{"id":110670,"date":"2021-01-13T17:32:34","date_gmt":"2021-01-14T00:32:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=110670"},"modified":"2021-01-13T17:32:34","modified_gmt":"2021-01-14T00:32:34","slug":"prime-ministers-thai-pongal-message","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2021\/01\/13\/prime-ministers-thai-pongal-message\/","title":{"rendered":"Prime Minister\u2019s Thai Pongal message"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\"><em>Mahinda Rajapaksa<\/em><\/span><br data-rich-text-line-break=\"true\" \/><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\"><em>Prime Minister of the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n<p>It is with immense\npleasure that I wish all Tamil devotees in Sri lanka and all over the world a\nvery happy Thai Pongal festival. In the Hindu-Tamil Calendar, the first month\nof the year is known as \u2018Thai\u2019, and \u2018Pongal\u2019 infers a new dawn. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The arrival of a\nnew harvest is celebrated on the day of Thai Pongal. It venerates Mother Nature\nand the Sun God, as an expression of gratitude for a bountiful harvest. This\ncelebration of the dawn of the new year is both culturally and religiously\nsignificant to the Hindu people. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>A traditional\nspecialty of Pongal is a sweet rice made with rice from the new harvest, milk,\nand sugarcane, is made as an offering to the Sun God as a show of gratitude.\nThese traditions and rituals give us an insight into and highlights the\ncultural and religious values of showing appreciation, respect and gratitude. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Although we differ\nin ethnicity, religion and language, our aspirations, hopes and dreams as Sri\nLankan\u2019s are similar.&nbsp; Even though we are\ncurrently facing challenging times, the government is committed to uplift the\nliving standards of all Sri Lankan citizens and is determined to work towards\novercoming these challenges together as a nation. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Therefore,\nthis year&#8217;s Thai Pongal festival can be celebrated with renewed hope by those\ncelebrating in Sri Lanka and all over the world. May the festivities of Thai\nPongal and the values that it propagates, cultivate a spirit of peace and\nreconciliation between all Sri Lankan\u2019s. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I wish\neveryone celebrating a happy and prosperous Thai Pongal and the very best for\nthe year ahead. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Mahinda Rajapaksa<br>Prime Minister of the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Mahinda RajapaksaPrime Minister of the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka It is with immense pleasure that I wish all Tamil devotees in Sri lanka and all over the world a very happy Thai Pongal festival. In the Hindu-Tamil Calendar, the first month of the year is known as \u2018Thai\u2019, and \u2018Pongal\u2019 infers a new [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[125,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-110670","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-mahinda-rajapaksa","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110670","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=110670"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110670\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=110670"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=110670"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=110670"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}