Opinion

All in the family: Growth and the IMF

Published

4 years ago

2022/04/30

By Gamini Seneviratne

(This article was first published in The Island in 2001. It is reproduced, today, given its relevance to the present situation.)

That heading should not be taken to refer to the political micro-families in this and other parts of the world, although within the IMF’s grand design, such ‘families’ do matter. ‘The IMF’ here refers to the entire complex of global predators which it orchestrates.

For those who can laugh at larceny on a grand scale, the growth of such post-regnal family-trees of a much lower order in South Asia is a bit of a joke. From the Bhuttos et al in the west, the Ranas in the north, the Zias et al in the east, the lesser Gandhis, from chemicals, dams, power plants, etc., in the centre, to cement, steel, airlines, ports, arms, peace deals and so on in the south, the tale of treason has many twists to it. The main strand of the rope that binds them all together is provided by the IMF and its relatively poor relative, the World Bank and, its associate banks which do some of the dirty work for it. What matters to us is that the rope is being used to throttle the people in our countries.

It is a pity that Dr. Kumari Jayawardena did not extend her researches to cover those who have become “somebodies” – ugly word – overnight in the past few years, because such an account could not fail to illustrate vividly what is being said here.

The following lines from an old Rugby Song encapsulate the nexus between the IMF/WB, MNCs, and the military power of the west. The money they roll in is from us, but it cannot be extracted without the help of corrupt Presidents, Prime Ministers, other, self-confessed military rulers and their henchmen.

My father manufactures

French Letters,

My sister makes holes with a pin.

My uncle arranges abortions,

My god, how the money rolls in,

rolls in,

My god how the money rolls in!

How does the IMF set about putting into force its programme for destabilising the socio-economic foundation of our people and their manner of living? Dr. Nadeem Ul Haque, the IMF boss in this country and the effective decision maker, (regardless of the World Bank man styling himself ‘Country Manager’), for the apology of a government that has foisted itself on us, has spelt it out in an address to the National Chamber of Exporters last week [The Island, 26th December, 2000].

I have reason to believe that Dr. Haque is a civilized person, and these comments are not directed personally at him. As a South Asian and a national of Pakistan, which we have long regarded as a friend, I have no doubt that he would be ready to be as accommodating towards us as Washington is prepared to permit him to be. It may be taken as read, though, that he has no such leeway. Willy-nilly he is part of the system of extraction globally.

In his talk, Dr. Haque has obviously been conscious that his audience had somewhat limited interests and he has addressed those as any good speaker should do. However, he has, en passant, touched on more vital matters. I comment on those.

They relate to “governance”, trade unions, and “smallness”. Also “imagination”, which is the distinguishing marker of such self-serving constructs as “economic efficiency” which the larger family of the imperial pillagers continues to present to our astonished gaze.

Let us take the matter of “smallness”. Dr. Haque had told our imaginative and hopeful exporters that it has to do with the size of a country or of its population. He has said that small countries must have small governments or government agencies. What he has not said is that they should have small cabinets of ministers: when he refers to the cost of ‘governance’ he has in mind the public services.

What he means is that governments should be put out of business, except in the matter of using its clout to remove “subsidies” on, say, public health, farming, education and the administration of the law and to deliver “incentives” to the oh so efficient! “private sector”.

What Dr. Haque has taken off on is the antipathy of would-be monopolists to “big government”, which means a system of regulation of economic activity in the public interest. The desired end of “reform” is that “big business” is favoured at the cost of the social responsibilities of the institutions that have been set up by the people to act in their behalf.

The IMF has no word at all about “big business” and what one might call, if one were in an especially benign mood this season, its inefficiencies. In fact, you’d have to be pretty sozzled and non compos mentis to buy that shoddy and very private ‘good’.

The cynical exploitation of the consumer by big business following the ‘privatization’, which the IMF has the temerity to come over here and advocate to us yakkos, has long been known in the USA and, more recently, in the UK.

How have those societies dealt with this abomination? In the USA, the remissness of any private centre for medical care or any primary or secondary educational institution [yes, parents do tend to lose interest after their ‘kids’ reach a certain age] could lead to demands for ‘compensation’ in often hefty monetary terms. Lawyers grow rich and enter the league of the ‘big businessman’. So is it with their public services, such as private transport. The internal airlines, all private, in the USA have the worst safety record anywhere in the world. Not to mention the inconvenience they subject their customers to, the baggage they ‘lose’ or the lousy food they serve. Such little things make for an increase in ‘profit’ which, after all, is all that private business is about.

In the UK, we have had quite recently, graphic examples of the outcome of Big Business taking over from Big Government. To give a current example, the common people of that country are crying out for the re-nationalisation of the rail system. Cost-cutting has resulted in the neglect of essential safety procedures and led to horrible accidents. ‘The IMF’ would no doubt point to ‘the bottom line’ on a ledger as proof of the efficiency of private management of that mode of public transport.

And it is not only in those countries, but everywhere, including ‘small’ Sri Lanka, that we have had mass resistance to GMO foods that are being peddled by MNCs, whom it is the IMF’s mandate to support.

And, predictably, we have here the IMF demanding that the government “sheds” itself of its responsibilities by the people. Dr. Haque [I am sorry that I have to keep on referring to him by name, but it is a relatively common name, such as is mine here, and am sure that his namesake, the late Dr. Mahbub Ul Haq, would not have taken offence], asserts that in most “advanced countries” [big] business would consider the need to conform to national laws “a waste”, presumably, of time – and profit. Sure, sure, in the most “advanced” of those countries, [big] business has all the necessary short-cuts to profit opened through ‘lobbyists’, most of them former senators, congressmen or other high officials in the aforementioned ‘big government’

We have Dr. Haque talking about a “labour aristocracy”. Maybe some such phenomenon exists in Australia. We do know however how the labour unions have been manipulated in the USA; for example, the lumber workers have been ‘employed’ to provide a rationale for the continued felling of the old growth forest of over a thousand years of age in Washington and Oregon. The identical motivation occurred when port workers in New York and New Orleans were paid to shove wheat that had been paid for into the sea rather than ship it to you-know-who. In the USA, when the term ‘labour aristocracy’ does acquire meaning, its members are being employed right now to shut out imports of manufactures from the third world. This is in the teeth of the agreements which the USA herself thrust down our throats via the WTO. If the IMF is looking for ‘governance’ it should look to such acts that promote ‘economic efficiency’.

The attempts to emasculate trade unions is a part of that ploy. Here we have the USA arguing strenuously against “low-cost labour” from Asia that compromises the livelihoods of its citizens. And here we have the IMF urging our governments to destroy a supposed “labour aristocracy”. Our organized working class has, largely through the dictates of the IMF, endorsed by servile governments compounded by the actions of an incompetent and utterly corrupt administration [which the IMF has done nothing to bring down – as they cannot until a suitably subservient alternative is found/built up], been compelled to survive a budget that has reduced their own to a shoe-string on one shoe. How would they respond? What, if any, more attacks on them does the IMF have to offer them?

Dr. Haque has also spoken about ‘pampering constituencies’. His, i.e. the IMF’s, gripe is about the ‘constituencies’ that are of no use to them, – in fact, those which get in the way of the larger and the lesser ‘families’ mentioned above. What the IMF has directed its ‘reforms’ towards is the pampering of big business. In South Asia, as elsewhere, the incumbent claimants to state power are the instrument through whom the IMF family operates. The less representative they are of the people, and the more securely armed against the people they are, the better.

The term “reform” should raise hackles, especially among South Asians. We have had so much of it. In this country we had the “Colebrook-Cameron Reforms” a hundred and sixty-seven years ago. They were designed to break down the traditional socio-economic foundations of this country and to use those elements in it which would give, not ‘cheap’ but costless labour for their marauders. The use of that term by the IMF has no connotations other than those of a century and a half ago. Except that the ‘stakes’, as in the betting game, are much higher now.

The primary question that Dr. Haque has raised is “Why has South Asia not grown?” He has also spoken of Singapore et al having looked to us for guidance on “agendas” that we in South Asia, Sri Lanka in particular, had initiated. His thesis is that the winner is the one who crosses the line, – not the one who’s fastest off the mark. It is not possible to countenance such convoluted logic. We have had loads of ‘theory’ on how various countries that were targeted by big business have responded to the ‘windows of opportunity’ that were advanced in the language of the camel seeking refuge. East Asia is held to have ‘developed’ on the rails of a ‘Confucian ethic’ [a matter that I was quizzed on at a ‘brown-bag’ seminar at Cornell ten years ago, long before I was aware of any family connection with that institution]. Does the IMF [or Dr. Haque] have a corresponding culture-based theory about India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka? – a Hindu / Islamic rate of growth, a Christian rate of profligacy, a Theravada level of tolerance and a Mahayana mode of mayhem together bringing about a Buddhist condition of stagnation?

And, finally, lest we forget, a South Asian scale of corruption?

Dr. Haque has spoken of the need to indoctrinate our children towards supporting the education ‘reforms’ that he advocates. Perhaps, he should take some time out to read “The Pearl of Great Price”, the Lalith Athulathmudali memorial oration delivered by the Vice Chancellor of the University of Colombo, Prof. Savithri Goonesekera. The agenda that we set ourselves fifty years ago resulted in a relatively high growth in the life chances of our people. It was precisely the kind of growth that the great family that the IMF speaks for, cannot abide. And that is why those gains have been eroded through ‘market reforms’. The agenda for the control of resources globally is impeded by manifestations of self-sufficiency anywhere. The substance of Dr. Haque’s complaint is that South Asia has not “grown” in the directions desired by transnational capital. With the goals we set ourselves, the money cannot roll in.

All News Advertisement

Opinion

A safe harbour without a legal map: Why Sri Lanka needs a domestic refugee law

Published

7 hours ago

2026/09/7

Thilina Walpola

A file picture of the Rohingya refugees rescued by the Sri Lanka Navy

by Viran Maddumage
Assistant Lecturer & PhD (Reading) Department of Human Geography and Migration,
Macquarie University Australia

Sanduni Rathnayake
Lecturer (Probationary) Faculty of Law,
General Sir John Kotelawala Defence University

When a boat carrying desperate people reaches the shores of an island, the first question should be a humanitarian one: how can these people be kept safe? But sooner or later, another question becomes unavoidable: what does the law say?

For Sri Lanka, that question is becoming increasingly important.

In December 2024, the Sri Lankan Navy rescued more than 100 people believed to be Rohingya refugees from a fishing vessel found adrift off the country’s northern coast. Among them were women and children. They were brought ashore and provided with food, water and medical assistance. The incident was not entirely unprecedented; Sri Lanka had encountered a similar arrival of Rohingya people by sea in 2022.

These incidents expose an uncomfortable gap in Sri Lanka’s legal architecture. Sri Lanka is capable of rescuing people in distress. It can provide immediate humanitarian assistance. But once those people reach our shores and seek protection, where exactly does the law take them?

Sri Lanka has not ratified the 1951 Convention relating to the Status of Refugees or its 1967 Protocol. The Convention and Protocol constitute the central international instruments defining refugee status and establishing international standards for refugee protection. More importantly, Sri Lanka does not currently have a comprehensive domestic legal framework establishing a national procedure for determining refugee status. UNHCR has consequently played an important role in registering and assessing asylum claims in Sri Lanka.

This arrangement may function when refugee movements are limited. But it is not a substitute for law.

Problem of a legal vacuum

An asylum-seeker is not simply an undocumented migrant. An asylum-seeker is a person asking another state for protection because returning home may expose them to persecution or serious harm. A refugee is a person whose circumstances meet the applicable criteria for international protection.

The distinction matters because ordinary immigration law is principally concerned with controlling entry, residence and departure. Sri Lanka’s Immigration and Emigration framework, for example, is designed to regulate the entry and departure of persons and to provide for the removal of certain non-citizens. Refugee law asks a different question: what happens when the ordinary assumption that a person can simply be returned to their country of nationality is no longer safe?

That question cannot be answered adequately through immigration enforcement alone.

At present, Sri Lanka lacks a dedicated statutory process that clearly answers basic questions. Who may apply for asylum? Who determines whether an individual qualifies for protection? What procedural rights does the applicant have? What evidence must be considered? Is there a right to appeal? What happens while an application is pending? When may detention be used? What happens when the applicant is a child? And, most importantly, what safeguards exist against returning a person to a place where they face persecution or other serious harm?

Leaving such questions to ad hoc administrative arrangements creates uncertainty not only for refugees and asylum-seekers, but also for the State itself.

Why international law alone not enough

One might respond that Sri Lanka already participates in the international human-rights system and therefore has obligations relevant to the treatment of vulnerable non-citizens. That is true. But international commitments and domestic enforceability are not necessarily the same thing.

Sri Lanka’s constitutional and legal framework has traditionally reflected a dualist approach to international treaties. The Supreme Court’s decision in Singarasa v Attorney-General is particularly significant in this regard. The judgment recognised that treaty obligations undertaken by the State do not, merely by virtue of international acceptance, automatically become enforceable domestic law; legislative implementation is required for treaties to have internal legal effect.

This principle makes the case for domestic refugee legislation even stronger.

The answer is not to pretend that international law does not matter. Nor is it to suggest that Sri Lanka has no responsibilities towards people seeking protection. Rather, the lesson is that where protection is important enough to be recognised internationally, it should also be translated into clear domestic rules that courts, public officials and affected individuals can actually understand and apply.

A refugee should not have to depend upon uncertainty about the precise relationship between an international obligation, administrative practice and domestic immigration law to know whether they can safely remain in the country while their claim is considered.

Principle of non-refoulement

At the heart of refugee protection is the principle of non-refoulement: the prohibition against sending a person back to a place where they face persecution or other serious threats to their life or freedom.

The principle is one of the foundational concepts of international refugee protection. Its significance extends beyond the formal status of a person as a recognised refugee. International human-rights law also provides important protection against removal in circumstances where return would expose an individual to serious harm.

For Sri Lanka, the question therefore cannot simply be whether the country has ratified the Refugee Convention. The more fundamental question is whether Sri Lankan law provides an effective mechanism for ensuring that a person who may require international protection is identified and assessed before removal.

Without such a mechanism, even a principle as important as non-refoulement risks becoming difficult to operationalise.

The Rohingya arrivals demonstrate why this matters. These were not abstract legal hypotheticals. They were human beings arriving by sea after fleeing circumstances in which their safety could not simply be assumed. The State had to decide what to do with them.

And whenever the State must make such decisions, law matters.

A Sri Lankan solution

The answer should not necessarily be the wholesale transplantation of another country’s refugee legislation. Sri Lanka has legitimate interests in border management, national security, immigration control and public order. A domestic refugee law can recognise those interests while also establishing safeguards for people genuinely in need of protection.

A Sri Lankan Refugee and Asylum Act could establish a clear national asylum procedure. It could define who qualifies as a refugee and who may seek asylum, establish an independent or appropriately insulated refugee-status determination mechanism, and provide applicants with basic procedural guarantees.

There should be an opportunity to present evidence, an obligation to give reasons for decisions and a meaningful avenue of review or appeal.

The legislation should also address detention. Irregular entry should not automatically transform a person seeking protection into a criminal. Where detention is considered necessary, the law should establish clear grounds, safeguards and review mechanisms, with particular protection for children and other vulnerable persons.

The framework should provide temporary documentation to asylum-seekers while their claims are being considered. It should address access to essential healthcare and education, and determine whether and under what conditions recognised refugees may work.

Most importantly, the legislation should expressly incorporate appropriate safeguards against refoulement.

Such legislation would not mean that every person arriving without a visa must be permitted to remain indefinitely. Refugee law has never required that. A functioning asylum system distinguishes between those who require international protection and those who do not. It gives the State a lawful process through which to make that distinction.

That is precisely why having a legal framework can actually strengthen immigration control rather than undermine it.

From humanitarian reaction to legal certainty

Sri Lanka has a long history of displacement. Hundreds of thousands of Sri Lankans themselves experienced displacement during the country’s civil conflict, while many Sri Lankans sought protection abroad. The experience of displacement should make the country particularly conscious of what it means to cross a border because remaining at home is no longer safe.

At the same time, Sri Lanka is not required to choose between compassion and sovereignty.

A properly designed refugee law can protect both.

It can establish who has a right to seek protection, who decides that claim, what evidence is required and what happens when the claim succeeds or fails. It can provide national authorities with procedures rather than uncertainty. It can provide courts with legal standards rather than administrative ambiguity. And it can provide refugees and asylum-seekers with something that is often more valuable than a promise of goodwill: legal certainty.

There is also a broader institutional argument. Reliance upon external humanitarian actors to fill a domestic legal gap may be understandable as an interim measure, but refugee protection should ultimately rest upon a framework for which the State itself is legally accountable.

Sri Lanka therefore faces a choice.

It can continue responding to refugee arrivals when they occur; rescuing boats, providing temporary assistance and finding administrative solutions to individual situations.

Or it can anticipate the next arrival before it happens.

The second approach is the more responsible one.

The sea surrounding Sri Lanka has never been merely a geographical boundary. It has been a route of migration, trade, conflict, escape and refuge. People will continue to cross it for many different reasons. Some will arrive as migrants. Some will arrive irregularly. Some may arrive because they have nowhere safe to return to.

When the next boat reaches our shores, Sri Lanka should not have to improvise its legal response.

A safe harbour needs more than compassion. It needs a legal map.

For Sri Lanka, the time has come to draw one.

Opinion

Panadura debate: special exhibition most welcome

Published

1 day ago

2026/09/6

Thilina Walpola

The special exhibition displaying original manuscripts relating to the Panadura Debate at Rankoth Vihara is welcome and, as Nishantha Peiris mentions (News, 30 Aug), the debate gained international interest following the publication of a book containing the speeches made in the debate. The credit for this must be given to John Capper, the then editor of the Ceylon Times. He published an account of each day’s proceedings in his paper and the full text of the speeches in a book entitled ‘Full Account of the Buddhist Controversy Held at Pantura in August 1873.

The preface of the book stated: ‘In the belief that an authentic account of the Controversy which took place at Pantura in August last, between a Buddhist Priest and two Ministers of the Protestant religion, will be read with interest by a large number of persons here and in Europe. I have produced the proceedings in the present form. The report has been revised by the respective disputants, so that it may be taken as a correct account of what passed’.

Capper’s book was picked up by J M Peebles who was in India, who then published an extended version in the United States. If an original copy of Capper’s book is available in Sri Lanka, it should be exhibited in the Rankoth exhibition.

Yours faithfully,

Dr R P Fernando,

19 Danetree Close,
Epsom UK

Opinion

In Memory of Dr Upatissa Pethiyagoda

Published

3 days ago

2026/09/4

Thilina Walpola

Dr. Pethiyagoda

It is with a deep sense of sadness that I record the passing of Dr Upatissa Pethiyagoda, who died on 27 August 2026 at the age of 94. To many, he was a distinguished scientist, accomplished administrator, diplomat and public intellectual. To me, he was much more than that.

Dr Pethiyagoda was a proud product of Trinity College, Kandy. At a time when a first class in Botany was a rarity, he obtained one and subsequently pursued postgraduate studies in London. His scientific career reflected not only his knowledge but, more importantly, an enquiring and restless mind that was never satisfied with simply accepting what was known.

In the 1970s, he headed the Plant Physiology Department of the Tea Research Institute of Sri Lanka. He was part of a formidable team of scientists that included Drs R L de Silva, R L Wickramasinghe, P Sivapalan, Tilak Wettasinghe and W Danthanarayana. They were scientists who contributed enormously to the development of the tea industry in Sri Lanka, and Dr Pethiyagoda stood comfortably among them.

In 1978, he moved to the Coconut Research Institute as its Director. It was there that I had the privilege of working with him. Those years left a lasting impression on me.

Dr Pethiyagoda was, in every sense, a complete scientist. Although his formal specialisation was plant physiology, he was remarkably comfortable discussing almost anything scientific. What distinguished him was his curiosity. He questioned the science behind the ordinary things that most of us simply accepted. I remember his asking questions such as, why is an orange green in Sri Lanka? It was typical of him: an apparently simple observation would lead him to ask what lay behind it.

That curiosity never left him.

After his tenure at the CRI, he undertook an FAO assignment in the Middle East, working on the improvement of date palms. There he was exposed to agriculture under conditions of severe water scarcity. He pursued this further during a visit to Israel, learning about agronomic practices suited to such environments. Later, when he worked with the Mahaweli Authority, he was able to translate that knowledge into practice, introducing high-value horticultural crops to Systems B and C.

What impressed me was not merely that he acquired knowledge, but that he connected knowledge from one context to another and turned it into practical solutions. His enquiring mind and analytical ability enabled him to do this with remarkable effectiveness.

He was equally impressive as a communicator. Dr Pethiyagoda was an eloquent speaker, whether he was talking about science, agriculture, public policy or the everyday affairs of our country. His speeches were often laced with wit, humour and the occasional tongue-in-cheek remark. But beneath the humour was a very serious mind. He was forthright in his opinions and, importantly, he was not afraid to express them, whatever the possible repercussions.

His contributions to the media demonstrated this courage.

Writing about the travel to London by a former President, he observed:

“Where a person enjoys immunity by virtue of his position, this carries a reciprocal obligation to exercise an abundance of exemplary behaviour. In effect, immunity is best exercised, when the need to invoke it, is never allowed to arise.”

[Immunity Does Not Confer Impunity – Colombo Telegraph]

That was quintessential Pethiyagoda—precise, pointed and impossible to misunderstand.

He was equally outspoken about the government’s decision to ban inorganic fertiliser with ‘immediate effect’. He was deeply distressed by what he believed would be the consequences for farmers, particularly the poorer farming community. He would speak about it almost every day, driven not by political considerations but by his conviction that science and evidence had been disregarded.

In one of his writings on the subject, he remarked:

“What the ‘Vipathmaga’ caper taught us was that advice of sundry ‘Experts’ can be disastrous. Professors of Surgery, clergymen and Pediatricians are not the best equipped to advise on fertilisers, as much as a Soil Scientist should not prescribe treatment for a sick child.’ [Some Lessons That Can Be Learned Even From Disasters – Colombo Telegraph]

And in another article, his frustration was summed up in the memorable words:

“Stupidity, like History, has a way of repeating itself.”

[Unscrambling eggs – Colombo Telegraph]

These were not simply provocative statements. They reflected a scientist who believed deeply that public decisions, particularly those affecting agriculture and the livelihoods of farmers, should be based on evidence and sound scientific advice.

Perhaps, what I will remember most about Dr Pethiyagoda is that his curiosity survived almost to the very end of his life.

Very recently, he was still asking questions and pursuing ideas. He was interested in the possible genetic differences between the waraka and wela varieties of jak, because he wondered whether the wela variety might have commercial potential for cellulose extraction. He was disappointed that he could not find relevant scientific literature in Sri Lanka. More than the particular subject, what struck me was that at 94 he was still thinking about a scientific question, looking for evidence and wondering whether an apparently ordinary resource could have an important national application. He lamented the lack of interest among scientists and academics in such questions of national importance. That concern, too, was very much part of who he was.

Dr Pethiyagoda also served as President of the National Academy of Sciences, Sri Lanka. Unfortunately, he was unable to complete his term because he was appointed Ambassador to Italy, with representation at the Food and Agriculture Organization in Rome. Even in that role, he remained very much the scientist. I understand that he made a significant contribution to FAO discussions. As Ambassador, he also had the unenviable task of entertaining Sri Lankan Ministers of Agriculture who attended FAO sessions. I know from my own conversations with him that those informal dinners were not merely social occasions. He would discuss agricultural issues with the Ministers, and I have little doubt that his views—and the force with which he expressed them—sometimes influenced their thinking.

Looking back, what I admired most about Dr Pethiyagoda was not any particular position he held or any particular achievement. It was the way he thought.

He questioned.
He analysed.
He connected ideas.
He challenged conventional wisdom.
And he was willing to say what he believed to be true.

He also demonstrated that science should not remain confined to laboratories, research papers or academic institutions. For him, science was a way of looking at the world and, ultimately, a means of improving the lives of people.

It is perhaps ironic that, only a few months ago, he wrote about “The Cost of Dying”, as distinct from the “Cost of Living”. In that article, he reflected on the manner in which our mortal remains should be disposed of, observing: “I am in two minds regarding the manner in which the mortal remains are disposed of, ‘according to the will of the deceased’. But with the cessation of the breath, ownership or tenancy ceases.” Even in contemplating death, he brought his characteristic questioning mind to the subject. What particularly caught my attention, however, was his explanation of the Buddhist practice of holding dânes (almsgivings) for monks of the local temple in the seventh day and third month following a death. I had never really thought about the significance of this practice before. That, too, was typical of Dr Pethiyagoda: he could take something that we had accepted as ordinary and familiar and make us stop, think and see it differently.

His passing has created a colossal vacuum in Sri Lanka’s scientific community. People of his intellectual breadth, curiosity, courage and independence are rare. We may not always have agreed with everything he said, but we could never doubt that he had thought deeply about it and that he had the courage of his convictions.

For those of us who had the privilege of knowing him, there is sadness in his passing. But there is also gratitude—for having known such an extraordinary mind, for having learnt from him, and for having witnessed at close quarters his unwavering commitment to science and to the development of our country.

I shall remember Dr Pethiyagoda with great affection and immense respect.

Ranjith Mahindapala
Past President, National Academy of Sciences of Sri Lanka.