Features

Not just her good karma

Published

4 years ago

2022/02/19

By Uditha Devapriya
Review of Sandya Salgado’s Not Just My Good Karma
2019, Rs. 2,500, 326 pages

One of the best anthropological studies of advertising ever written, Steven Kemper’s Buying and Believing charts the growth of the industry in Sri Lanka from the early 20th century. Kemper argues that advertising in the country was largely uneconomic in character until 1977. Companies advertised because they had to, not because they wanted to. There were several large-scale advertising agencies, many of them setting up shop during the Sirimavo Bandaranaike years. But limited to English-speaking audiences and middle-class tastes, their work hardly reached the Sinhala and Tamil speaking masses.

Everything changed after 1977. Responding to the UNP government’s liberalisation of the economy, the advertising industry grew by 20 percent a year. A whole spate of reforms, including the privatisation of State enterprises and the reduction of import tariffs, led to intrusions of not just foreign capital and investment, but also foreign, specifically Western, consumer tastes and preferences. These had a considerable effect on the industry. Unlike earlier, when agencies pandered to more sophisticated tastes, they began shifting to a local idiom. Thinking in English then, they began working in Sinhala and Tamil now. The advent of television, free trade zones, and garment factories only fuelled these trends.

Sandya Salgado’s entry into advertising coincided with this period. Armed with a degree in languages “and a head full of dreams”, she wrote to three agencies. Rejected by the first of them, she was interviewed by the second and hired by the third. Beginning her career in 1983, she shifted to other agencies with the years and ended almost three decades later. Not Just My Good Karma is an account of all those years. Lucidly written and accessible, it is at once a memoir and a study of a much vilified, little understood industry.

The book is in three sections. In the first, Sandya dwells on her hometown, Panadura. In the second, the longest, she walks us through the many agencies and outfits she worked at. In the third, she recounts what she did after leaving the industry, including a brief stint at the World Bank. She wraps it all up by insisting that she still hasn’t retired.

There’s a deeply personal touch in the first section. That has a lot to do with where Sandya hails from and what moulded her upbringing, but also, I think, with the fact that Panadura, her home town, is in many ways my hometown too. Sandya summons a melange of personal anecdotes and historical facts. She dwells on caste, class, religion, and politics, and how they intermingled at a time of deep political and social change.

Hardly a defender of the past, she nevertheless limits her memories to observations. Yet she often throws in a comment or two, as in her take on how social class determined where, and more importantly how, you sat in Panadura.

“Those who came for monetary gain mostly entered from the rear of the house, the kussi pila. They would speak standing while achchi would sit on a wooden sofa and listen to their tales of woe… The next social class of persons sat on the steps of the house while achchi would be seated on a chair facing them. There would be another class of people who were not invited into the drawing room, but would be requested to sit in the pila, the verendah of the house, as the drawing room was for special and distinguished guests… There was an underlying class system that prevailed in the welcoming of guests those days which we didn’t make a big deal about but accepted silently.“

These are fascinating insights, and they fascinated me. What’s intriguing about them is how Sandya broke away from such strictures, rebelling against the place assigned to the women of the family. One of the first women in Panadura to drive a car, her mother encouraged this streak in her while “tactfully making us change our views to something less controversial or impractical.” As a result of such influences and encounters, Sandya came to sway between two worlds, of rebellion and pragmatism. She revelled in both, keeping in line with a Sinhala middle-class upbringing while defying the limits of such an inheritance.

Perhaps it’s the advertiser in her, or perhaps it’s how close she is to her hometown, but Sandya’s observations are surprisingly sharp and penetrative. At one level they are almost anthropological, especially her observations on caste and class in Panadura society, much of which make up a particularly edifying epilogue. The bottom line is that they all turned her away from conventional fields while empowering the career woman in her: one reason why she never pursued higher education beyond her Bachelor’s. It was with the latter degree, in fact, that she entered advertising, where she found herself a total misfit.

“I was not from Colombo, didn’t smoke or drink andI wore a saree – not the most common attire in advertising. Apart from not having any sensational stories about my sex life to share, I had a particular qualification: my Sinhala was better than my English. But what set me apart was that I was proud to acknowledge this fact openly.”

Throughout the 1980s the country’s leading advertising agencies went on a creative binge, outdoing each other locally and even internationally. The results were some of the most prodigiously creative campaigns to emerge from the industry. Handling accounts initially at TAL, then moving on to Grants, Sandya found herself in the thick of it all. Starting with CIC (Dulux Paints) and Anchor at TAL, she began coordinating bigger and more lucrative clients at Grants, including Ranasinghe Premadasa. It was her work for Premadasa, specifically for the Gramodaya project the latter oversaw during his presidency, which became her baptism of fire. From there on, for Sandya at least, it was uphill all the way.

What’s particularly interesting are the finer, little details that Sandya remembers from this period. Simply put, she doesn’t ignore anything. Working at an advertising agency then was obviously different to working at one now. How clients saw creatives and how creatives saw each other made up life in

the industry. That is why anecdotes are so important: because it’s the most personal encounters which often sparked off the most creative ideas.

“One morning when I was travelling to work, I saw a child less than 10 years old, not more than two and a half feet tall, carrying a load bigger than himself. The radio in my car was playing the song ‘Nobody’s Child.’ This immediately made me want to fight for children’s rights. I remember sitting with my ever-willing creative team to share my idea of developing a campaign against child abuse and they were on board with no questions asked.”

This, of course, was the origin of one of the most effective public service campaigns in the country’s history. It was, however, hardly the only one Sandya conceptualised and oversaw. Think of the two most innovative campaigns from this period: the child immunisation drive, and the polio eradication ads featuring Neela Wickramasinghe. Sponsored by UNICEF, both achieved their objectives, enabling Sri Lanka to achieve Universal Child Immunisation status and to eradicate polio completely by 1993. Both bore Sandya’s imprint, though they had to be promoted against much scepticism and opposition.

“I remember how the UNICEF team went completely quiet when [the idea of using Neela for an emotional plea over polio] was suggested. The nay-sayers had many excuses against this idea but I kept insisting that this would be a winner if we only could get Neela to agree… I recall meeting Neela at her home where she lived with her mother… Neela not only agreed promptly, but said she would appear for the campaign free of charge.”

In his book, Steven Kemper notes a rather curious paradox: While advertising executives tried to get closer to the local idiom through Sinhala and Tamil speaking audiences in the 1980s, their cultural conditioning made this gulf impossible to bridge. It was much later that agencies tried to go beyond media-centred communications, approaching rural audiences head-on. Kemper’s account ends in the late 1990s, around the time Sandya left conventional advertising, as she puts it, and entered Ogilvy Rural. A media-neutral agency, Ogilvy Rural, which later became Ogilvy Action, sought to do what advertising had failed to: reaching the broader masses. This was a gap agencies had not really addressed until then.

As usual Sandya found herself in the thick of things. Forming a network of young district coordinators, attempting and failing to woo Unilever with the new approach, and gradually striking gold with Dulux, Singer, Commercial Bank, Reckitt Benckiser, Maliban, and a host of other national and multinational brands, she came up with some of the most unforgettable campaigns from recent times, taking their messages to rural and suburban audiences. In this she had clear and definite ideas about what they should be aiming at.

“In my whole career I had never ever submitted or worked on a single piece of creative for the sake of an award… This was a concept I could never fathom and in fact I clashed many a time with my contemporaries in the industry on this topic. For me the first award comes from the consumer, when they accept and respond positively to our message. The second award is if the sales needle moves due to the campaign and of course the third and final one is the response I get from a contented client.”

In other words, winning awards was never a priority. Yet many of these campaigns did scoop up several prizes. More importantly, they gave us some of the most memorable one-liners ever to come out from the industry, including Maliban’s yahagunayen idiriyeta and Dialog’s gihin enakan, not to mention my personal favourite, Signal’s sinaha bo wewa.

It is to Sandya’s credit that she never took her commitment to these clients as an excuse to pollute, deface, and obstruct public spaces. She was particularly candid about what she calls “responsible communications.” Whether it was a Lifebuoy mobile shower in Kataragama or an Eveready makeshift lighthouse along “a dark, rural road”, she always tried to preserve. In doing so she emphasised the need for subtlety, and understatement.

“My eternal fight with the brand managers was not to ‘over-brand’ and clutter these sacred locations. I wanted it to be more a service with minimal commercialisation. When I couldn’t convince the Unilever activation team to be subtle, I would always complain to Amal and he would intervene, as he understood the importance of being mindful of the environment. This of course was my ongoing battle on many of the campaigns we worked on: to be as subliminal as possible with branding.”

Almost 30 years after joining TAL, Sandya Salgado left advertising in 2011. Working at the World Bank, then coming back home and setting up a travel agency, she has since refused to resign. At the end of the book she strikes a particularly optimistic note.

“Being forthright has been my trademark and ‘saying as it is’ was my thing. Age and maturity have made me bite my tongue more frequently and now, I smile, nod and shut up. This helps heaps. It’s now a conscious decision. My friends have said I am like Marmite: either I am loved or hated. How true!”

It’s difficult to read Not Just My Good Karma and not think of the years she spent in the field as the most rewarding anyone could have hoped for. This is an account of how life used to be in one of the more formative periods in the country’s and the industry’s history. Bringing together a galaxy of writers, designers, thinkers, and doers, ad agencies delivered on briefs, moved the sales needle, and contributed to the country’s pop culture. To paraphrase Steven Kemper, it was a time when companies advertised not because they had to, but because they wanted to. Sadly for us, this is a time that may never come back again.

The writer can be reached at udakdev1@gmail.com

All News Advertisement

Features

Palm leaf manuscripts of Sri Lanka – 1

Published

4 mins ago

2026/05/8

Thilina Walpola

Palm leaf manuscripts

Palm leaf manuscripts have been in existence in Sri Lanka since ancient times. The two oldest palm-leaf manuscripts found in Sri Lanka today are the Cullavagga Pâli manuscript of the H. C. P. Bell collection, which is held at the Library of the National Museum, Colombo, and the Mahavagga Pâli manuscript in the University of Kelaniya collection. Photocopies of both are available at the Library of the University of Peradeniya. Both are dated to 13 century. Cullavagga manuscript has wooden covers richly decorated in lac with a design of flowers and foliage.

Karmmavibhâga

However, the oldest known Sinhala palm leaf manuscript in the world is the Karmmavibhâga which was found in a Tibet monastery in 1936 by the Indian scholar Rahul Sankrityayan. Rahul Sankrityayan, (1893–1963) former Kedarnath Pandey, was an Indian polymath, who searched out rare Buddhist manuscripts on his travels abroad. Sankrityayan visited Sri Lanka as well. Vidyalankara Pirivena is mentioned.

Sankrityayan visited Tibet several times to collect manuscripts from the Buddhist monasteries there. In May 1936 on his second visit to Tibet, Sankrityayan visited the Sa-skya monastery. The Chag-pe-lha-khang Library in this monastery was specially opened for Sankrityayan.

He stated in his autobiography that when the clouds of dust which greeted this rare opening of its doors had subsided, they beheld rows of open racks where volume on volume of manuscripts were kept. “After rummaging around, I came across palm-leaf manuscripts. They were not wrapped in cloth, but were tied between two wooden planks with holes through them.” Sankrityayan found several important manuscripts he had been looking for, in that collection.

Sankrityayan catalogued fifty-seven manuscripts bound in thirty-eight volumes. The thirty-seventh volume was written in the Sinhala script. Sankrityayan records that this volume contained ninety-seven palm- leaves each of which measured 18 1/4 by 1 1/4 in. (46 x 3 cm.) and that there were seven lines of writing on each folio.

According to Sankrityayan, these Sinhala texts originally belonged to a Sri Lankan monk called Anantaśrî who had come to Tibet in the time of ŚSrî Kîrttidhvaja (Kirti Sri Rajasinha). Analysts noted that Sankrityayan does not give the source of this information and the manuscript makes no mention of Anantaśrî.

Sankrityayan had taken with him to Tibet, one Abeyasinghe, (Abhayasimha) to help him with copying manuscripts. They made hand-copies of the important manuscripts. Abhayasimha had copied about 250 to 350 strophes each day. But he fell ill due to the extreme cold and was sent home in June. Abeyasinghe had written letters home during his stay in Tibet.

Photographs of the manuscripts found during Sankrityayan’s expeditions in Tibet are preserved at the National Archives in Colombo. There is also a copy in Vidyalankara pirivena library The Historical Manuscripts Commission In its 1960/1961 report, drew attention to this manuscript, known as Sa-skya Codex, describing it as “a unique document.” (Annual Report of the Government Archivist 1960/61, 1963)

Sinhala scholar P.E.E. Fernando examined photographs of the Sa-skya Codex at the request of the Historical Manuscripts Commission and assigned it to the 13th century. The Historical Manuscripts Commission, dated it to either twelfth or the thirteenth century.

The Historical Manuscripts Commission observed that this manuscript was of great value for the study of the development of the Sinhala script. Ven. Meda Uyangoda Vimalakîrtti and Nähinne Sominda in their edition of the Karmmavibhâga published in 1961 agreed that the Sa-skya Codex represented an early stage in the evolution of the Sinhala language.

Mahavamsa

The Mahavamsa is considered a unique historical document. There is nothing like it in South Asia, and probably all Asia, with the exception of China. Mahavamsa provides a historical account of events, with emphasis on chronology and dating. This, it appears, was rare at the time.

However, Mahavamsa is not a political history, though that is the popular perception of it. It is a religious history. It was written to record the introduction and entrenchment of Buddhism in the country. Other Buddhist countries, such as Cambodia, Burma and Thailand value the Mahavamsa for this reason. They held copies of the Mahavamsa and used events from it in their temple frescoes.

But Mahavamsa is also an important reference source for reconstructing the political history of Sri Lanka. Political and social facts are included in the Mahavamsa narrative when describing religious events, and this makes the Mahavamsa important for historians. This tradition of history writing, beginning with the earlier Sihala Attakatha and Dipawamsa, it is suggested, started in Sri Lanka in 2^nd or 3^rd BC.

Today, the Mahavamsa has become a major source of historical information, not only for dating kings, temples and reservoirs, but also for reconstructing ancient Sinhala society. The fact that Kuveni was seated beside a pond, spinning thread has been used to indicate that there was water management and textiles long before Vijaya arrived. Dutugemunu (161-137 BC) paid a salary to the workers building the Maha Thupa. This shows that money was used at the time.

Copies of the Mahavamsa have been treasured and looked after in Sri Lanka for centuries. They have been copied over and over again. The manuscripts were held in temple libraries because the subject of the Mahavamsa was the entrenchment of Buddhism in Sri Lanka.

The Mahavamsa manuscripts did not pop up suddenly during British rule as people seem to think. The British did not ‘discover’ the Mahavamsa. It was there. When the British administration started to take interest in the history of the island, the sangha would have directed them to the Mahavamsa, in the same way that they directed HCP Bell to the ruins in Anuradhapura and the Sigiriya frescoes. HCP Bell did not discover those either.

The British administrators saw the value of the Mahavamsa and copies were sent to libraries abroad. The Bodleian library, Oxford has a well preserved Mahavamsa manuscript, taken from Mulkirigala, which Turner used for his translation. Cambridge has two Mahavamsa manuscripts. The two copies at India Office library, and the copy in East India Library are probably in the British Library today. The Royal Library, Copenhagen, has a copy, consisting of 129 sheets, 12 lines to a leaf, written in good handwriting.

In Sri Lanka there are several copies of the Mahavamsa in the Colombo Museum Library. One copy, known as the ‘Cambodian Mahavamsa ‘is in Cambodian script. University of Peradeniya has at least three copies.

It is interesting to note that the Mahavamsa was known to the Sinhala elite and some had copies in their private libraries. The Historical Manuscripts Commission of the 1930s said in its first report that five copies of the Mahavamsa and a 19^th century copy of the Dipawamsa were found in private collections.

The temple libraries had many copies of the Mahavamsa. Some were of very high quality. Wilhelm Geiger had looked at the copies held at Mahamanthinda Pirivena, Matara and Mulkirigala vihara. Asgiriya, Nagolla Vihara and Watagedera Sudarmarama Potgul vihara, Matara, are three of the many libraries that held copies of the Mahavamsa.

Sirancee Gunawardene examined the copy at Mahamanthinda Pirivena, Matara, very closely. She says that it is a very old manuscript. According to its colophon, the manuscript was first copied 400 years ago. It is in a very good state of preservation. It has 232 folios. Each 50 cm long 6.25 wide. Nine lines on each side, in Pali metric verse.

The writer of the manuscripts said that his version was an improvement on the copy. He wrote, “I will recite the Mahavamsa which was compiled by ancient sages. [their version] was too long and had many repetitions. This version is free from such faults, easy to understand and remember. It is handed down from tradition, for arousing serene joy and emotion’ .

The Mahamanthinda manuscript records the continuous history of 23 dynasties from 543 BC to 1758 AD. It refers to the principle of hereditary monarchy as 39 eldest sons of reigning monarch succeeded their fathers to the throne. It highlights the fact that fifteen reigned only for one year, 34 for less than four years, 22 kings were murdered by their successors, 6 were killed during battles, 4 committed suicide, 11 were dethroned.

Mahawansa as a World Heritage document

An ola manuscript of the Mahavamsa, held in the Main Library of the University of Peradeniya has been recognised by UNESCO as a part of World Heritage. UNESCO announced In 2023 that it has included the Mahavamsa as one of the 64 items of documentary heritage inscribed in the UNESCO’s Memory of the World International Register for 2023. The manuscript is dated to the early 19 century.

The certificate declaring the Mahawansa as a world heritage document was handed to the Chancellor of Peradeniya University by UNESCO Director General, who visited the University in 2024 specially to do so. She also unveiled a plaque marking the declaration.

The story began much earlier. The National Library of Sri Lanka and the Ministry of Buddha Sasana had jointly appointed a 6-member committee headed by Prof Malani Endagamage, to find the best preserved copy of the Mahavamsa in Sri Lanka. This would have been in 2000 or so. For two years, this team had examined copies from over 100 temples nationwide.

Temples around the country yielded copies, crumbling to well-preserved, reported Sunday Times. There was one from the Ridi Vihara that almost made the cut, but four other copies were shortlisted. One from the Dalada Maligawa, Kandy and three manuscripts from the Main Library of the University of Peradeniya. Three academics from the University’s History Department, Professors K.M. Rohitha Dasanayaka, Mahinda Somathilake and U.S.Y. Sahan Mahesh examined the three Peradeniya manuscripts

Dasanayaka said, “We poured over the copies together, and it became clear that one copy stood out. While the other two had numerous inconsistencies, this one, written in a curvy hand, was neat and beautiful. After more than two centuries, the manuscript was still very attractive, with a ‘flaming cinnamon orange’ cover and elegant lettering.

The first section of the manuscript ends with Mahasen (274–301 AD), written by the monk Mahanama. The second part ends at 1815. The author is given as Ven. Thibbotuwawe Buddharakkhita but he was dead by 1815. The final part was probably done by an acolyte. He has done a very neat job, seamlessly adding his bit, concluded Dasanayake.

This manuscript was acquired by the Library of University of Peradeniya when K. D. Somadasa, was the Librarian (1964 – 1970). It is held in the Main Library and its Accession Number is 277587.

National Library & Documentation Services Board of Sri Lanka, which administers the National Library of Sri Lanka submitted a nomination to UNESCO on behalf of this manuscript. UNESCO responded positively to the application.

UNESCO said the Mahavamsa was recognized as one of the world’s longest unbroken historical accounts, presenting Sri Lanka’s history in a chronological order from the 6th century BCE. The authenticity of the facts provided in the document has been confirmed through archaeological research conducted in Sri Lanka and India.

It is an important historical source in South Asia, said UNESCO. It was the first of its kind in South Asia, initiating a mature historiographical tradition. It has contributed singularly to the identity of Emperor Asoka in Indian history. The existence of a number of manuscripts of the Mahavamsa in several countries as well as the transliteration and translation of the text to several Southeast Asian and European languages stand testimony to its immense historical, cultural, literal, linguistic and scholarly values, .” UNESCO press release said.

Further, UNESCO found that this manuscript was correctly conserved at the University Library. The university and its library maintained high standards in safeguarding the palm-leaf manuscripts, preventing deterioration, declared UNESCO. (Continued)

REFERENCES

https://archives1.dailynews.lk/2021/02/25/local/242520/ola-leaf-mahavamsa-be-declared-world-heritage

Sirancee Gunawardana Palm leaf manuscripts of Sri Lanka . 1977 p 41,44-47 , 253 290 292, ,

N. E. I. Wijerathne Methods, Techniques and Challenges in Deciphering the Sa-skaya Codex. Vidyodaya Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences (2025), Vol. 10 (01) https://journals.sjp.ac.lk/index.php/vjhss/article/view/8571/6001

First report of the Historical Manuscripts Commision.1933 SP 9 of 1933. p . 53, 95, 96

https://journals.sjp.ac.lk/index.php/vjhss/article/view/8571/6001https://www.austriaca.at/0xc1aa5572%200x00314cc3.pdf

https://leftword.com/creator/rahul-sankrityayan/

https://www.reddit.com/r/IndianHistory/comments/1oc5tc2/in_his_autobiography_meri_jeevan_yatra_rahul/

https://www.sundaytimes.lk/230910/plus/in-search-of-the-perfect-mahavamsa-531513.html

https://www.dailymirror.lk/breaking-news/Mahawansa-declared-a-world-heritage/108-287528

https://mfa.gov.lk/en/visit-of-unesco-dg/

https://sundaytimes.lk/online/education/UNESCO-ready-to-support-digitalisation-of-Ola-leaf-books/290-1146314

https://media.unesco.org/sites/default/files/webform/mow001/53_131%252B.pdf

by KAMALIKA PIERIS

Features

A new Sherlock Holmes novel

Published

4 mins ago

2026/05/8

Thilina Walpola

Tales of Mystery and Suspense – 1

“The House of Silk” is set in a grim Victorian winter, and moves from Baker Street to a luxurious suburban villa, from dingy pubs to elegant London clubs, from a correction school for boys high on a hill to Dr Silkin’s House of Wonders, which provided noisy low life entertainment. Holmes and Watson went there in search of the House of Silk, a name they had heard when looking into the death of one of Holmes’ Baker Street irregulars (slum children who ferreted out information for him) .

I do not think highly of sequels to books written by highly regarded writers, though I must admit that this dislike is based on just a few samples. But while in England I was given by my former Dean, with a forceful recommendation, a book about a Sherlock Holmes mystery, supposedly written by Dr Watson. I began on it soon after I got back home, and found it difficult to put down, so I suppose I will not look on Anthony Horowitz as an exception to my rule. I may even look out for his efforts at continuing the adventures of James Bond, though I suspect Fleming’s laconic style will be less easy to emulate.

“The House of Silk” is set in a grim Victorian winter, and moves from Baker Street to a luxurious suburban villa, from dingy pubs to elegant London clubs, from a correction school for boys high on a hill to Dr Silkin’s House of Wonders, which provided noisy low life entertainment. Holmes and Watson went there in search of the House of Silk, a name they had heard when looking into the death of one of Holmes’ Baker Street irregulars (slum children who ferreted out information for him). They had asked Holmes’ brother Mycroft for help in finding what and where this was, but he had warned them off, having been himself told by someone very senior in government that it might involve those in very high positions, and further inquiries might prove dangerous.

Needless to say, Holmes does seek further, and is lured to an opium den where he is drugged, to be found outside with a gun in his hand and the body of a girl beside him, the sister of the murdered boy Ross. A passer-by swears he had seen Holmes fire the shot, and the owner of the opium den and a customer swear that Holmes had taken too much opium and left the den in a demented condition. A police inspector who had been passing promptly arrests Holmes and Watson, and even their old acquaintance Inspector Lestrade finds it difficult to get access to him.

Watson eventually gets to see him when he is in the infirmary, after he has been told by a mysterious man that Holmes was going to be murdered before his case could be taken up. The man said he had earlier tried to get Holmes to investigate the House of Silk by sending him a white silk ribbon, such as had later been found tied round the hand of the murdered boy. But, as a criminal himself, he said, he could not reveal more, though he himself was horrified by the business of the House of Silk, which gave criminality a bad name, which is why he wanted it all stopped.

Holmes escapes from the infirmary, with a little help from the doctor whom he had once assisted earlier, right under the nose of the nasty Inspector Harriman. He then joins up with Watson, and having with the help of Lestrade overcome the men designed to kill him at Dr Silkin’s House of Wonders, he sets off, with an even large posse of policemen, to the House of Silk.

After much suspense, the habitues of the House of Silk are arrested, the Inspector having broken his neck in the course of a chase downhill, having fled when his misdeeds were exposed. The mastermind claims that he will not face a trial because of the important people involved, but instead falls down a staircase while in prison and breaks his neck. One of the noblemen involved commits suicide, but another, and the medical man who had sworn he saw Holmes kill the young lady, get off without charge.

But then we revert to the original story, which had involved an art dealer who came to Holmes because he was being followed by someone he thought was an American gangster out for revenge. This was because he had shipped some pictures to an American buyer, and these had been destroyed when a train was held up by an Irish gang and the coach with the safe in it dynamited. The buyer and the dealer had got a private agency to investigate, and this had ended with the gang being killed in a shootout, though one of the twins who led it had escaped. The buyer had subsequently been killed, and Mr Carstairs feared that the twin who survived had followed him to England.

Holmes and Watson went to Carstairs’ house, where they met his wife, whom he had met on the boat back from America, and his sister. Their mother had died some months earlier, when gas had filled her room after the flame had gone out. It transpired that there had been a break in, and some money and a necklace stolen from a safe, and it was in tracing these, through a pawnbroker, that Holmes and Watson had found the American murdered in the hotel where he had been staying.

The leader of the irregulars had come to tell Holmes that they had traced the man to the hotel, and Ross had been left on guard. He seemed terrified when Holmes and Watson and Carstairs turned up, but said he had seen nothing. When the boys had been dismissed, and the room opened up, the man was found dead, the murderer obviously having gained entrance through a window.

Holmes assumed the boy had seen someone he recognized, but he could not be traced, until he was found dead, horribly tortured. The silk band around his wrist then led Holmes to pursue the House of Silk. One of the boys at the school where Ross had been mentioned that he had a sister at a pub, and she, when confronted, asked in fear if they were from the House of Silk and then, having lunged at Watson with a knife, ran off – herself only to be found dead outside the opium den, which prompted the arrest of Holmes.

After the drama at the House of Silk, Holmes and Watson go to the Carstairs household, where he explains exactly what had taken place, identifying the murdered man as not a member of the gang but the head of the private agency which had investigated them. As my Dean told me, Horowitz then ties up all the loose ends with consummate skill, connecting with a fine thread all the malefactors, of various kinds.

Features

Sacred Heights, Fragile Ground: Why Sri Pada Must Not Be Reduced to a Profit Project

Published

4 mins ago

2026/05/8

Thilina Walpola

Sri Pada. Image courtesy University of Sabaragamuwa

Sri Pada is not merely a scenic mountain or a tourism asset; it is one of Sri Lanka’s most sacred living landscapes and among its most significant biodiversity strongholds. Anchored by the Peak Wilderness Sanctuary, spanning approximately 224 square kilometres, this region contains an extraordinary mosaic of tropical rainforest, montane forest, and cloud forest ecosystems. These habitats sustain a remarkable concentration of endemic life from delicate orchids and ancient ferns to rare amphibians such as Pseudophilautus macropus and elusive bird species like the chestnut-backed owlet. It also functions as a critical watershed, feeding major rivers that sustain communities far beyond its slopes, even as it already faces mounting stress from pollution during peak pilgrimage seasons.

What distinguishes Sri Pada most profoundly is that its ecological richness is inseparable from its spiritual meaning. For centuries, it has been venerated by Buddhists, Hindus, Muslims, and Christians alike. The pilgrimage is defined not simply by reaching the summit, but by the journey itself—the long, often nocturnal ascent through forested paths and thousands of stone steps. This climb is an embodied act of devotion, humility, endurance, and merit-making. The terrain is not incidental; it is sacred. To replace this lived ritual with a cableway is not modernisation; it is a redefinition of meaning, reducing an act of faith into passive consumption and weakening centuries of spiritual continuity.

The argument that such a project would enhance tourism is equally unconvincing. Sri Pada already attracts pilgrims and visitors in large numbers without mechanised intervention. Indeed, for many, particularly those from highly urbanised societies; the demanding climb is precisely the appeal. It offers authenticity, effort, and reflection in a world increasingly shaped by convenience. A cable car risks eroding this uniqueness, replacing it with a standardised, convenience-driven experience that could ultimately diminish its draw.

The environmental consequences, however, are far more serious and enduring. Constructing a cableway would entail clearing forest corridors, erecting towers, and expanding access infrastructure within an ecologically fragile sanctuary. This would fragment habitats, disrupt wildlife movement, and intensify human intrusion into sensitive zones. Noise, waste, and increased footfall would further degrade the ecosystem, accelerating soil erosion, stressing water catchments, and heightening the risk of invasive species. In a finely balanced cloud forest system, such disturbances are not easily reversible.

Sri Lanka does not have to speculate about the risks of ill-considered development in fragile landscapes; it has already witnessed them. The case of Ambuluwawa Tower, developed within a multi-religious complex under the direction of D. M. Jayaratne, offers a sobering precedent. Situated in an environmentally sensitive and geologically unstable zone, reportedly without a sufficiently rigorous Environmental Impact Assessment, the site came under renewed scrutiny after the devastating Cyclone Ditwah in late 2025. The extreme rainfall triggered widespread flooding and catastrophic landslides, with the Ambuluwawa area among the worst affected. Authorities issued urgent warnings about escalating landslide risks, designating the area as critically vulnerable and ordering immediate evacuations, as unstable slopes and waterlogged terrain signalled the likelihood of further, potentially deadly collapses. What unfolded there illustrates a critical lesson: when development disregards ecological limits and geological realities, natural hazards can quickly escalate into human crises.

Equally troubling is the policy mindset such proposals reveal. A government that presents itself as progressive cannot afford to equate progress with unchecked commercialization. The growing tendency to prioritize revenue-generating mega-projects, while downplaying or disregarding long-term environmental and cultural consequences, is deeply concerning. It reflects a narrow calculus where short-term financial gain is elevated above ecological sustainability and cultural integrity. In a site like Sri Pada, this approach is not merely misguided—it is appalling. Development cannot be reduced to a balance sheet when what is at stake is a sacred landscape and a globally significant biodiversity reserve.

This raises a fundamental question: what is the role of governance in relation to places like Sri Pada? It is not to convert them into profit centres, but to act as custodians—protecting what cannot be replaced. Large-scale investments may promise returns, but the irreversible loss of ecological integrity and spiritual meaning carries a far greater cost, one that no revenue model can offset.

Preserving Sri Pada, therefore, is not about rejecting development—it is about redefining it responsibly. It calls for strengthening sustainable pilgrimage management, improving waste control, and reinforcing conservation efforts without altering the essential character of the site. True progress lies in safeguarding what is unique, not in transforming it into something generic.

Sri Pada stands at a rare intersection of faith and nature, where biodiversity and belief have coexisted for centuries. To disrupt that balance in pursuit of short-term gain is to misunderstand its essence. Protecting it is more than an environmental or cultural obligation—it is a duty to ensure that what is sacred, rare, and irreplaceable endures.

by Janakie Seneviratne