Opinion

Reviving the legacy of Lenin

Published

3 months ago

2025/10/19

Labour of love: restoring my father’s 72-year old motorbike

The 1953 British motorcycle was more than just a reliable workhorse. It was a symbol of my father, Lenin Lindberg Jayasinghe’s, identity. To him, it was his most treasured possession, one he hoped would be passed down to the next generation.

The throaty growl of the single-cylinder 350cc machine had the gravitas of a military parade commander. The entire neighbourhood would know when he left for, or returned home from, work.

The beat of the bike was also the warning for my brother and me to rush home from the nearby playground.

Although he later shifted to more modern motorcycles and cars after the liberalisation of imports in 1978, the Velocette MAC remained his beloved machine, a family heirloom worthy of being passed down through the generations.

Restoring the family faithful became my project after he passed away in January 2018. After decades of languishing in a garage, the machine looked like a candidate for the scrapyard. The tyres had perished and the rubber mouldings had become brittle.

Transporting the corroded cycle from his home at Kadawatha to mine in Colombo for restoration was an emotional journey. It brought back memories of the joyous rides during the late 1960s and 1970s, when Sri Lanka faced severe import restrictions and food and clothing were in short supply.

This was a bike that transported a family of four — sometimes all at once. Wearing helmets was not mandatory then. The black and chrome Velocette had even been used to carry accident victims to hospital in an era when even owning a bicycle was a luxury.

Unlike modern-day vehicles, it had no locking mechanism, but there was never any fear that the 350-pound (160-kilo) beast would be nicked. It took real skill to kick-start it, let alone steady it without risking grievous bodily harm to oneself.

In maintaining a vehicle during import restrictions was not easy. Improvisation was key at that time, and the Velocette bore plenty of evidence of my father’s ingenuity in overcoming the import controls of the day.

The seat had been reupholstered many times with leftover plastic sheets, rigifoam, and sponges from freight cartons of the late 1970s. Three-inch wire nails had been used to hold the upholstery in place, with pieces of wood under a thick metal base.

All that had to be stripped off carefully and replaced with a more professional job that was fairly close to the original seat.

The tail light of the motorcycle was fashioned from a plastic jar lid of the then popular Marketing Department mixed-fruit jam.

The main challenge at the start of the restoration was finding tools made to imperial measurements, which had been abandoned nearly five decades ago with the shift to metric standards globally.

However, thanks to the generosity of Ravi Ekanayake, General Manager at Mercantile Investments’ Motor Division, who lent me a pristinely preserved set of Britool socket wrenches — a legacy of his late, motor-enthusiast father — the restoration became far easier.

After nearly two months of painstaking work, mostly by the highly skilled painter I. Samson, the bike now looks as good as I can remember.

When I showed the final result to my uncle, Jayantha, a retired Deputy Inspector-General, it brought him to tears, not because I had done a bad restoration, but because it reminded him of his brother, who had also been his guardian since they lost their father, Jones Alexander Jayasinghe, at an early age.

Amal Jayasinghe

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Opinion

Those who play at bowls must look out for rubbers

Published

6 hours ago

2026/01/27

Sahan Weerasooriya

President Anura Kumara Dissanayake should listen at least to the views of the Mothers’ Front on proposed educational reforms.

I was listening to the apolitical views expressed by the mothers’ front criticising the proposed educational reforms of the government and I found that their views were addressing some of the core questionable issues relevant to the schoolchildren, and their parents, too.

They were critical of the way the educational reforms were formulated. The absence of any consultation with the stakeholders or any accredited professional organisation about the terms and the scope of education was one of the key criticisms of the Mothers’ Front and it is critically important to comprehend the validity of their opposition to the proposed reforms. Further, the proposals do include ideas and designs borrowed from some of the foreign countries which they are now re-evaluating in view of the various shortcomings which they themselves have encountered. On the subject, History, it is indeed unfortunate that it has been included as an optional, whereas in many developed countries it is a compulsory subject; further, in the module the subject is practically limited to pre-historic periods whereas Sri Lanka can proudly claim a longer recorded history which is important to be studied for the students to understand what happened in the past and comprehend the present.

Another important criticism of the Mothers’ Front was the attempted promotion of sexuality in place of sex education. Further there is a visible effort to promote trans-gender concepts as an example when considering the module on family unit which is drawn with two males and a child and two females and a child which are nor representative of Sri Lankan family unit.

Ranjith Soysa

Opinion

Seeds of discord

Published

6 hours ago

2026/01/27

Sahan Weerasooriya

When the LTTE massacred people, mostly Sinhalese Buddhists, government leaders never claimed that the Tamil community, which the LTTE claimed to represent, was driven by hatred. That restraint mattered. That is why it was outrageous to hear President Anura Kumara Dissanayake tell Tamils that Buddhists visiting the North to worship were doing so out of spite. If reports are accurate, the President also declared that we needed a prosperous nation free of racism and united in spirit. Yet, in the same breath he sowed seeds of division recklessly.

Had he spoken in Tamil or English, some might have dismissed it as a slip of the tongue. But in Sinhala, the words carried unmistakable intent. Who could have expected such divisive rhetoric to come from the head of a nation now enjoying fragile coexistence, after enduring a 30‑year war and two insurrections that devastated the economy?

A Ratnayake

Opinion

Where are we heading?

Published

6 hours ago

2026/01/27

Sahan Weerasooriya

The Island editorial, dated 22 January, 2026, under the title ‘Conspiracy to subvert constitutional order,’ is an eye-opener to those who supported the so-called Äragalaya in July 2022 and those who voted to bring the current regime into power with various positive expectations, including ‘ a system change’. ( https://island.lk/conspiracy-to-subvert-constitutional-order/ )

The editorial highlighted, with irrefutable evidence, how a foreign diplomat and a group of Sri Lankans, consisting of some religious leaders (a Buddhist monk, some Catholic priests) and a trade unionist, made a blatantly illegal bid to pressure the then Speaker Mahinda Yapa Abeywardena to take over the executive presidency in violation of the Constitution. The intention of the intimidator tactics was said to be to create in Sri Lanka a situation similar to that in Libya.

The editorial also mentioned how Minister K.D. Lal Kantha and his JVP attempted to lead the Aragalaya protestors to capture Parliament, but without success. Addressing a public rally, under the title ‘Let’s read Lenin’, a few days ago, Minister Lal Kantha has revealed that their planning was to follow what Lenin had said and done during the Russian revolution. Minister Lal Kantha said: “We do not have the power of the State although we managed to obtain the power of the Government. Hence, we are now engaged in the struggle to win the power of the State’’.

In a democratic society, there is a need to ensure maintaining Law and Order without any state interference. It looks like the intention of the Minister is to bring the Police, Armed Forces and the Judiciary, including all the State Services, under direct control of the ruling party, by filling those positions with JVP loyalists to suppress the opponents of the government.

There is also an attempt by the JVP-led forces to remove the Attorney General by making unsubstantiated allegations against him. As per a latest news item in The Island, under the title “Opposition slams sitting HC judge’s appointment as Justice Ministry additional Secretary”, is alleging President Anura Kumara Dissanayake of trying to control the judiciary by appointing a sitting High Court judge as Additional Secretary to the Justice and National Integration Ministry. (https://island.lk/opposition-slams-sitting-hc-judges-appointment-as-justice-ministry-additional-secretary/)

On the other hand, the ruling party is trying to appoint one of their cronies as Auditor General, possibly, to cover up a number of questionable deals made during the year they ruled and to ensure achieving the so-called power of the State.

Unless the people, especially those who naively dreamt of ‘a system change’, have a clear understanding of the ultimate goal and motives of the ongoing changes and take appropriate actions to protect their own democratic rights, they will be left with no other alternative but to live under a repressive government.

Sangadasa Akurugoda