,225 salary increment by April 1 for Grade 1 teachers and principals. Teachers in Service Grade 2.1 will receive an increase of Rs. 4,056, those in Grade 2.2 will receive Rs. 2,061, and teachers in Grade 3.1 will receive only Rs. 860.
“We all expected a Rs. 20,000 salary increment, but not a single word was mentioned about implementing the two-thirds of the remaining salary increment approved in the Subodhini Committee report. The budget only referred to an increase in the basic salary by Rs. 15,000,” Stalin said.
“The teachers who took to the streets in protest were assured that their demands would be met, but now they have been let down by the government. The future decisions of teachers and principals will depend on the government’s response to their concerns,” he added.
Colombo, Feb 18 (Daily Mirror) – Following recent controversial remarks to the media, MP Nilanthi Kottahachchi has been adviced to refrain from making statements to the media.
“I ‘m sorry, I am unable to make any comments to the media as I have been instructed by the party not to speak to the media,” she stated when reporters posed a question to her on Sunday (16) during the Clean Sri Lanka programme in Gimpatha, Keselwatta.
The Agricultural and Agrarian Insurance Board says that measures will be taken to swiftly provide insurance compensation to farmers in districts that have not yet received payments for crops damaged by the floods last November during the 2024/25 ‘Maha Season’.
Accordingly, Rs. 202 million is expected to be credited to the back accounts of 9,368 farmers in the Batticaloa District tomorrow (19).
Furthermore, the board stated that Rs. 98 million will be credited to compensate 6,671 farmers in the Trincomalee District for their damaged crops by February 21, the board said.
Thus far, a total of Rs. 306 million has been credited to the bank accounts of a portion of the farmers in the districts of Polonnaruwa, Vavuniya, Mullaitivu, and Trincomalee as insurance compensation of the crops damaged.
Sri Lanka’s budgeted expenditure for 2025 will likely lead to a wider fiscal deficit and slower-than-expected fiscal consolidation, Moody’s Ratings said on Tuesday, a day after the island nation unveiled its budget.
Sri Lanka aims to transform its crisis-hit economy to prepare to resume debt repayments from 2028, President Anura Kumara Dissanayake said on Monday while announcing the budget which is seen as a key step towards returning the country to durable, long-term growth.
The budget is mostly in line with targets set under a $2.9 billion International Monetary Fund (IMF) programme, including a key 2.3% primary account surplus goal.
Expenditure is estimated at 21.8% of GDP as Sri Lanka directs more resources towards welfare and infrastructure development, analysts said, while revenue will be 15.1% of GDP.
The budget has set a deficit target of 6.7% of GDP, which falls short of a 5.2% goal for 2025 preferred by the IMF.
The budget underscores the challenge that Sri Lanka’s fiscal authorities will continue to face because of its still weak debt affordability, still narrow revenue base, and underlying social constraints,” said Christian Fang, vice president – senior analyst at Moody’s Ratings.
Sri Lanka is aiming to grow 5% this year, Dissanayake told parliament, emphasising the need to support small businesses and key economic sectors such as tourism and tea to put the island nation’s economy on a sustainable recovery.
Sri Lanka’s economy went into freefall three years ago after running precariously low on dollar reserves, leaving it unable to afford essentials such as fuel, medicine and cooking gas.
Helped by the IMF bailout secured in March 2023, the island’s economy has partly recovered and completed a $25 billion debt restructuring with bilateral creditors and bondholders last December.
Sri Lanka is awaiting IMF approval for a fourth tranche of about $333 million.
Source: Reuters
–Agencies
President Anura Kumara Dissanayake, in his capacity as the Minister of Finance, Economic Stabilization and National Policies, presented his maiden Budget Speech in the Parliament today (17).
The 79th budget of the Independent Sri Lanka aimed at developing the country in a way that enables it to repay debt when repayment commences in 2028 today (17), encapsulated three main facets;
i. Growth of production of industry, services and agriculture.
ii. Production must take place with the active engagement and participation of people.
iii. The benefits and gains from production must be equitably shared across society.
The Head of the State also noted that this years’ budget is prepared based on these principles, and that the government intend to set a foundation to create an economy where all citizens are active participants, active stakeholders, and active beneficiaries.
According to the Head of State, the budget deficit for the fiscal year 2025 is estimated at Rs. 2,200 billion, which is 6.7 as a percentage from the GDP.
The total expenditure for next year will be Rs. 7,190 billion, which is 21.8% of the country’s GDP and the total revenue and grants will be Rs. 4,990 billion (15.09%).
The government has allocated Rs. 5,886 billion for recurring expenditure such as subsidies and salary payments. For salaries and wages, Rs. 1,230 billion has been set aside, and Rs. 1,290 billion for subsidies and transfers.
President’s full budget speech is as below;
Why has the price of gold been increasing so fast, breaking records? Economist Michael Hudson explains the politics of the precious metal, and the dynamics of the US dollar system.
Continued from Friday, February 7, 2025
Since the JVP/NPP’s arbitrary decision to curtail former president Mahinda Rajapaksa’s security and have him relocated to less expensive accommodation is now being legally challenged through an FR petition lodged with the Supreme Court in Colombo, nothing more needs to be said here about it. What I am doing here instead is to express a personal opinion for what it is worth, about something that is of utmost national importance. The interests of the country (nation) matter more than those of individual politicians or political parties. That is why inclusive nationalism (not ethnonationalism or racism) is vital at this juncture. It is an open secret now that almost all our leaders, with a few honourable exceptions, are being led by the nose by foreign powers (at loggerheads with each other, pursuing their own respective national interests) as Sri Lanka is located in a geostrategically sensitive point in the Indo-Pacific Ocean. Our response to the inevitable aggression that we have no choice but to face should not be politicised within the country. As a patriotic senior Sri Lankan living outside Sri Lanka with absolutely no stake in its current affairs or future prospects, I earnestly request all the MPs and the President with due respect to ponder on the useful implications of what I have just stated. It is their responsibility to look after the people/country (‘raja dhamma paja rakkha’ (the ruler’s duty is to protect the people) through wise statecraft at home and suave diplomacy abroad.
To return to my subject, the question why probably the NPP is going after Mahinda Rajapaksa, though not a mystery, remains to be considered. I hope that this will not be misconstrued as propaganda for Mahinda Rajapaksa who, I believe, is politically ‘out of combat’ because of his advanced age, and should now be in quiet retirement. His significance, though, as the foremost champion of nationalist politics has not diminished yet. Out of the five living past presidents, Mahinda Rajapaksa, when in power, was recognised as the most authentic face of Sri Lankan nationhood. He cut an imposing figure on the world stage. In accordance with usual diplomatic protocols, top level foreign state visitors still regularly pay him courtesy calls. Foreign ambassadors resident in Sri Lanka have formal goodwill meetings with him occasionally. As he wrote in an X post, he had a meeting with Indian High Commissioner Santosh Jha on February 5, 2025.
I never hero-worshipped Mahinda Rajapaksa. Quite a number of my articles that I wrote as a nonprofessional newspaper columnist, especially those written over the past eighteen years (2007-2025) and published in The Island and elsewhere, bear testimony to this. I have criticised Mahinda Rajapaksa more than I have praised him. I always offered constructive criticism of his politics, both when he was in power and when he was in the opposition.
My criticism of Mahinda Rajapaksa was basically focused on three areas: what I saw as his family-bandyism or nepotism (giving his own sons,siblings and other kith and kin priority in his public/political life, often to the disadvantage of more deserving others), his harmful, unnecessarily secretive approach to wooing the support of the minorities while taking the loyalty of the Sinhalese Buddhist majority, his main support base, for granted, and his lenient treatment of some of his closest associates who were up to no good.This made me describe him once as ‘a flawed diamond’ (a borrowed metaphor that surfaced from the depths of my ancient literary memory). More recently though, I found myself using such pejorative adjectives as ‘ruinous’ and ‘rascally’ in reference to the Rajapaksas, for squandering, as I believe, the benefits that accrued to the nation from the heroic victory of 2009 over separatist terrorism. That it was a national victory that would not have materialised but for the invaluable contributions of the Rajapaksas is a different matter.
The barefaced geopolitical meddling that intensified after the end of terrorism in 2009, seriously undermining the stability of unitary Sri Lanka, according to my understanding, was greatly facilitated by the three blunders mentioned above that MR could have avoided had he had enough foresight to keep in check his ego-propelled dynastic ambitions. It looked as if his concern for the youth of the country didn’t go beyond his own sons and nephews. He never wanted to allow someone outside his family to succeed him. Had he at least made Maithreepala Sirisena premier (instead of the late D.M. Jayarathne, even then a doddering old man) in 2010, the disastrous upset of 2015 would not have come about so easily (though engineered from outside).
The ‘baiyas’, who are ready to forget and forgive their old champion for services done, will not take kindly to the NPP for harassing him. If there are plausible allegations of financial or other crimes against him and his family, let them be investigated and let them face the full force of the law. But mere unsubstantiated allegations should not be bruited about as political propaganda against them. This is what I emphasised in a column under the title Prosecute, but don’t persecute” published in The Island on May 28, 2015 (that is, almost ten years ago). Who might want him persecuted? His political opponents and those who are baying for Mahinda Rajapaksa’s and his brother GR’s blood for defeating separatist terrorism, who seem to be allies now.
Let’s now turn to his would-be nemesis Anura Kumara Dissanayake. At the last presidential election held on September 21, 2024, as the leader of the Jathika Jana Balavegaya (JJB) alliance, popularly known as the Malimawa, Anura Kumara Dissanayake was declared winner after obtaining just over 42% of the total votes cast across the country. He beat his nearest rival Sajith Premadasa, leader of the Samagi Jana Balavegaya (SJB), who was supported by only about 33% of the national electorate. But the important thing is that there was little for AKD to crow about in this victory. Had it not been for the split between Sajith Premadasa and his former boss Ranil Wickremasinghe the leader of the almost defunct United National Party (UNP) that he left to form the SJB, Anura Kumara Dissanayake would hardly have become president. (I have criticised both Ranil Wickremasinghe and Sajith Premadasa, too, while admiring some of their personal attributes, as I did in ‘A role for Sajith and UNP ginger group’ published in The Island/August 28, 2019).
Let’s also remember the fact that AKD’s presidential win on September 21, 2024 and the Malimawa’s seemingly impressive performance at the subsequent parliamentary election held on November 14, 2024 were heavily qualified by certain factors that render both successful outcomes (i.e., Malimawa’s presidential and electoral victories) seem accidental, i.e., they are not truly representative of the significant asymmetries of public opinion between regions and communities, for it is probable that the different racial and religious communities that voted for the Malimaawa expect different things from the NPP government in return. The Malimaawa win seemed almost an electoral aberration.
The wild promises made by the JVP/NPP for getting elected were probably nonchalantly exaggerated due to their unstated private assumption that they were not going to face the hazard of being required to deliver on those promises, as they never expected to win with such a massive majority. For example, what did the Malimawa promise the voters in the North and East, who are predominantly Tamil speaking ethnic Tamils and Muslims respectively, not forgetting the Sinhalese minority living with them, to win their collective support? Were these promises identical with what the Malimawans pledged before the ethnically mixed population in the rest of the country where the Sinhala speakers form the overwhelming majority? Did the Malimawa politicians work to bring about a uniform and consensual awareness of their principal electoral platform of fighting endemic corruption among politicians and bureaucrats, and what they have erroneously identified as ‘the atrocious legacy of the past 76 years’ (alleged wrong policies and corrupt practices of politicians in power in the post-independence period to date)? Do these Malimawans believe that their approach to the first and their specific conception of the second are being accepted and embraced by the average citizens in every part of the country with equal conviction and enthusiasm?
To be concluded
blog: eesrilanka.wordpress.com
‘Before you study the economics, study the economists!’
e-Con e-News 09-15 January 2025
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‘I know that return to my island is quick & to my political life is impossible.
The pace of colonial events is quick, the turnover of political leaders rapid.
I have already been forgotten; and I know that people who supplanted me
are themselves about to be supplanted. My career is by no means unusual.
It falls into the pattern. The career of the colonial politician is short & ends
brutally. We lack order. Above all, we lack power. We mistake words, and
the acclamation of words for power; as soon as our bluff is called we are lost.
Politics for us are a do-or-die, once-for-all charge. Once we are committed
we fight more than political battles; we often fight literally for our lives.
Our transitional or makeshift societies do not cushion us. There are no universities or
City houses to refresh us and absorb us after the heat of battle. For those who lose,
and nearly everyone in the end loses, there is only one course: flight.
Flight to the great disorder & emptiness: London & the home counties.’
– The Mimic Men (1967)
This passage is from VS Naipaul, this Trinidadian’s work of fiction about a colonial leader exiled in England. Dystopian. ‘We lack order’. Really? We deliver tea, rubber & coconut on time, don’t we. To others. But then, Naipaul too is a mimic man who mouths the colonial tale, faithfully parses its chattering points. The English appeared to like him so much, they even anointed him a knight! Sir Vidhya… Sans a horse or a lance. Sans a continental missile. Or even dynamite. They only gave him that dynamite & oilman turned missile-maker’s Nobel Prize. They only permitted him a pen (at that time, perhaps, patted on a typewriter, massaged by his English wife, published in London in 1967). But it was a sponsored pen. He liked to laugh at Black people’s delusional foibles, in thinking we can long escape the enslaver, with our silly permitted ‘protests’ & ‘demonstrations’ & ‘independences’. It is the type of literature adored by our mimic literati at their English literary festivals, run by tourist agencies (aka land speculators aka plane & car importers) and the English banks (HSBC, Standard Chartered etc.) that ‘sponsor’ them, where they play at words.
Naipaul is from the Caribbean. To which Sri Lanka is umbilically tied. A colony of Tate & Lyle (yes, the Tate of that ‘London Art Gallery’). Yes, a sugar plantation! Naipaul is an Indian. The indentured Indians were taken to supplant the Africans, who were themselves enchained to supplant the ‘native’ Amerindians, whose land they stole, where now the whites feel at home. Sound familiar?
Note: it is written in an almost passive voice. Who is it who ‘supplants’ our leaders? Tate & Lyle. Unilever. ‘Leaders’ in the US & Canada are usually employees of Mr Rockeller’s Exxon Corporation (in Sri Lanka, perhaps known as Caltex, Chevron, etc). Many multinational corporations (MNCs) operating in Sri Lanka, have larger budgets than so-called sovereign nations combined… Naipaul, by the way, was critical about his father, a journalist. His father had not fathomed the ‘postcolonial’ shift in the power centre post-1945, from London to Washington, and failed to give lip, cater to those interests…and had a nervous breakdown. Sir Vidhya chose not to….
In media in Sri Lanka, foreign news means BBC and CNN… English affairs ancient and modern, artistic, literary and other, therefore led the way to this week’s arrival of the latest English minister-in-charge of colonies, now appropriately named ‘West’ and entitled ‘Minister for Indo-Pacific’ – an English verbiage no doubt ordered by USA’s NATO. And just as s/he/it arrived, a northern politician threatened to demolish a Buddhist temple… Meanwhile in Munich (‘Little Monk’) a security conference was arranged, with the US Vice-President’s speech presaged by an attendant ‘terrorist attack’ blamed on an Afghani ‘refugee claimant’, while in Palestine, the Anglo-American mince-meating of the innocents was continued, producing more refugees… and headlines…
This last week (look at ee’s news compendium below if you dare), the English media in Sri Lanka was preoccupied with the antics of the US agency with ‘AID’ suffixed to its title, whose origins along with the ‘internet’ are in ensuring the repression of any real (industrial) resistance to continuing colonized underdevelopment:
*
The SLPP delegation asking Chung to investigate how USAID funds
were disbursed in Sri Lanka is like setting a thief to catch a thief,
thief & the master of the house combining!
– Sena Thoradeniya (see ee Sovereignty,
It’s time for Julie Chung to Bow out Gracefully!)
*
While there was much talk of USAID interference in Sri Lanka, the truth is Sri Lanka’s economy & related political life have long been tied to the capitalist system, with our artists & economists (they are artists too, with their prevarications) in tow.
In this ee Focus, Shenali Waduge asks, ‘Are there any economists in Sri Lanka who can give an alternative to IMF?’, a question ee is somewhat dedicated to. Waduge wonders: ‘Why are Sri Lanka’s economists ignoring ground realities of IMF conditions? When water, food production, fuel, gas (essentials to citizens) fall out of government hands into international corporate hands or even local corporate hands & when these entities begin to raise prices at will, when they decide to deny supply – what can citizens or the government do, especially when companies are now taking governments to international courts…’ Indeed our economists & literati are stipendiaries of various colonial embassies.
ee Focus also reproduces Usvatte-aratchi’s inquiry into ‘Education & Schools’. He points out: ‘The modern equivalents of liberal arts are mathematics and science’. Well, tell that to the funny literati who claim to inform and entertain us, like monkeys (who can also turn off the lights!). Usvatte-aratchi describes how: ‘The relationship between universities and the economy & society was rapidly transformed in the latter half of the 19th century. From an institution that the church dominated, universities became partners in innovations in the economy.’ He should have emphasized this was largely a European phenom. Indeed, as one ‘young Joseph Needham’ (so intimate we are!) was told, ‘the future lay in ‘atoms & molecules, atoms & molecules, my boy’.
*
The expression ‘Green Revolution’ is said to have been first used by
an administrator of USAID to describe developments in Asian Agriculture following
on the introduction of IR8 by the International Rice Research Institute in 1966
*
Rice & its prices were also another preoccupation of the media, which variously blames local millers & politicians, but leaves out the role played by the English in the destruction of the ancient village irrigation systems, and as usual leaves out the names of such players as England’s Unilever & BAT’s Ceylon Tobacco & ICI’s CIC, et al…
Which is why ee continues to reproduce SSA’s Capital & Peasant Production: Studies in the Continuity & Discontinuity of Agrarian Structures in Sri Lanka, this time introduced by Newton Gunasinghe. He records the ‘unprecedented boom’ in the 1980s of research institutes (state & NGO) and superficial academic analyses of agrarian studies, which all fail to unearth the underlying interests and attendant weeds, leading to:
‘Indeed, ironically the most pronounced facet
of the Accelerated Mahaweli Development Project
seems to be the accelerated speed at which the
resettled peasant is being evicted from his land.’
The Introduction scans the book’s various analyses, the overriding of local initiatives that developed local seeds resistant to disease, soon supplanted by varieties requiring imported fertilizers by ICI’s CIC, etc (yes, ICI’s CIC who pays devalued rupees for the recurring media meme that somehow an organic fertilizer policy was to blame for the melting-down)… It also looks at the role played by England’s Ceylon Tobacco Co, and the growth of agricultural ‘entrepreneurs’… and the failure to examine the variety of agrarian systems in the country that promote the pauperization of the peasant.
Gunasinghe also mentions SBD de Silva’s examination of the backwardness & stagnation, which he attributed ‘to labour-intensive methods of production, which ruled out technological innovations, [to] the control exercised by agency houses over the plantations which were basically trading monopolies, and the separation of ownership & management…’
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Hit your competitors in the pocket book, hit ’em hard.
Then you either buy ’em out, or take ’em with you.
– James Buchanan Duke, US Tobacco Trust, 1889
*
Which brings us back to the perfidious and obsequious role played by our Mimic Men, so-called artists & glitterati & economists who are paid to ignore, and worse, muddle up such matters… As we have noted before, what the US President is saying is neither new nor original. Recall, and it is important to recall if we wish to comprehend:
The US government made 371 treaties with the original people of their ‘America’,
1776-1871. As one of their leaders, called ‘Red Cloud’ in English, recorded:
‘They made many promises to us, but they only kept one:
They promised to take our land and they took it.
*
As noted, the celebrated literati, the economists, the media (let’s not call them ‘our’ literati, ‘our’ media) simply refuse, or are paid to refuse, to listen. The idea that the USA under Trump will stop interfering in the rest of the world is pure delusion… regardless of their concerns for further genderization, they still want to turn both women and men into their ‘bitches’?
This week also saw pompous Anglomanic claims about ‘digital privacy’ & ‘freedom’, about control over the ‘data’ machinery, whose machines we are not allowed to make… There has also been continued hype about so-called ‘artificial’ intelligence (AI), which turns out to be not very artificial at all… Machines cannot create value; only humans, and working humans in particular, can do that. All AI, especially in English, is still colonized & biased, just the newest high-tech mimic men… As a Russian analyst noted, how even with China’s new open-source DeepSeek, which has popped their pompous balloons and shaken their stockmarkets:
‘…bias comes from being trained on liberal western media. All you get are
summaries of what all the Anglo-American media have been writing. This is the same
for ChatGPT & comparable western LLMs [Large Language Models]. As future models
get trained on voice & video they will be biased further, unless the Chinese & Russians
refrain from training on more English content and avoid the biases in that content.
Russians & Chinese would be wrong to train on data from the Anglo-Saxon world.’
*
________
Contents:
Namal Rajapaksa and an SLPP delegation met US ambassador Julie Chung they previously despised openly. Although they stated that USAID was discussed, it is common knowledge that USAID is handled by a separate office of the US government with a separate office in Sri Lanka. Julie Chung is not associated with USAID projects in Sri Lanka!
Instead, the SLPP delegation discussed US citizenship issues of some of their party members who lost it and have been unsuccessful in regaining it. They also highlighted corruption investigations carried out by the police which they alleged were a human rights violation.
Chung promised to look into the US citizenship issue with the rest of the US State Department but would not comment on ongoing anti-corruption investigations stating that they were internal affairs of Sri Lanka and reaffirmed US government commitment to good governance and reduced corruption.
USAID has provided $2 billion since 1956 to Sri Lanka. Most of it went to non-development related aid, post-tsunami and other wheat purchase subsidies from US suppliers and for political purposes. Only an insignificant amount of USAID was provided to development related initiatives.
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