To whom does Sri Lanka belong?
Tamils and Sinhalese, Hindus and Buddhists believe in karma and rebirth. Sri Lanka is a transit station in Sansara. Did we have a choice in coming here? No. Do we have a choice to where we will go from here? No. Sri Lanka belongs to none and none belongs to Sri Lanka. It belongs to nature.
From the vast experience of the past some of which has been very bitter to me and my relations, but very valuable; communal, racial, and statements of intolerance of different religious faiths, have been the prime cause of adding fuel to the fires of destruction that have been started after independence. Elders and senior citizens owe it to the coming generations to stand up and protest, now. That much we owe this country which has given us terra firma over a long period of time. With regret I reproduce a letter I wrote to the editor 10 years ago.
A news item appeared during the time of the State Council (1936), when we were happy-go-lucky Ceylonese. I have a photo copy of this while my good friend Stanley Jayatunga, a nonagenarian living in Malabe has the original. It was based on a speech made by the then member for Matale electorate in the State Council, B.H. Aluwihare, a barrister, actively involved in the independence movement along with Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru. He could have been identified anywhere as he sported a Gandhi cap and North Indian vest. The news item appeared under the heading ‘A Ceylonese Culture’ and is reproduced below:-
"Is there such a thing as a Ceylonese culture, and if so what is it?
This is a question that arose in a debate a few days ago in a literary club in Colombo. Speaker after speaker got up and asserted that there is no such thing.
And then somebody went on to quote the delightfully eloquent passage from State Councillor B.H. Aluwihare, apologising at the same time for the authority’s ‘knowledge of history and geography.’
‘Ceylonese culture is like the Sinhalese people. It is one of the most hybrid things on earth. It is born of Portuguese and Dutch culture and it is mixed up today with the British. In ancient days it arose on the tree of the Veddha culture. It was enriched by the Hindus and the Aryans at the Ganges, and then it was touched by the fervour of the South Indian and Tamil. I am not certain that we have not to some extent been enriched by the thoughts of the Negroes of Africa. I am not certain that we are not affected by the adventurers and traders from Arabia.
‘Therefore Sir, it is a most hybrid culture. It is certainly rich. But when you ask what the Ceylonese culture is the answer is that culture has come to us from all the ends of the earth. It has enriched us, and if ever we do boast of anything, it is that we have the wealth of the four corners of the world. It has enriched our vision, our mind, our literature, and that is what we are able to boast of — the breadth of vision and the breadth of thought of our golden age.’
It is from Aluwihare’s speech in the State Council on the subject of non-Ceylonese teachers. A large majority of the debaters I have referred to refused to believe in Aluwihare’s theory."
S. Thambyrajah
Colombo 3
Tamils and Sinhalese, Hindus and Buddhists believe in karma and rebirth. Sri Lanka is a transit station in Sansara. Did we have a choice in coming here? No. Do we have a choice to where we will go from here? No. Sri Lanka belongs to none and none belongs to Sri Lanka. It belongs to nature.
From the vast experience of the past some of which has been very bitter to me and my relations, but very valuable; communal, racial, and statements of intolerance of different religious faiths, have been the prime cause of adding fuel to the fires of destruction that have been started after independence. Elders and senior citizens owe it to the coming generations to stand up and protest, now. That much we owe this country which has given us terra firma over a long period of time. With regret I reproduce a letter I wrote to the editor 10 years ago.
A news item appeared during the time of the State Council (1936), when we were happy-go-lucky Ceylonese. I have a photo copy of this while my good friend Stanley Jayatunga, a nonagenarian living in Malabe has the original. It was based on a speech made by the then member for Matale electorate in the State Council, B.H. Aluwihare, a barrister, actively involved in the independence movement along with Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru. He could have been identified anywhere as he sported a Gandhi cap and North Indian vest. The news item appeared under the heading ‘A Ceylonese Culture’ and is reproduced below:-
"Is there such a thing as a Ceylonese culture, and if so what is it?
This is a question that arose in a debate a few days ago in a literary club in Colombo. Speaker after speaker got up and asserted that there is no such thing.
And then somebody went on to quote the delightfully eloquent passage from State Councillor B.H. Aluwihare, apologising at the same time for the authority’s ‘knowledge of history and geography.’
‘Ceylonese culture is like the Sinhalese people. It is one of the most hybrid things on earth. It is born of Portuguese and Dutch culture and it is mixed up today with the British. In ancient days it arose on the tree of the Veddha culture. It was enriched by the Hindus and the Aryans at the Ganges, and then it was touched by the fervour of the South Indian and Tamil. I am not certain that we have not to some extent been enriched by the thoughts of the Negroes of Africa. I am not certain that we are not affected by the adventurers and traders from Arabia.
‘Therefore Sir, it is a most hybrid culture. It is certainly rich. But when you ask what the Ceylonese culture is the answer is that culture has come to us from all the ends of the earth. It has enriched us, and if ever we do boast of anything, it is that we have the wealth of the four corners of the world. It has enriched our vision, our mind, our literature, and that is what we are able to boast of — the breadth of vision and the breadth of thought of our golden age.’
It is from Aluwihare’s speech in the State Council on the subject of non-Ceylonese teachers. A large majority of the debaters I have referred to refused to believe in Aluwihare’s theory."
S. Thambyrajah
Colombo 3
