{"id":156351,"date":"2026-05-23T14:56:48","date_gmt":"2026-05-23T21:56:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=156351"},"modified":"2026-05-23T14:56:48","modified_gmt":"2026-05-23T21:56:48","slug":"japan-india-have-some-caste-lessons-for-sri-lanka","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2026\/05\/23\/japan-india-have-some-caste-lessons-for-sri-lanka\/","title":{"rendered":"Japan & India Have Some Caste Lessons for Sri\u00a0Lanka"},"content":{"rendered":"

e-Con e-News<\/a><\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n
\"\"\/<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

blog: https:\/\/eesrilanka.wordpress.com<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018Before you study the economics, study the economists!<\/em>\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

e-Con e-News 17-23 May 2026<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

India & Japan are in a mighty, mighty hurry. A USA-inspired urgency. They are renewing pressure on Sri Lanka \u2018to expedite industrial & trade integration\u2019<\/em>. And they have a plan \u2013 an economic caste system: Sri Lanka has to only produce \u2018inputs\u2019, India will capture \u2018assembly margins\u2019, and Japan shall capture \u2018technology rents & FDI returns\u2019 (see ee Focus<\/em><\/strong>).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018An analysis of the bidding documents, amendments<\/p>\n\n\n\n

& official clarifications exposes a procurement<\/p>\n\n\n\n

structure that goes as a simple service contract but<\/p>\n\n\n\n

sets up \u2018a monopolistic trap\u2019 for the government<\/p>\n\n\n\n

at the end of the agreement\u2019s tenure.\u2019 \u2013 see ee Industry<\/em><\/strong>,<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Proposed contract for e-passports\u2026<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

So, what exactly do such \u2018technology rents\u2019 mean? An e-passport scam <\/strong>was exposed this week, involving a French & Finish contract<\/strong> with the Department of Immigration & Emigration (DIE<\/strong>)? DIE has been trapped, failing \u2018to cap prices for post-contract software licence renewals\u2019,. Thus DIE has granted \u2018absolute pricing power\u2019 to the USA\u2019s Oracle, Microsoft (Windows) & antivirus providers, \u2013 they will have to be paid \u2018to keep the base servers running\u2026\u2019 for now & through our next lives (see ee Random Notes<\/em><\/strong>).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The education system and the corporate media must share the blame for enabling such innumerate, industrial illiteracy<\/strong>. The media are bribed to amplify the incessant press releases proclaiming the \u2018$Billions\u2019 of aid by the IMF<\/strong>, World Bank, ADB, EU, etc. Our education doesn\u2019t teach us that such \u2018aid\u2019 <\/em><\/strong>doesn\u2019t mean we get the cash to spend on our own priorities. This \u2018aid\u2019 means we have to buy their overpriced industrial machineries, goods & services, and pay them back with under-priced primary (natural: human & no-human resources) and depreciating cash, forever. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So, why are India & Japan in such a rush to make Sri Lanka submit to this economic caste system?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018India & Japan both require an external fix<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

for their internal economic problems<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2013 Sri Lanka is that fix!<\/em>\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to Shiran Illanperuma (see ee Focus<\/em><\/strong>) both Japan\u2019s & India\u2019s economies are not what they claim themselves to be. Japan is stuck: a declining power<\/strong>, it seeks salvation by playing the role of the USA\u2019s police dog in East Asia (see how Japan\u2019s PM<\/strong> bent down on her knees before Australia, to apologize for killing a few thousand white people there in World War II. She apparently can\u2019t ever apologize to Sri Lanka, China, Korea, or Vietnam, wherein Japan\u2019s Asian victims number in the millions\u2026.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     Meanwhile \u2013 in the land of opium-trading nabobs & maharajahs & nizams & jaghirdars & sahibs, usurious Parsi and Jain, Banias, Chettiar & Bohras, rentier Tatas, Adanis & Ambanis (all funders of the ruling BJP<\/strong>) \u2013 a service-sector-dominated India<\/strong> has to play the same obsequious role in our region.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This week saw the US Government dismissing fraud charges against Indian billionaire Gautam Adani<\/strong> (who has taken over Colombo Port). Adani is accused of bribing Indian officials and lying to US investors to obtain a solar energy project in India. Adani\u2019s case was dropped by the US government after Adani appointed to his legal team Robert J Giuffra Jr, one of US President Trump\u2019s personal attorneys. Perhaps Kapila Chandrasena, who the USA was hounding to target the Rajapakses, would still be alive if he had hired the ambulance-chasing shyster Giuffra. However, Adani also had to pledge a $10billion investment in the USA<\/strong>. The US government then announced a $275million settlement with Adani over alleged sanctions violations involving Iran.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Japan and India are all part of the US Indo-Pacific Strategy<\/strong>, which is rousing tensions & militarization to squeeze Asia. They all have a<\/strong> plan<\/strong>. But does Sri Lanka have a plan? <\/em>No.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018Colombo must have its own clearly defined objectives<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

& parameters before embarking on a readymade strategy<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

to fix someone else\u2019s problems<\/em>.\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Illanperuma examines the more dynamic models offered by modern Vietnam & China in the context of the General Secretary of the Communist Party of Vietnam & President of Vietnam T\u00f4 L\u00e2m\u2019s recent visit to Colombo:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018Vietnam did not conduct shock therapy or<\/p>\n\n\n\n

wholesale privatisation \u2013 it instead conducted<\/p>\n\n\n\n

a very deliberate process of selective FDI with<\/p>\n\n\n\n

technology transfer, industrial clustering,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

& development banking\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He reasserts:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018Sri Lanka\u2019s real problem is that it does not<\/p>\n\n\n\n

have a plan for itself, even as regional &<\/p>\n\n\n\n

global hegemons integrate us into their plans\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

(see ee Focus<\/em><\/strong>)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2022 Trillions & billions and profits & assets galore greet every reader of any business news in Sri Lanka. The bankers lounge in ecstasies. Some of their employees, feeling perhaps left out of the fun, have sought to make a few under-the-table withdrawals by hook & by crook. Why not?  Criminals only have Sinhala village names in the media. Yet people are dying while the banks are making a killing. And how are banks doing it? By investing in real production?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018In a functioning market, high bank profitability should<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

signal efficient intermediation, savings being channelled<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

productively into investment, employment, & growth\u2019<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

No way.<\/em> Welcome to the Octopus who squeezes you, the Leech who sucks you dry & the Snake who swallows up your very being.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018In 2023 alone, over 1,750 properties belonging to SMEs<\/p>\n\n\n\n

were auctioned under the law. These were not abstract<\/p>\n\n\n\n

balance sheet entries. They were factories, workshops,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

warehouses, family homes pledged as collateral,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

& the accumulated savings of a lifetime.\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The International Monetary Fund drives this highway robbery:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The IMF has called for the reinstatement of<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

parate execution<\/em><\/strong>, warning that prolonged suspension hinders<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

banks\u2019 ability to manage non-performing loans & price credit<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

risks, potentially destabilizing the financial system. The IMF\u2019s<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

concern is legitimate in principle but perverse in practice<\/strong>.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

So writes CA Saliya in his perplexing disclosures on how Sri Lanka\u2019s banks are basking in a bubbly bacchanal, while the nation starves (see ee Focus<\/em><\/strong>). He does not blame \u2018borrower profligacy\u2019. He lays his sights on internal policies: high interest rates (Hullo Central Bank?)  and mechanisms that \u2018destroy the very collateral value it claims to protect\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018Until World War 2 there were legal sanctions against<\/p>\n\n\n\n

tea growing by Africans just as in Sri Lanka,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

during the early years of the 20th<\/sup> century, village headmen<\/p>\n\n\n\n

were instructed to destroy rubber trees planted by the peasants.\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2022 The economic system of Sri Lanka, as framed by its ruling import-export plantation economy<\/strong>, is neither modern, nor industrial. This week\u2019s ee Focus<\/em><\/strong> offers a complex & intricate excerpt of SBD de Silva\u2019s classic The<\/em> Political Economy of Underdevelopment, <\/em>Chapter 10. SB counters the scholarly assertions about the management deficiency of peasants (which if there ever was, has been due to a lack of investment). He seeks to show:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018That plantation crops could have been grown on smallholdings<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

as cheaply & effectively as on the plantations<\/strong> themselves, but<\/p>\n\n\n\n

that the plantation interests together with the colonial state<\/p>\n\n\n\n

actively impeded the development of smallholdings.\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Using the \u2018monopolistic practices of traders\u2019 and deploying \u2018legal-institutional barriers\u2019, colonialism discouraged smallholdings, fearing they would \u2018divert labour from estates\u2019. They also aimed to push peasants towards less-remunerative farming, even as Kenya\u2019s smallholders have produced comparative yields. Whereas each tea estate in Sri Lanka likes to boast its own factory, Kenya also has large cooperative factories<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     SBD challenged the notion that these estate plantation crops in Sri Lanka could even be regarded as industrial activity. They have limited the use of estate machinery to processing rather than for increasing the skills & productivity of the much more numerous labor used for fieldwork. The greater efficiency of larger plantation holdings is & was a myth<\/strong>. SBD concludes: There has been \u2018no compelling reason for combining cultivation & processing under the same management\u2019. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2022 Why is the USA so psychotically focused on strangling Cuba<\/strong> so as to grab it? The richest & most powerful country in the world seeks to undermine a proud nation 90 times smaller in size, with a population 30 times less. Socialist Cuba offers its people, better healthcare & education. Indeed, it can be reasserted, Cuba poses the threat of a good example<\/strong>. The USA have sought, by mass murder & bribery to prevent the rest of the Caribbean & the Americas from following Cuba\u2019s example.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     This ee Focus <\/em><\/strong>concludes Prince Kapone\u2019s response to such questions as: \u2018Has socialism failed?<\/em><\/strong>\u2019 He simply answers: \u2018The first task\u2026 is not to answer the question. It is to reject it<\/strong>.\u2019 Rather, the first tactical manoeuvre is to restore \u2018scale, context & proportion\u2019 to any discussion. His argument is that \u2018the real question is whether it works\u2019, and then to define what a \u2018working\u2019 socialist society actually means<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     Socialism\u2019s record, in practice, comes from material life \u2013 \u2018food, housing, education, healthcare, industrial capacity, life expectancy, literacy, social infrastructure\u2019. This is undeniable. Kapone also points out: socialist countries arose not out of \u2018a seminar hall\u2019 but from \u2018world war, civil war, economic collapse, & foreign invasion, counter-revolution, prolonged encirclement, blockade & subversion, wars against colonial & imperial armies, countering the crimes and deficiencies of capitalism. Compare the riches of Europe & their settler colonial states \u2013 to watch what is happening in Cuba, in Gaza, the frozen wars surrounding China, is to watch their newest re-enactments of an over 500-year-long history genocide & enslavement.  In truth, they are also rewinding Sri Lanka\u2019s own history of invasion & destruction & continuing siege before our eyes\u2026Viva Cuba! Jayaveyvaa Lanka!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As the USA strives to escalate wars of the world, the need for our countries to unite<\/strong> grows more pressing day by day. The US-commanded military clique has expanded into almost all of Eastern Europe since the 1990s, and fully colonized Western Europe \u2013 most evident in their genuflection at the USA\u2019s terrorism against Russia & Iran, which has damaged Europe\u2019s economy as well. Thus, ee Focus<\/em><\/strong> also continues the Tricontinental Institute (TI)\u2019s intricate elaboration of \u2018Hyper-Imperialism<\/strong>: a Dangerous Decadent New Stage\u2019 (see ee Focus<\/em><\/strong>). TI lists the USA\u2019s abandonment of nuclear arms-control treaties, as well as compares national war budgets (\u2018the USA controls\u2026 an astounding 74.3% of all military spending worldwide<\/strong>\u2019<\/strong>) and overseas military bases, which directly threaten Asian, African & independent American countries \u2013 \u2018especially\u2026 the darker nations of the<\/strong> world<\/strong>\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Advertisement<\/p>\n\n\n\n

https:\/\/edge.aditude.io\/safeframe\/1-1-1\/html\/container.html<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Privacy Settings<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u2018Joint Apparel Association Forum (JAAF) said the country\u2019s focus<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

should be on maintaining confidence, avoiding speculation &<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

supporting industries that generate foreign exchange\u2019<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2013 see ee Industry<\/em><\/strong>, JAAF says Rupee Depreciation<\/p>\n\n\n\n

driven by global pressures, not economic decline<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2022 So there it is: JAAF<\/strong>, one the foremost hoarders abroad of dollars, earned from sweating Sri Lankan labor, is stashed outside the country. The latest merchant media game is to blame only \u2018external shock, not domestic excess<\/em>\u2019, whatever that means. \u2018Domestic excess\u2019 if any, is to be reserved for the Rajapakses, Sinhala Buddhists, and other \u2018authoritarians\u2019. The merchant media<\/strong> which has made an \u2018industry\u2019 out of wailing about corruption<\/em>, is in fact, the most corrupt<\/strong>. They scream about retail corruption but in fact cover up the greatest wholesale swindles (which also include their owners & soap-sodden sponsors).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     The rag swindlers and tour operators and labor traffickers are only superseded by such multinational banks and corporations (MNCs) as Standard Chartered, Citibank, HSBC, Ceylon Tobacco (CC) & Unilever, with their transfer-pricing tricks. JAAF declares that conjuring optimism is what a supine media should be all about \u2013 \u2018maintaining confidence\u2019, avoiding \u2018speculation\u2019. We are sure they don\u2019t <\/em>mean avoiding speculation in real-estate (land)! They mean investing hope, sweat, and rupees in the import-export plantation fraud. These labor-intensive rag traders are also like the plantation traders & tourist shills. They are not industries. If the country was turned into one great garment workshop, one great estate, one great hotel, there would be no need for schools or universities. Because they\u2019d only need seamstresses, tea-leaf pickers & rubber tappers & coconut grabbers & bedmakers, floor sweepers & tea pourers. Why are they so afraid of industrialization? It is simple. Why has much of North America & Europe de-industrialized? They fear the power of a national proletariat. Real industrial trade unions. This is why much of Sri Lanka\u2019s & India\u2019s workforce is atomized & fragmented & \u2019informalized\u2019. The merchant fear of an organized working class has led to the enfeebling of nations. Hence, unless the current glooming wakes us up & unites us, we are doomed to continue failing to unite as a people with the countries that matter most in this world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Read the main media in Sri Lanka and you will only learn of the great things merchants & moneylender are up to! The companies proclaim, and the master\u2019s voices amplify their claims in \u2018breaking news\u2019<\/em> & bold headlines.  They are big on green<\/em><\/strong> this & that, renewables<\/em><\/strong> & saving elephants & rare creatures<\/em>. But in truth, they fear the growth of an energy secure & self-sufficient Sri Lanka. Their pesticidal \u2018green revolution<\/em>\u2019, which is more like a homicidal white revolution<\/em>, only exists to postpone a worker & peasant-led red revolution\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As the moon unveils its naked shining at its fullest, we approach the birth of the Buddha who brought enlightenment to a world trammeled by brahmins & patricidal kings. The 2026 \u2018Yala\u2019 cultivation season has also begun. Paddy broad-casting is now in full sway. Those who promised to resurrect the great irrigation systems are yet to revive the solidarity these ancient hydraulic innovations once engendered. Now, only paddy prices have not been increased. With the state abdicating its primary role for food security, cultivators have to source fuel, fertilizers,<\/strong> pesticides<\/strong>, & tractors<\/strong> from private importer middlemen<\/strong>, who have also hiked transport charges, shipping costs, and packaging charges. The prices of food are being hiked. Will the wages of human labor also rise? Farm workers are sporadically employed due to the uneven nature of labor application in rice cultivation, and therefore need higher wages. These issues can only be resolved through rural industrialization. Such are the lessons, SBD de Silva tried to teach us. Such are the most vital lessons, yet to be learned by our leaders, even those who claim to be from the very villages they claim to represent\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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________<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Contents:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Japan & India Have Some Caste Lessons for Sri Lanka<\/a><\/blockquote>