Morning
Spice by Ginger
Many citizens do not care for each otherNow the talk goes
round that many a fellow citizen does not care a damn what happens to the neighbour in
this high wall era. The reason could be that neighbours cut themselves off from each other
with the trend not to have much association with each other. In a sense, it is a good
thing as there is no case of my mustard your sauce and neighbours inflicting themselves on
each other. But at the sametime, there is a certain callousness that sets in on each
other. Recently, a friend of Gingers who lives in the more exclusive climes of Colombo 7
had such an experience.
Suddenly she found herself in darkness. At first she did not have lights in the house.
She possibly thought this was due to one of the usual breakdowns and did not worry unduly.
Then when the lights did not come on for more than a couple of hours, she felt things were
getting out of hand and tried to find out what was happening. Some houses had lights and
others did not and her lights came on at 4.30 a.m. In the meantime, it was not possible to
asceertain the reason till the next day when it was discovered that someone was building a
new house and he was getting some kind of connection. Should that individual not have
informed those concerned and apologised for the inconvienced. Such forms of common
courtesy do not seem to strike the citizen these days.
Reduce spirit of cricket fans
Rupavahni certainly knows how to rub salt into a wound. Here we were cursing the rain
that was surely lessening our chances of winning the third Test and salvaging some of our
cricketing prestige. Now somebody at Rupavahini decided to rub our faces in the dust a
little more after the Pakistanis had already done that.
When the covers were on and there was time to kill, some bright spark decided to give
us a repeat telecast of the second test at Galle where we got one of our worst thrashings
in recent times. It was certainly more than a little depressing. It would have been better
to show a replay of a match in which we fared a little better at least to buoy the spirits
of our cricket fans.
King of cha-cha - beat
One does not know how big his heart was. It may have been enlarged though as he died of
complications that followed a heart operation. Tita Perenta created quite a sensation in
the fifties when he was the king of the cha-cha-beat. Americans just went ga-ga over him.
He died recently at the age of seventy seven. He was later known for his involvement
with Afrocuban rhythms and of being one of the pioneers who created the Salso. He had
produced over sixty albums during a career that lasted over five decades.
The SLAAS seminar on ethnic
conflict
The SLAAS seminar on the ethnic conflict brought together the views specially of the
Sinhala intelligentsia. The shortcoming of this seminar was the inadequacy of the Tamil
views. Too many presentations resulted in lack of time for completing them and absence of
question and answer sessions. Therefore the presentations would have to be best treated as
private opinions on which no firm conclusions could be drawn on. The seminar had
deliberately avoided the question of a solution and therefore the change of constitution
considered necessary for solution was out of order.
Yet this seminar brought out some important observations and the most important being
that: 1, The Sinhala intellegentsia was firmly against considering the Eastern Province as
a specific homeland for any specific group of people. 2. That the preference was that the
entire land be considered the homeland for all the inhabitants 3. On the issue of the
Northern province, a reluctance to express an opinion.
The presentations of Mr. Siran Deraniyagala, the Commissioner General of Archaeology,
of Mr. Dennis N. Fernando Fellow of the National Academy of Sciences and of Dr. Nalin de
Silva, Secretary Chintana Pashadaya would play an important role in the perception of the
Historic Dimension of the conflict which seems to have a great bearing on the conflict.
Dr. Siran Deraniyagala stated that Lanka was land connected to India due to drop of sea
levels till recently as 5000 BC or 5000 years ago and he further stated that the genetic
relationship of the people would determined by DNA test sampling. He further stated that
the Anaruradhapura excavations show occupation up to 800BC.
Mr. Dennis N. Fernando in his Presentation stated that they Hydraulic technology in
Lanka predated the Aryan colonisation of Lanka and that this was the Technology of the
yakkhas and that the yakkha and the Naga culture had spread from Persia and red sea, the
shipping trade. He further stated that the Eastern province was part of the Kandyan
Kingdom which the Dutch obtained on treaty with the court of Kandy which was later
abrogated as the Dutch did not keep to the terms of the Treaty. Further abbrogated as the
Dutch did not keep to the terms of the Treaty. he stated that a vast migration of Tamil
people occurred in the Portuguese and Dutch times from India to Jaffna to grow tobacco and
their law, the Thesawalami was accepted by the Dutch as the law in the Jaffna area.
Dr. Nalin de Silva stated the Aryan preceded the Dravidian in India quoting Nilkantha
Shasthri as his source and that the Tamil culture having a great antiquity in India as
incorrect and he stated that the Sinhala was a fusion of the Yakkho people of Lanka with
the Aryan.
Dr. C. M. Madduma Bandara of the University of Peradeniya presented an interesting
proposal of dividing the regions based on river basins rather on community which also does
not alter the boundaries of the Northern province while providing a sea coast to all
provinces.
Prof. Tissa Witharana in his presentation stated that it is first essential to set up
the conditions for peace and that wide devolutionary power must be considered as
essential. To a question on why devolution should be equated to a non unitary, state he
stated that Mr. Batty Weerakoon, lawyer and leader of the party had said that devolution
was possible within a unitary framework and that these matters are being discussed at the
talks on the proposal constitutional reforms.
Prof. Carlo Fonseka in his presentation apologised for some of this writings on the
Mahawansa as he had written with insufficient verification which since he has been
enlightened on and he indicated that it is better to base firm conclusions on the
empirical rather than on the speculative.
It is only multi disciplinary bodies like the SLAAS that can take a political stand and
also has the capacity to mobilise the intelligentsia and the professionals who could work
out the appropriate solutions as guidelines for the politicians to take decisions.
Such guidelines could help the politicians in their decisions, who otherwise would only
be guided by the pressure of popularity hunting in order to win elections. Hopefully, the
SLAAs could conduct in the near future seminars on the original settlers and on a
political solution based on the balanced view of the Sinhala and the Tamil.
A. C. de Almeida
Paiyagoda
Colour blind drivers
Some drivers of Sports Utility Vehicles the so called SUV’s known in the West as
SOB’s must be colour blind the way they run red lights. Barely a week ago, at high
noon, I was in a line of traffic awaiting the green light to proceed towards the
parliament. At the top of the line was a lady driver with two children on the rear seat.
When she was about to move after the green light, another travelling at high speed
coming from Kanatte towards Borella ran the red light. Where are all the traffic
policemen? I was sandbagged for cycling abreast at Thurstan Road at high noon.
another hazard is the hump across the road, the so called sleeping policeman. Some are
so savage they are no better than the Beechers Brook at Aintree. With all the savagery the
perception of risk is so overwhelming one is fearful of driving on the roads in case
things happen beyond your control.
This undercurrent of lawlessness and indifference also comes out in many other ways.
Punks with their heavy metal bands carry on regardless oblivious to the fact that there is
a power crisis and a brutal war.
Their mindless rackets on floodlit stages in public places go on till the wee hours in
the morning with hardly a wimper from the authorities. Trying to purge the stench of
incompetence and lawlessness in the Democratic Socialist Republic is to invite madness and
despair.
Ephrem Fernando
Colombo 4
A reply to E. A.
V. Naganathan
Racial and ethnic problems
Mr. E. A. V. Naganathan, in his letter published in "The Island" of June 8
had, as usual, resorted to racial rhetorics and in the process, had made use of
half-truths, in a vain attempt to press his point, though unsuccessfully.
Sri Lanka had been inhabited 500,000 years ago whilst stone culture had its beginnings
around 10,000 B.C. and the Balangoda culture coming to the fore around 5000 B.C. Those
inhabitants were neither Aryans or Dravidians.
A part of South India, in ancient times, was called ‘Dravida’ and inhabitants
of that part of the country apparently came to be called Dravidians. The Dravidian
languages such as Tamil, Telegu and Kanarese were the main languages throughout the Indian
Sub-continent before the arrival of Aryans originating from the Iranian Plateau and who
spoke Indo-Aryan languages. They settled down in the northern part of India.
In the 5th Century B.C. , Vijaya, who was banished from Sinhapura, a Kingdom of North
India, landed in Lanka with 700 of his followers. They were of Aryan origin. Vijaya came
to marry Kuveni, a local woman and his followers too would have done the same. It is also
said that they got down North Indian women to be their partners. The word Sinhalaya would
have emerged after the arrival of Vijaga and his followers from Sinhapura. Those North
Indian immigrants and the local inhabitants, with the passage of time, inter married, and
as a result pure blooded Aryans ceased to exist.
The Dravidians came to Sri Lanka later on as merchants and conquerors. Some of them
stayed on and mixed with the locals. Hence those Dravidians who came here ceased to be
pure blooded Dravidians.
The Sinhala language is a blend of Sanskrit, Pali and the language of the early
inhabitants. Sinhala, no doubt, is not as ancient a language as Tamil as much as Hindi is
not as old as Tamil.
Mr. Naganathan has contended that Rajasinghe II wrote to his brothers and the French in
Tamil and that has said, proves that Tamil was the language of all state correspondence.
It is history that there were Tamil Kings, who of course embraced Buddhism and were
Lankan, whom the Sinhala majority accepted as their King. On the other hand, meeting Mr.
Naganathan’s argument that Rajasinghe II wrote in Tamil, doesn’t Mr. Naganathan
correspond with his children, relatives and friends in English? Does that mean that
English is the language of state correspondence meaning that English is the state language
? A person of Mr. Naganathan’s calibre may hundred years later quote that and say
that English was used because English was the state language. The fact that we at present
use English for state correspondence can germinate such wrong theories!
Whatever it may be, quoting or misquoting history does not make sense over the present
impasse. We have in this country two distinct categories of people - Sinhala speaking and
Tamil speaking. Sinhala speaking people are in the majority. The problem is that an
extremist minority among the Tamil minority does not want to accept that reality. The
conflict originates there which of course is fuelled by the extremist minority among the
Sinhala majority.
If not for the politicians who took short-cuts to political power sowing seeds of
divisive tendencies, we would not have faced the tragic situation we are facing today.
Then again the politicians - both Sinhala and Tamil - who failed to cease opportunities
that came their way to solve the crisis should also take their share of blame.
I therefore appeal to Mr. Naganathan not to misquote history.
Upali S. Jayasekera
Colombo 4
Ombudsman
RMV to set a world record?
I applied for a duplicate driving licence to the Commissioner of Motor Traffic on 1st
February, 1996 under the registered cover No. 5495, as I lost my original one. To prove
that my original licence was lost, I did a complaint at the Ambalangoda Police Station and
a copy of that too was annexed to my application.
Thereafter, I sent a reminder to the personal name of Mr. Mathew Perera, Deputy
Commissioner of Motor Traffic on 6th January, 1999, as he requested the listeners of a
radio programme to send details to his personal address, in cases of delayed driving
licences, so that he would take action to rectify the matters in no time.
But up-to date, I have not got my duplicate driving licence and I am compelled to have
in my possession a copy of the complaint, I made to the police if and when they happen to
check my driving licence. But the police told me in 1996, that the copy of the complaint
is not legally accepted as a duplicate driving licence and it is my responsibility to have
a driving licence in possession when driving. Luckily for me no police officer has stopped
me, up-to-date.
Would any of the readers of ‘The Island’ inform me how to get it, please.
Lalaji Manawadu
Ambalangoda |
