Janaka Perera

As Sri Lanka marks the 70^th Anniversary of the British departure from her shores on February 4 we wonder whether we have paved the way for the emergence over the decades of corrupt and blundering rulers from among our own politicians to replace the old colonial masters, in the name of independence and democracy.

To cap it all we have seen the failure of our supposedly national leaders to get rid of their slavish colonial mentality for the past 20 years. The first display of this servility was inviting England’s Prince Charles as the chief guest at our 50^th ‘independence’ anniversary celebrations – 26 years after we became a republic. Thereafter an attempt was made to celebrate the 500^th Anniversary of the arrival of the Portuguese in the country. Fortunately, the government which planned the celebrations lost the Parliamentary election of 2005.

Now our leaders have invited another member of the British royalty, Prince Edward as the chief guest at the February 4^th event. Why could not our rulers invite the head of state of a neighbouring country for this?  If they wanted royalty to grace the occasion why could not they invite a member of the Thai or Bhutanese royal family? Merely because Sri Lanka is a member of the Commonwealth she is not bound to invite a member of the British royalty.

It is in this context we need to discuss the ‘meaning’ of Sunday’s celebrations.

Without understanding the different periods of European occupations this country since 1505 we can never understand the struggle against colonialism, which culminated with the fall of the Kandyan kingdom in 1815.

All the foreign invasions prior to the Portuguese encounter caused mainly physical and material destruction and political upheavals. There were no vast differences between the religious cultures, traditions and values of the invaders and those of the people of this country.

The entry of European adventurers to Asia changed all that. In addition to the loss of life and property it had a destructive impact on all spiritual beliefs and knowledge the conquered peoples had inherited from their ancestors. Sri Lankans were no exception. They were subjected to brainwashing by the colonialists in a way that no non-European invader did. (This servility is still reflected in many Sinhalas who have become ignorant of their roots including language)

We cannot see the true picture of this without demolishing the myth of the bloodless struggle for independence.”  This was spread by ‘Uncle Toms’ who wanted to indirectly create the impression that the real freedom fighters were those who campaigned for constitutional reforms and convinced the British to give the country dominion status (supposedly independent but still attached to the British crown under which foreign policy was executed).

These slavish leaders hardly paid attention neither to the blood sacrifices of our forefathers up to 1848 nor to the fact that the country gradually began losing its independence and identity 300 years before the British the occupation.

Our true independence struggle began with the arrival of European armies, starting with the Portuguese. Veediya Bandara, Seethawaka Rajasinghe (Rajasinghe I), Vimaladharmasuriya I and Rajasinghe II were among the pioneers who led that armed struggle.  Thanks to their efforts we were able to preserve our national and cultural identity to a considerable extent though our country eventually capitulated to the British, primarily due to the treachery and stupidity of some members of the Kandyan aristocracy.

If not for the aforementioned heroes this island would have ended up like the former Spanish colony, Philippines – an Asian aberration – almost totally uprooted from its Asian cultural roots.  In fact that is what Sinhala traitors like Don Juan Dharmapala (who willed his kingdom to the King of Portugal) wanted Sri Lanka to become.

The second stage of our freedom campaign began after the fall of the Kandyan kingdom.  In the two armed uprisings of 1818 and 1848 patriots like Monarawila Keppettipola, Puran Appu and Gongalegoda Banda sacrificed their lives fighting against British imperialism.

After 1848 their mantle was taken up by personalities like Ven. Miggettuwatte Gunananda, Walisnghe Harischandra and Anagarika Dharmapala on a cultural level, spearheading a strong movement for revival of Buddhist rights and values.

Politically however there was neither violent nor non-violent freedom struggles (like the civil disobedience campaigns of Mahathma Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr.) though some leaders were imprisoned by the British merely on suspicion during the communal riots of 1915.

The situation was different in the neighbouring subcontinent, where the British established ‘India’ (later to break up into three nations). From the anti-British Indian (sepoy) mutiny which broke out in 1857 to the time the British gave up the colony in 1947 the country experienced both armed struggles and non-violent civil disobedience campaigns causing much bloodshed and executions of freedom fighters. The last of these uprisings was the Royal Indian Navy mutiny of 1946.

However most of these campaigns did not cause noticeable cracks in Britain’s Empire on which ‘the sun never set.’   It was external factors that really forced the British to change their minds (these are hardly taught in Sri Lankan history books)

The event that heralded the beginning of the end of British imperialism, sooner than expected was the outbreak of war between Britain and Germany on September 3, 1939. Two years later it became World War II with Japan’s entry to the conflict following her attack on the American naval fleet in Pearl Harbour.

The national leaders of India and Myanmar decided to exploit the situation to the maximum.  According to the late Indian author Kushwant Singh the dilemma the Indians faced at the time was whether to give their unstinted support to Britain in the war and pressure the British to give independence afterwards or to first declare independence (the Quit India movement) and then offer support to the British.  The latter could not afford to face the war without Indian support. At the time it also meant the support of those in today’s Pakistan and Bangladesh.  Soldiers belonging to various ethnic groups in the British-Indian Army were fighting in the Middle-East, Europe and Asia.

Elsewhere Indian (Bengali) nationalist Subhas Chandra Bose and Myanmar’s General Aung San (father of Aung San Suu Kyi) had formed armies with Japanese support to fight the British. (Japan’s early successes in the war shattered the myth of the white man’s superiority over the ‘coloured’ races).

All these developments weakened Britain’s hold on the colonies and drained her economy despite the eventual defeat of the Axis Powers, Germany, Italy and Japan in the war. Consequently, the British were no longer in a position to maintain her Asian empire.

When they lost the Indian subcontinent (their ‘jewel in the crown’) there was little purpose in keeping Sri Lanka as a colony.

However since 1983 the island has been opened once again to foreign meddling, this time by the so-called international community, which includes our last colonial master. With a set of cowardly rulers at the helm the process will no doubt be accelerated.