{"id":110384,"date":"2021-01-04T17:07:46","date_gmt":"2021-01-05T00:07:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=110384"},"modified":"2021-01-04T17:08:07","modified_gmt":"2021-01-05T00:08:07","slug":"unrealities-of-call-for-covid-related-burials-london-protestors-carrion-call","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2021\/01\/04\/unrealities-of-call-for-covid-related-burials-london-protestors-carrion-call\/","title":{"rendered":"Unrealities of call for Covid-related burials: London protestor\u2019s carrion call"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Rohana R. Wasala<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n

I\nwould like to kindly alert  readers to certain distorted versions of my\narticles,<\/strong>and\nforged documents falsely attributed to my authorship appearing in a fake<\/strong>Face\nBook account created in my name by an unknown person, who is probably assuming\na pseudonym. However, there are an unknown number of genuine social media\nwebsites that reproduce my articles without distortion and with due\nacknowledgements to the sources that I originally direct my writings to. Apart\nfrom several best known, widely circulated Sri Lankan national newspapers,\nthere are only two reputed online news media journals – Lankaweb and Sri Lanka\nGuardian – that publish my articles with my explicit permission. Thank you for\nyour attention to this matter. – RRW<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

(Note on the sub-title of this article: It is a play on the well\nknown phrase \u2018clarion call\u2019 and refers only to what I choose to call propaganda\nvultures.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jehan Perera has proffered unsolicited advice to the government\n(\u2018Religious clergy take stand for religious right to burial\u2019\/The Island<\/em>\/December\n29, 2020) seeking to force its capitulation to foreign interventionist forces,\nthrough false propaganda. The same article appeared simultaneously on the\norganization\u2019s website under the title: \u2018Government to take a stand for\nreligious right to burial\u2019. The charge implied by this title (i.e., alleged\nindecisiveness in allowing burial of Corona-dead Muslims) against the\ngovernment is baseless.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was in March (nine months ago) if my memory doesn\u2019t fail me,\nthat the Director General of Health Services (DGHS), the duly appointed\ncompetent authority in the Covid-19 containment situation, issued a special\ngazette notification decreeing that bodies of persons who die of the disease be\ncremated. That decision was taken by the competent authority based on the\nadvice of experts, not directly by the government which had delegated the power\nto do so to that official. Muslims\u2019 (or anyone else\u2019s for that matter) right to\nburial has never been denied, and is not being challenged in any way. But that\nright cannot be exercised in this national emergency. It is only because of the\nstrict health guidelines laid down on a cold scientific basis that cremation\nhas been made mandatory. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Religious sentiments are common to all.  Buddhists, Hindus,\nCatholics, and others are also affected by the same painful restrictions in the\nperformance of religious rituals and in the choice of the proper mode of\ndisposal of the bodies of their near and dear ones dead from the corona\ninfection. If our local experts say that there is no alternative to cremating\nbodies to prevent the virus from contaminating the soil or the water resources\nof the country, then that has to be accepted in the best interest of all. The\nWHO periodically issues certain broad health guidelines, but common sense tells\nus that they need to be adapted to suit the specific local conditions that\nexist in each country. It is absolutely wrong to cry out to the world that the\ngovernment is trampling on the right of Muslims to bury their dead.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The government is not neglecting its duty out of a sense of\ncomplacency (\u2018a kind of self-satisfaction\u2019) as JP seems to suggest. Only those\nwithout an iota of humane concern for the wellbeing of all Sri Lankans can\ndiscount or totally ignore the prodigious amount of work that our healthcare\nworkers and the security personnel (the latter looking after the logistics\naspect of the massive operation) do and the tremendous personal sacrifices they\nmake in helping the nation to survive the catastrophic corona pandemic. If the\npresent administration was as dysfunctional as the cursed yahapalanaya that JP\nsupported, could this sort of efficient mobilization of the nation be realized?\nThere is no need for me to refute his false allegations of delays in decision\nmaking regarding the artificial burial-cremation issue or in ordering suitable\nvaccines (several of which, globally, are still being tested); the government\nhas already taken the necessary steps in obtaining them at the earliest\npossible, whenever they are made available.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

JP drags in the recent (Mahara) \u2018prison riots\u2019 in order to\nhighlight them as \u2018a harbinger of what can happen in the larger society if a\nlarge section of the people feel they are being trapped and marginalized to\nsuffer the consequences\u2019. The implied allegation that Muslims (because the\nprison population cannot be described as \u2018a large section of the people\u2019) \u2018are\nbeing trapped and marginalized\u2019 is entirely baseless. There is congestion in\nprisons. That is a longstanding problem that must be fixed. The incidents are\nunder investigation. JP\u2019s concern is not with the welfare of the prisoners\n(most of them drug addicts under detention) or the difficulties the prison and\nsecurity forces personnel experience in dealing with groups of drugged inmates\nfighting among themselves, while others were trying to break the prison gates\nto escape. He asserts that \u2018Among these worst affected sections of the\npopulation, it appears that the Muslim community has been disproportionately\naffected by the Covid infection\u2019, thereby falsely suggesting that, like the\nprison population, the Muslim community are being confined to cramped\nconditions, enabling the rapid spread of the deadly infection. JP who knows how\nabominably some innocent but ill-informed and irresponsible Muslims behaved\ntowards the healthcare workers who were doing their level best to help them,\nwhile taking the risk of exposing themselves and their loved ones back home,\nincluding their children, to the deadly virus through contact transmission. Ten\ntimes more non-Muslims also live in congested areas, not out of choice, but for\nlack of better places to live (in spite of the fact that Muslims, according to\nJP\u2019s opinion, as a traditionally trading community, tend to live more in urban\nsettings than the Sinhalese and Tamils, being basically agrarian communities,\nwho possess lands and live in more spacious environments). But  JP goes on\nto distort facts to project the few deliberately non-cooperative Muslims as\nvictims of alleged governmental insensitivity to their religious feelings:\n\u2018They are afraid that if they are confirmed as Covid patients, both they and\ntheir relatives will be at risk of being forcibly cremated if they fail to\nrecover from the coronavirus infection, which goes against fundamental Islamic\ntenets.\u2019 Won\u2019t these Muslims listen to reason, if their educated leaders\nexplain to them that if cremation is what the health authorities order in this\nhopefully temporary situation, that is the law, and that it must be obeyed\nwithout questioning?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is obvious why JP is writing this sort of stuff. He is hardly\nknown outside the English speaking NGO circles, either by the monolingual Tamil\nspeaking minority or the similarly monolingual Sinhala speaking majority, for\nboth of whom the avowed vision of his NGO enterprise: \u2018A just and peaceful Sri\nLanka in which freedom, human and democratic rights of all people are assured\u2019\nis hardly beyond our reach. It is what paradoxically foreign interventionists\noperating through NGOs and local anti-nationalist collaborators are doing their\ndamnedest to batter to wreck and ruin in order to destabilize the country. This\nseems to done in pursuit of the interfering powers\u2019 own geopolitical\nends. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

His claim that during \u2018the holiday season\u2019 he received a number of\ntelephone calls from civil society members across the country must be taken\nwith a pinch of salt in view of what I said about him above. He seems to link\nwhat he describes as \u2018the greater concentration of coronavirus relative to\npopulation amongst the Muslim community\u2019 to the alleged unjust treatment meted\nout to them by the government through the \u2018enforced\u2019 cremation of dead Covid\nvictims. The dangerous implication of this is not hard to guess: at least some\nMuslims may try to hide Covid patients and deaths from the authorities, and put\npaid to all the latter\u2019s endeavours to contain the spread of the virulent\nvirus. JP even refers to the Minister of Justice having raised concerns about\nmandatory cremation of bodies of Muslims who have died of Covid-19. In this\nsituation sensible people listen to doctors and scientists, rather than to\ntime-serving politicians. The local experts who know what is best for Sri Lanka\nin the current situation say that cremation guarantees the total destruction of\nthe virus, and that burial doesn\u2019t, and that therefore the first (cremation) is\nthe only option for the country. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

JP tries bolster his arguments by quoting BBS General Secretary\nVen. Galaboda-aththe Gnanasara Thera: \u2018The fact that the religious belief of\nthe Muslim community is being violated has led the leader of the nationalist\nBodhu Bala Sena, the Buddhist prelate Ven Galagodaaththe Gnanasara to speak up\nfor the religious right of the Muslims to be buried even in cases of Covid\ndeaths.\u2019 To the likes of JP, Buddhist monks are bete noires, and this one\n(Gnanasara Thera) is arguably the most hated by them. JP butters him up as a\n\u2018Buddhist prelate\u2019; the monk is no prelate (no Nayake); he is just an ordinary\nmonk, who has nevertheless achieved some success in waking up the usually\nlaid-back Nayake monks at least to a sitting up position, prising open their\neyes to the existential threats currently posed by religious fundamentalists of\nboth varieties to the Buddha Sasana. Originally, he was vehemently against\nburial, because that is contrary to expert advice and is in contravention of\nthe DGHS\u2019s ruling. The Thera may now be thinking of a safe modification of the\nburial mode like using an impervious concrete casket or a crypt in which to\nseal the body before being buried (but these are not viable options). As a\nBuddhist monk he may be suggesting this at least partly out of compassion for\ninnocent Muslims who are upset (out of ignorance) about having, for this while,\nto burn the bodies of their relatives dead from corona. He must be thinking of\nsome way to stop Islamic religious extremists from gaining a firmer foothold\nwithin the Muslim polity by exploiting this highly sensitive burial issue. Ven.\nGnanasara, remained apolitical, whatever critics might say, until Ven. Ratana\u2019s\n(in)famous fast in the Maligawa precincts, something that the Most Ven.\nMahanayake Theras censured in no uncertain terms, and that Ven Gnanasara\nhimself criticised. The BBS secretary may be launching a preemptive strike at\nVen. Ratana who is going to parliament as the national list MP from the AJBP (I\nam sorry about there being no time or space to unpack this assertion of mine\nhere.) <\/p>\n\n\n\n

About a fortnight ago, Ven. Gnanasara told the media how NGOs are\ncreating global hatred and illwill against Buddhist monks based on the false\nallegation that it is they who are demanding the cremation of bodies of Muslim\ndead, out of spite. In a video of a protest rally held in London on December\n13, 2020 against Sri Lanka\u2019s (health-authorities-imposed) Corona related\ntemporary burial ban, a female demonstrator, speaking in Sinhala, is heard\nloudly demanding that our president should reject offhand what she mocks as the\n\u2018legal advice of the bald headed uncles dressed in yellow robes\u2019 (sivuru\nporawagath thatta mamalage neethi upades piliganta epa). <\/p>\n\n\n\n

BBS General Secretary Ven. Gnanasara Thera played a fragment of\nthe woman\u2019s denunciatory harangue containing this remark from his phone at a\nshort news briefing on December 22, 2020. The phrase \u2018thatta mamala\u2019 is an\nutterly disrespectful way to refer to Buddhist monks that only an ignorant\ninsensitive uncultured person could use. It is deeply offensive to all Buddhists,\nespecially to Sinhalese Buddhists, who treat monks with reverence whatever\ncriticisms are justly or unjustly made about them. Obviously the woman is an\nuncouth non-Buddhist Sinhala speaker. She says: \u2018We don\u2019t want any religious\nfrictions. We want to live in peace, without having to burn our children, these\npeople, like animals. Mr President, please (mediate in this matter and) arrange\nfor us to bury (our dead). We have no use for the yellow-robed thatta uncles\u2019\nadvice\u2019. She hardly conceals her callous disregard of the feelings of fellow\nSri Lankans who make no issue of cremating their dead relatives in the present\ncircumstances in the interest of public health. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The monks have repeatedly made it clear that they, like the rest\nof the people of Sri Lanka and the government, are not concerned about whether\ndead bodies are buried or cremated, or about whether one method is of greater\nmerit than the other except that in the deadly Corona pandemic situation, the\nmode of disposal of corpses of Corona dead should be done according to the\nstrict instructions of the authorised health experts, who, invariably take into\nconsideration the global guidelines issued by the World Health Organization\n(WHO). The wording of the WHO guidelines shows that they are not expected to be\nfollowed blindly by every country; they need to be modified primarily to suit\nthe local physical conditions and only secondarily to the religious\nsensitivities of the people. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Religious sensitivities are common to all communities and these\nmust be inter-communally respected without discrimination. One religious\ncommunity\u2019s feelings cannot be regarded as more sacred than another\u2019s. Anti-Sri\nLanka agents abroad and anti-national forces at home have launched a calculated\npropaganda blitzkrieg whose barely concealed target is the present government.\nThe propaganda onslaught is justified on the basis of the false allegation that\nBuddhist monks are demanding the cremation of bodies of Muslims who have died\nof Covid-19, spitefully disregarding their surviving relatives\u2019 religious\nsensitivities.  Nothing is further from the truth than this charge against\nBuddhist monks. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Rohana R. Wasala I would like to kindly alert  readers to certain distorted versions of my articles,and forged documents falsely attributed to my authorship appearing in a fakeFace Book account created in my name by an unknown person, who is probably assuming a pseudonym. However, there are an unknown number of genuine social media […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[91],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-110384","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-rohana-r-wasala"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110384","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=110384"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110384\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=110384"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=110384"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=110384"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}