{"id":122415,"date":"2022-01-26T17:35:09","date_gmt":"2022-01-27T00:35:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=122415"},"modified":"2022-01-26T17:35:09","modified_gmt":"2022-01-27T00:35:09","slug":"mercilessly-assaulted-suranga-lakmal-awaits-justice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2022\/01\/26\/mercilessly-assaulted-suranga-lakmal-awaits-justice\/","title":{"rendered":"Mercilessly Assaulted Suranga Lakmal Awaits Justice"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Dr. Tilak S. Fernando CEYLON TODAY<\/strong>\u00a0|\u00a0FOCUS<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n
\"Mercilessly<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Early last Christmas\nmorning following the teachings of Jesus Christ\u2019s, of kindness, forbearance,\nand tolerance, the writer accompanied by two friends headed towards\nNaththandiya. The coconut plantations on either side of the road made the drive\ndown delightful watching. However, we found it strange the prices of coconut\nwere so high because the coconut estates were in abundance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We went searching for a\nmercilessly assaulted man. He was the forty-two-year-old Suranga Lakmal.\nSuranga lives in the Asoka Pura housing scheme close to a prominent carbon\nfactory in Thorawita. Lakmal\u2019s house is a half-finished one in a very bad\ncondition. He is a single parent with two children. His children are in the\ntenth and ninth grades and attend a local school.  His old and feeble\nmother looks after him and the two children after his wife left him a few years\nago. The family is deprived and underprivileged. Lakmal worked as a carpenter,\nbut during the Covid-19 pandemic, he could not find any employment. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This incident occurred\nsometime in May 2021. Lakmal\u2019s children were crying for food, so his mother\nasked him to go and pick a fallen coconut from the neighbouring coconut\nplantation to feed the hungry children with polsambol<\/em> and rice. The\nneighbouring fifty-acre coconut estate is owned by the Ceylon Pentecostal\nMission (Lanka Sabawa<\/em>). Romesh Priantha de Silva and Sugathawansa are in\ncharge of the estate. They caught Lakmal collecting the fallen coconut from the\nplantation and started to abuse him very badly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Romesh Priantha de Silva\nand Sugathawansa, the two persons who caught Suranga Lakmal when he picked the\nfallen coconut, and attacked him mercilessly, had gone to the extent of\nstripping Lakmal of his clothes. They held his naked body upright in a crucifix\nposition and struck Lakmal with an iron mallet on his back and his genitalia\nignoring his pleading. He implored them to hand him over to the Police, \u2018if picking a fallen coconut is a crime to feed his hungry\nchildren.<\/em>\u2019<\/em> The video shown on TV and\nsocial media platforms clearly shows how Lakmal beseeched them to stop, while\nthe vicious pair continued to beat him up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Both attackers did not pay\nany attention to the pleading of Lakmal\u2019s but continued to hammer him on his\nback with the iron mallet, which seriously damaged Lakmal\u2019s vertebral column.\nNow he is unable to bend down and unable to work because he is a\ncarpenter. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Six months later<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was only after we\narrived at Lakmal\u2019s house were we informed this inhumane act had occurred six\nmonths ago. The Suranga Lakmal video which was shown on TV news and social\nmedia platforms just before Christmas 2021 was actually six months after the\nattack. When the crime occurred, Lakmal reported it to the Marawila Police Station.\n Following Lakmal\u2019s Police entry, the Marawila Police produced their\nB-report reference B-169\/21 and filed a case against the two perpetrators at\nthe Magistrate\u2019s Court, Marawila. The police complaint was acknowledged and\nconfirmed by a letter signed by the Registrar of the Courts on 6 December 2021.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was after watching the\nrevolting scene of Lakmal\u2019s brutal attack that we felt we should visit the\ndesperate family and extend whatever help we could give. So, early on Christmas\nmorning, we started our journey towards Naththandiya, with a car full of dry\nrations including some coconuts, which was the cause for Lakmal\u2019s attack. My\nfriend Karuni handed over the dry rations to Lakmal\u2019s mother and distributed\ncash to each family member as a Christmas contribution.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

His mother\u2019s explanation<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Suranga\u2019s mother explained\nhow she requested her son to pick a fallen coconut from the adjoining coconut\nestate as her two grandchildren were starving and crying of hunger. After the\nsavage beating on Suranga Lakmal, a compassionate neighbour, Professor D.S.J.\nKalubowila, brought this inhumane act to the Human Rights Commission. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

After filing the case at\nMarawila Police Station, Suranga Lakmal appealed to the President Gotabaya\nRajapaksa, in a registered letter in detail. Suranga Lakmal voted for Gotabaya\nRajapaksa during the Presidential election and had high hopes of the President\ntaking remedial action against the two offenders. He was unsure whether the\nPresident watched Suranga Lakmal\u2019s video on Swarnavahini news or even read his\nletter sent under registered cover! In his letter to the President, he wrote\nhow his two children were crying of hunger, and at that moment, his mother\nasked him to pick a fallen coconut from the adjoining coconut estate to help her\ngrandchildren from starvation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In response to Suranga\nLakmal\u2019s letter to President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, the Ombudsman attached to the\nPresidential Secretariat wrote to the D.I.G. Puttalam District, under his\nreference PS\/OMB\/04\/2174\/21 and PS\/OMB\/04\/2301\/21 on 12 November 2021,\nrequesting the Police to take appropriate action against the perpetrators, with\ncopies to Suranga Lakmal and Prof. D. S.J. Kalubowila. Regrettably, neither the\nD.I.G. at Puttalam District nor the Police at Marawila took appropriate action\nagainst the perpetrators despite the attached Presidential Secretariat\nOmbudsman\u2019s letter of 12 November 2021. It shows to what extent the innocent\npeople who are less influential and helpless have to go through constantly!<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

 During our visit to\nSuranga Lakmal, two Buddhist priests from Kandy arrived to see him after\nwatching the horrific video clip of how Romesh Priantha de Silva and\nSugathawansa savagely struck Suranga Lakmal by hanging him in a crucifix\nposition! The distressed family still depends on charity from various people\nwho saw the vicious beating on TV and social media platforms. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sumith Liyanage wrote to\nthe Police Retired Senior Officers\u2019 Association newsletter and explained his\nexperience on the current Police Force. He said thus: Many noble qualities\nhad vanished mysteriously from what is known as this august (Police) body;\nJustice and fair play are the aspirations of civilised societies; equality and\nimpartiality in dispensing justice are the hallmarks of a healthy democracy.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Suranga Lakmal\u2019s family\nurgently needs a water well, they have no access to water. There is no water\nsupply in the area they live. Therefore, the family\u2019s urgent requirement is to\nhave an adequate water supply at their disposal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

tilakfernando@gamil.com<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Dr. Tilak S. Fernando CEYLON TODAY\u00a0|\u00a0FOCUS Early last Christmas morning following the teachings of Jesus Christ\u2019s, of kindness, forbearance, and tolerance, the writer accompanied by two friends headed towards Naththandiya. The coconut plantations on either side of the road made the drive down delightful watching. However, we found it strange the prices of coconut […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[43],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-122415","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-by-drtilak-s-fernando"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/122415","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=122415"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/122415\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=122415"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=122415"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=122415"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}