Sinhala or Sinhela Debate:
I'll Take the High Road Let Janak Take the Low!

Aloy Perera, Toronto, Canada.

Janak Surendra, from Down Under, the land of OZ. has tried to make few ripples in the internet by his enfeebled "screech" of a response to my essay, probably in a vain attempt to imitate the fearful loud mouthed Tasmanian devil! E mails of praise that inundate my own monitor screen especially from Sydney are revealing and outnumber those that disagree with my views by ten to one! But the writer, Australians who know him agree, seems to do better in Tasmanian devil's other reputed role as carrion scavenger par excellence!

The names at issue were "Sinhala" and "Sinhela". Not my own nomenclature, Aloy Perera or his, Janak Surendra! The fellow ignores it altogether and in a huff picks on my Christian name Aloy and my surname Perera! My pedigree, 'caste', my religion, my writing skills and my character and good name with an oblique innuendo or two! Attention deficit or what? I do not know. No more proof needed that he had rushed in where devas fear to tread!

Janak Surendra has written in response to my rather light hearted essay in the Lanka Web on "Fools Rush in Where Devas Fear to Tread: What's in a Name?…" In the true fashion of a phony Sinhala Patriot, instead of responding to any or all of the issues I had raised Janak has resorted to passing a few cheap and low down jibes and insults. He has speculated on my pedigree and questioned my eligibility to be a Sri Lankan - on account of my given name, not to mention his divinations on trifling mundane stuff about which a normal person wouldn't dream of writing, second guessing the caste and religion he thinks I belong to, and worse of all, his insulting comment about the great institution, Independent Newspapers Limited where I had honed my journalistic skills under great editors like D.B.Dhanapala (my Lokka), Cyrus W. Surendra, E.C.B Wijesinghe, R. Tammita, J.F Samaranayake, David Karunaratne, V.W. (Vewi) Abeygunawardhane and colleagues such as celebrated Colombo Era Sinhala poet, Vimalendra Waturegama, Cyril A Seelavimala, G.W. Surendra, Gunadasa Liyanage, Nandasiri Alwis, Mahinda Karunaratne,P.M. Jayathilake, Tihariye Manel Perera, Arthur U. Amarasena etc. then there's this ludicrous irrelevancy of dragging my given name and my European surname Perera about which I had no choice just as Janak hadn't had any I believe, about his own unless he considers himself to be the reincarnation of "Surendra", the omniscient Chief of gods(Sura) who is the Hindu god of rain! After whom Janak's 'god fearing' parents named their precious son! (Gosh! He does not know my Sinhala family-name, I mean the "ge-name", of which I am indeed proud because while it gives me an ephemeral identity it also presents a dauntlessly patriotic Sinhala ancestry to draw from!

His reply, the ignominious piece he wrote, is a showpiece of chronic hypocrisy which only extreme notions of caste, pure blood and race can engender when framed on lines of Puritanism. Someone needs to puncture the solemn pretentiousness of purists like Janak Surendra so they may realize the ridiculous plight to which they have been reduced. A laughing stock to the majority of Sinhala people by foisting an old notion of yet another name change for Sri Lanka at this crucial junction of Sri Lanka's destiny!

Since Janak seems to be obsessed with a sense of caste and had alluded to my being of the fisher caste (Of course, he's dead wrong on that count)! He obviously denigrates the fisher caste as a low caste. I want to educate Janak a little! The Karavas (the Fisher Caste, a label that's not quite fair or accurate) consider themselves to be among the highest castes of Sri Lanka. The most famous ancestor of the Karavas or Kauravas being Saint Arhant Mahinda, (from Mahavamsa and according to experts in Kaurava studies) who was instrumental in the official establishment of Buddhism in Sri Lanka although historical and archaeological findings point to a thriving Buddhism, though not widespread, prior to Arhant Mahind's arrival)! Examine some clan names like Mihindukulasuriya, Kurukulasuriya, Manukulasuriya, Warnakulasuriya etc.

Janak seems to have spent a considerable period of time on the internet trying to trace the origin of my given name, Aloy! How childish? He obviously hit a snag not knowing which one fitted the context most! That usually happens when writers who try to wax eloquent on subjects they have never studied in the classroom or the lecture theatre relying entirely on internet websites which one may take seriously only at ones own risk. While websites may be useful, I have come across unimaginable falsehoods, inaccuracies and errors in today's web sites on subjects I had studied or have developed an interest in.

Obsession with Caste

Coming back to Janak's curiosity about my caste, I have this to say! You figure it out! Usually, my people don't concern themselves with matters of hook-line and sinker - You probably think I go fishing every weekend! No I don't! Nor are my people accustomed to going round and round the kurundu crushing sekkuva or washing others' clothes save our own! My people never learned the skill of blowing the Mynahama to make the steel pliant! No clue whatsoever as to how to burnish a bangle or beat a ring or a golden necklace loops into shape even if the tools of trade lay before me ready and handy! Never really mastered the art of climbing high to pluck or tap like some of our staunch, distant Southern Sinhalayas do! My people do appreciate the musical throb of the drum but the skill that goes to make the drum sing and talk is Alas! Not ours to know! Although I occasionally chew a sara vita(betel) with a pinch of shell lime or chunnam I don't have the foggiest idea about the many different uses of chunnam and how it is made; again I have to depend on the Southerners who are said to be experts on chunnam. But I know for a fact that as a little boy and a teen-ager, when Asvaddum-season coincided with school holidays I couldn't wait to leave the Boarding School in Colombo to hasten to my little village to the spacious and airy home of my parents nestled among tall palms and luxuriant foliage to don the Amude (loin cloth) and join my kith and kin, knee-deep in water in our own kumbura (paddy field), to replant paddy! Or lay out furrows in the field or to learn how to handle the plough and the poruva!

Just out of curiosity, I wonder where Janak fits in the Sinhala scheme of things! - And Janak says I am ineligible to be a Sinhalaya/Sri Lankan on account of my name and pedigree! And he calls himself a Sinhala Buddhist patriot!

Normally, I would not dream of writing all this rubbish but for Janak's obsession with the caste system that's fast disappearing in Sri Lanka! Not to mention Janak's insatiable longing to trace my race and of course, my caste! As if he was seeking a life partner! Why? I wonder! How queer! I am an old man! And I am taken!

Janak Surendra is my best example yet of the ubiquitous phony Sinhala Patriot (for ever trying to acquire some importance) living in World's City Centres and doing a lot of harm to the Sinhala cause whom I had referred to in the previous essay Janak is railing now; living as he does in plenitude and comforts of the West, in OZ down under, secure and far removed from the child molesting, bowel bursting brutality of the murderous Eelam Tiger in the Wanni. In Sri Lanka itself, there's not a hum about the ludicrous campaign these Sin+Helayas are waging on foreign soil!

Janak Surendra is living proof that every point I had raised in that essay was valid! Of course, he's wrong on all counts particularly in his imaginations of my pedigree! Janak has only succeeded in exposing himself as yet another specimen of an uncouth Sinhalaya unworthy of the noble, refined Sinhala Race! Sinhala taste!

When Mutual Respect Falters

While I do not intend to waste my time responding to incoherent irrelevancies, horrible insinuations, insane innuendos and grotesque, xenophobic links he purports to tie up - childish/puerile, dumb for the most part - I mean to spare a few lines of my own for Janak's edification and understanding.

Since I do not claim to be erudite (Really, I am not at all good at being learned but every thing I write, I write out of the abundance of my heart or seen with my own eyes and felt deep within, with malice to none!) not having the advantage of a long list of degrees and qualifications after my name, perhaps like Janak Surendra who despite his learning seems to me to be suffering from a stance of a chronic inferiority complex, I can only attempt to enlighten him - I'll try to keep the debate above board without descending to the lowest and squalid depths in which Janak himself seems to wallow. But I'll try to use words and expressions he would understand. Remember his insults, innuendos, that pedophile reference for instance? Then hear this for a change! I'll tell you what's in a name 'a la Janak Surendra!'

It was 1968 and long before Independent Newspapers folded - I played no part in it as Janak alleges - I had left my editorial job there and had joined JWT as a junior executive (Creative Writer) in the copy and research department headed by my friend and Sinhala playwright Dharmasiri Wickramaratne of "Onna Babo Attinniya" fame, when Bill Campbell, an American held sway as its Director. Some personal business took me to India, in 1971, a journey that lasted a whole month! JVP guerilla rebellion had just started and I read in the Indian newspapers how bad it was! Grim pictures of bodies or body parts of youths floating down Kelani Ganga, Kalu Ganga, Deduru Oya, Malvatu Oya, Gin Ganga, Matara Ganga and Menik Ganga etc. were flashed in the front pages of Indian Express, The Hindu etc. from which Sri Lankans at home were mercifully spared due to stringent censorship measures Sirimavo Bandaranaike enforced.

Visiting a remote village in the State of Bihar (not very far from the ancient Vanga/Banga kingdom alleged birth place of Vijaya being somewhere around there, I had been waiting to get the O.K. to go as close as possible to the War Zone along with an Indian friend…Not far from there, Bangaladesh was being born.. India and Pakistan locked in a war of wits and real skirmishes on each others' borders that led to the two week disastrous war between the two nations that heralded the birth of Bangaladesh! Tarrying in this little town called Luckeesari, if I remember right, not far from Nalanda, one afternoon I walked into a sort a kiosk, a veritable "leli kade" with a patio to taste the unique Indian tea for which it was famous. There was a portly old man seated on a long bench and a few street kids who much to his annoyance taunted him again and again shouting "Janak Vallah!" Janak Vallah!. The kids were a noisy rabble, mostly teenagers in shorts or swimming trunks. I felt sorry for the man who wielded his staff like a sword each time a rambunctious youth got near him calling him "Janak Vallah!" Being curious, I asked my host why the term Janak Valla seemed to so offend him. He said the man then in his late sixties, once powerful and influential, a member of the Hindu Arya Samaj and a rabid Hindu nationalist with political links belonged to the warrior caste but had had a very bad reputation. He had been a well known Don Juan in the locality who had impregnated a lot of widows and molested not a few young girls in the neighborhood in his life time. "Some of these street urchins taunting him could well be the children he had fathered! And they do not know that! So the fellow earned the nick-name "Janak Vallah!" I was a little puzzled as I knew the meaning of Janaka in Sinhala, Pali and Sanskrit. "Oh. I see, it means something like, "the father of the nation?" I asked. My host laughingly began to educate me. "You see pal, your knowledge of Sinhala doesn't count here! In the local patois slang, part Gujarati, part Bangali, this word Janak has specific meanings! "Such as…?" I queried. "Janak!" particularly when it rides a Vallah is really is a bad word, a profanity! Janak as procreation - from Sanskrit "pra + janana" or pra + janaka, or simply janak is O.K. The meaning of the word you are hearing now, if I were to give a loose translation, would be "the tool of procreation". Janak in patois slang here also means "human semen"! (Try translating that into Sinhala! Talk of Pedophile connections? Huh!)

Words Can Kill

"Janak" which incidentally is not a Sinhala word but its Hindi, therefore, foreign, counterpart - is totally and completely un-Sinhalese! The Sinhala usage being "Janaka" with the first syllable long or short depending on what you really want to say! - As you have seen, depending on which syllable the accent falls, the name Janak can also mean procreation, or procreator or simply, tool of procreation.
So translating into similar local Sinhala context, the word Janak opens a Pandora box of possible Choice Sinhala expletives! Amu Kunu Harupa! Or Titta Katha (raw filth) Effortlessly, some dozen or so epithets pop up in my mind even as I write with which I have no doubt most Sinhala readers would be familiar, the interesting gutter slang guttersnipes are wont to use! Far be it from me to heap about one score plus ten epithets on our Janak Surendra to describe or qualify him! Like he did by implication in his own letter referring to my name..

I crave your indulgence! I keep falling into uttering/writing unadulterated nonsense!

So you see! This is where self censorship should play its part. That's the inner discipline of a good writer and that comes with good breeding and perhaps religion! See what pitfalls writers can be exposed to! Janak, take note!

Names irksome to Janak's ear, Sri Lankan/Sinhala Aloys and Pereras, Luigis, Ludwigs, Fernandos, Diases, De Costas, De Silvas et al of the Sri Lanka/Sinhala world may still survive in spite of the interesting but erroneous and unnecessary links Janak Surendra seems to have conjectured in a veritable fit of mind-epilepsy to belittle me.

Sadly, Janak Surendra's vituperations trigger within me a certain sense of loss that I am made to feel in the evening of my life these days as I yearn for the return of a fascinating era of the late fifties and early sixties when the on going debate on the Sinhala Buddhist cause was exciting and interesting. Great Buddhist proponents like G.P. Malalasekera, L.H. Metthananda, P de S. Kularatne, K.N. Jayatilleke, celebrated author Martin Wickramasinghe, T.U. de Silva among the laity and stalwart monks like Venerable Theras, Bambarande Siri Seevali, Kotahene Pannakitti, Veliwitiye Sorata, Kiriwattuduve Pragnasara, Walpola Rahula, Henpitagedara Gnanasiha, Baddegama Vimalawamsa and Venerable Madihe Pannasiha Maha Nayaka, with opponents such as Oriental Scholar-Bishop Edmund Peiris, Fr. D. J. Anthony, Fr. Don Peter, Fr. Quintus Perera among the Catholics and Bishop Lakdasa de Mel, and Bishop Lakshaman Wickremasinghe representing Anglican protestants, all Sinhala scholars, took the debate out into the national media of the time, mainly the national press, focusing on the cause of the Sinhala Buddhist, engaging the entire nation in a disciplined debate; because there was always some injustice to be righted or some disadvantage to be avenged in the fledgling nation! The colonial legacy of a bureaucracy that resisted or restricted change until the socio-cultural revolution of 1956 wrought out seething changes in the nation's political landscape empowering the common man!

Getting Personal is losing Focus!

With comprehensive understanding and vast intellectual resources at their disposal, the aforementioned leaders, learned and intelligent men of genius expended immense energy they possessed to focus on a rational debate mostly with opponents of like caliber following on the ethics of Buddhism and common etiquette stating clearly what each had to say, not minding on whose corns they tread, still respecting their opponents' views and never getting personal like the present day phony writers in the Sri Lankan public media, here in the West and there down under do.

The above mentioned patriotic luminaries had adequately dealt with the five century long plunder and rape by the White Man, perhaps before Janak was born! Sadly, this generation of neophytes in journalism knows nothing about it! My contention is that there's no need to reinvent the wheel but to take up from the progression point somewhere in the sixties without the annoying replay of past wrongs! The relentless campaigns led by the above mentioned patriots then had brought in their train marvelous results and seething changes of attitudes in all segments of the Sri Lankan body politic except among the ranks of the insane LTTE! The era of bickering is over! Now is the time for action! Time for reaching out! A home spun indigenous Sinhala Catholic, Christian spiritual, cultural and linguistic heritage (I am not referring to the American style conversion oriented Fundamental Christian outfits that go about offering bribes to increase their numbers) has taken firm roots in Sri Lanka which Sinhala Buddhist extremists in their blinded bigotry simply do not want to acknowledge, thus dividing an important component in the nation's Sinhala equation.

Today's malaise is in part the result of selfish politicians, dishonest and spineless lay and religious leaders of the Sinhalese and the Tamils, eroding religious values and 'Johnnies come lately' of the Web patriots' list with mega appetites of megalomania parading their so called newfangled recipes for nation building hell bent all the same on destroying the wealth of goodwill that still glows in the hearts and minds of the vast majority of Sri Lankans belonging to different races, different religions and cultures etc.., don't help much either! There's not a hum about this useless "Sinhela" debate in our Heladiva itself!

I definitely see a tide in affairs of the nation today that holds out hope! Peace and prosperity! A determination among all segments of the Sri Lankan populace to eliminate a common foe! Victories gained over four decades ago can be revived and enhanced in today's context so that reason and sanity may become restored in the nation!

Coming back to the point, it was a delight then to share in those lively debates written in the national press in immaculate Sinhala whether it was about an expose of Catholic Action or the 'mysterious employment securing miracles' of the Catholic Church that occurred with a little push from the government run Labour Secretariat or the issue of Assisted Schools run by the Church that had a done deal with the colonial government of the past or Permanent Secretary, Buddhist activist N.Q. Dias' Government Services Union watchdogs scrambling to scan confidential files of Christian or Tamil or other bureaucratic bosses even in the Army, Navy and the Air Force spying for clues of nepotism, favoritism, corruption and sabotage…etc.. Sure, those were fun times! Ask respected doyen of Sri Lankan Journalists in L.A., Walter Jayawardhana, if we did not then enjoy every minute of it! Those enchanting, idyllic times! He can enlighten you! Everyone both the participants and readers alike took things in their stide never got so overexcited as to dispatch demolition squads of thugs to torch and pillage churches or temples! But the puny patriots of the web of our times seem to get their kicks from the warped idealism of the hordes of extremists and bigots - laymen and monks/clergy - who vie with one another to bring out the worst in the Sinhala polity.

Sinhala Journalism in Sri Lanka

Since October last year, I had spent a few months at a time in Sri Lanka and witnessed the appalling lowering of Sinhala journalistic standards while I observed the English media maintaining an admirable level of high standards. Pick any Sinhala daily; Dinamina, Lankadipa, Divaina or Lakbima! On a given day one may come across a cumulative one thousand or more language, syntax and grammatical errors in them! That aside, the quality of writing seems hopeless for a rich and proud language except for the contributions by erudite Buddhist monks. Most contributors on national issues seem ill informed or misinformed and not having a broad-band vision or the logic that characterized writers of the golden fifties and early sixties! Worst of all they display a built in intolerance of others' views and get personal in most unimaginable ways. They don't seem to have any sense of respect for others or their own profession. In short, they write like some of their counterpart Sinhala extremists in the web in global City Centres who usually write in English! Reading some of the contributions of some Sinhala journalists in the national Sinhala media I was made to wonder if Sri Lanka ever enforced its laws of Defamation and Libel!

In New Heladiva Republic
Olcott And Buddha on TRP- VISAS?

If writers who contribute to the national Sinhala press are poor writers lacking in writing skills, Janak is an exception; he writes good English in my estimation but what he writes (like those of his ilk in North America) more often than not is utter rubbish. If allowed to go unchallenged, it will contaminate the minds of all fair thinking Sinhalayas leading to disaster. Janak appears to have the knack to browse the right website to get enough fodder to flog an opponent! But writers like Janak can easily appear to be foolish if the info they gather happens to get inserted out of context! And particularly if they have never bothered to study the relevant subject! In this instance, Janak's research on St. Aloysius or Luigi Gonzaga is one such example! The 'facts' Janak had chosen to lay bare are incomplete and even inaccurate! St. Aloysius, born to an illustrious and wealthy family was by nature extremely religious from his early years. Having given up his inheritance, he opted for a life in the priesthood or monastery and spent the rest of his short life, pursuing the monastic ideal in meditation and emptying himself and purifying his mind after the fashion of an ascetic…probably contemplating a higher realization in his own way and became a striver worthy of emulation. He died before he reached his 30th year. By popular sanction, he was held in high esteem as a saint and was revered! The Church canonized him! So there's nothing wrong with 'my patron saint' and I enjoy bearing the name of a saint! Does it therefore make me ineligible to be a Sri Lankan! In Janak's logic yes, simply because I am named after Catholic saint! Why doesn't he tell that to Olcott Gunasekera, one of the most exemplary of Buddhists living in our time and a veritable asset to Sinhala Buddhists and the nation of Sri Lanka! If Janak were to tell Mr. Gunasekera, "Olcott, friend, you are not eligible to be a Sinhala Buddhist any more! Ergo, a Sri Lankan! If you want to continue your voluntary work with the Dhamma Vijaya Foundation or the Sasana Sevaka Samitiya, I tell you, give up that ruddy Yankee name, Olcott, at once! Or else, never mind Colonel Olcott, we'll strip you of your 'indigenous status!' May be for the good work you do, we might be able to grant you little concession! We'll let you stay in Sri Lanka with a visa as a TRP holder! I am sorry Olcott! Noooo… exceptions! Even if Sidhattha Gautama were to return he too will be on a TRP, with perhaps a multi-entry Visa!" how absurd he would sound?

An eminent Sri Lankan Buddhist monk passing through Toronto upon seeing Janak's reply and other related essays became so exasperated as to exclaim, "Mahattayo! Mun Okkoma Mano Rajjayaka Jivathvena Minissu! Lankavedi ova kiyanda giyoth mun pissanta ganan ganivi! Angoda gihin damavi!" ("Mister! All these fellows are living in a fool's paradise! If they were to repeat these things in Sri Lanka today, people will take them to be insane and dump them in Angoda!") When one is at a loss for epithets to describe these dreamy simpletons or mad know it alls, British Philosopher Herbert Spencer comes to ones aid hitting the nail right on the head! Says he, "When a man's knowledge is not in order, the more of it he has the greater will be his confusion!"

I am not offended by Janak's comments, obiter dicta, re. my English needing some polish! English definitely is not my mother tongue! In fact I write better in Sinhala and am proud that I can! And by Indra! I can live with that kind of obtuse comment!

Now there are a lot of writers who write in the Web. Some well known names such as H.L.D. Mahindapala(one of the sharpest minds and a much read and sought after writer of eminence even before the advent of the Web) Victor Gunasekera, CharlesPerera, Nizam Matara, to name only a few, and the Web Chief Walter Jayawardhana himself who stands tall, have drastically independent views (I have immense respect for them). They all write well thought out, cogent, compelling essays as classy journalists the world over do without descending low to be personal.. Of course, our Janak Surendra is no Mahindapala!

Aloy Perera, Toronto, Canada.
E-Mail: stephenperera@rogers.com