This refers to the letter of Mr. C. B. Punchibandara which appeared in "The Island" on 8th December 2008. In the opening paragraph Punchibandara says "The statement Dr. Colvin R. De Silva is supposed to have made...." He was not certain but chose to make conclusions on the famous comment made by Colvin on the language issue "two languages one nation one language two nations."

Punchibandara’s position was that there had been a change in Colvin’s line of thinking on the language issue subsequently. Let us see who is ignorant of facts.

The assertion that Punchibandara made in the following paragraph is correct.

That is Colvin was the Chief Architect of the 1st Republican Constitution. The word chief implies that there was more than one person involved in the process of constitution making. In this instance it was the Constituent Assembly consisting of members of Parliament which went through the basic resolutions and finally adopted the 1972 constitution. The TULF left the CA when their proposal to divide the country into five regions of which three were to have a Tamil majority was rejected by Colvin. Referring to this proposal Colvin remarked that he defused the Dynamite. If not it would have led to another round of bloodshed wrecking the constitution making process itself.

Merits and demerits of the provisions in the chapter on language in the constitution can’t be discussed in isolation without understanding the politics of the day. The 1970 period was dominated by SLFP politics. It reflected the politics of Sinhala Buddhist electorate. This was the position whether one likes it or not. According to Colvin’s terminology a constitution reflects the existing class relations. At the General Elections held in May 1970 even though the SLFP faced the Elections as a constituent partner of the United Front it alone obtained a clear 2/3 Majority in Parliament. Jubilant Samasamaja youth leaguers who went in demonstrations to Bernard’s residence got a shock when they saw that Bernard was not in a happy mood. Analysing the results Bernard told them that there was a move to form a Government by the SLFP without the left partners and not to expect much even if a Cabinet was formed with the LSSP and CP as the results had weakened the bargaining power of the left.

By 1972, the Sinhala only Act and the Tamil language (special provisions) Act were in force for more than 10 years without being challenged successfully in courts. In the circumstances Colvin did the maximum by incorporating them in the Constitution and strengthened the force of the two laws. What was wrong in it? Can this be interpreted as a change in Colvin’s line of thinking on the language issue?

If Punchibandara’s contention is correct we can go back to 1963 the year the ULF was formed with MEP and CP and claim that Colvin changed his stance in 1963. What is the logic behind this argument? The LSSP was aware of Mr. Philip Gunawardhana’s stand on the language policy. He was vociferous that Sinhala only Act should be implemented in the Northern & Eastern provinces despite the resistance of the FP. In spite of his chauvinistic attitude the LSSP believed that such an alliance would be beneficial for the common good of the people and decided to join hands with the MEP and CP. The main objective was to push the country towards socialism. In this connection it must be remembered that the Sinhala only draft bill had a clause for the use of Tamil language as well. This was the result of the representations made by Tamil public servants to Mr. S.W.R.D. Bandaranaike. However it was dropped at the pre enactment stage due to the fast started by Mr. F. R. Jayasooriya in the precinct of Parliament. Later, Bandaranaike himself admitted that dropping that clause was a mistake in his speech in Parliament introducing the Tamil Language (special provisions) bill in 1958. By then the damage was done. I hope Punchibandara will not repeat his argument ad nauseam.