Courtesy Adaderana

The World Bank says it is ready to provide emergency support to Sri Lanka and protect the vulnerable people amidst the unprecedented economic crisis in the country.

World Bank Vice President for South Asia Hartwig Schafer said he held talks with Sri Lankan Finance Minister Ali Sabry and Governor of the Central Bank Dr. Nandalal Weerasinghe in Washington on Tuesday (19).

He said they discussed actions to address the economic crisis, support stabilization and recovery, and protect the vulnerable people in Sri Lanka.

He also said the World Bank is deeply concerned about the impacts of the crisis on the poor and vulnerable and stand ready to provide emergency support for essential medicines and health-related supplies, nutrition, and education.

Had a good meeting today with Sri Lanka’s Finance Minister Ali Sabry and CBSL Governor Weerasinghe, discussed actions to address the economic crisis, support stabilization and recovery, and protect the vulnerable people.”

We at the World Bank are deeply concerned about the impacts of the crisis on the poor and vulnerable and stand ready to provide emergency support for essential medicines and health-related supplies, nutrition, and education,” he tweeted. 

Finance Minister Sabry and a delegation including the CBSL governor and the Finance Secretary are in the US for the annual spring meetings of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank.
 
The Finance Minister also had talks with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and India’s Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman in Washington on Monday.

Had a good meeting today with #SriLanka’s Finance Minister Ali Sabry and @CBSL Governor Weerasinghe, discussed actions to address the economic crisis, support stabilization and recovery, and protect the vulnerable people.

[1/2] pic.twitter.com/l40MJeGOjQ— Hartwig Schafer (@HartwigSchafer) April 19, 2022

Courtesy Adaderana

Sri Lanka Police says that a special team of 20 police officers has been appointed under the IGP’s instructions to investigate yesterday’s incident at Rambukkana, which resulted in the death of a protester and left several others injured. 

Senior Police Spokesman SDIG Ajith Rohana stated this during a press briefing held today (20) to brief on the progress of the investigation regarding the incident.

He said that a special police team has been appointed by the Senior DIG in charge of Sabaragamuwa Province, on the instruction of the IGP, in order to conduct investigations. 

He said the team consists of one SSP, three ASPs and in addition to that another 16 police officers. 

Altogether, 20 police officers are in the team and the team is headed by SSP Wasantha Kandewatte, the SSP and division in charge of Seethawakapura-Awissawella police division, he said.

In addition to that, he said that police has submitted a report to the Kegalle Magistrate’s Court in terms of the provisions of the Section 22 of the Criminal Procedure Code in order to conduct an inquest in respect of the dead body, in terms of the provisions of Chapter 30 of the Criminal Procedure Code.

According to the police officers who participated in the operation, they had made their notes and the notes state that they used reasonable force according to the law in terms of the provisions of Sections 89 to 99 of the Penal Code. In addition to that, Section 107 of the Criminal Procedure Code, Section 56 of the Police Ordinance and in addition to that in terms of the provisions of the Chapter 08 of the Criminal Procedure Code.”

In addition to that, we are recording statements from the injured persons.” Senior DIG Ajith Rohana said there are 13 injured persons who had been admitted to hospitals and apart from that, 20 police officers have also been injured in the incident. 

He said a Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP), an Assistant Superintendent of Police (ASP), a Sub-Inspector (SI), an Inspector (IP), 06 Sergeants and 10 Police Constables are among them.

We are conducting further investigations and the investigations are conducted in a transparent manner and the investigative team has been instructed to record all the statements of persons involved,” he said.

In addition to that, they have been further instructed to collect scientific, technical and circumstantial evidence in respect for the incident, he said. 

In addition to that, we have made a request from the court to make an order to the Government Analyst to visit the scene and give his opinion in respect of the circumstances of the scene.” 

We are conducting further investigations and after the magisterial inquest, the court will deliver a verdict. According to the verdict police are going to take actions,” SDIG Rohana added. 

Responding to questions, he said that the investigating team has directed its special attention towards the property damages that had occurred during the protest. He stated that public property, private property and property belonging to certain institutions have been damaged and that these damages will be estimated and necessary measures taken.  

He also said that one suspect has been arrested in this connection. 

He also requested the people of the Rambukkana area to act in a peaceful manner and assured that investigations are proceeding.  

Courtesy Hiru News

World Bank’s Vice President for the South Asia Region Hartwig Schafer states that he met Finance Minister Ali Sabry and CBSL Governor Nandalal Weerasinghe and discussed actions to address the economic crisis, support stabilization and recovery, and protect the vulnerable people in Sri Lanka

Courtesy Hiru News

Sri Lanka’s government Treasury Bill yields increased to 24.36% at the auction today (20).

Rs 97.5 billion was offered by CBSL and Rs 48 billion was accepted.

The weighted average yield Rate was 23.21 % for 91 days 24.77% for 182 days and & 24.36% for 364 day Treasury bills.

Dr Sudath Gunasekara Maahnuwara

This puzzle came to my mind as I was going through the list of Cabinet and State Ministries published yesterday. Having seen the overlapping and confusion found in the previous lists of Ministries, I was expecting some improvement at least this time. But it was even more disgusting and appalling to see they have repeated the same blunders they did in the past, in naming the new Ministries. I can understand the President making those mistakes as he had no experience or the knowhow in making such lists in the past. He can always take cover under the pretext that it was not he who made it and he had only to sing the list prepared by his secretary. True but surely, he should have the common sense to go through it and see whether it is scientific” as he promised at the elections.

The big question that came to my mind was how can a man who cannot make a proper classification of state functions to be given to his ministers for which he alone has the responsibility to select the correct individuals as Ministers to be in charge of those Ministries. True it is the onerous responsibility of his secretary to do that job. But ultimately it is the man who sign it, on whom the responsibility comes.

Shouldn’t there be a scientific or functional criteria in allocating functions to each ministry. That is what you call scientific.

The next question I have been trying to understand is the difference between a cabinet minister and the state minister. As far as I know there is no provision in the Constitution for the appointment of State Ministers.

Sec 46 of the Constitution provides only for the appointment of Deputy Ministers who are only deputies to Cabinet Ministers appointed to assist the cabinet minister. The idea of having a Deputy I think was to get him trained under a senior, to act in his absence and also replace him if it becomes vacant due to the removal, resignation or his death, so that the smooth continuity of the functions of the ministry will be ensured without any disruption

From what I came to know these State ministers under the present Government are independent. They don’t come under any cabinet minister. I think this is a device invented by Gotabhaya to build up his own team bypassing the old hands of Mahinda. The list of ministers appointed yesterday proves my point. I do not know how they submit cabinet papers on their subjects since submitting cabinet papers is a function of cabinet ministers

This designation of State Minister was originally coined by JR to accommodate Ananda Tissa De Alwis in the cabinet as there was no cabinet portfolio to be given to him as a cabinet minister. Premadasa his successor also had few State ministers outside the cabinet. Ananda, though he was called State Minister was a member of the cabinet as such he had no problem in submitting cabinet papers.

But in the present context where they are not cabinet ministers, I really don’t know how they get cabinet papers connected with their subjects approved by the cabinet

The present cabinet has no minister for cultural Affairs and Industries but there is a state minister for each. Also there is no cabinet minister for Ayurveda. What is even worse is there is no cabinet or state minster for Lands. This clearly shows how confusing and silly these classifications are. I am wondering as to what the presidents Secretary and Chief Advisor are doing. If I were the president, by now, both of them would have been sacked for making me a big joker in the eyes of the public

I am attaching herewith the lists of new Cabinet ministers and State Ministers, so that my reader can verify the veracity of what I have said here.

New Cabinet

1. Dinesh Gunawardena – Public Administration, Internal Affairs, Provincial Councils & Local Government.

2. Douglas Devananda – Fisheries

3. Dr. Ramesh Pathirana – Education and Plantation Industries

4. Prasanna Ranatunga – Public Security & Tourism

5. Dilum Amunugama – Transport & Industries

6. Kanaka Herath – Highways

7. Vidura Wickramanayake – Labour

8. Janaka Wakkumbura – Agriculture & Irrigation

9. Shehan Semasinghe – Trade & Samurdhi Development

10. Mohan Priyadarshana De Silva – Water Supply

11. Wimalaweera Dissanayake – Wildlife & Forest Resources Conservation

12. Kanchana Wijesekera – Power & Energy

13. Thenuka Vidanagamage -Sports and Youth Affairs

14. Dr. Nalaka Godahewa – Media

15. Professor Channa Jayasumana – Health

16. Naseer Ahamed – Environment

17. Pramitha Bandara Tennakoon – Ports and Shipping

:

State Ministers

 1   Prof. G.L. Peiris – State Minister of Defence

 2   Rohana Dissanayake – State Minister of Provincial Councils and Local Government

 3   Arundika Fernando – State Minister of Plantation Industries

  4  Lohan Ratwatte – State Minister of Urban Development

  5  Tharaka Balasuriya – State Minister of Foreign Affairs

  6  Indika Anuruddha – State Minister of Housing

  7  Sanath Nishantha – State Minister of Water Supply

   8 Siripala Gamlath – State Minister of Mahaweli

   9 Anuradha Jayaratne – State Minister of Irrigation

  10  Sisira Jayakody – State Minister of Indigenous Medicine

  11  Prasanna Ranaweera – State Minister of Industries

   12 D.V. Chanaka – State Minister of Tourism / State Minister of Tourism

    13 D.B. Herath – State Minister of Livestock

    14 Kader Masthan – State Minister of Rural Economic Crop Cultivation & Promotion

    15 Ashoka Priyantha – State Minister of Trade

   16 16 A. Aravind Kumar – State Minister of Estate Housing and Community Infrastructure

    17 Geetha Kumarasinghe – State Minister of Culture and Performing Arts

චන්ද්‍රසිරි විජයවික්‍රම, LL.B., Ph.D

අප්‍රේල් 9 දා සිට ගතවන දිනයක් පාසා ගෝල්පේස් වනාන්තරයෙන් එලියට පනිණ කරුණක් නම්, එය රටේ <රීසනබල්> මිනිසුන් හැම දෙනාම විසින් අවිවාදයෙන් පිළිගන්නා රට තුල <සිස්ටම් චේන්ජ්> උදෙසා කරණ අරගලයක් නොව, 2005 ජනාධිපති මැතිවරණයේ සිටම usa, uk, eu, india, canada, australia, unhrc බටහිර ඒජන්සිය යන ආයතන (පාලන තන්ත්‍ර, ආණ්ඩූ) විසින් ලෝකල් කළුසුද්දන් හරහා මෙහෙයවන <රෙජීම් චේන්ජ්> ඩොලර් ව්‍යාපාරයේම දිගුවක් බවය. 2010 දී සරත් ෆොන්සේකාගේ චන්දයටද ඇමෙරිකන් ඩොලර් පොම්ප කල බව එලිවිය. 2015 දී යහපාලන මෛත්‍රී සිරිසේන බලයට ගෙන ඒමට මිසිස් චන්ද්‍රිකා, මංගල සමරවීරලාට ඩොලර් දුන් ආකාරය ඇමෙරිකාවේ රාජ්‍ය ලේකම් විසින්ම පසුව අනාවරණය කරණ ලදී.

2019 දී රටේ සිස්ටම් චේන්ජ් එකක් බලාපොරොත්තු වෙමින් රටේ හැමතැනම තාප්පවල, බිත්තිවල චිත්‍ර ඇන්ඳ, පුරන් කුඹුරු අස්වැද්දූ, තරුණයින් 2022 දී සිය බලාපොරොත්තු සුන්වීම ගැන අරගල කරනවා නම් එය කරන්නේ කොළඹ නොව චිත්‍ර ඇන්ඳ ගම් වලමය. ඔවුන් මන්ත්‍රී නිවාසවලට ගල් ගසන්නේද නැත. රටේ හැමතැනම සිස්ටම් චේන්ජ් සඳහා අරගල කරනවා වෙනුවට, ගෝල්පේස් පිටියට ඔවුන්ව දක්කාගෙන ආවේ කවුද? උදාහරණයක් වශයෙන් රාසමානික්කම් කොළුගැටයා පාර්ලිමේන්තුවේදී කිව්වේ අරගලය නොකඩවාම බස්නාහිර පලාතේ කරගෙන යායුතුය යනුවෙනි. සුනිල් හඳුන්නෙත්තිට කියවුනේ ඔවුන් අරගලයට සහාය දෙන බවය. කොළඹ ජනගහනයෙන් සියේට  හැටකට වඩා මුස්ලිම් හා දමිළ ජනයාය.ඉතිරි අයගෙන් සෑහෙන කොටසක් ඉතාමත් දුගී පැල්පත්වාසී එදිනෙදා ජීවිතය ගැටගසා ගැනීමට වෙහෙසෙන අයය. තවත් බොහෝ පිරිසක් කොළඹ හතේ නොවුනත් එසේ සිතන අය හා යන්තම් ජාම් බේරාගෙන තට්ටු නිවාසවල ඒ.සී. නැතත් විදුලි පංකා දමා ගෙන ඉන්නා පිරිස්ය. සිංහල ක්‍රිස්තියානීන්ට අමතරව තවත් සුළු කොටසක් වත් ඕ මයි ගෝඩ් බෞද්ධයින්ය. මොවුන්ට අවශ්‍ය සිස්ටම් චෙන්ජ් නොව රෙජීම් චේන්ජ්ය. 

සිස්ටම් චේන්ජ් වෙනුවට රෙජීම් චේන්ජ් හරහා රට කැබලි කිරීමේ ව්‍යාපාරය

මෙම කාරණය තර්කාණුකූලව හා යුක්තිසහගත (රීසනබල්) ලෙස විමසා බැලිය හැකි තවත් විධියක් නම් මෙහි පහතින් ඇති ආකාරයට රටේ ජනයා වර්ග කිරීමය. ගෝල්පේස් පිටියට එන-යන පංචස්කන්ධ ඉහත සඳහන් වර්ගීකරණය අනුව බෙදිය හැකිද?  (මෙම ලැයිස්තුවට ngo ඩොලර් ඒජන්තලා ඇතුලත් කර නැත; ගෝල්පේස් ජවනිකාව දැකබලා ගැනීමට එන පිරිස්ද සිටින බව මේ පිළිඹද අළුත්ම ආරංචියය!)

A-1.සිංහල බෞද්ධ

A-1-1.බුදු අම්මෝ බෞද්ධ

A-1-2.ඕ මයි ගොඩ් බෞද්ධ

A-2.සිංහල ක්‍රිස්තියානි

A-3.සිංහල බෞද්ධ මාක්ස්වාදී

A.4.සිංහල ක්‍රිස්තියානි මාක්ස්වාදී

B-1.දෙමළ හින්දු

B-2.දෙමළ ක්‍රිස්තියානි

B-3.දෙමළ හින්දු මාක්ස්වාදී

B-4.දෙමළ ක්‍රිස්තියානි මාක්ස්වාදී

B-5.පහත් කුලවලට අයත්සේ සළකණ පීඩිත දමිළ ජනයා

C-1.මුස්ලිම් පාරම්පරික

C-2.මුස්ලිම් ශාරියා අරාබි

C-3.ඉස්ලාම් ආගම අත්හල මුස්ලිමුන්

1551 දී දොන් ජුවන් ධර්මපාල රජවීමේ සිට ආරම්භවුණ ක්‍රිස්තියානි කළු සුද්දන් ගේ බෝවීමත් සමඟ, සුද්දන් විසින් 1815 දී සිට හා ඉන් පසු 1948 දී සිට දිගටම ගෙන යන <කළු සුද්දන්ගේ පාලන ක්‍රමය> නමැති සිස්ටම් එක චේන්ජ් කිරීම ඉහත සඳහන් A-1 කොටස ප්‍රාර්ථනා කරණ දේය. කළු සුද්දන්ගේ සම්භවය හා ආධිපත්‍යය (1-9, 2014 ඔක්තෝබර්) නියෝජිත ප්‍රජා-තන්ත්‍ර වාදය නමැති නාස් ලණුවෙන් ගැලවෙමු (1-5, 2020 මාර්තු) යන මාතෘකා යටතේ මේ පිළිඹඳව මාවිසින් ලියූ ලිපි මාලාවක් ලංකාවෙබ් වෙබ් අඩවියේ පළකර තිබේ. මේ නිසා ගෝල්පේස් පිටියේ එන්ජිම එම A-1 පිරිසේ අය නම් එය මේ තරුණයින් විසින් රටට කරණ මහඟු සේවයකි. නමුත් එය අරාබි වසන්තයක් කර ලිබියාවට හෝ ඉරාකයට අත්වූ ඉරණමට ලංකාව ගොදුරු කර දීමේ කූඨ ප්ලෑනක් නම් එය ගෝල්පේස් වනාන්තරයක්/කාන්තාරයක් වන්නේය.

නමුත් අවාසනාවකට මේ තරුණයින්ව ඔවුන් නොදැනම  සිංහල බෞද්ධ විරෝධී දුෂ්ඨයින් රැළක් විසින් රවටා ඇති බවක් පෙනේ. මෙහිදී මට මතක් වන්නේ 1971 දෙසැම්බර් මාසයේ ජේවීපී කැරළිකරුවන්ගේ ශාක්ෂි සටහන් කිරීම සඳහා සිරිමාවෝ ආණ්ඩුව විසින් යොදාගත් සිවිල් නිලධාරීන් 200 දෙනාගෙන් එක් අයෙක් වශයෙන් මට ලැබුණ අත්දැකීමය. අවංකවම ඊට සහභාගීවූ තරුණ-තරුණියන් සටනින් මියගියේය. බොහෝ නායකයින් සැඟවී බේරුණේය. ගෝල්පේස් ජරමරය ගැන දිනපතා එලිවන කාරණා අනුව සිදුවන්නේ කුමක්ද?

මෙය සිංහලයාට, සිංහල බෞද්ධයාට, ලෝකයේ ඇති එකම ඉඩම් කැබැල්ල රැක ගැනීම මූලිකවූ සෙසු ජනවර්ගවලට සාධාරණය ඉටුකිරීමේ අහිංසක තරුණ අරගලයක් නම් ඊට හොට දමන්නට තතණන අය දෙස බලන්න. පස් වතාවක්ම සියදිවි නසා ගැනීමට තැත්කල අයෙක්වූ සන්නස්ගල මෙන්ම සේපාල් අමරසිංහ සාටකය සමඟ චීවරයද පටලවා ඇත. දළදා මාළිගාවේ හා කතරගම පින්කැට රාජසන්තක කරන්නට මේ අවස්ථාව ඔවුන් යොදාගෙන ඇත. පල්ලිවල සල්ලි ගැන ඔවුන් නිහඬය. ඕස්ට්‍රේලියාවට පැනගිය සුදත්ත තිලකසිරි සිවුර පතුරු ගසමින්, පර්ත් නගරය විඩියෝ කරමින් සිටී. ශ්‍රී සද්ධර්මය ගැන කියනා නාගානන්ද කොඩිතුවක්කු, ඒ ධර්මය ලොවට රැකදුන් හාමුදුරුවරුන්ට අපහාස කරමින් සිටී. බ්‍රදර් චාල්ස් ඔහුගේ නියම ස්වරූපය එලි කරමින් සිටී. ඔහුගේ නියම ස්වරූපය එලි කරමින් සිටී. ඔහු B-2 ට වැටේ. අභිෂේකා ප්‍රනාන්දු ඇගේ slvlog ගුරුවරයා වන දර්ශන හඳුන්ගොඩ අනුව සිතුවොත් ජේවීපි ඇස්දෙකක් සහිතය. ජේවීපී කට්ටියට පොදුවේ මාක්ස්වාදීන් වශයෙන් ආගමක් හෝ ජාතියක් අදාල නැත. සිංහල බෞද්ධයින් ඇල්ලේ ගුණවංශ හාමුදුරුවන් බෙදන, යම් මරණ භයකදී ඉබේටම බුදු අම්මෝ යැයි කටින් පනින හෝ ඕ මයිගෝඩ් යයි කියැවෙන යනුවෙන් දෙකොටසකි.

මේ යුද්ධය නම් කවදාවත් දිණන්න බෑ යයි 2005 ට පෙර සිට දිගටම බෙරිහන් දුන් කී දෙනෙක් දැන් මේ තරුණ අරගලය තුලට රිංගා ගෙන සිටිනවාද? ඉහතින් කල  ජාති-ආගම්-භාෂා වර්ගීකරණයකට මා පෙළඹුණේ ගෝල්පේස් පිට්ටනිය<සිංහල-දමිල-මුස්ලිම් එකතුවක්> ලෙස එහි අය විසින් පුන පුනාම ප්‍රකාශකරණ නිසාය. මොවුන් උප්පැන්න සහතිකයේ ජාතිය සිංහල වෙනුවට <ශ්‍රී ලාංකික> යයි දමන්නට හදන හා මව් භාෂාව වෙනුවට ඉංගිරිස් වලට ආපසු යායුතුයයි කියන අය විය යුතුය. මොවුන්ගේ මේ ජාතික සමඟි කතාව කෙතරම් අන්ධ මිථ්‍යාවක්ද යන්න මේ වේලාවේ පෙඩරල් හරහා ඊළම් සුරුට්ටු පත්තු කර ගන්නට එලිපිටම පාර්ලිමේන්තුවේ කතාකරණ ඒබ්‍රහම් සුමන්තිරන්, රාසමාණික්කම් කොල්ලා හා පොන්නම්බලම් යන ගොයියන් විසින් පැහැදිලිකරදී ඇත. ගෝල්පේස් සටන <නිර්පාක්ෂික> යයි කියන කතාවට ටිල්වින් සිල්වා හා පෙරටුගාමි නායක දුමින්ද නාගමුව පිළිතුරු දී ඇත. සිරස ටීවී කාරයින් විසින් දිගින් දිගටම කියන්නේත් මහජන උද්ගෝෂණ නිර්පාක්ෂිකය යන සිංදුවමය. ඒසේ යලි යලිත් කීමෙන්ම ඒවා නිර්පාක්ෂික යයි කීමට සිරසකාරයින්ට කිසියම් යටි අරමුණක් නොතිබේද යන සැකයක් මතුවේ.

<ජාතික සමඟිය>, < නිර්පාක්ෂික අරගලය> යන මුලාවීම් දෙකට අමතරව රන්ජන් රාමනායක සමඟ ඉස්සරහ හා පස්ස පැත්ත ගැන කල කතාව පාර්ලිමේන්තුවේදී යලි එලිකල හිරුණිකා අම්මන්ඩී (සිහිවිකල්ව මෙන් ඕස්ට්‍රේලියාවේ සිට දොඩවන සුදත්ත තිලකසිරිගේ යකඩ ගැහැණිය) <චීවරධාරීන්> මේ අරගලයට හතුරුකම් කරණවා යයි කියා සිටී. මෙය සන්නස්ගලගේ දළදා මාලිගාවේ හා කතරගම දේවාලයේ පින්කැට ජනසතු කිරීමේ යෝජනාවේ අනිත් පැත්තය. මේ අනුව ගෝල්පේස් පිටියට වඩින අය මෙන්ම සිවුරු උස්සාගෙන පොලිස් කදුළු ගෑස් නාන අය සිල්වත්  හාමුදුරුවරු වන අතර ගෝල්පේස් ජරමරයට විරුද්ධ අය <චීවරධාරීන්ය>.

රටේ භූගෝල විද්‍යාව හා ඉතිහාසය නොදන්නා කමින්, චන්ද ප්‍රකාශණයේත් අවුරුදු දහයක් තුල කරනවා යයි සඳහන් කර තිබූ පෝර ප්‍රශ්ණයක් මතුකර ගැනීම නිසා ලෝක ඉතිහාසයේ වෙන කිසිම රටක සිදු නොවූ ආකරයේ ගොවි ජනතා විරෝධවලට අහිංසක, වෙන යටි දේශපාලන අරමුණු නැති, පිරිස් සහභාගී  වුණ බව නිසැකය. එසේ නමුත් මෙහි යටින් රට කැබලි කිරීමේ ව්‍යාපාරය සඳහා ක්‍රියාකරණ දේශීය හා විදේශීය ඩොලර් බලවේග සිටිනා බව ගොවියන්වත්, තරුණයින්වත් දන්නේද නැත.

රටේ අගමැතිලා, ජනාධිපතිලාගේ වංක භාවය ආරම්භ වන්නේ ඩී.එස්. සේනානායකගෙන් ඔහු රටේ අගමැතිවීමට කලින් සිටමය. මේ නිසා මහින්ද රාජපක්ෂගෙන්ද ලෝභ-ද්වේෂ-මෝහයෙන් තොර පංචස්කන්ධයක් බලාපොරොත්තු විය නොහැකිය. රුවන්වැලි මහාසැය අභියසදී ගොඨාභය දිවුරුම් දෙන අවස්ථාවේදී චමල් විසින් ඔහුට කුරක්කන් සාටකයක් දැමූවිට ඔහු එය වහාම ගලවා දැම්මේය. එසේ වුවත් භගවත් ගීතාවේ එන අර්ජුන කෙනෙක් වීම ගෝඨාභයට කළ නොහැකි දෙයක් විය. රාජපක්ෂ දේශපාලකයින්, රාජපක්ෂ නිලධාරියාව හිරකාරයෙක් කලේය. හිට්ලර් කෙනෙක් වෙලා හරි රට හදන්න යයි කීමෙන් 69 ලක්ෂයක් බලාපොරොත්තු වූ දේ ගඟට කැපූ ඉණිමෙන් ගලා ගියේය. වෙනත් රටට ද්‍රෝහී දේශීය හා විදේශීය බලවේග රිංගා ගෙන සිටියත් නැතත්, රටේ තරුණ පිරිසේ නැගී සිටීම, මීට පෙර වෙනත් කිසිම ජනාධිපති කෙනෙකුට නොලැබුණ සෙකන්ඩ් චාන්ස් එකක් <දේශපාලන හොරෙක්> නොවන ගෝඨභයට ලඟාකර දීමය. ඔහුගේ අළුත්ම ප්‍රකාශණයෙන් එලිවන්නේ තරුණ අරගලය වෙස්වළාගත් භාග්‍යයක්සේ ඔහු විසින් සළකණ බවය.

මීට කලින් පැවති තිස් අවුරුදු යුද්ධය දිණන්න පුළුවන් යයි කී එකම ඉහළ රාජ්‍ය නිලධාරියාවූයේ ඔහුය. යස්මෑන්ලාගෙන් බේරී මේ දෙවන යුද්ධයට ඔහුට මුහුණ දීමට හැකිය.

අග්‍රාමාත්‍ය මාධ්‍ය අංශය

ගරු කථානායකතුමනි,

මේ වනවිට රට මුහුණ පා ඇති අභියෝගයන් පිළිබඳව මේ ගරු සභාවේ සිටින  මන්ත්‍රීවරුන්ට හොඳ අවබෝධයක් තියෙනවා. අපේ රට ඉතිහාසය පුරා දිගු කාලීනව මුහුණ දුන් ආර්ථික අභියෝගය අද වනවිට ඉතා දුෂ්කර තැනකට පත්ව තිබෙනවා.

ගරු කථානායකතුමනි,

ආණ්ඩුවක් කවදාවත් කැමැත්තෙන් තමන්ගෙ ජනතාව දුෂ්කරතාවයට පත්කරන්නෙ නැහැ. එහෙත් අද රටේ ජනතාව දුෂ්කරතා රැසකට මුහුණ දෙමින් සිටින බව අප පිළිගත යුතුයි.

විදුලි කප්පාදුව, ඉන්ධන හිඟය, ගෑස් අර්බුදය අපට පෙනෙන දුෂ්කරතා පමණයි. මේ නිසා ඇතිවුණ තවත් නොයෙක් දුෂ්කරතාවයන්ටත් ජනතාව අද මුහුණ දෙන බව මා දන්නවා.

ගරු කථානායකතුමනි,

මේ අප ගෙවමින් සිටින්නේ මේ අර්බුදයෙන් ගොඩ එන්න රටක් ලෙස අපි හැම දෙනාම එක්ව කටයුතු කළයුතු  මොහොතක්. දේශපාලනික වශයෙන් බොරදියේ මාළු බාන්න මෙය අවස්ථාව නෙමෙයි කියලයි මා විශ්වාස කරන්නෙ. අපි හැමදෙනාම ගැන ජනතාව බලා සිටිනවා. කවුද අවංකව රටට ආදරය කරන්නෙ කියලයි ඔවුන් බලාගෙන ඉන්නෙ. ඒ නිසා රජයක් ලෙස අපට තිබෙන වගකීමෙන් මිදෙන්න බෑ වගේම මේ අර්බුදයෙන් ගොඩ එන්න අපට තිබෙන සැලසුම් එකින් එක ඉදිරිපත් කිරීම අවශ්‍යයයි.

ගරු කථානායකතුමනි,

දේශපාලනික වශයෙන් අපට තිබෙන මතභේද විසඳගන්න කලින් රට මුහුණ දී තිබෙන අභියෝගයෙන් රට මුදාගන්නයි අපි ප්‍රමුඛත්වය දිය යුත්තේ. ඒ නිසා රජයක් විදියට විරුද්ධ පක්ෂයටත් කිසිදු භේදයකින් තොරව රට ගොඩනගන්න එක්වන්නැයි අප ආරාධනා කළේ අවංක චේතනාවෙන්.ඒ ආරාධනය අදටත් වලංගු බව මා ඔබට සිහිපත් කරනවා.

ගරු කථානායකතුමනි,

රටේ පවතින අර්බුදය ජය ගැනීමට නම් ඒ සඳහා ආර්ථික කළමනාකරණය ඉතා වැදගත්. ඒ වෙනුවෙන් ජනතාවගේ මෙන්ම මේ උත්තරීතර සභාවේ පක්ෂ විපක්ෂ භේදයකින් තොරව ඇගයීමට ලක්වන ආර්ථික කළමනාකරණ ක්ෂේත්‍රයේ ජාත්‍යන්තර අත්දැකීම් සහිත ආර්ථික විශේෂඥයන් තිදෙනෙකු පත්ව සිටිනවා. මහ බැංකුව ඇතුළු මූල්‍ය පරිපාලනය වෙනුවෙන් ඒ සම්බන්ධව ජාත්‍යන්තරව පිළිගත් පුද්ගලයෙක් පත්කරන්න අප කටයුතු කළා.

ඒ විතරක් නෙමෙයි, ජාත්‍යන්තර මූල්‍ය අරමුදල, ලෝක බැංකුව, ආසියානු සංවර්ධන බැංකුව ඇතුළු විවිධ ජාත්‍යන්තර ආයතන සමඟ අපි දැනටමත් සාකච්ඡා ආරම්භ කර තිබෙනවා. ඔවුන්ගෙන් අපට ඒ සඳහා යහපත් ප්‍රතිචාර ලැබෙමින් තිබෙනවා. ඒ වගේම අපේ මිත්‍ර රටවල් මේ මොහොතේ අප සමඟ මේ ආර්ථික අර්බුදය කළමනාකරණය කර ගැනීමට අවශ්‍ය සහය ලබා දෙමින් සිටිනවා.

ගරු කථානායකතුමනි,

මුදල් අමාත්‍යතුමා, මුදල් අමාත්‍යාංශයේ ලේකම්තුමා, මහා බැංකු අධිපතිතුමා මේ මොහොතේත් දැඩි කැපවීමකින් යුතුව ඔවුන්ගේ වගකීම සහ යුතුකම රට වෙනුවෙන් ඉටුකරමින් සිටිනවා.එහෙත් මෙවැනි අවස්ථාවක අප වඩාත් කල්පනා කළ යුත්තේ කෙටි කාලීනව තත්ත්වය කළමනාකරණය කර ගන්නවා වගේම දිගු කාලීනව මෙවැනි අර්බුදයන් නැවත රට තුළ ඇති නොවීමට වග බලා ගැනීමේ ස්ථිර අඩිතාලමක් දැමීමයි. විරෝධතාවයට එහා ගිය මැදිහත්වීමක් ඊට අවශ්‍ය බව මා කලින් සිහිපත් කළේ ඒ නිසයි.

ගරු කථානායකතුමනි,

ඇතිවෙලා තිබෙන අර්බුදයට විසඳුම් අප සෙවිය යුත්තේ සාකච්ඡා මාර්ගයෙන්. අර ගාලුමුවදොර විරෝධතාවයේ නිරත කණ්ඩායම්වලටත් මා සාකච්ඡාවකට එන්නැයි මීට පෙර ආරාධනා කළා. ඔවුන්ගෙ වටිනා අදහස් අරගෙන කළ යුතු මැදිහත්වීම කරන්න අප ඉදිරිපත් වුණ බව සිහිපත් කළ යුතුයි.

ගරු කථානායකතුමනි,

දීර්ඝ කාලීන විදුලි කප්පාදුවලට එක් හේතුවක් වූයේ නිසි කලට විදුලි බලාගාර ඉදි නොවීමයි. පුනර්ජනනීය බලශක්තිය පිළිබඳව තැබූ ඉදිරි පියවර ඇතැම් පිරිස් හිතාමතාම මග හැරියා. දැන් ඒ වරද අතීතයට පවරා ඵලක් නැහැ. අපි ඒ වෙනුවෙන් ගත යුතු ක්‍රියාමාර්ග ගනිමින් සිටිනවා. බලාගාරවලට අවශ්‍ය ඉන්ධන හිඟය පියවමින් සිටින නිසාත් මේ වන විට මධ්‍යම කඳුකරයට වැසි ඇද හැලෙන නිසාත් මේ ප්‍රශ්නය ඉතා ඉක්මනින් විසඳන්න අපට පුළුවන්.

දවසෙන් දෙකෙන් මේ ප්‍රශ්නය අවසන් වෙනවා කියනවාට වඩා අපට හැකි ආසන්නම තැනින් අපි විසඳුම දෙනවා කියන එක වැදගත්. මිනිත්තුවෙන් මිනිත්තුව හරි අපි විදුලි කප්පාදුව අඩු කරනවා.

ඒ වගේම ඉදිරි සති කිහිපය තුළ ඉන්ධන හා ගෑස් හිඟය පාලනය කරන්න අවශ්‍ය පියවර ගෙන තිබෙන බව අතිගරු ජනාධිපතිතුමා, ඊයේ දිනයේ ජනතාව හමුවේ ප්‍රකාශ කළා. ඉන්ධන ලැබෙන බවට විශ්වාසයක් තිබෙන නිසා ඉන්ධන හිඟයක් එනවයි කියලා සැකයක් තියා ගන්න එපා.

එදිනෙදා වැඩ කරන ජීවිතේ පැය කිහිපයක් පෝලිම්වල ඉන්න ගියාම ඇතිවෙන වේදනාව දන්න නිසා, මේ තත්ත්වය මඟ හැරීමට අවශ්‍ය බව අපි පිළිගන්නවා. විසි හතර පැයෙන් විසඳුමක් නොලැබුණත්, අපි ඔබ තව බොහෝ කල් පෝලිම්වල නොතියන බව මතක තබා ගන්න.

ගරු කථානායකතුමනි,

ආර්ථික අර්බුධයට විසඳුම් සොයනවිට ඒ සඳහා අපේ රටේ ආර්ථික, දේශපාලන හා සමාජයීය ස්ථාවරත්වයත් ඉතා වැදගත්. ඒ සඳහා ගත හැකි කඩිනම් හා ප්‍රායෝගික විසඳුම ලෙස ආණ්ඩුක්‍රම ව්‍යවස්ථා සංශෝධනයක් ඇතිවිය යුතු යැයි මා විශ්වාස කරනවා.

ගරු කථානායකතුමනි,

එහි ආරම්භක පියවර ලෙස දහනව වැනි ආණ්ඩුක්‍රම ව්‍යවස්ථා සංශෝධනය අත්‍යවශ්‍ය හා කාලීන සංශෝධන සහිතව ප්‍රජාතන්ත්‍රවාදීව බලාත්මක කිරීම කෙටි කාලීනව ගත හැකි කාලෝචිතම විසඳුම බවයි මගේ විශ්වාසය.

ඒ ඔස්සේ යමින් අතිගරු ජනාධිපතිතුමාගේ ද ආශිර්වාදය ඇතිව පුළුල් නව ආණ්ඩුක්‍රම ව්‍යවස්ථා සංශෝධනයක් දක්වා අප ගමන් කළ යුතු වෙනවා. ඒ වෙනුවෙන් අප ගන්නා වෑයමට පක්ෂ විපක්ෂ භේදයකින් තොරව ඔබ සැමගේ සහයත්, ජනතා ආශිර්වාදයත් ලැබෙනු ඇතැයි මා අපේක්ෂා කරනවා.

ස්තුතියි! 

ආචාර්ය සුදත් ගුණසේකර

අග්‍රාමාත්ය සිරිමාවෝ බන්ඩාරනායක මැතිනියගේ හිටපු ස්ථිර ලේකම්, ශ්‍රී ලන්කා පරිපාලන සේවා සන්ගමයේ සභාපති (1991-1994) සහ මහනුවර සින්හල බෞද්ධ ජෙස්ඨ පුරවැසියන්ගේ සන්විධානයේ සභාපතී

  (මව් බිමට ආදරය කරණ පුරවැසියෙකුගෙන් මුලු රටටම අලුත් අවුරුදු තෑග්ගක්!)

වර්තමාන අර්බුධයෙන් රට ගොඩ ගැනීමේ ඒකායන නොවුනත් හොඳම ක්‍රමය පුලුල් ජාතික වැඩපිලිවෙලක් ක්‍රියාත්මක කිරීමට එකඟවන නව ජනාධිපතිවරකු යටතේ පාර්ලිමේන්තුවේ සිටින සියළුම පක්ශ නායක්යින් සහ අමාත්ය තනතුරුවලට අදාල  විශයන් පිළිබන්ද විසේසඥ සහ ප්‍රායෝගික දැනුමක් ඇති පිටතින් ගන්නා විශිස්ඨ පුද්ගලයින් කීපදෙනකුගෙන් සමන්විත සර්ව පාක්ශික අන්තර්කාලින ඇමති මන්ඩලයක් යටතේ තුන් (3)අවුරුදු කාලසීමාවකට, 2025 වනතුරු රට පාලනය කිරීමයි.

එසේ කිරීමෙන් එකිනෙකා අතර කුළල්කාගන්නා වර්තමාන පක්ශ අතර ජාතික වැඩපිළිවෙලකට එකඟත්වයක් ඇතිවීමෙන් පවතින දේශ පාලන අස්ථාවරත්වයද සමනය වී,නව දේශපාලන සන්ස්කෘතියක් ඇතිවී සමාජ අසහනය දුරුවී, ආර්ථිකයද යහපත් වී,රටට සාමයද උදාවනු ඇත.

සවිස්තරාත්මකව පහතින් දැක්වෙන මෙම වැඩපිලිවෙල ක්‍රියාත්මක කිරීමට දලදා සමිඳු ඉදිරිපිට දිවුරා පොරොන්දුවීමට සූදානම් නම්, එසේම එය කළ හැකියයි තමන්ට ආත්ම විශ්වාශයක් ඇත්නම් ගෝඨාභය රාජපක්ශ ජනාධිපතිවරයාටම වුවද තව දුරටත් ජනාධිපති වශයෙන් කටයුතු කළ හැක. කෙසේ වුවද එසේ කිරීමට නම් ඔහු වටා සිටින ප්‍රධාන උපදේශක අතුලු කේවට්ටයින් සියල්ල වහාම ඉවත් කොට මේ සින්හල බෞද්ධ රටේ රාජ්ය නායකයකුගේ උපදේශකයින් වීමට අවශය දැනුම, විචාර බුද්ධිය සහ පරිනතබව ඇති රට පිළිගත් පැවිදි, ගිහි උගතුන් පිරිසක් ඒ සඳහා පත්කර ගත යුතුය.

මන්ද විපක්ශය ගෙන ඒමට අදහස් කරන විශ්වාශභන්ග යෝජනාව ඉස්ථිරවශයෙම පරාජයවන බැවින් පාර්ලිමේන්තුවේ බහුතරය ආරක්ශාකරගතහොත් තව ටික කලක් මේ රජයම තිබිය හැකිබැවිනි…

එහෙත් පැහැදිළිව කවුරුත් වටහාගතයුතු කරුණක්

•මර්ධනයෙන් හෝ

• අර්බුධයේ නිර්මාත්තෲන්වන ඇමතිකමක් දැරීමට කිසිම සුදුසුකමක් නැති අසාර්ථක අතීතයක් ඇති ආත්මාර්ථකාමී හොර මැර අයම විටින් විට මාරුකරමින් ඇමති මන්ඩල පත්කිරීමෙන් හෝ

•ජනාධිපතිවරයාගේ, ප්‍රධාන උපදේශක ඇතුලු කේවට්ටයින්ගේ මෙතෙක් ජනාධිපතිවරයා මනෝලෝකයකට ගෙනගොස් විනාශකරණළද උපදෙස් අනුව  තවදුරටත් ක්‍රියා කිරීමෙන් හෝ හෝ

• ඥානක්කා සහ තිරුපති දෙවියන්ගේ  උපදෙස් අනුව හෝ

• සජිත්, අනුර කුමාර වැනි බලය ලබා ගැනීම එකම අරමුණ කරගත් දවල් සිහින දකින රටේ පවතින ගැටලු වලට ඔවුන් යෝජනා කරන කිසිදු පිළියමක් ඉදිරිපත් නොකොට රජයට ගෙදර යනමෙන් හිස් සටන්පාඨ පමණක් කියමින් ඔවුන් කියන පරිදි පාර්ලිමෙන්තුව විසුරුවාහැර මැතිවරණයක් පැවැත්වීමෙන් හෝපවතින අර්බුධ කිසිසේත්ම විසඳිය නොහැක

පාර්ලිමේත්ව විසුරුවා මැතිවරණයකට යාමෙන්ද එය විසඳිය නොහැක.

මන්ද දැනට රටතුල පවතින ආර්ථික,දේශපාලනික සහ සමාජ අසහනය අනුව විපක්ශ නායකයා සහ අනුර දිසානයක ඇතුලු ඇතම් අය කියන පරිදි මැතිවරරණයකට යාමට මේ අවස්ථාව කිසිසේත්ම සුදුසු නොවේ. එය වූ කළී කබලෙන් ලිපට වැටීමකි.

මැතිවරණයක් පවත්වා අවසාන කිරීම සඳහා අවම වශයෙන් මාස 5 ක් වත් ගතවීම, රටතුල පවතින අර්බුධකාරි තතවය නිසා සාධාරන මැතිවරණයක් පැවැත්වීමේ දුස්කරතා, මැතිවරණයකට වැයවන රුපියල් කෝටි 1500 පමණ විශාල වියදම සහ එය සොයාගැනීමේ ඇති අපහසුතාව, පවතින සමාජ අසහනය යටතේ පාක්ශිකයින් අතර මැතිවරණයකදි ඇතිවිය හැකි ගැටුම් නිසා විශාල ගණනක් මියයාමට වුවද ඇති ඉඩකඩ, මැති වරණයක් තිබ්බද කිසිම පක්ශයකට රජයක් පිහිටුවීමට ප්‍රමාණවත් ආසන සන්ක්යාවක් නොලැබීම නිසා අනිවාර්යෙන්ම එකිනෙකට පරස්පර අදහස් හා අරමුණු ඇති පිරිස් සමන්න්ඝ හවුල් ආණ්ඩුවකට යාමට සිදුවීම නිසා බලලෝභී, ආත්මාර්ථකාමි දේශපාලකයින් ඕනෑම පාවාදිමක් කොට ආණ්ඩුවක් පිහිටුවනු ඇත.එසේ වූ විට බෙදුම්වාදීන් සහ ජාතිවාදීන් අතට පාලන බලය නැවතත් යාම නිසා සින්හල බෞද්ධයින්ගේ අයිතිවාසිකම් තවත් අහිමිවීම සහ පක්ශ දේශපාලනය නමැති මළපුඩුවේ මේ රට තව තවත් හිරවී ඉන් මිදීමට ඇතී ඉඩකඩ මුළුමනින්ම ඇහිරීයාම  ආදී හේතු මැතිවරණයකට විරුද්ධව ඉදිරිපත් කළ හැක. එබැවින් බල ලෝභයෙන් උමතුවි ගිනිගෙන දැවෙන අනුන්ගේ රැවුලෙන් තම සුරුට්ටුව පත්තුකර ගැනීමට දඟලන බඩගෝස්තරවාදි බලලෝබී දේශපාලකයින් හැර සිහි මොලේ ඇති කිසිවෙකු මේ අවස්ථාවේදී මැතිවරණයක් පැවැත්වීමට එකඟ නොවනු ඇත.

මේ අර්බුධයෙන් රට ගොඩ ගැනීමේ ඒකායන ක්‍රමය

එමනිසා වර්තමාන  අර්භුධය විසඳීමට ඇති  අවස්ථාවෝචිත හා සුදුසු එකම  ක්‍රමය මහජන මතයට කන්දී  ජනාධිපතිවරයා සහ අගමැතිවරයා වහාම ඉල්ලා අස්වී පවතින පාර්ලිමෙන්තුවට විවස්ථාවෙ 40 වන වගන්තිය අනුව නව ජනාධිපතිවරයෙකු පත්කොට ගැනීමට ඉඩ සලසා පාර්ලිමෙන්තුවේ සිටින සියලුම දේශපාලන පක්ශවල නායකයින්ගෙන් සහ ඉන් පිටතින් නව ජනාධිපතිවරයා විසින් තෝරාගණු ලබන දේශපාලනය, ආර්ථිකවිද්යාව, මේ රටේ කෘශිකර්මාන්තය,කර්මාන්ත, මූල්ය, විදේශප්‍රතිපත්ති, පරිපාලනය, වෙළඳ හා වානිජ කටයුතු,  සෞක්ය වැනි ශේස්ත්‍ර පිළිබඳ විසේසඥ දැනුමක් සාහ් ප්‍රායෝගික දැණුමක් ඇති දේශප්‍රේමී බුද්ධිමතුන් කීපදෙනකුගෙන් සමන්විත විධායක බලතල සහිත 17 දෙනකුගේ පමණ අන්තර්කාලීන කුඩා ඇමති මන්ඩලයකින් රට පාලනය කරන රජයකින් පමණි. (වර්තමාන ඇමති මන්ඩලයේ මෙන් මෙම නව ඇමති මන්ඩලයේ, මැටි  ඇමති, මිරිස් ඇමති, රතුලූණු ඇමති,වේවැල් ඇමති,පිත්තල ඇමති, එලවුළු ඇමති,පලතුරු ඇමතී, බතික් හා මැටි  ඇමති, හා බුලත් සහ හුණු ඇමති  වැනි විකාර උප ඇමති හා රාජ්ය ඇමති තවාන්ද නොමැත)

නව ඇමතිමන්ඩලය  ජනතා අපේක්ශාවන්ට අනුකූලව සකස්කෙරුණු ජාතික ප්‍රත්හිපත්ති මාලාවක්  ක්‍රියාත්ම්ක කිරීමටද  එකඟ විය යුතුය. (කෙටුම්පතක් පහතින් දක්වා ඇත) ඊට එකඟ  නොවන කිසිවෙක් එම ඇමති මන්ඩලයේ සිටීමට සුදුසුකම් නොලබයි. තවද 2025 මැතිවරණය දක්වා එම ඇමති මන්ඩලය පැවතිය යුතු බවද මම යෝජනා කරමි.

පාර්ලිමේන්තුවේ සිටින සෙසු මන්ත්‍රිවරුන් සියලු දෙනාම අමාත්යාන්ශ 17 ට අදාල  කමිටු 17 කට බෙදා එකී අමාත්යාශ වල කටයුතු අධීක්ශනය කළ යුතුයයිද තවදුරටත් මම යෝජනා කරමි.

දැන් අපි නිසැකවම අරාජකවූ රටක්

මේ රජයේ අවිධිමත්, අදූරදර්ශී හා අක්‍රමවත් රාජ්ය පරිපාලනය සහ අක්‍රමවත් මුදල් පාලනය නිසා මේ වනවිටත් රට අරාජක වී බන්කොලොත් වී හමාර බව ලන්කා වාසී  ජනතාව මෙන්ම  මුළු ලෝකයම දැන් පිළිගෙන හමාරය. යමෙක් එය නැතැයි කියනවානම්, එය තම පස්චාත් භාගය හෙළුවෙන් බව නොදැන අහන්කාරයෙන් සහ මුග්ධභාවයෙන් මත්වී සෙබඩ ඉදිරියේ ප්‍රේමාන්විත රන්ගනයක යෙදෙන මොණරෙකුගේ නැටුමක් වැනියයි කිව යුතුය.

ඕනෑම රජයක මූලික වගකීම් තුනක් ඇත

ඕනෑම රජයක මූලික වගකීම් වශයෙන් කෞටිල්ය විසින් ප්‍රකාශිත රක්ඛ (රටේ ආරක්ශාව) පාලන (පාලනය) සහ යෝගක්ශේම(ජනතාවගේ සුභසෙත  සැළසීම) යන  පරමාර්ථ තුනම ඉටුකිරීමට මේ රජය දැන් සාකළ්යෙන්ම අපොහොසත් වී ඇත.

ඒ අතර

අද මුළු රටම ජනාධිපතිවරයා වහාම ඉල්ලා අස්විය යුතුයයි අරගල කරයි.

ඒ සමන්ගම දැනට සිටින අග්‍රාමාත්ය වරයාද ඉල්ලා අස්විය යුතුයයිද ඔවුහු කියත්. ඒ දෙකෙන් කුමක් සිදුවුවත් සියලුම ඇමතිවරුන්ගේ තනතුරුද ඒ සමඟම අහෝසිවේ  එවිට රට අරාජික වෙයි, මේ  වූ කළී අති භයානක තත්වයකි.

එසේ වුවහොත් රට අරාජකවීම වලක්වා ගැනීම සහ රටතුල අඛණ්ඩ පාලනය පවත්වාගෙන යාම සඳහා පාර්ලිමේන්තුව වහාම රැස්වී දැනට රාජ්ය සභාවේ සිටින මන්ත්‍රීවරුන්ගෙන් මේ රටේ ජනාධිපති තනතුර දැරීමට වඩාම සුදුසු පුද්ගලයා, ආණ්ඩුකරම විවස්තාවේ 40 වන වගන්තිය අනුව, ජනාධිපතිවරයා වශයෙන් පත්කොට ගතයුතුය. එවිට ඔහුට දැනට සිටින ජනාධිපතිවරයාගේ ධුරයේ ඉතිරි කාලය ජනාධිපති වශයෙන් කටයුතු කළ හැක.

එසේ පත්වන නව ජනාධිපති වරයා රට අරාජික වීම වැළැක්වීම සහ රාජ්ය යාන්ත්‍රණය ස්ථාපිතකොට රටේ පාලනය සහ ජන්තා සේවාවන් අඛන්ඩව පවත්වාගෙන යාම සඳහා ප්‍රථමයෙන්ම අමාත්ය මණ්ඩළයක් පත්කරගත යුතුය.ඒ සඳහා පවතින තත්වය යටතේ වඩාත්ම සුදුසු ක්‍රමයනම් රට පිලිගත් ජාතික වැඩපිලිවෙලක් ක්‍රියාත්මක කිරිමට එකඟ වන සර්ව පාක්ශික අන්තර්කාලින අමාත්ය මණ්ඩලයක් පත්කර ගැනීමය.

එබැවින් ඉහත සඳහන් පරිදි ජනාධ්හිපතිවරයා සහ අගමැතිවරයා යන දෙ දෙනාම ඉල්ලා අස්වුවහොත්

ප්‍රථමයෙන්ම,

රට අරාජකවීම වලක්වා ගැනීම සහ රටතුල අඛණ්ඩ පාලනය පවත්වාගෙන යාම සඳහා පාර්ලිමේන්තුව වහාම රැස්වී දැනට රාජ්ය සභාවේ සිටින මන්ත්‍රීවරුන්ගෙන් මේ රටේ ජනාධිපති තනතුර දැරීමට වඩාම සුදුසු මහජන නියෝජිතයා, ආණ්ඩුකරම විවස්තාවේ 40 වන වගන්තිය අනුව ජනාධිපතිවරයා වශයෙන් පත්කොට ගතයුතුය.

ඒ සමඟම හදිසි විවස්තා සන්සෝධන

1) දැනට පවතින විවස්ථාවෙන් ජනාධිපතිවරයා සතු විධායක බලතල අග්‍රාමාත්ය වරයා ඇතුලු අමාත්ය මන්ඩලයට පවරාගැනීම

2)      පාර්ලිමේන්තු මන්ත්‍රීන් නොවන, පක්ශයයකට අයත් නැති විසේසඥයින් පිටතින් ඇමති මණ්ඩලයට පත්කරගැනීමට විවස්තාවෙන් ඉඩකඩ නොමැතිනිසා පවතින ජාතික ලැයිස්ටුව අහෝසිකොට පත්කල මන්ත්‍රීන් 6 දෙනකු හෝ 7 කු පත්කර  ගැනීම සඳහා ජනාධිපතිවරයාට බලය දීම

3 ද්විත්ව පුර වැසියන්ට පාර්ලිමේන්තු මන්ත්‍රීවරයකු හෝ වෙනත් කිසිම රාජ්ය සේවා තනතුරක් දැරීම තහනම් කිරීම

යන කරුණු තුනට

 අවශ්ය විවස්ථා සන්සෝධන සම්මත කර ගත යුතුය.

අනතුරුව

නව ජනාධිපති වරයා විසින් තුන් අවුරුදු කාලසීමාවකට උපරිම වශයෙන් 17 දෙනකුට නොවැඩි අන්තර්කාලීන සර්වපාක්ශික අමාත්ය මණ්ඩලයක් පත්කළ යුතුය. (මෙම ඇමති මන්ඩලයේ නියෝජ්ය ඇමතිවරුන් නොසිටිය යුතුය )

නව අමාත්ය මණ්ඩලය පහත සඳන් පරිදි විය යුතුයයි මම යෝජනා කරමි.

 යෝජිත අමාත්ය මණ්ඩලය

ජනාධිපති; අමාත්ය මණ්ඩලයේ ප්‍රධානියා, ආණ්ඩුවේ ප්‍රධානියා සහ සන්නද්ධ සේවාවන්හි ප්‍රධානියා

1අග්‍රාමාත්ය, රාජ්ය ආරක්ශක,  බුද්ධසාසන හා සන්ස්කෘතික කටයුතු

2 මුදල් හා රාජ්ය පරිපාලන

3 ඉඩම්, වාරිමාර්ග සහ පරිසර සන්රක්ශන

4 කෘශිකර්මාන්ත, වැවිලි කර්මාන්ත සහ කුළුබඩු

5 කර්මාන්ත, බලශක්ති හා තාක්ශන 

6 අධ්යාපන සහ ක්‍රීඩා

7 අධිකරණ, නිතිය හා සාමය

8 සෞක්ය, ආයුර්වේද සහ සමාජසේවා

9 නිවාස, පලාත්පාලන හා ජලසම්පාදන

10 වෙලඳ හා නාවික 

11 විදේස සහ ජාත්යන්තර කටයුතු

 12 ධීවර සහ සමුද්‍ර සම්පත් –

13 කම්කරු හා රැකිරක්ශා –

 14 ගමනාගමන, මහාමාර්ග හා ගුවන්සේවා 

 15 ප්‍රවුර්ති, ගුවන්විදුලි, රූපවාහිනී සහ ජනමාධ්ය

16`උඩරට ගැමි පුනරුත්ථාපන සහ කන්ද උඩරට (ජාතියේ හදබිම ) සන් රක්ශනය 

17 ස්වදේශ කටයුතු, ග්‍රාම සන්වර්ධන හා රජයේ වැඩ

මා ඉහතින් සඳහන් කරණලද නව අන්තර්කාලීන ඇමතිමණ්ඩලය විසින් ක්‍රියාත්මක කළයුතු යෝජිත  ජාතික ප්‍රතිපත්හ්ති මාලාවේ කෙටුම් පතක්ද පහතින්  දක්වමි.

අන්තර්කාලීන  ජාතික රජයේ ප්‍රතිපත්ති

1.මේ සෑම අමාත්යාන්ශයකටම රජයන් වෙනස්වීම අනුව වෙනස් නොවන.ජාතික ප්‍රතිපත්ති මාලාවක් තිබිය යුතුය

2 ස්වාධීන අධිකරණයක් හා ස්වාධීන රාජ්ය සේවයක්.

3 රාජ්ය සේවයේ දේශීය (ශ්‍රි.ළන්.පසේ).  මෙන්ම විදේශීය සේවා ශ්‍රී.ලන්.වි.සේ තනතුරු සියල්ලටම වුර්තීය නිලධාරීන් පමණක් පත්කල යුතුය.දේශපාලකයින් සහ ඔවුන්ගේ දූ දරුවන්,   ඥාතීන් සහ හිතවතුන් පත්කිරීම වහාම අවසන්කල යුතුය මේ වනවිට පත්කොට ඇති එවැනි අය වහාම ආපසු ගෙන්විය යුතුය..

3 රාජය සන්ස්ථා සහ මන්ඩල ආදියටද එම ප්‍රතිපත්තියම අනුගමනය කළයුතුය.

4 මෙරට, පිටරට සියළුම රාජ්ය සේවා ආයතන වලට සේවක සන්ක්යාව  භාන්ඩාගාරයේ සැපයීම් සහ සේවා සන්ක්යා දෙපාර්තමේන්තුවේ නියමයන් අනුව පමණක් සිදුකල යුතුය.

5 සමස්ත රාජ්ය සේවටම බඳවා ගැනීම් කලයුත්තේ තරඟ විභාග වලින් කුසලතා අනුව පමණි.

6.රාජ්ය මුදල් වැය කිරීම කල්යුත්තේ රාජ්ය නිලධාරීන් විසින්, රාජ්ය ආයතන හරහා පමණි .දේශපාලකයින් හරහා විමධ්යගත ආදී විවිධ ක්‍රම ක්‍රම හරහා  රාජ්ය මුදල් බෙදා හැරීම සහ අවභාවිතය වහාම නතරකළ යුතුය.

7. එසේම කාර්යක්ශම, අපක්ශපාති රාජ්ය සේවයක් ගොඩනැගීම සඳහා එය ජාතික, දිසා, සහ  ප්‍රාදේශීය වශයෙන් දේශ පාලනීකරණය කිරිමද වහාම නතරකළ යුතුය.

8 සියළුම රාජය සේවකයින්ගේ පත්වීම්,මාරුකිරීම් හා උසස්කිරීම් ආදිය රාජයසේවා රෙගුලාසි අනුව පමණක් සිදුකළ යුතුය. සියලුම

9 මැති ඇමතිවරුන් වසරක කාලයක් වැටුප් නැතිව සේවය කළ යුතුය

10 1977 ජේ.ආර්/රජිව් ගිවිසුම, 13 වන විවස්ථා සන්ශෝධනය සහ පලාත් සභා අහෝසි කිරීම

11.ආණ්ඩුකාර නතුරුද අහෝසිකොට කාර්යාලද වහාම වසාදමා එම කාර්යාල වල රජයේ නිලධාරීන් දිසාපති, ප්‍රාදේශීය උපදිසාපති සහ වෙනත් එවැනි කාර්යාල වලට අනුයුක්ත කිරීම

 12 ජනාධිපති, අග්‍රාමාත්ය, අගවිනිසුරු අමාත්ය මන්ඩල ලේකම්, ත්‍රිවිධ හමුදාපතිවරු සහ පොලිස්පතිට හැර වෙනත් කිසිම රාජ්ය නිලධාරියෙකුට නිල රථ නොදිම

13 තම රාජකාරියට වාහන අවස්ය සියලුම රාජ්ය නිලධාරින්ට එක් එක්  මට්ටමේ ශේස්ත්‍ර රාජකාරි සඳහා ඒ ඒ මට්ටමේ අමාත්යාන්ශ, දෙපාර්තමේන්තු සහ උප කාර්යාලවල වාහන සන්චිතයක් බැගින් පවත්වා ගත යුතුය.

14 තම රාජකාරි කටයුතු සන්දහා වාහනයක් අවස්ය නිලධාරින්ට කලින් පැවති ක්‍රමයට  වාහන ගැනීම සඳහා ණය මුදලක් දීම.

15 දේශපාලකයින්ගේ විශ්‍රාම වැටුප් ක්‍රමය සහ සියලු අමතර වරප්‍රසාද අහෝසි කිරීම. එසේම ඔනුට  හෝ ඔවුන්ගේ ඥාතීන්ට රජයේ කොත්‍රාක්, මත්පැන්, වැලි, දැව බලපත්තර ආදිය දීම තහනම් කළයු තුය.

16 දේශපාලනය මහජන සේවයක් මිස දැනට කෙරෙන පරිදි රක්ශාවක් හෝ වියාපාරයක් හා ජාවාරමක්කොට නොගත යුතුය.

17 බලයේ සිටින එමෙන්ම දැනට බලයේ නැති ආණ්ඩුකාරවරුන් මැති ඇමතිවරුන් වැනි කිසිකෙනෙකුට ප්‍රභූ ආරක්ශාව නොසැපයිය යුතුය. එසේම ඔවුන්ගේ නිල රථ,හා නිල නිවාසද වහාම රජයට භාර දිය යුතුය.

18 මේ රටේ එක ජාතියක්, එක නීතියක් යන රාජ්ය ප්‍රතිපත්තිය ක්‍රියාත්මක කිරීම

 19 මේ රටේ ජාතිය ස්‍රී ලාන්කික  අනන්යතාව සින්හල බෞත්ධ.

අභයන්තර රාජයපාලනය

20 සුද්දා මේ රට හා ජාතිය විනාශකිරීමට ඇටවූ  මර උගුලක් වන දේශ පාලන පක්ශ ක්‍රමය සහ පලාත් ක්‍රමයද  අහෝසි කිරීම සහ ඒ වෙනුවට දේශපාලන පක්ශ නැති ස්වදෙශීය සන්ස්කෘතිය පදනම් කරගත් දිසා රාජ්ය පාලන ක්‍රමයක් ඇතිකිරීම.

21 රටේ අභයන්තර පාලනය දිසාපති, ප්‍රාදේසිය උප දිසාපති, කෝරාල සහ ගම්පති වරුන් යටතේ නැවතත් ක්‍රියාත්මක් කිරීම

22 සෑම ග්‍රාම සේවා කොට්ථශයකටම ග්‍රාමීය සේවා මද්ධියස්ථානයක්. ගම් මට්ටමේ සියලුම රාජ්ය නිලධාරින් එම කර්යාලයේ එකම වහලක් යටතට.

විවිධ

23 සෑම අන්තර් ජාතික ගිවිසුමකටම ජාතික රාජ්ය සභාවේ අනුමතිය අනිවාර්ය කිරීම

24 ආර්ථික සන්වර්ධනයට අදාල සන්වර්ධන කටයුතුවලට හැර වෙනත් කිසිම කෙනෙකුට  තීරුබදු රහිත  වාහන ආදිය ලබා නොදීම

25 රටේ විදේශ මුදල් සන්චිතය වැඩිකර ගැනීම සඳහා මහ බැන්කුවේ ජාතික සන්වර්ධන අරමුදලක් ආරම්භකොට විදෙස්වල සිටින සියලුදෙනාටම මාසිකව එම අරමුදලට තමන්ට හැකි මුදලක් එවනමෙන් ඇරයුම් කිරීම සහ එම ගිණුම් අයිතිකරුවන්ට ඒ සඳහා විසේශ පොලියක් ගෙවිම සහ වෙනත් වරප්‍රසාද ලබා දිම

26 1977 සිට මේ රටී දේශපාලනය කල සියලු දෙනාගේම වත්කම් සොයා බලා වැරදි අන්දමින් උපයාගත් සෑම සතයක්ම (මෙරට පිට රට   ඇති) සහ දේපල සහ මුදල් අපචාර  පිළිබඳ වරද කරුවන්ට දැඩි දඬුවම්. දේපල රාජ සන්තක කිරීම සහ ප්‍රජා අයිතිය අහෝසිකිරීම ඇතුලු. එසේම මේ රටේ පුරවැසියන් රොහල්වල බෙහෙත් නැතිව  මිය යද්දී වයිද්ය ප්‍රතිකාර සඳහා දේශපාලකයින් ඇමරිකාව, සින්ගප්පූරුව සහ ඕස්ට්‍රේලියාව වැනි රටවලට රජයේ වියදමින් ගොස් ලක්ශ ගණනින් වැය කළ මහජන මුදල් ආපසු රජයට ලබාගැනීම

27 දේශපාලකයින් විසින් පිටරට බැන්කුවල තැන්පත්කොට ඇති මුදල් මේ රටට ගෙන්වා රාජසන්තක කිරීම.

28 සියලුම රජයන් විසින් රටට අහිතකර අන්දමින් එලම්බ ඇති සියළුම ජාත්යන්තර ගිව්සුම් අදාල පාර්ශව ස මඟ සාකච්චාකර අහෝසි කිරීම හෝ කොන්දේශි රටට හිතකර අඳමින් සන්සෝධනය කිරීම

 29 මේ රටේ ඉන්ධන ටිකවත් බෙදාගන්ට බැරිව දැනට ඉන්දියාව සතුකොට ඇති රන් බිජු දාන කිකිළියක් වැනි,ඉන්ධන බෙදාහැරීම  වහාම ලන්කා පෙට් සන්ස්ථාවට ආපසු භාර දීම

30 මේ රටේ කිසිම ජාතික සම්පතක් පිටරටකට විකිනීම මින්මතුවට තහනම් කිරීම.

31 මිනීමරුම්, ලමා අපචාර, මත්ද්‍රව්ය පිළිබඳ සහ දේශද්‍රෝහි සියලුම අපරාධ, වලට මරණ දඬුවම දිම වහාම ආරම්භ කිරිම.

32 මේ රටේ ජාතික අධ්යාපනයට විශාල හානියක් සිදුකර ඇති එසේම දැනටත් සිදු කරණ, ජනතාව සූරාකන, මනසින් විජාතික අනාගත පරම්පරාවක් බිහිකරන රට පුරා පිහිටුවා ඇති ඊනියා ජාත්යන්තර පාසැල් වසන්ගතය වහාම  අහෝසි කිරීම.

33 දැනට ඇති පරිදි 100 ඉක්මවන වාර්ශික රාජ්ය නිවාඩුදින ගණන ජාත්යන්ත්‍ර සාමාන්ය ගණනවන 12 හෝ ඊට ආසන්න ගණනකට අඩු කිරීම

ඒ යටතේ

1සින්හල අලුත් අවුරුදු නිවාඩු               2,

2ජනරජ දිනය මැයි 22 :                        1

3 වෙසක්පෝය                                      2

4ජාතික වීර දිනය  (මැඉ 9)                   1 

5 පොසොන් පෝය (ජාතික දිනය)       1  බුද්ධාගම ලක්දිවට ගෙන ආ දිනය

6 ජාතික ගොවි කම්කරු දිනය  මැයි     1                 

7 ජාතික වීර දිනය                                 1

8  ජාතික පරිසර දිනය                           1

7 ජාතික ළමා  දිනය                              1                  

8 ජාතික මව් වරුන්ගේ  දිනය               1

9 ජාතික වැඩිහිටි  දිනය                        12

සෙසු සියළු පෝය දින සහ ඒ ඒ ආගම්වලට අදාල ආගමික දින අදාල ආගම් අදහන අයට පමණක් සීමා කිරීම. (මේ තුලින් ලෝකයේ වැඩිම රජයේ නිවාඩු දින ගණන ඇති අපගේ රටේ, දැනට වසරකට අහිමිවන මිනිස්දින කෝටිගණනක් රටේ සන්වර්ධනයට යොදාගැනීමට ඉඩ ප්‍රස්ථාව ලැබෙණු ඇත  

34 රාජද්‍රෝහී, දෙශද්‍රෝ හී අපරාධ, මත්ද්‍රව්ය පිලිබද   අපරාධ, සාපරාදී මිනිමැරුම්, ආගමික සිද්ධස්ථාන වලට සිදුකෙරෙන අපරාධ ආදීයට මරණ දඬුවම දීම

මැතිවරණ ක්‍රමය

35 ප්‍රජාතන්ත්‍රවාදය බේරාගැනීමට මැතිවරණ ක්‍රමය වෙනස් කිරීම.

දැනට පවතින  දිස්ත්‍රික් මන්ත්‍රී ක්‍රමය,අනුපාත ක්‍රමය, බහු ආසන ක්‍රමය,  මනාප ක්‍රමය අහෝසි කිරීම සහ පැරනි ආසන ක්‍රමයට යාම. පක්ශයේ නායකයා විසින් අපේක්ශකයින් තෝරන ක්‍රමය වෙනස්කොට  පැරනි මැතිවරණ කොට්ඨාශශ ක්‍රමයට යාම සහ අදාල මැතිවරණ කොට්ථාශයේ ජනතාව විසින් තම අපේක්ශකයා තෝරා ගන්නා ක්‍රමයක් හඳුන්වා දීම..

 එසේම තම අපේක්ශකයා තෝරාගැනීමේ බලය ආශනයේ ජනතාවටට දිය යුතුය.අපේක්ශකයෙකු වීම සඳහා අවම අධ්යාපන, වත්කම්, චරිත සහ ප්‍රජා සේවයට ඇති පළපුරුත්ත මෙන්ම ආසනයේ වසර 5ක අවම පදින්චිය  හෝ එම ආසනය තුල උපන් අයකු වීම අනිවාර්ය කළ යුතුය තවද කිසියම් නියෝජිතයකු තම වගකීම් නිසියාකාරව ඉටු නොකරන්නේ නම් ඔහු ඉවත් කිරීමට අදාල චන්ද කොට්ඨාශයේ චන්ද දායකයින්ට බලය දිය යුතුය. 

36 ක්‍රි.පූ.427 සිට මේ රටේ තිබුණු තුන් සින්හලේනැවත පිහිටුවීම

37 1815උඩරට ගිවිසුම අත්සන්කරනවිට තිබුණු සින්හ කොඩිය නැවතත් මේ රටේ ජාතික කොඩිය වශයෙන් පිළිගැනීම.

38මු ලු රටටම එක ජාතික ගීයක් සින්හලෙන් පම්ණක් ගැයීම

39 රටපුරා අධිරාජ්යවාධී නස්ඨාවශේෂ වශයෙන් දක්නට ලැබෙන සියළුම පුද්ගල නාම,  ස්ථාන, මන්මාවත්, චතුරස්සර නාම සින්හලෙන් ලිවීම සහ සජිත් ප්‍රේමදාස විසින් උදාගම් වැඩසටහන යටතේ රට පුරා නව ගම්මානවලට තබා ඇති අරාබි සහ ඉන්දීය නම් වෙනුවට, ඒවා මුල්බැසගැනීමට පෙර වහාම සින්හල නම් ආදේශකිරීම

40.සමස්තලන්කාවාසීන් මෙන්ම මුලු ලොවම ලන්කා රාජ්ය සින්හල බෞද්ධ රටක් වශයෙන් පිලිගැනීම

41 සියළුම ජනවර්ග, භාශා, ආගම් සහ ප්‍රාදේසීය නම්වලින් ඇති සියලුම දේශපාලන පක්ශ තහනම් කිරීම . 

42 1505  -1848 දක්වා වසර 443ක් තිස්සේ මේ රටත් සින්හල ජාතියත් පෘතුගීසි, ඕලන්ද සහ ඉන්ග්‍රීසි යන ප්‍රබල අධිරාජ්යවාදි ආක්‍රමනිකයින්ගෙන් ආරක්ශාකරගත් කන්ද උඩරට  වීර සින්හලයින් වෙනුවෙන් ද එසේම 1815 සිට 1948 දක්වා සටන් වලදී 100-1000 ගණන් මරා ඔවුන්ගේ  ඉඩකඩම් සියල්ල බලහත්කාරයෙන් අල්ලාගෙන ,තම ගම්දනවු වලින් පන්නා දමා ඔවුන් සතු සියළු දෙයම අහිමිකොට නැවත ඔවුන්ගෙන් කොල්ලකාගත් ඉඩම්වල ඉන්දීය වතුකම්කරුවන් ලක්ශ ගනනින් පදින්චිකොට ඔවුන්ගේ ඉඩම්ද අහිමිකොට තම උපන්බිමේම අනාථයින් බවට පත්කොට සදාකාලිකවම දරිද්‍රබවේ පතුලටම දමා ඔවුන්ට ඉන්ග්‍රීසීන් විසින්  සිදුකරණ ලද අසාධාරනකම් වලට ද, 1948 සිට මේ දක්වාම කිසිදු රජයකින් යුක්තිය හා සාධාරණය ඉටුකොට නැත. එදා ඒ උඩරැටියන් නොසිටියේනම් අද සින්හල කියා ජාතියක් හෝ රටක් අපට  නැත.

එමනිසා ඒ වීර මුතුන්මිත්තන්ගෙන් පැවත එන උඩරට සින්හලයින්ට දැන්වත් ඔවුන්ගේ අහිමිවූ ඒ අසාධාරනයන්ට සාධාරනය ඉටුකළ යුතුය.

මේ සඳහා අලුතෙන් පිහිටුවීමට යෝජිත උඩරට ගැමි සන්වර්ධන හා කඳුරට (හදබිම ) සන්රක්ශන අමාත්යාන්ශය යටතේ විශේශ ජාතික වැඩ පිලිවෙලක් සකස්කළ යුතුය.

එහි මූලික අන්ග වශයෙන්

1 මු.ම. අඩි 5000 ට ඉහල සම්ස්ස්ත භූමියම ( සින්හල රජකාලේ මෙන්) දැඩි සන් රක්ශිත හා ආරක්ශිත ඉකලාපයක් වශයෙන්ප්‍රකාශ කිරීම (මෙම කොටසේ සියලුම වර්ගයේ ජනාවාස තහනම්කළයුතුය.මෙම කොටසට අවශ්ය කම්කරුවන් ඊට බහැරින් ගෙන ආ යුතුය ).

2 අඩි 3500-5000 දක්වා විශාල පරිමාණයේ තේ වතු පමණි. ඒ තුලද තේ කර්මාන්ත ශාලා, සහ ඒවා පාලනය කිරීමට අත්යාවශය ගොඩනැගිලි හැර වෙනත් කිසිම ජනාවාශයක් නොසෑදිය යුතුය.

3 අඩි1000 -3500 අතර කොටසේ මිශ්‍ර වගා සහිත  අක් 2 ½ ගොවිපවුල් පදින්චිකිරීමේ ව්යාපාරයක් ආරම්භ කළයුතුය.(මේ කොටසෙන් 3500-5000 අතර කොටසට අවශ්ය කම්කරුවන් සැපයිය හැක )

මෙම වැඩපිළිවෙල ක්‍රියාත්මක කිරිමෙන් කඳුරට වන සම්පත් ආරක්ශාවී භූ  ස්ථාවරත්වයද රැකෙන අතර  ජල පෝශක ප්‍රදේශ ආරක්ශා වීම මෙන්ම පාන්ශු සන් රක්ශනය වීම, තේ වගාව ආරක්ශා වීම, ජනතාවගේ ඉඩම් ප්‍රස්නය විසඳීම මෙන්ම වතු දෙමල ප්‍රස්නයද විසඳෙනු ඇත.

.

43.පාර්ලිමෙන්තුවේ දැනට සිටින ජාතිලැයිස්තු මන්ත්‍රී 29 අහෝසිකොට  ඉතිරි 196,  1977 ට පෙර තිබුණු 165 දක්වා අඩුකළ යුතුය.

44.මේ රටේ ආර්ථිකයේ කෘශි කර්මාතයට සහ පශුස්ම්පත් සන්වර්ධනයට  මුල්තැන් දිය යුතුය.

45 ඒ සමඟම  කෘශි කර්මාන්තයේ සියලුම අන්ශවලට නැවතත් රසායනික පොහොර ලබාදි රටේ ආහාර ස්වයන්පෝශිත භාව්ය සහ සුරක්ශිත භාවය ආරක්ශාකොට කෘශි භෝග අපනයනය වැඩිකර ගැනීමට වහාම පියවර ගත යුතුය.

46 බුඩ්ධාගම් රාජ්ය ආගම කිරීම සහ අනෙකුත් සියලුම ආගම් ඇදහීමේ අයිතිය පමණක් තහවුරු කිරීම.

මේ සඳහා අලුතෙන් පිහිටුවීමට යෝජිත උඩරට ගැමි සන්වර්ධන හා කඳුරට (හදබිම ) සන්රක්ශන අමාත්යාන්ශය යටතේ විශේශ ජාතික වැඩ පිලිවෙලක් සකස්කළ යුතුය.

එහි මූලික අන්ග වශයෙන්

1 මු.ම. අඩි 5000 ට ඉහල සම්ස්ස්ත භූමියම ( සින්හල රජකාලේ මෙන්) දැඩි සන් රක්ශිත හා ආරක්ශිත ඉකලාපයක් වශයෙන්ප්‍රකාශ කිරීම (මෙම කොටසේ සියලුම වර්ගයේ ජනාවාස තහනම්කළයුතුයා.මෙම කොටසට අවශ්ය කම්කරුවන් ඊටබහැරින් ගෙන ආ යුතුය ).

2 අඩි 3500-5000 දක්වා විශාල පරිමාණයේ තේ වතු පමණි. ඒ තුලද තේ කර්මාන්ත ශාලා, සහ ඒවා පාලනය කිරීමට අත්යාවශය ගොඩනැගිලි හැර වෙනත් කිසිම ජනාවාශයක් නොසෑදිය යුතුය.

3 අඩි1000 -3500 අතර කොටසේ මිශ්‍ර වගා සහිත  අක් 2 ½ ගොවිපවුල් පදින්චිකිරීමේ ව්යාපාරයක් ආරම්භ කළයුතුය.(මේ කොටසෙන් 3500-5000 අතර කොටසට අවශ්ය කම්කරුවන් සැපයිය හැක )

මෙම වැඩපිළිවෙල ක්‍රියාත්මක කිරිමෙන් කඳුරට වන සම්පත් ආරක්ශාවී භූ  ස්ථාවරත්වයද රැකෙන අතර  ජල පෝශක ප්‍රදේශ ආරක්ශා වීම මෙන්ම පාන්ශු සන් රක්ශනය වීම, තේ වගාව ආරක්ශා වීම, ජනතාවගේ ඉඩම් ප්‍රස්නය විසඳීම මෙන්ම වතු දෙමල ප්‍රස්නයද විසඳෙනු ඇත.

(ශ්‍රී ලන්කා පරිපාලන සේවයේ, ප්‍රාදේශීය ආදායම් නිළධාරි, අතිරේක දිසාපති,දෙපාර්තමෙන්තු ප්‍රධානි,සන්ස්ථා ප්‍රධානි, විවිධ අමාත්යාnශ ලේකම් වරයෙකු, වෘතීය සන්ගම් ප්‍රධානියෙකු සහ විශ්ව විද්යාල කතිකාචාර්ය වරයකු වශයෙන් වසර 40 ක් පමණ කාලයක් තුල මා ලැබූ අත්දැකීම් වලට අමතරව සමාජයේ විවිධ තරාතිරමේ ගිහි පැවිදි පැතිකඩක් සමඟ සාකච්චා කිරිමෙන් ලබාගත් තොරතුරු සහ ජපානය,තායිලන්තය.ඉන්දියාව, එන්ගලන්තය සහ ඇමෙරිකාව වැනි රටවල සන්චාරයකිරීමෙන් ලබනලද අත්දැකීම්ද මෙම ලිපිය සකස්කිරීමට උපකාරවිය)  

Courtesy The Daily Mirror

• Down to 1, 000-2, 000 a day from 4, 000-5, 000
• SL welcomed 43, 761 tourists from April 1 to 18
• Cumulative tourist arrivals up to April 18 at 329,095

Sri Lanka’s tourist arrival rate has started to witness a dip in the month of April due to the ongoing economic crisis.
The Tourism Ministry yesterday said that the daily tourist arrivals that were in the range of 4,000 to 5,000 in the recent months have now contracted to the levels of 1,000 to 2,000.​​

Reappointed Tourism Minister Prasanna Ranatunga yesterday said steps are being taken to increase tourist arrivals.

He added that necessary measures are being taken to ensure the safety of tourists visiting the country and to provide them with the necessary facilities without any hindrance.

Tourism sector stakeholders have been repeatedly calling out for help to have continuous access to fuel so the industry can operate with minimal impact amidst the shortages.

While accommodation providers continue to struggle to procure diesel to fuel generators during power-cuts, tour operators are unable to go forward with their planned packages. Several tour operators took to social media to highlight their plight where they highlighted their inability to transport guests to tourist sites due to difficulties in purchasing fuel.

Meanwhile, for the 1 to 18 April period Sri Lanka welcomed a total of 43, 761 tourists, bringing the total arrivals for the year so far to 329,095.  

For the first 18 days of April, the United Kingdom has emerged as the major source market, bringing in 8,743 visitors. India, which has slipped to the second position, accounted for 5,802 tourists.

Courtesy Punchng.com

The Chinese government has decided to provide emergency humanitarian assistance to Sri Lanka to help the country cope with the current difficulties.

The spokesperson for China International Development Cooperation Agency, Xu Wei, on Tuesday, said China had noticed Sri Lanka’s economic difficulties and was ready to help.

Wei said, We believe that the Sri Lankan government and people will overcome the temporary difficulties and maintain economic and social stability and development.”

Sri Lanka had been in the midst of a severe economic crisis featuring shortages of foreign exchange, fuel, and other essential supplies as well as rising inflation.

Read Also

Sri Lanka: IMF to consider request for financial aidSri Lanka: Protests resume over fuel price hikeSri Lanka: Over 40 lawmakers withdraw support for government

On Tuesday, protests had resumed across the country over the fuel price hike.

The protesters were demanding the resignation of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa and Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa, who is the president’s brother.

The economic crisis in Sri Lanka had meant a lack of the United States dollars, which had affected imports.

By Devjyot Ghoshal and Uditha Jayasinghe Courtesy FXEMPIRE

COLOMBO (Reuters) – India and Sri Lanka have resumed talks on linking their electricity grids, officials told Reuters on Tuesday, a step that could aid New Delhi’s goal of reducing China’s influence on the island nation, now grappling with a severe economic crisis.Advertisement

71% of retail investor accounts lose money when trading CFDs with this provider

There was no immediate prospect that power cuts brought by the crisis could be eased by the talks, which are a preliminary effort on a multi-year project both sides have explored before.

India has extended assistance running into billions of dollars to its southern neighbour to fight the crisis, brought on by a steep drop in foreign exchange reserves that stalled imports of essentials such as fuel, so disrupting power supply.

It is at very initial stages of discussion,” Wasantha Perera, secretary of Sri Lanka’s power ministry, told Reuters, but gave no further details.

Protests and political turmoil brought on by rocketing inflation, a currency devaluation and shortages have spurred the nation of 22 million to begin talks with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for a loan programme, also backed by India.

Now officials of both countries are turning to a project that has made little progress since it was first proposed more than a decade ago, aiming to link the neighbours with a miles-long transmission line running under the Indian Ocean.

The grid connection project came up in talks with India’s power ministry in March, when Basil Rajapaksa, then Sri Lanka’s finance minister, visited New Delhi to seek assistance, said a source with knowledge of the matter.

It will be mutually beneficial,” added the source, who sought anonymity, as the talks were private.

The foreign ministries of both India and Sri Lanka did not immediately respond to Reuters’ requests for comment.

The project figured among the key objectives of a strategy paper issued by Sri Lanka’s diplomatic mission in India last July.

This would enable Sri Lanka to obtain electricity during operational maintenance and droughts, and also to export excess generation to India,” it said in the document.

Nearly two-thirds of Sri Lanka’s electricity is generated by oil and coal-fired plants, while hydro makes up the rest.

Its total daily power demand is just a fraction of India’s, and meeting peak demand can be a challenge during times of drought.

VYING FOR INFLUENCE

Beijing and New Delhi have long vied for influence over the island, strategically located just off India’s southern tip, and Indian assistance in recent weeks has swelled amid a worsening crisis that has brought thousands on the streets.

The grid connectivity project could become part of New Delhi’s requests from Sri Lanka, which has also secured Chinese infrastructure deals in recent years, a source with knowledge of India’s thinking told Reuters, on condition of anonymity.

Until now, India has provided aid amounting to about $1.9 billion through credit lines and swaps, and is ready to commit up to $2 billion more to help Sri Lanka tackle its worst financial crisis since independence from Britain in 1948.

The plan to link the two grids has been in the works for years, with the neighbours signing a pact in 2010 on feasibility studies for an undersea power cable.

A study by the Power Grid Corporation of India envisaged deployment of either a 500-megawatt (MW) or a 1,000-MW undersea transmission system, the state-run company said in an annual report in 2015.

The shortest distance separating India and Sri Lanka is a narrow strip of ocean called the Palk Strait, which is about 40 kilometres (24.85 miles) wide, though the length of an undersea cable would depend on its alignment.

Subsea electrical cables with long spans include the NordLink, between Germany and Norway, which is about 623 km (387 miles) long.

(Reporting by Devjyot Ghoshal and Uditha Jayasinghe in COLOMBO, Additional reporting by Sudarshan Varadhan in CHENNAI; Editing by Krishna N. Das and Clarence Fernandez)

Courtesy 5 Pillars

Sri Lankan Muslim Mohamed Nafas says that Muslims are at the forefront of unprecedented public protests against the Rajapaksa government and are rebuilding their strained relationship with the majority Sinhalese community in the process.

Sri Lankans – regardless of race, religion, ethnicity and political affiliation – have taken to the streets demanding the immediate resignation of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa.

Public protests have taken place across the country with the slogan GO home Gota”. The most notable protest is underway in Galle Face, Colombo, for the 10th consecutive day with thousands in attendance.

The island nation is grappling with its worst economic crisis since independence from Britain in 1948.

It is caused in part by a lack of foreign currency, which has meant that Sri Lanka cannot afford to pay for imports of staple foods and fuel, leading to acute shortages and very high prices.

With power cuts lasting half a day or more, and shortages of food, medicines and fuel, public anger has soared.

Critics say rank corruption and nepotism – Rajapaksa’s brothers and nephews occupied several key ministerial portfolios – are the main reasons for the situation the country has found itself in.

Highly educated Buddhist Sinhala youths along with Tamils and Muslims are in the forefront leading the protests. Sri Lankans from various parts of the country are joining hands with the protesters passionately.

Despite the Rajapaksa government’s severe attempts to disperse the protesters, this has been defeated by the unity of the people and the prompt legal aid of prominent lawyers in the country.

The government that came to power using racism and Islamophobia as a tool is now exposed and the majority of the Sinhalese have now understood the conspiracies of the government to keep the nation divided for political gains of the ruling elites.

Today, the government is at odds with the interests of people and has earned their collective distrust and anger. The will power, determination, clarity and the uncompromising demands of the people staging massive protests have weakened the state’s tools that have long been used for manipulating the general public.

It has taken a serious economic crisis and the resulting power cuts, price hikes, and fuel shortages for Sri Lankans to come together and stand united. It is overwhelming to see Muslims being aided by Sinhalese to do their iftars at the protest sites.

The Sinhala-Muslim relationship, that has been in tatters because of the anti-Muslim hate speeches and unsavoury media campaign carried out by the racist hardliners, has now been built again.

Courtesy The Manila Times

COLOMBO: Sri Lankan Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa said on Tuesday the constitution would be changed to clip presidential powers and empower parliament as protesters continued to call on his brother, President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, and their powerful family to quit over the country’s economic crisis.

The premier told the legislature that the power transfer would be one of the quick steps that could be taken to politically stabilize the South Asian country and help talks with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for an economic recovery plan.

“While looking for solutions to the economic problems, it is important that we have political and social stability in the country,” Mahinda said, adding that reverting to a constitutional status with more powers to parliament would be the start of the reforms.

Gotabaya concentrated more powers in the presidency after his election in 2019.

Thousands of protesters were occupying the entrance to the president’s office for the 11th day on Tuesday, holding him responsible for the economic crisis.

Gotabaya admitted on Monday that he made mistakes, like delaying going to the IMF for help and banning agrochemicals with the aim of converting Sri Lanka’s agriculture to fully organic, leading to the crisis.

Despite this, both brothers have refused to step down, resulting in a political impasse. Opposition parties have rejected the president’s offer to join a unity government, but they are unable to hold a majority in parliament and form a new government.

In a Cabinet reshuffle on Monday, Gotabaya appointed many new faces and left out four family members who held Cabinet and non-Cabinet ministries in what seemed an attempt to please the protesters without giving up his family’s grip on power.

The Rajapaksa brothers are likely to retain their same grip on power even if the constitution is amended since they hold both offices.https://geo.dailymotion.com/player/x7y6v.html?video=x89x45v&customConfig[customParams]=custom&actionInfo=false&mute=true&dmPubtool=customembed-v2about:blank

Sri Lanka is on the brink of bankruptcy, with nearly $7 billion of its entire $25-billion foreign debt due for repayment this year. A severe shortage of foreign exchange means the country lacks the money to buy imported goods.

People have endured months of shortages of essentials like food, cooking gas, fuel and medicine, lining up for hours to buy the very limited stocks available.

Last week, the government said it was suspending repayment of foreign loans pending talks with the IMF. Finance Minister Ali Sabry and officials left for talks with the global financial institution on Sunday. The IMF and World Bank are holding annual meetings in Washington, D.C. this week.

Sri Lanka has also turned to China and India for emergency loans to buy food and fuel.

Vikas Dhoot Courtesy The Hindu

NITI Aayog member Ramesh Chand says ‘mind–boggling’ farm subsidies make sector dependent on State ‘crutches’

India could end up facing a Sri Lanka–type economic crisis if it doesn’t shun the culture of freebies” and subsidies in sectors like agriculture, NITI Aayog member Ramesh Chand warned, stressing that the mind–boggling” support measures for farmers has made agriculture extremely dependent on such crutches.

Our policies and support to agriculture and many other sectors are going in a direction that if we do not put a check on it, I think a day is not far when our fate will be same as that of the Sri Lankan economy,” Mr. Chand said, blaming self–anointed experts” for skewing the debate on farm subsidies and minimum support price (MSP) for crops.

Listing out several support measures that are not even quantified while calculating farm subsidies support, Mr. Chand reckoned that India has already hit the 10% limit of State support for the sector and flagged the additional costs of implementing the MSP regime.   

The latest number is that if we are buying anything at MSP, the economic cost comes to be 30%–35% more than the MSP and the government is not able to dispose the produce even at the MSP. This means that to pay ₹100 to the farmer, it costs ₹35 to the government,” he noted, explaining that a procurement of ₹3 lakh crore would thus entail some sort of additional support of ₹1 lakh crore.

Mr. Chand, who was speaking at the annual day function of the Delhi School of Economics, pointed out that fertilizer subsidy was usually the only number considered while evaluating farm sector support measures.  

We don’t recognise how much subsidy is going as interest subvention as if a farmer repays loan on time, he gets subvention of 4%. Some States pay the entire interest for the farmer. Then there is crop insurance, for which 70%–80% of the premium is paid by the Central government, there are internal freight subsidies.”

Every four five months, some proposal comes to NITI Aayog to pay ₹5,000 crore or 6,000 crore for the mills to clear farmers’ arrears. If you reckon all those things, you will find that we have reached the WTO norm of 10% support for value of agriculture,” Mr. Chand said.

Calling for greater awareness about the dangers of the freebie culture in the ruling dispensation and the public at large, the NITI Aayog member said: Sometimes, I used to feel bad money can drive out good money. Now, we are experiencing bad ideas are driving out good ideas. I consider it as a very dangerous kind of practice.”

Apart from the fiscal implications of dedicating large parts of its spending on just one sector, he also said the approach is detrimental to farm sector productivity.

Since we are spending more and more money for support and subsidies, the measures which are needed to give a push to the growth and efficiency are not working. As a result, we are caught in a vicious cycle.

Since infrastructure and irrigation are not improving much, no farmer leader is asking why the area under canal irrigation is declining. Everybody says there is free power so we will go for more tubewells… and increasing costs means you can keep demanding more prices.”

Recalling his time as a student of agricultural economics, Mr. Chand said price and non–price factors were considered critical but over time, non–price factors have taken a back seat and price is just the only dominant factor for policy making, whether it is the political dispensation, farmer groups or some kind of experts”.  

Courtesy The Daily Mirror

Finance Minister Ali Sabry and Sri Lankan delegation meeting Indian Finance Minister N. Sitharaman and a top level Indian economic delegation at IMF Headquarters in Washington

• IMF says will consider request for RFI even though outside the standard of circumstances
• Commends SL for the steps already taken in the direction of resolving economic crisis
• India makes representations on behalf of SL for RFI
• Indian Finance Minister and top level economic delegation meets with Sabry and Lankan delegation
• India assures fullest support to SL in deliberations with IMF, especially for Extended Fund Facility

Sri Lanka’s request for a Rapid Financing Instrument (RFI) from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has received a positive response form the multilateral agency, a Finance Ministry communiqué said.

Finance Minister Ali Sabry made the special request during his meeting with the IMF Managing Kristalina Georgieva on Monday (18) at the IMF Headquarters in Washington D.C. While India has also made representations on behalf of Sri Lanka for a RFI, the IMF has communicated that it will consider the request made despite it being outside the standard of circumstances for the issuance of an RFI, the Finance Ministry said in a press statement yesterday.

According to the statement, the IMF has commended the steps already taken by the Finance Ministry to resolve the economic crisis in Sri Lanka. The IMF has assured its fullest support to Sri Lanka and a positive response has also been received to expedite the process to strengthen the support extended towards Sri Lanka, the Finance Ministry said.

Sri Lanka has been promised that it will receive the fullest support from India to brave through the ongoing economic crisis. Meeting with Finance Minister Sabry at the IMF Headquarters was also the Finance Minister of India Nirmala Sitharaman and a top level Indian Economic delegation.

According to the statement released by the Finance Ministry, Minister Sitharaman stressed India remains committed to strengthening the development of the Sri Lankan economy and building stronger bonds between the two nations as they move forward together. 

The Indian Finance Minister also affirmed to Minister Sabry that India will fully support the deliberations of Sri Lanka with the IMF especially on the special request made for expediting an Extended Fund Facility (EFF). After the initial meeting with the Fund on Monday, arrangements were also made to hold several more rounds yesterday.  Present at the meetings were also newly appointed Treasury Secretary Mahinda Siriwardana and Central Bank Governor Dr. Nandalal Weerasinghe.

Courtesy Livemint.com

NEW DELHI : With Sri Lanka buffeted by economic headwinds, Indian apparel exporters are beginning to receive orders from the UK, EU, and even Latin American countries where Indian textiles had little or no presence.

Textiles and garments contributed nearly half of Sri Lanka’s exports but fuel shortages amid its worst financial crisis and ensuing power cuts are disrupting the production of key exports such as apparel and tea.

Much of the tea orders have already started moving to India and now a similar trend is being witnessed in the textiles sector, experts said, especially as India and Sri Lanka produce similar kinds of apparel and garments.

However, Sri Lanka’s apparel and garments exports get duty free access to various countries, unlike Indian exports.

There could be some benefits in the long run. Their exports are duty-free and that makes a difference. Besides they are trying to keep their textile sector protected despite the crisis,” A. Sakthivel, president of the Federation of Indian Export Organizations (FIEO) told Mint.

Sakthivel added that discussions are ongoing and that exporters have begun receiving queries from several European countries.

Apparel Export promotion council (AEPC) chairman Narendra Goenka concurred that India can emerge as an alternative to Sri Lankan apparel as it can produce the majority of the same products at lower cost.

The shift in demand from Sri Lanka to India may not be large but exporters have started receiving orders even from markets where we had little presence such as Latin America. Demand is also higher from UAE and Australia, too. What could work in our favour is pricing. Sri Lanka’s cost of production of apparel was much higher compared with India’s and this is why customers are looking at us,” Goenka added.

XINHUA

COLOMBO (XINHUA) – The International Monetary Fund (IMF) commended the steps already taken by Sri Lanka to stabilise its economy, the Sri Lankan Finance Ministry said in a press release yesterday.

The ministry said Finance Minister Ali Sabry met with IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva on Monday at the IMF headquarters. The IMF assured their fullest support, and a positive response has also been received to expedite the process to strengthen the support extended towards Sri Lanka, according to the press release.

Sabry also requested a Rapid Financing Instrument (RFI) and the IMF has subsequently informed him that India had also made representations on behalf of Sri Lanka for an RFI.

The Sri Lankan government decided last week to suspend repayment for all debts for an interim period till it has an orderly and consensual debt restructuring programme supported by the IMF.

Courtesy The Daily Mirror

The STF has been deployed in Rambukkana as protestors continue to protest in the area.

Eye witnesses on ground said the situation in the area remains tense and angry protestors are demanding justice for the protestors who were injured and killed as police opened fire earlier this evening. 

Eight policemen have been injured in the clash, one protestor killed and 24 people injured. 

Courtesy The Daily Mirror

The 19th Amendment to the Constitution with necessary changes has to be implemented as an initial step to resolve the present political and economic crisis, Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa told Parliament today.

The Prime Minister also called for the support of all political parties representing Parliament to make this exercise a success.

“We accept that people in this country are facing many difficulties. The fuel and electricity crisis are only the visible issues and there are many untold issues arising from those issues. The country is facing a crisis where all have to get together to find a way out. “This is not a time to fish in troubled waters to gain petty political gains,” the Prime Minister said.

He said the government plans to overcome the situation should be implemented. He added that irrespective of political differences all have to get together to find a solution to the present crisis.

“The fiscal management is very important to overcome this situation,. Hence internationally recognised economic experts have been appointed to the high ranking positions. Additionally we have already initiated dialogues with the IMF, World Bank, Asian Development Bank and other related institutions. We are getting constructive responses. In addition, friendly countries are assisting us to get out of this situation.” he added.

He said further that the Finance Minister, Finance Ministry, Secretary to the Finance Ministry and the Central Bank Governor are committed to bring this issue back to normal. Our responsibility at this moment is to find a lasting solution for this issue while applying short term measures to relieve the people’s difficulties. “Hence the opposition should make an intervention in this endeavour rather than resuming protests,” the Premier said. “I invited protestors at the Galle Face to discussions to get their valuable views,” he stressed.

He further said that the reason for the long hours of power cuts is the non construction of power plants at the right times. The Premier added that the opportunity to convert ourselves to renewable energy has been neglected and there was no point in finding fault in past decisions. He added that the government is taking corrective measures. He expressed his hope that the issue could be addressed soon as there is ample rainfall in the hill country and provision of fuel to the thermal power plants.

Mr. Rajapaksa said that the LPG and fuel issue would be solved within a few weeks. He added that there would not be a shortage of fuel and that the queue culture would be changed. (Yohan Perera and Ajith Siriwardana)

Courtesy Adaderana

Police curfew has been declared within the limits of Rambukkana police area with immediate effect.

The curfew order will be effective until further notice, the Police Spokesman said.

The move came after one person died this evening (April 19) following a clash between the protesters and the police during a demonstration staged in Rambukkana against the recent fuel price hike.

The victim, who was rushed to the Kegalle Teaching Hospital, was pronounced dead due to gunshot wounds, the director of the hospital Dr. Mihiri Priyangani confirmed.

At least 24 other injured persons including 08 police officers who were at the scene have also been admitted to the Kegalle Teaching Hospital. Several of them are reportedly in critical condition.

As per reports, one of them is receiving treatment in the intensive care unit of the Kegalle Teaching Hospital.

Earlier this evening, it was reported that the police had fired tear gas to disperse the protesters who were blocking the level crossing in Rambukkana for more than 15 hours.

Later, a tense situation had ensured, during which the police opened fire at the protesters.

People in Rambukkana, who were standing in long queues to obtain fuel since early this morning (April 19), had staged a protest in the town, completely blocking the area. They had blocked all entry and exit roads to Rambukkana town, urging the authorities to provide fuel at previous rates.

Vehicular movement on roads and train operations on the Main Line were thereby hindered by the demonstration.

Courtesy Adaderana

The Inspector-General of Police says the law enforcement officers had to resort to minimum force to prevent a group of individuals from attempting to set fire to a bowser containing nearly 33,000 litres of fuel during the protest staged in Rambukkana.

In a statement issued on the casualties reported in police shooting during Rambukkana protest, IGP C.D. Wickramaratne, also stated that the measure was taken to prevent massive damages that may have been caused.

Meanwhile, Secretary to the Ministry of Public Security, Jagath de Alwis said steps are being taken to conduct a police headquarters-level investigation to determine whether the police had used excessive force when dispersing protestors at Rambukkana.

Courtesy Adaderana

UPDATE: The number of people injured during the Rambukkana protest has risen to 24, including eight policemen, the police media spokesperson says.

---

One person died this evening (April 19) following a clash between the protesters and the police during a demonstration staged in Rambukkana against the recent fuel price hike.

The injured individual, who was rushed to the Kegalle Teaching Hospital, was pronounced dead due to gunshot wounds, the director of the hospital Dr. Mihiri Priyangani confirmed.

In the meantime, 11 other injured protesters who were at the scene have also been admitted to the Kegalle Teaching Hospital. Four of them are reportedly in critical condition.

Ada Derana correspondent stated that one of them is currently receiving treatment in the intensive care unit of the Kegalle Teaching Hospital.

Earlier this evening, it was reported that the police had fired tear gas to disperse the protesters who were blocking the level crossing in Rambukkana for more than 15 hours.

Later, a tense situation had ensured, during which the police opened fire at the protesters.

People in Rambukkana, who were standing in long queues to obtain fuel since early this morning (April 19), had staged a protest in the town, completely blocking the area. They had blocked all entry and exit roads to Rambukkana town, urging the authorities to provide fuel at previous rates.

Vehicular movement on roads and train operations on the Main Line were thereby hindered by the demonstration.

Meanwhile, the United National Party (UNP) said in a statement that the shooting victim is a former member of the party’s Youth Wing.

UNP Deputy Leader, Ruwan Wijewardena, is travelling to Rambukkana to visit the family and the hospital to check on the others who sustained injuries in the incident, the statement read further.

UNP lawyers have also been dispatched to the hospital, it added.

Shenali D Waduge

Where do we start? How about the US-engineered regime change in 2015. It remains a puzzle why the engineers of the regime change decided to end yahapalana shelf-life, just as it is a puzzle why the present US-linked leaders together with a coterie of pro-US advisors, US-inclined Secretaries & Public Officials should suddenly fall out of favor, even after signing deals favorable to them at 12midnight. It is time we started to make some sense as many of us are baffled how a nationalist government ended up hated by the People & deserted the nationalist objectives that they committed to fulfill, based on which the 2/3 majority was given.

Inspite of the Church raising a sinister claim regarding Easter Sunday, it is noteworthy that yahapalana had lost its popularity by its own actions even without Easter Sunday. Yahapalana had was destined to be changed with or without Easter Sunday.

If yahapalana was helped to power with external support, does it also imply that the present government also had the same external support? Is this why the nationalist objectives have taken a backseat, leaving the nationalist camp baffled.

It is no surprise that everyone questions who is really advising the government & taking decisions in the interest of the country. It was a surprise to the nationalists when the Government departed from its non-aligned policy to declare India First, distancing Sri Lanka from its traditional friends. It raised the doubts amongst many as to where the government was going. Then came the sudden tilt to the US. The signs looked obvious.

While covid made the economic situation worse, mismanagement of the economy over decades of rule, began to haunt the island nation. Whether it was planned with ulterior motives and bad advice, the people began facing a string of hardships coming one after the other. If the outcome was calculated, the desired results were achieved – the people demanded relief & the government was only too happy to go to India for assistance. Was the decision not to go to Russia for discounted petrol primarily because it would anger US having seen the sanction threats given to new friend India? Was this why the flights to Russia were also stopped? Be that as it may, India happily stepped in & relief assistance meant signing several MOUs giving up state assets & placing Sri Lanka under Indian influence. Was this the planned scenario masterminded by our envoy who seems to be finding the path with ease! Was part of his plan, also to have Sri Lanka economically under western monetary institutes?

Did he mastermind the slogan Reject225” as part of the neoliberal globalist plan to break up sovereign states, end Parliamentary democracy & transfer powers to corporate rule & global multinational hegemony?

Speaking nationalism but actioning Western interests was seen in statement made immediately after swearing a new 17 member cabinet – that Sri Lanka should have gone to the IMF earlier. A cabinet portfolio to a person who humiliated the armed forces to show off to a former US envoy has also been a shock.

It is also interesting that the Court would extend travel ban on the former governor but reject calls to extend ban on former Finance Minister & Treasury Secretary. The reshuffle has not pleased to many either & the latest is an effort to prune the powers of the President which undoubtedly will have the hands up of most MPs primarily because, to have it clipped by a so-called nationalist government is a plus for any election campaign by the opposition. The executive powers must remain intact as it balances any efforts to exert undue influence over the legislature.

This brings us to the golden question – when everything was taking place subtly in the interest of US & India, why would there be a plot to change them? The protestors were all generally pro-West. Why would they go against a government that was towing West?

Let us presume, the present leaders were roped in to complete phase 1of their plan & having completed the majority of that wish list & placed their people in places, to carry out future agendas, why would their shelf-life suddenly expire too. Could it be that the current set of leaders were in a conundrum to commit to phase 2 of the project demanded of them?

Phase 1 of the project succeeded to bring Sri Lanka under western rule via its monetary arms & under stewardship of hand-picked officials/advisors aligned to them.

Phase 1 saw little or no objection as people’s attentions were diverted to looking into their personal needs having being forced to undergo a string of hardships. These genuine grievances soon generated into hate against the government & that hate was fueled further by a well-planned campaign that headquartered itself in Galle Face Green.

A crisis is the best time to unleash all the hidden agendas into the open. Genuine and valid grievances became fueled no different to modus operandi applied to protests in other parts of the world. All a cut & paste operation.

What is likely to have been phase 2 of the project? 

Could the phase 2 of the greater project have been to get the same government that agreed to place Sri Lanka under the rule of western monetary institutes, be asked to enslave the people to their values” – this would have meant to eliminate the historical place held by Sinhala Buddhists in all state apparatus including the constitution & enforce all that which we see being displayed in the protest zone without any opposition.

• Displace the primordial place given to Sinhala Buddhists & enshrined in the constitution
• Campaign to change Sri Lanka’s constitution from unitary to united”
• Federal system (in reality a confederal set up) – leading to ultimate breakup of Sri Lanka between the 3 power houses eyeing Sri Lanka.
• Change the National Flag
• Change the National Anthem
• Endorse the Gay movement & embed it into daily polity
• Inability to attack tenets of Buddhism means to attack rituals & cultures associated with it through centuries.

Who are these usual culprits united in their hate for the majority

• The JVP created to attack Sinhala Buddhists & responsible for killing thousands of Sinhalese & used to brainwash minds of Sinhalese youth to distance themselves from the Sinhala Culture & Buddhist philosophy.
• LTTE Diaspora a front of the West – primary movers of the breakup of Sri Lanka likely to be tasked to balkanize India
• Institutional Church, historical project remains intact. Generally pretending to be beacons of unity but carrying out sinister agenda as seen in their efforts to support LTTE terrorism (not applicable to Catholics/Christians who understand the greater picture)
• UNP-SJB pro-imperials – open economic policy without national planning has resulted in the reliance on only import economy neglecting national productivity
• Media often influenced by external parties & generally opposed to the majority populace
• NGOs paid to destabilize Sri Lanka

What if the same government that agreed to enforce Phase 1 refused to commit to Phase 2?

In such a scenario, with all plans in place, all that needed to be done was to get rid of the government twisting the genuine grievance towards a different motive. Is this what is taking place?

In so getting rid of the present government, all obstacles are removed & the current opposition would be more than willing to implement the wishlist that the present lot, we presume, may have refused.

This is a plausible reason why the US-linked leaders may have fallen out of favor. In the interim, the likelihood of using the same US-linked leaders to fulfil other parts of the plan cannot be ruled out. Then there is also the bride in waiting who has entered through the backdoor – we can now understand why! Will he finally become the bride!

Let us watch them with these thoughts at the back of our mind – whether both sides are taking the people for a ride!

The outcome or agenda remains to usurp the historical place of the Sinhala Buddhists as they are the common enemy of all. The pretense of unity was exposed by a plethora of humiliating and shocking posts against the pillars that held the nation together for centuries. These posters are unabashedly displayed & camouflaged by unity slogans.

Nevertheless, we do not wish to become South Korea & we certainly do not expect politicians who have lived off the taxpayer to dole out Sri Lanka as if it is their personal property.

Truth & karma will prevail.

Shenali D Waduge

Garvin Karunaratne, Ph.D. Michigan State University, Former G.A. Matara

The experience of the Divisional Development Councils Programme(DDCP) of Sri Lanka(1970-1977) is currently of great importance in today’s situation of unemployment and also the inability to import goods due to the lack of foreign exchange.   This is because the DDCP is a programme that really creates employment. Further it is important to note that the DDCP was entirely implemented with local Rupees.  Foreign funds were only required to import dyes for the Crayon Project and the amount of dollars spent to import dyes saved a vast amount of dollars that would have had to be spent on importing crayons.  The DDCP is a blue print that can be immediately implemented almost entirely with existing staff and it can get into production mode within months.  

There are very few employment creation programmes in the world. What one can find are training programmes which provide training but do not include placing the trained in an income generating project, including guidance till the project- either on a self employed basis or a cooperative endeavour, is successful. The DDCP included all the elements of vocational training in an on the job manner and active intensive guidance, ending in the trainee becoming self employed or cooperatively employed in production. The key element is that success was judged in terms of commercial viability. 

Another important factor in assessing the DDCP lies in the fact that the DDCP created employment for the drop outs of the education system. In any country, the education system provides knowledge and training and those who are very successful enter the universities or institutes of higher addressing the current situtaion of unbemployment and education to attend to further studies. The next lot that get pass marks at secondary school, but fail to enter further studies enter the job market and find employment. Those who are not successful in the education system and who do not get pass marks are classified as the drop outs and they continue to do menial jobs or continue to be unemployed, scraping the barrel, for life. The DDCP dealt with. the youths who are in the third category- i.e. the drop outs and therein lies its greatness. 

Training on the job, ending in being fully occupied in a cooperative enterprise, or being self employed, in both cases being engaged in income generation activities is what the DDCP attended to. The fact that drop outs of the education system were concentrated on gives the DDCP a great place among development programmes. 

The DDCP was the flagship of the Sirimavo Government of Sri Lanka during the period 1970 to 1977. It had very wide and visionary aims in keeping with the Manifesto of the United Front that won the 1970 parliamentary election . It was ” to transform the administration thoroughly, make it more democratic and link it closely with the people” 

As stated by Dr N.M.Perera, the Hon. Minister of Finance, in the Budget Speech 1973: The main objective of this Programme is to create employment opportunities in the rural areas through small scale projects in agriculture, industry and the provision of infrastructural facilities, making use of the resources available locally: increase national production and involve the people in national development work.” 

The chief aim of the DDCP was to create employment for the youth. As stated in the 1970 Budget Speech it was ” to fulfill the aspirations of thousands of young men and women for whom life will lose all meaning unless they can find a useful place in our society.” 

In actuality the DDCP was a crash programme with the objective of creating 100,000 jobs within the first year of the new government.. It was a socialist government that took office in 1970 and in keeping with the aims of the Government as reflected in The Five Year Plan of 1970, the aim was to lay the foundation for a further advance towards a socialist society”. 

Professor H.A.de S. Gunasekera, the eminent professor of economics at the University of Peradeniya was handpicked to lead the programme and he was appointed as the Permanent Secretary to the Ministry of Plan Implementation. The main charge of the Ministry was the implementation of the DDCP. 

The DDCP got off to a grand start. The Ministry of Plan Implementation was specially created for the purpose of planning and implementing the DDCP. Great prominence was accorded to the Programme. Even a helicopter was placed at the disposal of Professor Gunesekera, for him to travel to the various Districts. This was the first time that an administrator was accorded this privilege. 

At the District level, the Government Agent, the head of the District was held responsible for this programme.  

A Divisional Development Council was established in each division and these Councils were chaired by the Divisional Revenue Officer, later renamed Assistant Government Agent. A number of Graduate Assistants were posted to each AGA area and there was a Graduate Assistant for each Council. The Graduate Assistants were recruited specially for this DDCP. This category was recruited from among unemployed graduates. 

Popular participation was foremost in the mind of the Government. As Peris and Nilaweera state 

” these councils were expected to enable popular participation in which the elected bodies of the village- the cooperative society, the cultivation committee, the village council could have a role in planning and coordinating the overall development of the area.” (Rural Poverty Alleviation in Sri Lanka, 1983) 

The Plan also included organizing agricultural, industrial, fisheries and other income generating projects and for obtaining the maximum participation of the people in the planning, operation and management of the projects. The Divisional Development Council was the method of eliciting the participation of the people in planning their own development. 

The monthly meetings of the Council were held regularly and were attended by all the officers at the divisional level, representatives of all village level bodies and also by officers from the district level. Thus it was a body that could attend to the total planning of all development tasks at the divisional and village level. 

Each Council was allocated Rs. 200,000.00 to be spent within the first two years. Of this, 35% was earmarked for agricultural projects. However specific approval had to be obtained for each project from the Ministry of Plan Implementation and the feasibility of each project was studied in great detail. Special grants were given amounting to 35% of the total cost including capital costs and working capital. For instance in the case of the Gohagoda Agricultural Project of the Kandy District, an average project, the capital cost was Rs. 65,000.00, the working capital Rs. 34,000.00 and the grant allowed was Rs. 32,000.00. By 1976, the penultimate year of this Programme, as much as Rs. 127 million had been spent on various projects. 

While it was hoped that the Councils would be a coordinating body for all development work it was also projected that each Council would have to initiate and manage special projects where youths would be offered employment. What was new in the DDCP was that new projects were to be approved where youths would be enlisted, trained and guided to be employed in income generating projects. 

In these projects, the youths were to work with community support where community leaders would help the enterprises. Earlier there were multipurpose cooperatives at the village level with an apex body- a cooperative union at the divisional level. What was new with the DDCP was the thrust of community cooperatives at economic development. Earlier the multi purpose cooperatives only attended to the distribution of essential food, the purchase of paddy, providing credit and supplies for agricultural pursuits. In addition there were industrial cooperatives established for making furniture and for crafts.  There were Power Looms established on a cooperative basis. 

The Achievement 

By 1972, the DDCP was implemented islandwide. By 1973, 590 Councils were fully established and these Councils had submitted 1900 projects proposals of which 900 projects were approved and special allocations of funds were made for their implementation. All these projects were planned from the grass root level. These projects comprised 341 agricultural projects, 512 industrial projects and 47 infrastructural projects. Nearly 2000 acres were brought under cultivation, 68 poultry projects with a bird population of 150,000 were established and this enabled 7904 persons to find employment at an expense of Rs. 4.2 million. Over the period 1970 to 1976, a total of Rs. 127 million was spent and 33,271 jobs were created. Some of these offered only part time engagement. 

The work of the Councils concentrated on developing these projects. The role of planning and coordinating the total development in the division gradually receded to the background and was ultimately forgotten. The Assistant Government Agent of the division already attended to the function of planning and coordinating all development work at the divisional level. He continued to do this work. Projects were planned and established in all districts. There was a duplication of work because many of the industrial projects approved for the Divisional Development Councils were in crafts, an area that also came under the Small Industries Department. There were a few non craft industries like ceramics. In agriculture, the thrust was at establishing cooperative farms and this was a new feature. The services of the Department of Agriculture was obtained for this purpose. In most agricultural and industrial projects the youth workers were able to draw good incomes. 

Of special mention is the Paper Making Project in Kotmale in the Nuwara Eliya District where paper and cardboard making was commenced using waste paper and straw. This was a success till it was closed down by the new Government of 1977 which ran down the working and the achievement of the DDCP purposely. 

In the Galle District progress was made in agricultural farms and in the manufacture of farm implements. The Baddegama Assistant Government Agent, Wilson Perera was provided with four Graduate Assistants and 12 Project Officers. The latter were officers with experience in the particular vocation whose services were sought and they had been seconded for service for the DDCP. Their task was to work with the cooperative workers on a participative basis, teaching youths the essential elements of entrepreneurship in producing and marketing the products. It was hoped that the youths would eventually acquire the ability and capacity to manage the cooperative industry or agricultural farm on their own on a commercially viable basis, when the Project Officer would leave them and revert to their own substantive post or be posted to lead another DDCP project. Thereafter the youths were expected to function on their own steam. 

The development work done in Baddegama Council area included establishing a cooperative farm with 60 youths . At the very inception a neglected old farm was taken over. Its factory was repaired and a part of it was converted into residential quarters, 12 acres of neglected rubber was rehabilitated and tapping commenced, 40 acres of neglected tea was rehabilitated, 20 acres of jungle land was cleared and coconut saplings planted, 50 acres of neglected paddy land was rehabilitated and brought under regular cultivation. In addition, in 1975, a housing scheme was launched for the cooperators. Similar farm projects were established in most Districts. 

The Baddegama Farm Project was a great success till it ran into political problems. The DDCP was a socialist concept and engineered by the Marxist group of Ministers of the Cabinet of Ministers. These included Dr N.M.Perera, the Minister of Finance. These Ministers left the Government in 1975 and thereafter less emphasis was Placed on this Programme. 

The DDCP was implemented islandwide but I will confine myself to detail what was achieved in my District, Matara, to illustrate what the SLFP and its ally the LSSP stood for.  

In the Matara District, where I was the Government Agent many projects were planned and implemented. The projects included garment making, batik dyeing, crafts, pre-stressed concrete, sewing industry projects etc. The sewing and craft projects were a replica of what was done by the Small industries Department. 

A Batic Dyeing Cum Sewing Project was initiated in Morawaka where employment was offered to twenty girls. Batic Dyeing Training was at that time not done by any State Department or institution and it continued to be within the private sector with a very high margin of profit. The Sewing and Batic Dyeing Unit was a great success. 

In agriculture in the Matara District, virgin crown land was identified, jungles cleared, the land graded and brought under cultivation. A number of farms were established and the cooperator youths drew good incomes by cultivating cassava, ginger and other crops for which there was a market demand. The youth cooperators were taught details of crop planning, preparation of the land for cultivation, planting, , crop care, harvesting and marketing. All of these aspects were taught on the job as they engaged in the various tasks. The entire approach was participatory as detailed earlier in the case of the Baddegama Council in the Galle District. The aim was to make the youths think and thereby enhance their ability and capacity to get to working on their own. This included training in the management of every aspect of their cooperative enterprise. 

The Councils in the coastal areas of Weligama, Matara and Dondra had submitted projects for making inboard fishing boats. It was difficult to obtain approval for these projects from the Fisheries Ministry, the one Ministry that should have been interested.. Two projects for Matara and Dondra Councils were approved with the greatest difficulty. The Boatyard for Matara was established in 1972 and manufactured twenty four, 30 ft inboard motor boats a year. This was the first cooperative boat building project in the entire island and the cooperator youths were taught full details on the job from the selection of timber, tracing the templates, seasoning timber, cutting and fitting the timber and fixing the engines etc. The trainees had been trained in carpentry and they learned the manufacture of the boats on the job. The boats were sold to fishermen in cooperatives. This Boatyard Project was ably handled by the Assistant Government Agent, Ran Ariyadasa and Kumarasiri, the Graduate Assistant. This industry was an acclaimed success till it was closed down in 1978 by the newly elected UNP Government which wanted to discredit the DDCP. 

Other important industrial units established included a Hand Made Paper Unit at Yatiyana, an industry that has survived to this day(2009), recycyling used paper from government offices. At Kekanadure, an industry making agricultural implements was established in a village which was traditionally associated with the industry. This industry exists till today(2009).At Talpawila training in pottery was imparted to youths and a pottery industry was successfully established.  A Pre-Stressed Concrete Factory was established at Talpawila which made concrete pipes and posts of all types. This industry exists and currently employs 40 youths. 

The Morawaka Council submitted a proposal to establish a Water Colour Paint making project, A Feasibility study was made by the Industrial Development Board at our request. The project was aimed at avoiding imports. There was no resource in the area for this industry other than labour, but that was the strategy used by Japan and Singapore in their industrial development. The Ministry of Plan Implementation rejected this application. Instead of import substitution type of projects the Ministry of Plan Implementation was advising us to concentrate on brick making, tile making and crafts- the areas where the Small Industries Department had made inroads with great success.. In the private sector there were plenty of tile and brick making factories. The Ministry was not interested in establishing any import-substitution type of industries. Though we had submitted various proposals for Import-substitution type of industry they were all thrown into the dustbin. I therefore decided to plan and establish a cooperative industry on my own. I was ably assisted by the Planning Officer Vetus Fernando, who happened to be a chemistry graduate and Chandra Silva a resourceful officer who was the District Land Officer. He was working on the DDC Projects in addition to his duties. A graduate trainee Dayananda Paliakkara was specially selected to handle this task. 

In my work as the Deputy Director of Small Industries I had approved many new industries to be established and I had directed all my officers that they should investigate when they go for inspections and be certain that the entrepreneur actually manufactured the product. On my inspections too I saw that the items were really produced. This was done because there were people who pretended to have industries in an attempt to secure allocations of foreign exchange, import and sell the goods in the market instead of engaging in production. I had approved an industry to make water colours and was familiar with the process of manufacture. According to my opinion crayons was allied to making water colours. I decided that this could be an area for action. At that time easily 90% of the country’s requirements were imported and if we succeeded we will be creating employment for the unemployed and at the same time cutting off imports. The import content of the ingredients was easily less than 20% and this looked ideal.. 

After we had done some initial experiments and was hopeful of success, we had to obtain the services of a laboratory. I spoke with Mr Ariyawamsa, the Principal of Rahula College, the premier educational institute in the District. I knew a number of science teachers at this College, who offered ideas. Mr. Ariyawamsa readily agreed to allow us to use the College science laboratory for experiments to find out the technical process for the manufacture of crayons. We were also helped by the Science Inspector Mr. Rajapaksa. I had heard about the working of the Land Grant system in the USA where the Universities offered their technical expertise to bring about national development. 

Pooling the knowledge of every scientist that was available, led by our Planning Officer,Vetus Fernando it did not take long to find out the exact proportions of each ingredient that had to be used and to arrive at the real process of manufacture. The process was gradually mastered, but the crayons were not firm enough and Vetus Fernando, the Planning Officer who happened to be a chemistry graduate of the University thought it best to obtain the help of the Chemistry Department of the University of Sri Lanka, from where he had graduated a few years earlier. Vetus spent a number of days beseeching and begging his professors but none of them were interested in offering any advice. 

If any one of the dons had to spare an hour or two to have a careful look, to think of how it could be solved and try a few experiments- that was all that was required. This was a situation where a Land Grant University like Michigan State would have taken on the mantle of development very willingly. But sad to say our Universities are more engrossed with training graduates rather than been concerned about the role they could play in the development of the country. We continued experiments at the Lab at Rahula College and mastered the art of making crayons in around a further month. 

Once the process of manufacture had been finalized I had to decide how we would proceed with the manufacture. It had to be a cooperative structure. Further it had to be done with a great deal of secrecy because I was not expected to be establishing new industries without the approval of the Ministry of Plan Implementation. Though as the Government Agent of the District I controlled vast funds; each vote had a definite remit which had to be meticulously adhered to in spending. Finally I decided to trust Mr Sumanapala Dahanayake, the Member of Parliament for Deniyaya, an electorate in my District. He was also the President of the Morawaka Cooperative Union and in that capacity he had access to the funds held in the Cooperative Union which we could use as capital for the necessary expenses. However he had no authority to use the funds for a new industry. This was a deadlock that had to be surmounted. 

As the Government Agent of the District I was gazetted as a Deputy Director for Cooperative Development. This had been done with the idea of the Government Agent supervising the Assistant Commissioner of Cooperatives and the work of the Cooperative Department in the District for the purpose of implementing the agricultural development programme. I usurped the full powers of a Deputy Director of Cooperatives and ordered the President of the Morawaka Cooperative Union to use funds available with the Coop Union and establish the industry and get down to manufacturing crayons.. Sumanapala Dahanayke the President of the Coop Union, the maverick he was, readily agreed and we got down to establish the industry. Twenty unemployment youths were recruited and the Coop Union purchased the necessary equipment. More youths were employed for packing and handling. 

The industry was established and we got down to the making of crayons; labels and boxes were hastily printed and crayons packets were produced to fill a large room. This was done very quickly, working day and night because secrecy was a prime necessity. It was a grand task where every one- officers and cooperators pitched in to work as a team- working day and night. If the Ministry of Plan Implementation got wind of the project they could stop it forthwith, hold an inquiry and punish me. The task was to establish the manufacturing unit, make good quality crayons and to show them to key Cabinet Ministers and get them involved so that they could stand up for me in case I ran into a  problem for acting on my own without Ministry approval. The Minister for Industries Mr T.B.Subasinghe was surprised when shown the crayons that were produced and readily agreed to open the sales. With that we felt safe. With the inauguration of the sales, the industry came to the open and the success in production and sales amply justified the fact that no Ministry approval had been obtained. The Ministry of Plan Implementation had to eat humble pie and finally the crayon factory, established without authority in a most clandestine manner, gained the full approval of the Government. Ultimately the Coop Crayon industry established by Sumanapala Dahanayake in his capacity as the Presidenbt of the Morawaka Cooperative Union produced around a tenth of the crayons that Sri Lanka required. became  the flagship industry of the DDCP. 

The only import item in the ingredients that went into the manufacture was dyes and at the initial stages we obtained dyes at black market prices from the open market. The Ministry of Industries was requested for an allocation, but they said that they had no foreign exchange to be allocated to cooperatives for this purpose. An year earlier as Deputy Director of Small Industries I was personally in charge of allocating foreign exchange for small industries and I could have given an allocation for any cooperative. The personnel in the Small Industries Department and the Ministry of Industries were not prepared to bend the rules for the sake of national development. Finally we had to beseech the Controller of Imports, Harry Guneratne. The Controller of Imports allocated funds for the import of crayons and readily agreed to my suggestion to allocate funds for the import of dyes and to reduce the allocation for imports accordingly. Guneratne had the capacity to understand that in a crayon the import constituent was only 5 to 10% and he was making a real saving in foreign exchange to the extent of 90%. The Minister of Trade, Mr T.B.Illangaratna, whose authority was sought, too readily agreed. He was surprised with the quality of the crayons and it ended with a request from him that we should commence a crayon factory in Colombo. We put off that request for the moment stating that we would do that after our crayon industry was fully established on a commercially sound footing. 

This crayon industry was a grand success which paid up the total outlay in the first six months of its operation. After I left the Administrative Service in April 1973, the industry continued under the able direction of the Government Agent of the District and Sumanapala Dahanayake the President of the Coop Union till 1977 when the new Government interfered. Any good industry established by the former government was anathema to the new Government and the new Government sent a Deputy Director of Cooperatives, N.T,Ariyaratne with specific instructions to find fault with this industry so that they could take action against Sumanapala Dahanayake, the President of the Coop Union, the earlier member of parliament, who had established the industry under my direction and had with the youth cooperators managed it in a commercially viable manner. Mr Ariyaratne had found the industry in proper order fully commercially viable and reported that the industry was an asset and this saved Mr. Dahanayake. 

However, the crayon industry had to close down due to the onslaught of imports under the free trade policies of the new Government. At its heyday from 1972 to 1977 this crayon industry did produce around a tenth of the crayon requirements of the country and it could easily have been developed to produce not only the country’s entire requirements but could have even be developed to build up an export trade. 

. In any country when a successful industry is established it should be closely supported and guarded in the national interest. Not so in Sri Lanka, when political rivalry raises its ugly head.. 

As stated earlier the Marxist Ministers led by Dr N.M.Perera leaving the Government in 1975 led to the Government de- emphasizing the DDCP. With the free market and liberalization policy followed by the new Government the death knell of the DDCP was sounded. In the Budget Speech of 1978, it is said that though as much as 2619 projects were approved, 666 projects never got off the ground and of the balance approximately 700 closed down by 1976, of the remaining 700 only 5% were found viable, and as much as 72% of the agricultural projects had failed. This was more a part of the tirade that the new Government had toward the DDCP flagship of the former Government. 

Strengths and Weaknesses 

Many are the weaknesses and the strengths of the DDCP. 

The weaknesses are many. As pointed out earlier, the Ministry of Plan Implementation was approving only traditional and craft type of industry and agricultural farms and was shy of approving new import substitution type of industry. Perhaps the Ministry was frightened to march into new areas of activity because any failure would reflect badly. Imports eat into our available foreign exchange and also cause our people to be unemployed. Concentrating on crafts and basic traditional industries amounted to duplicating the work done by the Small Industries Department that had been active earlier. The Ministry should have actually taken the forefront to plan and establish import substitution type of industries. 

Another weakness was that the Programme solely depended on worker cooperatives and left the private sector totally alone. If the private sector had been activated in addition, then it would have been a case of walking on two legs. 

The main weakness lies in the Parliamentary form of party political governance system where when a new political party comes into power it throws away all the programmes and policies of the earlier government irrespective of successes. In the process, the baby is also thrown away with the bath water. 

The Strengths lies in the few projects that were successful. These commercially viable ventures helped the national economy. Their production did save foreign exchange that would have been incurred in imports. The fact that employment was made available for the cooperative entrepreneurs is also of key importance. 

An additional strength was the educational process of building up the abilities and the capacities of the participants and making them self-reliant entrepreneurs, able to stand on their own feet. This was due to the strategies of community development and non formal education which we used. At that time administrators who worked in the Rural development Department and that included the Government Agents of the Districts and the Assistant Government Agents in charge of Divisions had come to follow community development strategies and principles. We administrators had not even known the word non formal education, but we thought it best that we work with the trainees in a truly participatory manner, so that they could learn on the job. 

In the planning and implementation of the DDCP the Ministry of Plan Implementation did not give us any instructions as to how we should adopt a participatory approach. However the officers under the Government Agent included those who had worked for long under the Rural Development Department which attended to rural development work with the participation of the people. This Rural Development Department was our counterpart to the Community Development Programme of India and many other Third World countries that were implemented in the Fifties. The Rural Development Department followed the principles of Community Development as enunciated by the United Nations; The term Community Development has come into international usage to connote the process by which the efforts of the people themselves are united with those of Governmental authorities to improve the economic , social and cultural conditions of communities, to integrate these communities into the life of the nation and to enable them to contribute fully to national progess. This complex of processes is then made up of two essential elements ”…”the participation of the people themselves in efforts to improve their level of living with as much reliance as possible on their own initiative and the provision of technical and other services in ways which encourage initiative self help and make them more effective.(United Nations, 1965) 

It so happened that the entire staff handling development in Sri Lanka at the District level came under the influence of the Community Development ideas and this included the Government Agents who were development hardened workers who had a great deal of experience. It did not need directions on how to handle the education aspect to officers that had attended to working with the people for decades. The result was that the staff handpicked for the planning and the implementation of the DDCP did use the community development participatory approach. 

This included non formal education ideas as defined by me later on: Non Formal Education comprises experiential education processes to which people as participants are spontaneously subjected to as they actively work on an individual basis or in any group endeavour, be it in a discussion in the decision making that takes place in a trade union or a cooperative. It is completely spontaneous and as the learner participates, thinks and conscientizes, weighs the pros and cons of a problem and arrives at decisions, knowing fully well the confrontations involved and as the participants cooperate to face the obstacles, get used to collaborative practices of mutual help in achieving the tasks then through these repeated educational experiences, their initiatives develop and they become responsible.(From Karunaratne: Non Formal education Theory & Practice at Comilla) 

This quote would encapsulate the educational methods used by us in educating the trainees in the on the job situation in the various agricultural farms and industrial projects. Details provided of the projects in the Baddegama electorate in the Galle District and the Matara District shows that educational strategies were used to effectively enable the trainees to whet their abilities and in that process they gained the ability to become self reliant entrepreneurs. 

This educational enhancement is the strength that should have been built upon in every development program. 

In the case of the DDC Programme projects, with an initial grant for the machinery and a paltry allowance till the entrepreneurs derive incomes, we paved the way for the unemployed youth of a country to become net contributors. In this process they march from being net consumers to become net contributors. They have also in the process developed their abilities and capacities to stand on their own feet. This is a strength that stands in good stead. 

In Projects, the manufacture of farm implements in Baddegama, , the manufacture of crayons at Deniyaya, the pre-stressed concrete industry at Matara, the making of paper products at Kotmale and Matara and a number of such industries were all well established and commercially viable. So were many textile and sewing industries. The good number of DDCP industries that have been successfully implemented even today(2009), defying the inroads of imports indicate the viability of the DDCP Projects and the underlying strategies. The main tenet was import substitution which is forbidden under the IMF rules of the Structural Adjustment Programme, Even today, three decades later, my blood boils when I see a packet of foreign crayons being sold in Sri Lanka. My mind travels back in nostalgia to the time when the crayon factory provided employment to scores of youths in making and packing crayons and in selling them island wide. 

. Establishing the crayon industry was easily the happiest task I had done in my eighteen years’ service to my Mothercountry. It was also the most dangerous task I had done because I was not authorized to establish a new industry without the specific approval of the Minstry of Plan Implementation. I had experience in handling small industries earlier and was certain that the venture would be a success. If it had failed I would have been demoted for certain but I was certain of success. Further I knew Dr N.M.Perera the Minister of Finance personally as he had been a member of parliament in the opposition in Kegalla District where I worked as the Additional Government Agent for two full years. He gauged my ability and I became one of his trusted lieutenants in the field of development. I was certain that he would have stood up for me if I fell into a scrape by attempting to do the impossible which other administrators would shrewdly avoid. 

The DDCP had all the elements of a great employment creation programme, which was lost partly due to defects in the Programme itself , due to administrative ineptitude and partly due to political rivalry. 

What should have happened is what did happen in Singapore. In the words of Michael Smith
The real clue to Singapore’s success has been a brave, consistent, government generated long term industrial strategy. Professor Tom Stonier sees that strategy as having worked in two stages, In the early Sixties the emphasis was on import substitution. The Government had high tariff protection to help industries that would reduce dependence on imports. In the second phase, the emphasis shifted to export oriented manufacture. (From Asia’s New Industrial World) Singapore has had a steady rule by a single government for decades and thus did not suffer from political party rivalry. 

Conclusion
The DDCP of 1970-1977 was a genuine attempt at brining about development. Its achievement and the strengths and weaknesses have already been dealt with at length. 

Though certain aspects of the DDCP, like the agricultural farms and industrial projects were a great success and could have been easily built upon, the DDCP came to an abrupt end due to the fact that the newly elected President Jayawardena’s Government wanted the DDCP, discredited, annihilated and closed down. It was necessary for the new Government to paint everything that the earlier government achieved as black as possible. This was to get political mileage. It is sad that development in the Third World countries does fall between two stools, whenever a new government is formed. 

Development requires a long standing effort where programmes get continuously reviewed and renewed where the dead wood is dropped and new vistas are commenced. In any programme the weaknesses have to be identified and annihilated while the strengths are further developed on. This ideal is not possible in the case of a country where at the hustings an entire government can be changed. This is inimical for development. Perhaps the method of elections to the US Congress offers a model where continuity can be hoped for. This is because it is only a third of its members that are elected annually. This newly elected one third of Congress members join the already elected two thirds and continue . Thus the development that has been achieved is not lost. 

.
The DDCP can stand comparison to many other development programmes both in Sri Lanka as well as overseas. 

The DDCP was  the last attempt  we had to create employment and thereby bring about production that the country needed.  Earlier, we had the Rural Development Programme of the Fifties, again the Janasaviya Programme, again The Paddy Lands Act and its cultivation committees. Political changes deprived the continued development of all these programmes. After 1977 we had none, except for the grandiose Mahaweli which actually deprived water to the Sinhala Minipe farmers. It is sad that since 1977 we have not had any real employment creation and poverty allleviation programme.  It may be a good idea to summon those veterans of the DDCP programme who are yet alive to deliberate and come up with a better programme than the DDCP which can bring about development today. Let me live in hope.

 Garvin Karunaratne, Ph.D. Michigan State University,

Former G.A. Matara

18/4/2022

Article jointly by Sarath Wijesinghe President’s Counsel, former Ambassador to UAE and Israel, President Ambassador’s Forum  and Thumilan  Sivarajah –  Chair Blue Ocean group of companies (international) (Construction)

Peace is valuable and rare but easy to achieve in realization

Peace is valuable pleasant and rare. Freedom from war and disturbances bring peace, calmness, and Loving kindness, in a non – violent situation as a by – product of peace. Sri Lanka is bestowed with rare natural beauty and pleasant nature of the people with a smile willing to help needy – especially when you are in need of help and assistance. Peace and development are synonymous as the other part of the coin working hand in hand. Development and productivity brings economic benefits that minimises the causes of conflicts due to wants and shortages. Peace is a state of mind with no violence, in harmony and less or no confrontations and conflicts. Peace brings political stability, and cohabitation among different groups and religions. Economic stability, prosperity   is a main requirement for development in all kinds which includes human development, industry, agriculture and many other. In agriculture peace is needed to the famer to grow peacefully with no disturbances from man and other creators small or large. Industry and construction will prosper only in peaceful atmospheres. In Sri Lanka Road networks and construction was booming during peaceful situation with stability of economic peace and strength indicating that many are interconnected and interwoven in the state and private machinery. Booming road industry is resulted in an excellent network of roads right round Sri Lanka linked to highways. Peace is a main requirement and an ingredient to development as there is no room for development and productivity in a violent society. Except in ideal and utopian society the conflicts and differences are common among living beings controlled by restrictions religions and culture with love and affection in communities. Animals have conflicts for food, protection for themselves and children, and territory they defend such as tigers. Disputes are more in developed multicultural human communities for more and more wealth, controlled and restricted by religions and culture enhanced with the material development and developments on consumerism of goods and money in circulation. Conflicts escalate to various levels up to world wars that has resulted the loss of millions of human beings with destruction of private and public property. Development is an essential ingredient in a developed society for the needs of the members of the society, with the conflicts and differences when the provisions are limited and in short supply which is the main cause of the conflicts. Post war and conflicts may be an ideal field to breed peace and reconciliation in the battered society with conflicts and aftermaths of wars leaving aside the causes of wars and conflicts. After settlements of conflicts people realise the values of humanity and peace with peaceful living. We went through bitter periods and experiences of war during number of conflicts and disturbances having learnt lessons for the future educated by ourselves by experience and realization how valuable peace is to the human being and the world. Peace is an essential ingredient for economic and political stability, and peace will be the main partner in the process of economic and political stability, with the reputation from world over on diplomacy and foreign relations. Peace is a state of mind and one can have peace by developing himself physically as well as in mind in development of mind on realisation of the truth and reality as preached by Buddha that ‘All that we are is the result of what we have thought. It is founded on thoughts. It made up of our thoughts. If one speak or acts with an evil thoughts a pain follows one as follows the feet of the OX that drives the wagon’. ‘Dhammapada’ on Peace is that what matters is the thoughts and acts to follow so that is the self-control and discipline that matters for inner and general peace that spreads to the society at large which echoed in other religions on peace and love to the neighbours and mankind. In regularizing the thought process with education the society will be transformed to the just society with peace and reconciliation in places of war or disturbances before. Front line LTTE confronted with security forces in the South and North when Muslims were ordered to vacate north within hours. Luckily the reconciliatory peace process in ongoing in South and North with the North South dialogue with a successful momentum with development process in the entire country as one workshop unfortunately now retarded due to the current political and economic crisis expected to be resolved by easing the pressure exerted by unidentified and unknown pressure groups heading at Galle Face Green freely. Whoever is behind the Galle Face celebrations have brought about peaceful friendly and enjoyable atmosphere among the Colombo residents after the pressure and isolation of pandemic front that has devastated the economy of the country in shatters.

Reconciliation

Reconciliation is technically defines how the friendly relations restore after differences or arguments on given issues in an aggravated form. According to the traditional definition It is how to make it compatible persuade to accept something unwelcome. It is no exaggeration that in Sri Lanka during peacetime the different groups are so integrated and friendly especially in villages too is nearly an integrated exemplary communes of love and friendship. Colombo is a commune of a mixture of Tamil majority with Muslims and Sinhalese being the minority in the capital of Sri Lanka with valuable property and leading businesses owned by Muslims and Tamils a minority in the country as a whole is a wonderful situation. Tamils/Muslim and Sinhalese are integrated in Kandy, ‘Hambantota’, ‘Nuwara Eliya’, and many villages and townships in an exemplary way peacefully which is an example to other nations worldwide. In Sri Lanka situation the UNHCER is urging Sri Lanka to take steps on reconciliation especially after the events and the aftermath of the end of the war that ended in 2009 to meet justice and reparations to the suffered and victims of war when the communities are living together in love and affection to different groups and communities. Peace and reconciliation will be a main topic in at the deliberations of the periodic review process starting from 28^th February till 4^th April in Geneva full house the High Commissioner of Human rights taken the centre stage. But there are schools of thoughts that Sri Lanka is a nation that is already a country where the citizens are living in harmony in a peaceful atmosphere in a peaceful atmosphere, though there were certain incidents at the end of the 2009 war where steps were taken on reconciliation in small and large scales and healing process having taken steps to punish the wrongdoers. 

Sri Lanka went through most difficult times and currently the most difficult time

Sri Lanka went through the unfortunate war on terror the world rated unwinnable with the initiation of a misguided bunch of youth in the NE of Sri Lanka led by leader of LTTE who won over the minds of the Tamil Youth demanding a separate state carving North and East of ‘Sri Lanka’ – a highly illogical concept when 60% of the Tamil population happily settled with the Sinhalese and Muslims in the rest of the country. The group was assisted  by a misguided a part of the Tamil community living in Sri Lanka and mostly abroad who assisted the group in cash, kind and encouragement with the hopes given to them that they will achieve the gaols by an armed struggle when the armed struggle continued nearly three decades with the human cost and destruction of the resources taking the country back to over 5 decades of irreparable and wanton destruction in all kinds leaving the current generation to suffer in addition to the other war in 1987/88 waged by the JVP another  group  of  misguided Sinhala youth now appear to be reformed and entered into the mainstream of politics unfortunately the same ideology and concepts of the founder  whose fate was decided at ‘’’Borella’’ Cemetery under most tragic circumstances. Currently the UNHCER is urging justice and reparation to those who suffered human rights at the last stages of the wining of the war in 2009 alleging war crimes and /or deal with the security officers conducted the war ending the LTTE terror regime. JVP that went underground has come to the mainstream politics today with the other political parties in the opposition. Today there is a silver lining on peace reconciliation and peace co-existence among communities based on realizations realised in a hard way and it is the duty of all to adhere to it.

UNHCR and Procedure on member states on Human Rights Issues

According to UN procedure council sessions held  on 28^th February to 1/4/2022 for periodic review and the presentations from the concerned parties in the present of Ministers of Foreign Affairs and the Diplomats countries taking part. Current Human Right High Commissioner ‘Michelle Bachelet’ is in the centre who will submit the report and observations of the proceedings to the necessary parties for consideration. One of the main aims of the entire exercise of the UNHCR is peace and reconciliation aiming at stable peace and prosperity and to lay the foundation for the stable peace is the main aim with reconciliatory affects by the necessary parties. The other main hurdle for peace and prosperity is the world pandemic that has engulfed as other parts of the world and to our credit we have successfully completed the vaccinations to a sizable majority to the citizens with the assistance of the health workers and the security forces having performed their duties in a satisfactory manner setting an example to the rest of the world still lagging behind in the vaccine schemes. International recognition and goodwill is needed for internal stability. Sri Lankan government is always under stress and many improvements are expected on human rights areas.

Developments to continue despite wars and Pandemic and the unfortunate wars and disturbances

Developments take place at a rapid phase in all sectors and different magnitudes most notable being the Port City project initiated in a land carving out sea filled in a most strategic situation in the Indian Ocean, which is nearing completion aiming to be the maritime and a business hub of naval and business centre in Asia on the famous and traditions silks route. Road network is of highest quality akin to the network in UK that connects all corners of the country and it is a happy news that tourism has started booming and Covid 19 has ended soon and people will be adjusted to live with it in future as has been done on the Flu in UK where every citizen is annually vaccinated as a preventive measure. Sri Lanka was at some stage led Asia in construction sector with high rising buildings and apartments for affluent local regional and foreigners in business. Now that the difficult period is nearing to be competed it is time to start business ventures and construction sector with the new boom on tourism and the impending business boom to expect when there is a demand for apartments linked to temporary business visa. There is a shortage of expert skilled labour in Sri Lanka when the remaining unskilled labour are attempting to leave the country. Rest are aspiring for easy jobs such as ‘Uber’ and three wheel drivers which is a waste of valuable labour that should have been exploited by construction trade and it is time for the leading industrialists and those in the construction trade to lead training projects with state sector. Sri Lanka is in need of foreign exchange as foreign labour is one of the main resources of foreign exchange or Sri Lanka.. Developing the country is another form of establishing peace and reconciliation as stable economy and comfortable life will ease the stress and the tension of the average citizen in need of directions and assistance in the current difficult situations, with so any hardships and shortages including gas, electricity, food and financial shortcomings which are rampant on door steps of many. Time has now reached for the Chambers of Commerce, Business leaders and establishments, Industrialists, food Chains, to organize themselves in various ways and means to find solutions to generate jobs and much needed foreign exchange from exports, to the issues as concerned groups and leaders as it appears the state machinery is incompetent and incapable to handle the situation due to lack of vision strategy and leadership. It is  high time the business community and the concerned groups with educate and intellectuals to get themselves organized with the industrial/development  sector including the construction and IT fields (with international connections), as construction and IT will muster the long needed foreign exchange for a new chapter in Sri Lanka now battered with shortages and lack of resources when development in all kinds and sectors being the only way out to the citizen for a better and peaceful life with better economic conditions. -Sarath Wijesinghe PC could be contacted on sarath28dw@gmail.com whats app 0094777880166 active in UK- 

International

Ron Nixon writing to the New York Times in April 2011 says that the US democracy-building campaigns played a bigger role in fomenting protests” than was previously known. They key words here is than previously known. Which means we only come to learn of the involvement much later. By that time the expected damage is done.

Ron Nixon says that ‘key leaders of the movements’ were ‘trained by the Americans in campaigning, organizing through new media tools & monitoring elections”.

Note what he says next a number of the groups & individuals directly involved in the revolts & reforms sweeping the region, including the April 6 Youth Movement in Egypt, the Bahrain Center for Human Rights and grass-roots activists like Entsar Qadhi, a youth leader in Yemen, received training and financing from groups like the International Republican Institute, the National Democratic Institute and Freedom House”.

Ron Nixon says that some Egyptian youth leaders attended 2008 technology meeting in New York where they were taught to use social networking & mobile technologies to promote democracy – the meeting was sponsored by Facebook, Google, MTV, Columbia Law School & US State Dept.

Bashem Fathy, a founder of the youth movement that kicked started the Egyptian uprisings says  We learned how to organize and build coalitions,” 

Fathy, attended training with Freedom House, 

Fathy says This certainly helped during the revolution.”

Oadhi, the Yemeni youth activist attended American training sessions in Yemen.

However, activist groups complained in interviews that the United States was hypocritical for helping them at the same time that it was supporting the governments they sought to change” – do we not see this happening elsewhere too.

The Egyptian government even appealed to groups like Freedom House to stop working with local political activists and human rights groups”

Middle Uprisings undoubtedly were home grown – but they were helped & fanned by external forces. Isn’t this the same blueprint happening elsewhere too.

Here is another important statement by Stephen McInerney, Executive Director of the Project on Middle East Democracy 

We didn’t fund them to start protests, but we did help support their development of skills and networking,” ….. That training did play a role in what ultimately happened, but it was their revolution. We didn’t start it.”

KAMALIKA PIERIS

JR’s rule   was a period of lawlessness and corruption. Elections commissioner Punchihewa listed 3 elections as having the worst abuses in Sri Lanka’s electoral history. Two of these were held during the time of JR, the 1981 Jaffna District Development Council polls and the 1982 referendum.  His ministers were corrupt. Critics were beaten up, said critics.

It was when JR Jayewardene was head of state that thuggery and corruption in politics became entrenched in the central government for the first time in Sri Lanka’s political history. JR’s successors welcomed this and continued the good work, but   it started under JR.

There had been party thugs before, but they were active mainly during elections. There was the village “chandiya” as well. This time it was different. Party thugs were criminal elements used by the government and given protection in return. They came on to the political arena, after the landslide victory of the UNP Government on July 1977.  Despicable underworld characters never before seen in government now emerged,” observed Dharman Wickremaratne

  Ruling party thugs openly attacked meetings of the opposition parties. They were provided with guns. They killed on contract.  They were allowed to engage in narcotic drug peddling, extortion and armed robbery to maintain themselves.

The majority of those recruited as university security personnel in Jayewardenepura University were underworld criminals.  They regularly attacked university students who were opposed to the Government.

Each President and Prime Minister who came after JR was associated with a leading thug. The J. R. Jayewardene regime was responsible for the rise of Gonawala Sunil. There was also Nawala Nihal.

The Gonawala Perera family were active supporters of the UNP.  Gonawala Sunil worked for the UNP and had known the UNP leaders for a long time. He used to welcome UNP bigwigs at the Katunayake airport whenever they returned to Sri Lanka.  His house was regularly used for UNP small group meetings, said Dharman Wickramaratne.

Sunil had carried out attacks on Opposition politicians and stuffed ballot boxes. The thugs who regularly attacked Kelaniya University’s leftwing and other anti-UNP students from 1978 onwards were Gonawala Sunil’s men led by UNP Minister Cyril Mathew.  Gonawela Sunil had been the bodyguard of Ranil Wickremasinghe, Minister of Education in the J.R. Jayawardene government.

Gonawela Sunil was involved in the massacre of 53 prisoners at Welikada Prison in 1983 and raping a 14-year-old girl in 1982. He was convicted of  murder, and was serving in prison when he was released on a presidential pardon given by  JR  just before the 1982 presidential election. Subsequently, he was made an all-island Justice of the peace   and Chairman of the Gramodaya Mandalaya of his area.  Sunil was killed at his residence by two assassins in 1987. He was killed because his masters realized he knew too much and may get out of control.

Thuggery was used for suppressing strikes.  The General Strike of July 1980 was brutally put down. The UNP Government crushed a countrywide strike with the help of underworld thugs. The stinkers were only asking for an increase in salary.

400,000 public and private sector employees staged a lunch-hour demonstration on July 5, 1980 demanding a monthly pay increase of Rs. 300. Two armed gangs which emerged from the direction of the Government Supplies Department at Chittampalam Gardiner Mawatha, and Lake House started attacking the protesters with stones. The thugs included underworld gangster Aluthkade Paala.

They also threw a bomb killing a trade union member D. Somapala, who was a Supplies Department Employee. Somapala’s death shocked the working class. Lake House photographers had taken photos of battered blood-soaked strikers, who were attacked near Lake House, but the newspaper was more worried about publishing them and antagonizing JR than reporting the act.

Stinkers were deemed to have vacated post and a number lost their jobs. The Government suspended the payment of July salaries to the strikers. All trade union offices in State-owned buildings were closed and sealed. The strikers were given an opportunity to report for work under certain conditions. Many were able to get their jobs back claiming that they were seriously ill due to various reasons during the strike period.

This General strike caused 40,356 persons to lose their jobs, causing over 300,000 of their dependants to end up in utter misery. Some strikers who had lost their jobs committed suicide, being unable to maintain their families. Family lives were disrupted. Some became mental patients. Children were orphaned. The jobless strikers were forced to vacate the houses where they were living on rent. 

Hundreds of them became beggars. In 2013, a national newspaper carried the story and photo of a striker begging in Borella. A few managed to survive by their own effort and with the help of relatives. Others became pavement hawkers, drivers and bus conductors.

This was reversed in 1989. All July strikers who were employees in Government and Local Government Services were reinstated, given pension rights with bonuses Steps were also taken to provide each of them with a monthly allowance of Rs. 5,000 for the rest of their lives.

Thuggery was used for suppressing demonstrations. Up to the end of 1986 thugs armed with bicycle chains were seen together with the police outside the Colombo University during student demonstrations. There was also a pro-UNP Eksath Samawadee Students Front. These students unofficially resorted to thuggery in the Kelaniya and Moratuwa Universities from 1978 to 1984. 

On March 16, 1978 about 40 underworld gang members who arrived armed with clubs at the Kelaniya University attacked students who were demonstrating.  The attackers were instigated by the pro-UNP Samawadee Students Front. (Continued)

අග්‍රාමාත්‍ය මාධ්‍ය අංශය

ජනතාවට වග කියන රජයක් බිහි කිරීම සඳහා විවිධ පාර්ශවයන්ගෙන් ලැබෙන ඉල්ලීම් ගරු අග්‍රමාත්‍යතුමාගේ අවධානයට යොමු වී ඇත.

විධායකය, ව්‍යවස්ථාදායකය සහ අධිකරණයට අදාළව, සාධනීය කරුණු ඇතුළත් ව්‍යවස්ථා සංශෝධනයක් කිරීමේ යෝජනාවක් කැබිනට් මණ්ඩලයට ඉදිරිපත් කිරීම සඳහා අග්‍රාමාත්‍ය මහින්ද රාජපක්ෂ මහතා බලාපොරොත්තු වේ.

එම සංශෝධිත ව්‍යවස්ථාව මඟින් ජනතාවගේ අපේක්ෂාවන් සාක්ෂාත් කර ගැනීමට හැකි වනු ඇති බව අග්‍රාමාත්‍යතුමාගේ බලාපොරොත්තුවයි.

අග්‍රාමාත්‍ය මාධ්‍ය අංශය

රජයට සහය පළ කරන නීතීඥවරුන් සහ ගරු අග්‍රාමාත්‍ය මහින්ද රාජපක්ෂ මහතා අතර හමුවක් අද (18) දින පෙරවරුවේ අරලියගහ මන්දිරයේදී පැවැත්විණි.

මේ වන විට රටේ උද්ගතව ඇති ගැටලු නිරාකරණය කිරීම සහ රජයට විරුද්ධව පවත්වන අරගල හේතුවෙන් රටට සිදුවන අගතිය පිළිබඳව මෙහිදී සාකච්ඡා විය.

ව්‍යවස්ථානුකූලව ජනාධිපතිවරයා ඉවත් කිරීම ඔවුන් පවසන පරිදි සිදු කළ නොහැකි බවත්, ව්‍යවස්ථාව පිළිබඳ පැහැදිලි අවබෝධයකින් තොරව, වර්තමානයේ ජනතාව මුහුණ දෙන ගැටලු මුල් කර ගනිමින් කිසියම් සංවිධානාත්මක පිරිසක් විසින් මෙම අරගල මෙහෙයවමින් තිබෙන බව පෙනෙනන්ට ඇති බවත්, මෙහිදී නීතීඥවරු පෙන්වා දුන්හ.

88-89 කාල වලදී පැවති අරගලවලදී ද එවකට රටේ නායකයා  වූ ජේ.ආර්.ජයවර්ධන මහතා ඝාතනය කළ යුතු බවට, ගෙනගිය විරෝධය අවසාන වූයේ රටට විශාල විනාශයක් සිදු කරමිනි.

අතීතය සහ පවතින නීති පිළිබඳ අවබෝධයකින් තොරව මේ වන විට තරුණ තරුණියන් යොදා ගනිමින් ජනාධිපතිවරයාට, අග්‍රාමාත්‍යවරයාට සහ රජයට එරෙහිව ක්‍රියාත්මක කරනු ලබන අරගලය, රටපුරා ක්‍රියාත්මක කිරීමට කටයුතු කරමින් සිටින්නේ නැවතත් රට ව්‍යසනයකට ගෙන යෑමට විය හැකි බවද නීතීඥවරුන් සඳහන් කළේය.

වර්තමාන අරගලවලට මුදල් ලබාදීම සහ පහසුකම් සැලසීම වෙනුවෙන් සාමාන්‍ය ජනතාව මුදල් ලබා දෙන බවක් නොපෙනෙන අතර, කිසියම් සංවිධානයක් විසින් සංවිධානාත්මකව මේ සඳහා මුදල් වියදම් කරමින් රට අරාජික කිරීමට කටයුතු කරමින් සිටින බවට සැක මතුවී ඇති බවත් නීතීඥවරුන් මෙහිදී පැවසීය.

මෙරට ජනමාධ්‍ය ද දැනුවත්ව හෝ නොදැනුවත්ව රට අරාජික කිරීමේ අරගලයට විවිධ අයුරින් සහයෝගය ලබාදීම නොකළ යුතු බවත් මෙවැනි අවස්ථාවක ජනමාධ්‍ය වගකීම් සහිතව කටයුතු කළ යුතුව ඇති බවත් නීතීඥවරු පෙන්වා දුන්හ.

මහජන නියෝජිතයින්ගේ වත්කම් විගණනය කිරීම කාලීන බවත්, එය රාජ්‍ය ආයතන සහ රාජ්‍ය නිලධාරීන්ගෙන් ආරම්භ කළ යුතු බවත්, මහජන නියෝජිතයින් කලින් කලට වෙනස් වුවද රාජ්‍ය නිලධාරීන් මාරු නොවීම සහ රාජ්‍ය ආයතනවලත් නිලධාරීන්ගෙත් දූෂණ සහ වංචා අද දේශපාලඥයින් මත පැටවී ඇති බවත් නීතීඥවරු කියා සිටියේය.

සංවිධානාත්මක කල්ලි ජනතාව උපයෝගී කර ගනිමින් රජය අපහසුතාවයට පත් කිරීමටත්, ජනාධිපතිතුමන් සහ අග්‍රාමාත්‍යතුමන් ඉවත් කර ඔවුන්ගේ පටු අරමුණු ඉෂ්ඨ කර ගැනීමට කටයුතු කරමින් සිටින බවත්, එබැවින් මෙම අර්බුදය, මනා අවබෝධයකින් යුතුව ජනතා අවශ්‍යතා ඉටු කර දෙමින්, ජනාධිපතිතුමන් සහ අග්‍රාමාත්‍යතුමන් ධෛර්ය සම්පන්නව කටයුතු කිරීම අත්‍යවශ්‍ය බවත් නීතීඥවරුන් මෙහිදී වැඩිදුරටත් පැවසීය.

රටේ උද්ගතව ඇති අර්බුදය  විසඳීමට රජය කටයුතු කරමින් සිටින බවත්, ජනතාව යොදා ගනිමින් වෙනත් සංවිධාන කරගෙන යනු ලබන දේශපාලන කුමන්ත්‍රණ ගැන ජනතාව  අවබෝධයෙන් සිටිය යුතු බවත් අග්‍රාමාත්‍ය මහින්ද රාජපක්ෂ මහතා මෙහිදී ප්‍රකාශ කර සිටියේය.

ජනාධිපති නීතීඥවරුන් වන ඩබ්ලිව්.දයාරත්න, රෂික් ෂාරුක් යන මහත්වරුන් ඇතුළු නිතීඥවරුන් පිරිසක් මෙම අවස්ථාවට සහභාගී වූහ.

Politics

1) SRI LANKANS HAVE BEING EXPERIENCING TOO MUCH RESTRICTIONS AND TOO MUCH DEFICIENCIES FOR SOME TIME NOW.

2) WILL THEY ACCEPT NEW RESTRICTIONS NORMALLY?  WILL THERE BE ANY CLASHES FOR NOT ADHERING TO THESE RESTRICTIONS ?  VERY LIKELY. IF THE AVAILABLE STATISTICS ARE CORRECT, MORE THAN HALF OF THE POPULATIONS MAY BE INVOLVED IN SUCH CLASHES. WHICH MEANS EVEN THOSE WHO ARE NORMALLY LAW ABIDING, ARE LIKELY TO HAVE CLASHES WITH AUTHORITIES.

3) THE INTENTIONS OF SUCH RESTRICTIONS SEEM TO BE GOOD. IF THE COUNTRIES SITUATION WAS NORMAL THE IMPLEMENTATIONS OF SUCH RESTRICTIONS WOULD HAVE PRODUCED SOME RESULT. SOMETHING LIKE MORE AND MORE PEOPLE SEEK TO HAVE BOOSTER DOSE.

BUT COUNTRIES SITUATION IS NOT NORMAL. THE MINDSET OF MAJORITY OF PEOPLE ARE SUCH THAT THEY ARE NO LONGER READY TO ACCEPT ANY MORE RESTRICTIONS. THEY ARE ALREADY ON THE STREET PROTESTING AGAINST THE GOVERNMENT. IT IS NO SECRET THAT THE GOVERNMENT IS ALREADY  IN DIFFICULT POSITION.

IS NOT IS POSSIBLE THAT VACCINATION CARD RESTRICTIONS ADD MORE DIFFICULTIES TO THE GOVERNMENT? VERY LIKELY. SPECIALLY SUCH RESTRICTIONS ARE LIKELY TO AFFECT MORE THAN HALF OF THE POPULATION.

4) ALL AUTHORITIES WHETHER HEALTH OR OTHERWISE, SHOULD AVOID ANY ACTION MAY CAUSE EVEN SLIGHTEST INCONVENIENCE TO PEOPLE AS THEY ARE ALREADY FED UP WITH THE GOVERNMENT. THEY HAVE  ALREADY HURT TOO MUCH AND ARE NOT READY TO TOLERATE SUCH ACTIONS ANY MORE.