Features

Cambridge, bar exams and return to Ceylon

Published

4 years ago

2022/10/2

by Nimal Wikramanayake

I went up to Cambridge early in October 1955 full of confidence and hope, but unfortunately my hopes were dashed to the ground shortly thereafter. In my first tutorial I was required in my Legal History class to write a tutorial on clause 39 of the Magna Carta -the clause which required “that no man shall be tried except by his peers” This reference, of course, was to the Barons and to no one else. I wrote a forty-page tutorial of which I was enormously proud. The result: I received an “A” while two other students received “A+” In my next tutorial in Roman Law, the same thing happened. The same two students bested me. I was devastated.

I lost all interest in my studies. Why, you may ask. You might find my reaction strange. I desperately needed my father’s approval, which I had never received. According to my father, who had been a first-class student, one was required to come first in everything one did. Nothing else was sufficient. (Many, many years later I learned that Kerry Packer and Tony Greig, the famous English cricketer, desperately sought their fathers’ approval, which they never received. I suffered the same fate.)

The upshot of this was that I stopped going to lectures and spent the next two and a half years playing poker and partying. These poker games were a spectacle to behold; it was a game of no-limit draw poker. I will give you an example of this game. On one occasion we started playing poker on a Friday evening and continued right through the night until Saturday afternoon. At this stage I was down 200 pounds. How was I to pay this when my allowance was only 50 pounds with which, in addition, I had to pay my college bills? We decided to take a short break from the game and went to the cinema.

The film was Love in the Afternoon with Gary Cooper and Audrey Hepburn. After watching the film, we returned to the game and finished playing on Sunday morning. I was finally up two pounds.I returned to my rooms in college and fell asleep. When my girlfriend, whom I later married, woke me up in the evening, I told her that I had four aces.

Prejudice in action

It was now March 1958 and I suddenly realised that I was in serious trouble. I had intended to go down to London and sit for the English barristers’ exams (the Bar exams) when I finished up at Cambridge in order to practise later on in Ceylon as an advocate.

The Bar exams came in two parts. I had to get a Second-Class in my law degree to be exempted from part I of the Bar exams. I went and saw Michael “Mickey” Dias, the greatest Ceylonese academic who was then the editor of Clerk and Lindsell on Torts. Mickey had taken six starred first classes at Cambridge; two in classics, three in the Law Tripos and one in the LLB, and had come first in his six years of study at Cambridge. In order to get a starred first one had to obtain an aggregate mark of over 80 per cent in every subject.

Mickey had initially studied classics and after that changed to Law. He got his LLB and LLM, as he came from one of the great legal families in Ceylon. Michael’s father R F Dias was a Supreme Court judge in Ceylon. Unfortunately, racism reared its ugly head at Cambridge; Mickey could not get a post there and ended up as a lecturer at Nottingham University. However, he later obtained a lectureship at Magdalene College (pronounced “Maudlane”) Cambridge. He was a lecturer in torts for over 40 years, but he never got a professorship.

I went to see Mickey and he said, “It’s quite simple. Take your six textbooks and read each subject for half an hour in the morning, half an hour in the evening and half an hour at night” I followed his advice for two and a half months and got a Second-Class.When I returned to Ceylon in 1959, my master, Kingsley Herat, used to read textbooks like novels. He taught me how to read legal textbooks. All you had to do was pick the book up and read it.

The Bar examination

My next task was to pass the barristers’ final examination which was being held two months later in September 1958. This exam had eleven subjects, eight of which were new to me, but I decided to sit for it. I came a cropper in “Equity”, the subject in which I was to become an expert many years later. I received a Conditional Pass in Equity which meant I had to sit for this subject again at the end of November. I sat for this subject and, cocky little bastard that I was, I left for Ceylon with my Italian wife, Anna Maria, shortly afterwards. I passed and was called to the Bar in absentia in England on February 12, 1959 – 63 years ago. This meant that I was not present when the young men and women were admitted to the English Bar.

When we got to Ceylon, Anna Maria was “horrified” at the indolent life we lived. She would find toothpaste on her toothbrush in the bathroom when she awoke in the morning. Whenever I had a drink at my father’s home, the drinks trolley would be rolled out on the front verandah for me. I did not need to pour my drinks out for I would ring the bell and the servant would come and do this little job for me which I could quite easily have done for myself. Was there some racism in my own attitude towards our coloured servants, I wonder?

My wife, the white woman

Anna Maria, who is Italian, came from a little town called Asolo in the district of Veneto in the north of Italy. During our time in Ceylon, she occasionally had to endure slights and insults, which she did with considerable dignity. In Ceylon in the 1950s, racial prejudice worked against white women who had married Sinhalese and Tamil men. Before I went to England my father had told me that I should not marry a white woman as she would meet with hostility and prejudice in Ceylon. He told me that a friend of his called Rajasingham had married a French girl and brought her back to Ceylon As a young lawyer he had to live with his parents because he had no work and no money. His mother detested his wife and used to make blistering hot curries for her and treat her badly. The wife finally went back to Paris after few years. This was not an isolated case.

It also happened to a very dear friend of mine who grew up with me – the late Vernon de Silva. Vernon went off to England in the 1960s and qualified as a medical specialist – a physician. He married a delightful English girl but his mother refused to acknowledge her and Vernon could not take her back to Sri Lanka. He had to settle in Australia.Fortunately, the people in Sri Lanka are more civilised today and many Sri Lankan-born men and women have married Europeans and Australians.

I remember one occasion in 1959 when we were invited to the wedding of a friend of mine, Chandra Seneviratne. His parents were extremely wealthy, and the wedding was held in their luxurious home in Rosemead Place, Colombo 7. It was customary at Sinhalese weddings for the women to congregate together inside the houses whilst the men regaled themselves in the large expansive gardens outside. I took Anna Maria into the house so that she could mingle with the women.

The wives of several friends of mine were gathered in one of the ante rooms so I took her in and introduced her to the ladies who were present. I asked one of the ladies to look after Anna Maria. I then went out onto the spacious lawn and joined my friends. Fifteen minutes later, Anna Maria came hurrying out and joined me. She was quite distraught. I asked her what had happened; and she told me that the ladies had kept conversing in Sinhalese and had deliberately gone out of their way to snub her. That was the last time I associated with these friends.

The early days

I was called to the Bar in Ceylon on October 12, 1959. It was a glorious day – I received numerous briefs from Dad’s proctors because Dad was at the height of his powers. I thought, what a wonderful profession. But unfortunately this was not to last.

The prime minister SWRD Bandaranaike had been shot a few weeks before I was admitted to practice. Shortly afterwards, the Chief Priest of the Kelaniya Temple, Buddharakkita Thero, and several others were charged with his murder. Earlier in the year, Dad had appeared for Dr Lenora, a physician and politician, in a defamation case against Mrs Vimala Wijewardene, then Minister of Local Government and a friend of the Chief Priest. Dad was successful and Dr Lenora was awarded Rs 100,000 ($20,000), which was a princely sum in 1959. The Chief Priest was so impressed that he wanted Dad to appear for him. Dad refused, as he had not done a criminal case since the early days.

Truth and justice

When a law student goes to law school, young and enthusiastic and full of hope, all he or she is interested in is truth and justice. My readers will probably think me a nasty old cynic when I say that it is not an absolute rule that truth and justice exist in legal proceedings. Many strange and unusual events can occur in a case which have nothing to do with truth and justice. I will give you a classic example to back up my statement, although one could argue that this case is an aberration.

Shortly after I was admitted to the Ceylon Bar, I was retained as junior counsel in a seduction case. In Ceylon, in the late 1950s – if I might put it rather indelicately – the goods were returned if they were spoiled. In the villages, the sheets were required to be hung out after the wedding night, just as in villages in Italy. The action for seduction comes from Roman law and from there it was introduced into Roman-Dutch law. The action is brought for “defloration of a virgo intacta” or the deflowering of a virgin. It was introduced into Roman Law by Justinian over 1,500 years ago when virginity was seen as a precious commodity. The Dutch ruled a small portion of the country from Colombo to Galle, including the town of Colombo, and introduced Roman-Dutch law into the country. Seduction, however, has a completely different meaning today. Our client was being sued not only for seduction, but for paternity, for giving the poor woman a baby.

The client turned up at my leader’s chambers for a conference and brought the record keeper of the army with him. The record keeper brought along the attendance register of the army which disclosed that our client was 200 miles away in an army camp in Jaffna for well over a year when the alleged incident took place, and could not have been in Colombo as alleged by the woman.

Months later, the lady attended court with her little son on the day judgment was to be delivered. He was the spitting image of our client. The result, however, was a foregone conclusion as the record keeper’s evidence was accepted and the lady’s action was dismissed.When we came out of court after judgment had been delivered, my leader Neville Samarakoon turned to the client and said to him, “That’s your child.’

The client replied, “Yes, it is, you see the record keeper is my best friend. He signed me up as being present in the barracks in Jaffna when I was having intercourse with the woman in Colombo 200 miles away. And this happened on most weekends for quite some time”

I was devastated. This was dreadful! I felt shattered. There was no such thing as truth and justice. I returned home mortified. I decided to leave the legal profession. I told Anna Maria that I was leaving the Bar immediately. After a few days, however, I calmed down and decided to carry on regardless. I became a cynical old man eventually.

The lean years

When I went to the Bar, my father was chairman of one of the big industrial companies in the country, the Associated Motorways Group, and in addition, chairman of the Free Lanka Insurance Company, the second largest Ceylonese insurance company in Ceylon. He sent a directive to the various officers of these companies that under no circumstances was I to be briefed by them in court proceedings. Dad wanted me to make my name without any help from him. Further, when proctors briefed him in a case, they would ask him whether he wanted me to be briefed as his junior. He would tell them that it was up to them to decide whether I was good enough to be briefed in the matter. So I was never briefed as my father’s junior in my early years at the Ceylon Bar as I was completely inexperienced as a barrister/advocate.

At that point in time there were three Queen’s Counsel who were pushing their sons extremely hard.In addition, I had married outside not only my caste but outside my race, which was frowned on at the time. I was shattered by his attitude, which was inexplicable to me. I now realise that his behaviour conditioned me for the extremely hard times I was to endure later on in Australia.

Although my early years at the Bar in Ceylon were extremely difficult, it was having to endure the buffets of fate with equanimity later in an extremely prosperous environment that was soul-destroying.

Anna Maria, my heroine

My dear wife was extremely supportive in those early years between 1959 and 1965 as briefs were few and far between. Life was a tremendous struggle without any help from my parents. An advocate or barrister who goes to the Bar without private means or legal contacts faces a perilous existence in his early years.

In 1963, as I was struggling to exist, I applied for a job with the Legal Department of the Employers Federation. This was a large organization which acted in disputes between commercial companies and their employees. I heard nothing from the company about my job application. Several months later, I met the chief legal officer, Lyn Wirasekera, who was a friend of Dad’s and enquired from him why I had not been called for an interview. He looked at me strangely and remarked that he had sent me a telegram calling me for an interview but I had not turned up.

It transpired that Anna Maria had destroyed the telegram. When I asked her why she had done that, she said she knew I had set my heart on being an advocate of the Supreme Court, that that was my destiny and I did not need to work for the Employers Federation.

As things did not improve during the following year, I applied for employment at the Estate Employers Federation as a legal officer. This was an organization formed by the plantation companies to act for them in legal disputes they had with their employees. The same thing happened again. I received a telegram calling me for an interview for a job. My wife again destroyed the telegram without my knowledge, so thanks to my dear wife I was destined to reach the top of the Junior Bar in Ceylon by 1968.

Humour the bastards

While I was reading in 19601 would go into court with my master, Neville Samarakoon. Whenever a judge said something remotely funny and looked about for approval, my master would fall into paroxysms of laughter. I later asked him why he was laughing when there was nothing funny in what the judge had said. His reply was, “Nimal, you must always kowtow to those stupid bastards. Humour the bastards and they will think you are a great bloke.”

Many years later at the Ceylon Bar there was a judge, S S Kulatileke, who fancied himself to be a comedian. He would often declaim what he considered to be a humorous remark and then turn from side to side looking for approval. I remember on one occasion he was doing a criminal case, and when the case was for hearing he shouted, “Call the robbers!” and started laughing, looking around. I decided that here was my opportunity to test my master’s theory. I burst out into raucous laughter. I positioned myself at a point where he would turn his face and each time I would burst into paroxysms of laughter at his witticisms. As a result, Kulatileke thought I was what the Italians call simpatico. Judge Kulatileke was very fond of me and, surprisingly, I never lost a case before him. Although my advocacy may have contributed in some measure to my success, I would advise all junior barristers to “Humour the bastards!”

In 1968,1 won an interesting case before Judge Kulatileke which also reinforced my belief that it is doubtful whether truth and justice exist in law courts. This was a landlord and tenant case. It was a most unusual case, for most of the properties in Colombo came under the Rent Control Act. The tenant could only lose his or her tenancy if the premises were reasonably required for the landlord’s use and occupation, or if the tenant surrendered the premises to the landlord. The likelihood of the tenant surrendering possession of the property was not only extremely rare but well-nigh impossible. In this case, it appeared that the tenant had delivered a written notice of surrender to my client, the landlord.

I opened my case and called the client. He gave his evidence about the surrender then Mr AK Premadasa got up to cross-examine my client. Premadasa was the leader in the Landlord and Tenant Jurisdiction. He subpoenaed my client to produce all the rent receipts over a period of some 36 months. The client was only able to produce 35; one rent receipt was missing. A peculiar feature of the rent receipts was disclosed – some of them were signed by the tenant at the bottom of the page. They were on A4 foolscap paper, not in a normal receipt book. Premadasa suggested to my client that he had torn off the thirty-sixth receipt and typed in this surrender letter above the tenant’s signature.

I reminded Judge Kulatileke that Premadasa was the acknowledged leader of the Landlord and Tenant Jurisdiction and that he was noted for his guile. It was an interesting theory that he had formulated, and because he was the leader of the Tenancy Bar he expected the judge to accept this ridiculous theory of his. I asked why anyone would resort to such a subterfuge. I argued that the defendant had decided to surrender his premises and then had had a change of heart. The receipt was ample proof of his behaviour. The judge accepted my submissions and I was successful.

Some members of the general public are under the misapprehension that lawyers are liars. Most of us certainly are not. We have to put our client’s story across. Occasionally my client comes with a story which would put Baron Munchausen to shame, but I have to put it across. That is what I am paid to do, although occasionally I have some doubts about its authenticity.When we came out of court I told my client that maybe Premadasa was right. My client then admitted he had indeed torn off the receipt and typed in the surrender in place of the receipt.

So much for truth and justice.

(To be continued)
(Excerpted from A Life In The Law – A Memoir)

All News Advertisement

Features

Beyond traditional jobs: Why Sri Lanka needs to facilitate the gig economy

Published

2 days ago

2026/09/25

Thilina Walpola

Image courtesy Oxford University

by Kapila Chinthaka Premarathne
Head of the Department of Agricultural Systems and a Senior Lecturer in Agricultural Economics at the Faculty of Agriculture,
Rajarata University of Sri Lanka

Beyond the Graduate Unemployment Number

Sri Lanka’s economic recovery has improved macroeconomic stability, but youth unemployment remains a significant labour-market concern. Around 43% of Sri Lankan youth aged 15–24 with postsecondary education are unemployed, the highest among the Asian economies compared in the IMF analysis, compared with about 36% in Bangladesh and 13.2% in Thailand. This reflects a problem of skills mismatches and the difficulty of connecting higher education with changing labour-market demand. The concern goes beyond unemployment itself. Sri Lanka has invested heavily in educating its younger population, yet the conventional labour market is not creating enough opportunities to convert these qualifications into income. Many young people possess degrees, technical knowledge and growing digital familiarity, but remain outside formal employment because suitable jobs may not exist in the right place, at the right time or under conditions compatible with their circumstances. This makes it necessary to think beyond traditional employment models and explore new ways of connecting Sri Lanka’s educated youth with economic opportunities.

This is where Sri Lanka needs to reconsider how it understands employment

Employment has traditionally been viewed through the employer–employee relationship, with qualifications leading to a formal job and regular salary. While this model remains important, digital platforms are creating new ways to generate income, allowing individuals to work for multiple clients across geographical boundaries without permanent employment. Sri Lanka therefore needs to look beyond simply creating conventional jobs and consider whether it is building the conditions for its educated population to participate in the growing global market for digital services.

The Opportunity of the Gig Economy

The gig economy extends far beyond ride-hailing and delivery services. Digital platforms increasingly connect skilled individuals with opportunities in software development, design, accounting, data analysis, digital marketing, translation, online education, research and consultancy. This is particularly relevant to Sri Lanka, where a highly educated population faces a relatively limited domestic market for specialised skills. Digital platforms can overcome geographical constraints by connecting Sri Lankan workers directly with international clients.

As highlighted in my previous LSE South Asia article on women and the gig economy, such work should not replace formal employment but can create additional income opportunities when supported by appropriate skills, digital infrastructure, training and institutional support. A skilled person in Anuradhapura, Jaffna, Batticaloa or Monaragala could potentially serve clients in London, Melbourne or Dubai without first relocating to Colombo. This makes the gig economy relevant not only to employment but also to Sri Lanka’s emerging digital services-export strategy.

A Digitally Familiar Generation

Sri Lanka’s younger generation is growing up with smartphones, social media, online learning, digital applications and digital financial services, giving them a level of digital familiarity that previous generations did not have. However, digital familiarity does not automatically translate into digital employability. The challenge is to transform everyday digital use into productive skills such as data analysis, artificial intelligence, software development, digital marketing, financial analysis and online professional services.

Sri Lanka therefore needs to move young people from being consumers of digital services to producers of digital value. Universities, vocational institutions and training providers can play an important role in converting existing digital familiarity into marketable skills that connect young people with both domestic and international opportunities. This is increasingly important as technological change and AI reshape labour markets and intensify the need for skills that match emerging forms of work.

The Gender Dimension

The gig economy may be particularly relevant to women, who often face barriers to conventional employment arising from childcare, eldercare, mobility, social expectations and rigid working arrangements. For mothers and women living outside major urban centres, fixed working hours and daily commuting can make formal employment difficult even when suitable jobs exist.

Digital gig work can provide greater flexibility, allowing women to undertake professional assignments from home or their communities and potentially serve international clients without relocating. As discussed in my earlier LSE South Asia article, this opportunity is most meaningful when supported by digital infrastructure, skills training, virtual work hubs, mentorship and appropriate institutional support. However, flexibility should expand women’s economic choices rather than simply add paid work to existing unpaid household responsibilities.

Pressure on Labour-Market Opportunity

The value of a job cannot be judged by salary alone, as commuting, working hours and household responsibilities can significantly affect its real economic value. Flexible digital work can potentially reduce some of these costs by allowing people to work from home or nearby digital hubs and participate in employment on a part-time or project basis. While gig work cannot solve all household pressures, a more flexible organisation of work can create additional employment opportunities while helping households manage their limited time and resources more effectively.

A Possible Third Option Between Unemployment and Migration

Sri Lanka’s migration and brain-drain concerns highlight the need to explore employment opportunities beyond the domestic labour market. While overseas migration will remain an important individual and economic choice, digital work can provide another pathway by allowing skilled Sri Lankans to serve international clients without physically leaving the country. Software developers, designers, analysts, researchers, translators and consultants can potentially earn from global markets while remaining in Sri Lanka. Digital gig work cannot eliminate migration or reverse brain drain, but it can create an additional option between domestic unemployment and physical migration—working for the world while remaining in Sri Lanka.

Recognising and Making Digital Work Reputable

A major institutional gap is that conventional systems are designed around salaried employment, while a freelancer may earn from multiple clients without a single employer or salary certificate. This can make legitimate digital workers difficult to recognise when they seek loans, leasing, insurance or business finance. Sri Lanka could address this through a voluntary digital-worker or independent-professional registration mechanism, providing a recognised economic identity based on qualifications, verified skills, platform activity and documented income, without creating unnecessary bureaucracy.

Such recognition should also make digital income bankable. Banks could assess verified platform earnings, bank transactions, contracts, invoices, tax records, savings and repayment history alongside conventional employment documents. A standardised digital income statement could further help workers demonstrate their financial capacity. The key shift is from asking “Who is your employer?” to asking “Can your income be verified and is it sufficiently stable?”. This would allow successful digital workers to build financial credibility and use their earnings to access credit, acquire assets and develop their own businesses.

Digital Payments Are Part of the Labour Market

Access to reliable international payment systems is essential if Sri Lankans are to participate effectively in the global digital economy. Recent developments in PayPal’s local banking arrangements, including its partnerships with Sampath Bank and Commercial Bank, indicate progress in this direction. However, the broader priority should be a regulated and efficient digital-payment ecosystem that allows workers to receive international earnings, transfer them to Sri Lankan bank accounts, document their income and meet relevant financial and tax requirements with minimal friction. International payment infrastructure is therefore not simply a technology issue; it is an essential component of Sri Lanka’s emerging services-export economy.

Building Infrastructure Outside Colombo

Digital familiarity alone is insufficient without reliable internet, electricity, computers, software and suitable working environments, particularly in rural and underserved areas. To ensure that the gig economy supports regional development rather than becoming another Colombo-centred opportunity, Sri Lanka could establish regional digital-work hubs through universities, vocational institutions, libraries and public-private partnerships. These hubs could provide connectivity, equipment, training, mentoring and assistance with platform registration and international payments. If graduates must migrate to Colombo simply to access such infrastructure, the geographical advantage of digital work is significantly reduced.

From Freelancer to Entrepreneur

Gig work should not be viewed as an end in itself. A person may begin with small online assignments, develop regular clients and professional credibility, and eventually establish a small digital enterprise. This creates a potential pathway from graduate to freelancer, professional service provider and entrepreneur, allowing individuals to create markets around their own skills rather than waiting for conventional vacancies. Universities can support this transition by teaching students not only subject knowledge but also portfolio development, market identification, client communication, digital platforms and contract management. A degree demonstrates educational attainment, while a professional portfolio demonstrates what a graduate can offer to the market.

Facilitation Must Be Matched by Protection

Promoting the gig economy without appropriate safeguards could simply transfer employment risks from institutions to individuals. Digital workers may face uncertain incomes, weak bargaining power and limited social protection. Sri Lanka should therefore facilitate digital work while also ensuring opportunities for independent workers to build savings, access insurance and participate in portable social-protection mechanisms. Flexibility should create greater economic choice without compromising long-term financial security, particularly for women.

A regional Example from India: Think Globally and act Locally

India provides a useful regional example of how the gig economy can be approached as a policy issue rather than simply as informal or temporary work. NITI Aayog has estimated the size and future employment potential of India’s gig and platform economy and has developed recommendations covering employment generation, skills, financial inclusion and social protection. More importantly, India has begun creating institutional mechanisms around these workers. Its e-Shram portal provides a national database of unorganised workers, including gig and platform workers, creating a recognised identity through which workers can potentially access employment, skills development and social-security services. India has also explored platform-led skills development through skill certificates, skill passports and on-the-job training, while NITI Aayog has proposed cash-flow-based lending models that could allow platform workers to demonstrate creditworthiness through their earnings rather than conventional employment or collateral.

Social protection has also entered the policy framework. India’s Code on Social Security, 2020 formally recognises gig and platform workers and provides a basis for schemes covering areas such as accident insurance, health, maternity, disability and old-age protection. India is still developing and refining these arrangements, and Sri Lanka need not replicate the Indian model.

However, the experience demonstrates an important policy lesson: the gig economy can be supported through a system that identifies workers, develops their skills, makes their income more visible to financial institutions and extends appropriate social protection. Sri Lanka could develop its own simpler framework suited to its smaller economy, beginning with recognising digital workers and building the institutional conditions that allow their skills and earnings to become part of the formal economy.

Rethinking Employment and the Next Opportunity

The 43 percent figure for educated young Sri Lankans should encourage a wider discussion about the changing nature of work. Sri Lanka will continue to need conventional employment through firms, industries, farms, professional organisations and public institutions, but the changing labour market also requires new opportunities to connect educated Sri Lankans with global digital markets. The gig economy can provide an additional pathway to increase female labour-force participation, reduce the pressure for migration and brain drain, and connect Sri Lankan skills with markets beyond geographical boundaries.

This does not require a complicated bureaucracy. It requires recognising legitimate digital workers, facilitating access to international platforms and payment systems, allowing verified digital income to support credit assessment, developing portable social protection, and strengthening digital infrastructure and skills beyond major urban centres. Better data on digital workers would also help policymakers develop evidence-based interventions.

The future of work is therefore not only about creating more jobs, but about creating more ways for Sri Lankans to work, earn and build livelihoods while continuing to live and contribute in Sri Lanka. The gig economy should be recognised as part of an emerging digital labour market and services-export economy, where workers can build professional identities, earn internationally, access finance and eventually develop their own enterprises.

Features

Are religions getting redundant in the modern world?

Published

2 days ago

2026/09/25

Thilina Walpola

by Dr Upul Wijayawardhana

We are living in an era of astonishingly rapid scientific advancement. From the time Apple launched the ‘iPhone’ in January 2007, the first targeting the mass market, smartphones have taken over the world, making them indispensable. According to the latest statistics, there are around 8.1 billion mobile phones with 7.4 billion active smartphones, for the world population of 8.25 billion. Except for a tiny minority of the very poor, most people have at least one smartphone.

We are now entering the era of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and smart robots. Recently, a ‘Chinese’ robot ran 100 metres faster than Usain Bolt! Though Alan Turing proposed the idea of ‘Thinking Machines’ way back in 1950, the real AI boom commenced with the release of the generative AI chatbot, ChatGPT, by OpenAI in November 2020. Number of technology firms in the US as well as in China have joined the race, China catching up very fast, quite unexpectedly. There is a frenzy at the moment, raising expectations, as the imminent floating of these companies is likely to value the two leaders, OpenAI and Anthropic, trillion dollars each!

However, trouble is brewing in the AI field. On top of the concerns raised by environmentalists regarding the huge power drain by AI centres, there are recent reports of some AI models hacking independently into other systems, without human input. Worse still, a senior researcher at Anthropic, who has previously worked for OpenAI as well, resigned in early September on ethical grounds stating that the way the two companies are fast-tracking AI poses an existential threat to humanity. Surprisingly, instead of a rebuttal the head of Anthropic supported his view, soon joined by three more heads of leading AI developers. Whilst they agreed on slowing progress, President Trump has claimed that slowing is totally unnecessary as long as a super intelligent President like himself is at the helm! There does not seem to be an end to Trump’s grandiosity! He was joined by Tony Blair. In contrast, King Charles held a summit with representatives of all AI developers to find a way AI could be developed without a threat to humanity. That is how wise leaders act!

Less sophisticated AI tools are already in widespread use and installed in computers, laptops and smartphones. Some of us are using these automatically. However, the more advanced AI tools like ChatGPT can change even reality. For instance, AI can generate videos hardly distinguishable from real ones. What you enjoy watching on YouTube may be just the creations of AI! Some people use AI to write articles; only a few of them admit that they do so. Very soon we may be reading stories AI creates and listening to music, courtesy of AI. Technology seems to be fast becoming the new religion? Or, will the existential threat move us more towards religion?

Religion, perhaps, is as old as humanity itself; various belief systems evolving and disappearing coupled with the fortunes of the associated civilizations. Just like AI, religion is also a creation of the human mind which our ancestors did to explain many phenomena which appeared, at that time, to be supernatural. Starting with Animism, perceiving the divine in the natural world around, humans went on to Polytheism, believing in many gods like in Hinduism, culminating in the concept of Monotheism.

World’s oldest religion, Hinduism, still in wide practice, is devoid of a founder or a single text. The earliest scriptures, Rigveda, is considered to be around 3,500 years old but archaeologists have discovered symbols of importance to Hinduism as far back as 7,000 BCE. Though it is considered to be Polytheistic, it can be argued that it was the precursor of Monotheism, the concept of a creator God, as Brahma was the creator in the triad, Trimurti, Vishnu being the preserver and Shiva being the destroyer. It seems to be a sensible balancing act; create, destroy and repair with improvements.

It is pretty obvious that as science expands, the importance of religion contracts but it is hardly likely religions would be totally redundant. We have no choice as to which family we are born to and that invariably determines what your religion would be, if any. Religion is the first brainwashing a child encounters and most remain in the same faith, often trying to defend even the indefensible, but some change through conviction or conversion due to one of many reasons. Further, religious rituals have social values and religious practices often come to one’s solace at times of distress. Therefore, many will continue with the religion they were born to but with declining enthusiasm, at times. However, some religions seem to be facing problems like falling attendances in places of worship. With education and tech savviness expanding, one would expect the youth to be less enthusiastic about religion but the converse is true in some religions, some youth becoming very militant unfortunately.

While most religions make you subservient to a supernatural power, the Buddha was wise and bold enough to remove those shackles. He proclaimed that one’s destiny is in one’s own hands. However, many Buddhists appear to attach greater significance to rituals than to practising the Dhamma.

Buddhism as a religion may become less relevant as the frontiers of science expands but the Buddha Dhamma, especially Abhidhamma and Vipassana, would receive increasing recognition, the Buddha remaining an authority on consciousness and the mind.

Scientific progress should be for the betterment of society but AI developers are taking huge risks, taking massive loans threatening the world economy, for one aim: profit! Some do not seem to care even if their actions pose an existential threat to humanity.

Perhaps, if the Four Sublime Attitudes (Sathara Brahma Vihara) expounded by the Buddha; loving kindness (Metta), compassion (Karuna), empathetic joy (Muditha) and equanimity (Upekkha) are adopted as universal values, the world would become a safer place to live in, with or without AI.

Features

‘The Bullet that Missed’

Published

2 days ago

2026/09/25

Thilina Walpola

Tales of Mystery and Suspense 21

by Prof. Rajiva Wijesinha

Another book that is part of a series, today—one that is fun without the brooding concentration on criminality in different forms that marks the Rebus novels. This one about the Thursday Murder Club, is a romp as its two predecessors were interspersed with deaths and what might be deaths.

The Bullet that Missed

begins with a meeting with the presenter of ‘South East Tonight’, a programme about the area, in which Coopers Chase is situated. The meeting is held because the club has decided to look into the murder of the producer’s assistant, Bethany Waites, whose car was found at the bottom of a cliff ten years ago. There was blood in it, but the body was never found.

Or, rather, the book begins with an account of Bethany Waites deciding, on the night she vanished, to meet someone in connection with a case of massive fraud that she had been investigating, after sending the producer, Mike Waghorn, a message that she had found new evidence though he had no idea what it was. The night she died, she sent him another message: “I don’t say this often enough, but thank you.”

CCTV cameras showed her leaving her place, but then the vehicle vanished, before being sighted near the cliff, with two people in it. Investigation of the fraud had led to the imprisonment of a woman, Heather Garbutt, though it proved impossible to pin anything on Jack Mason, the mastermind for whom she had worked.

The Club conducts investigations on several fronts, including through Connie Johnson, the drug dealer they had helped imprison in the earlier book. The psychiatrist Ibrahim, the most respectable member of the Club, interviews her in an attempt to get her to find out more from Heather, who is in the same prison as she. They also investigate the CCTV record of the night Bethany vanished, and deduce that she went to an apartment block and exited from its other side, and that is why she was not seen leaving the town. But some time had elapsed between her being seen in the town and then on the cliff.

Meanwhile, Elizabeth has been kidnapped, along with her husband, and taken to a house in Staffordshire, where she is told by a man called the Viking that she must kill a former KGB agent now in London, who has a profitable career in money laundering. The Viking tells her he will inform Viktor that she was responsible for stealing the diamonds, the story of which is told in the previous Murder Club Mystery, and Viktor will then kill her.

Elizabeth, who has an affair with Viktor, knows he will not kill her, but when the Viking says he will also send Viktor a picture of Joyce, she decides she must act, and goes to see Viktor, and fires when she gets him in the bathroom. But, of course, she fired into the ceiling, and Viktor is then taken to Coopers Chase, to stay with Joyce until they have dealt with the Viking. And Viktor then enjoys the camaraderie of the retirement home so much that he wonders whether he too should settle there.

Elizabeth does trace the Viking, or rather her husband does, for he has noticed rare books on the shelves in his library, and an antiquarian book dealer friend managed to find out who bought them. But before they could confront him, he comes to Coopers Chase, for he has seen the bullet hole in the bathroom of Viktor’s flat and realized he was fooled.

But he cannot bring himself to kill Joyce straight away, and she knocks him out with a drug in a cup of tea. When he meets Viktor, they both decide to fall in with the plans of the Club.

Before this, Heather has been found dead in her cell, with a note saying that ‘they’ were going to kill her, and only Connie could help. Before that she had admitted that she was frightened to name the man behind the fraud. Jack Mason said the same, after Ron had won his confidence. The Club had deduced by then that the body was buried in the garden of Heather’s house which Jack had bought, after she had been jailed, and digging reveals a gun and money, but no body. Jack tells them that the mastermind had said that Bethany was buried with a bullet with his DNA on it.

The Club is now working with the Chief Constable of Kent, Andrew Everton, who writes thrillers himself, but in the form of e-books. He is in search of a publisher, and delighted when Mike Waghorn puts him on his programme, as is Donna, who is substituted at the last minute for Chris.

The Club finds out whom Bethany visited in the apartment block—Mike’s assistant Pauline, who tells them later what she and Bethany had been doing. But this is after the man behind the fraud has been unmasked up in the house in Staffordshire, where he was trying to hire the Viking and Viktor to find the money that he had stashed away, using accounts that he could no longer trace. He has also confessed to murdering Bethany, hoping this will persuade the two money launderers to help him, but it turns out that he did not do this. Nor did he kill Heather, the incriminating note having been placed in her room by Connie, who decided that Heather’s suicide should be treated as murder so that the person who had been blackmailing her should be found out.

It was Jack Mason’s murder that was brought home to the crook. It turns out that Bethany, her appearance altered by Pauline, has vanished, to a new life in Dubai, where she has taken control of the missing millions. She has gone there because the threat, she received through the bullet she was looking at in the preamble, was to Mike and she wanted him out of danger.

Yet another whimsical conclusion to a whimsical book with enough loose ends left hanging for another sequel.