Features

Constitutionalism, Governance, and the People

Published

4 years ago

2021/12/5

by Prof. Savitri Goonesekere

Coming to the University of Peradeniya is always a special experience. It brings back memories of carefree student days in a perfect environment for friendship and learning. Who can forget the glorious “yellow showers,” the winding Galaha Road, the lawn mowers on fresh grass, “sunset and evening star” and the flute music? The memory is also tinged with sadness, for the troubled times experienced on this beautiful campus, the changes in that familiar environment that have taken place, over threescore years and ten. The changes themselves reflect my own experience, and that of all of us as citizens, on the governance of this country and our universities. I thank the Law Department for inviting me, an alumnus of the first Department of Law in our public university system, to deliver the inaugural Sir Ivor Jennings memorial lecture. Sir Ivor Jennings, the founding Vice Chancellor of the first national University of Ceylon and its twin successor the University of Peradeniya can also be described as one of the founders of Constitutionalism and governance in both the country and the national university system of Sri Lanka.

The inauguration of a lecture series in Sir Ivor Jennings’ memory by the Law Department can also be an occasion to reflect on his life and times in this country, and the changes we have witnessed in these areas. The topic I have chosen for this evening’s lecture is a tribute to a scholar and administrator of a colonial era, whose ideas are an important resource, as we respond to contemporary realities of governance in our country and the university system.

Let me clarify at the outset especially to students, that I am not one of the oldest living students of Sir Ivor Jennings. I was not a student of Sir Ivor, when he lectured in the Law Department, and was Vice Chancellor of the University of Ceylon in Peradeniya. Indeed, I discovered I was a prize winner in my secondary school, Ladies’ College, when Sir Ivor gave the keynote speech at our annual prize giving. I am sure that I was much less impressed with him, than I was with senior student Kumari Jayawardene, speaking passionately on a school platform on worker’s rights. I read through his classic works “The Law and the Constitution,” and “Cabinet Government,” and Jennings and Tambiah on “The Legal System of Ceylon,” very much in the spirit of plodding through “recommended readings.” Constitutional law paled in comparison with other law courses that inspired my interest. However, there were anecdotes that we heard about Sir Ivor. We heard that he was a “student friendly” former Vice Chancellor, quite the contrast of fearsome Sir Nicholas Attygalle. I recall my first examiners’ meeting in his room (the Vice Chancellor chaired the Board Meeting for the award of degrees.) Sir Nicholas looked at me with a steely eye and said “who may I ask are you?” Quite a contrast to Sir Ivor, who sent out a staff circular, which said, “My address is now 18, Aloe Avenue, Colpetty. A drink is always available for members of the staff who feel thirsty or otherwise sociable.”

Besides, we were the beneficiaries, the “nidahas adhyapanaya labee,” the early students to enjoy the beautiful learning environment that we knew Sir Ivor had struggled to create for us all, despite his implacable objections to the Kannangara policies of free education.¹ We enjoyed a peaceful conflict-free learning environment that had been created according to Sir Ivor Jennings’ vision of what university life should be.

When we were undergraduate, some of us women students who refused to boycott classes were met with hoots and whistles when we went for lectures. Yet our “black leg” voices were heard at a huge meeting held under the glorious tree in front of the Senate building, and the strike was over. This meeting was presided by senior politician Dr Sarath Amunugama. Barely a decade later when I was on the staff of the Law Department which had by then moved to Colombo, a student in one of the halls of residence in Peradeniya leapt from an upper floor during ragging, and was crippled for life. My students in Colombo told me they would be assaulted if they followed my advice and expressed their objections to boycotting classes “in sympathy” with the students suspended over the incident. The beautiful and conflict free learning environment that Sir Ivor Jennings, the founding Vice Chancellor had strived to create was already beginning to crumble, a decade later.

Sir Ivor’s commitment to academic excellence meant that high academic standards were maintained in the years that followed his term in office. Products of the University of Peradeniya at the time, and not just the top tier, achieved success and eminence in diverse fields. The equality of access that Sir Ivor feared would result in a “levelling down” of academic quality with free education, in fact gave equal access to a good education for those who entered through the portals of the University of Ceylon, Peradeniya.

Institutional memory in this country is very short. It is only the University of Peradeniya that has sustained our memories of Sir Ivor Jennings’ contribution to our university system and the governance of this country. When I served as Vice Chancellor of the University of Colombo there was no photograph of Sir Ivor Jennings in College House, which he had occupied for many years, or any other building. I obtained a faded copy of a black and white photograph from Prof. Kapila Goonesekere, former Vice Chancellor of Peradeniya University; nothing like the imposing painting of Sir Ivor by David Paynter that adorns the walls of your Senate room.

Sir Ivor Jennings and the Road to Peradeniya

The life and times of Sir Ivor Jennings are documented in his own autobiography, published with an introduction of great professional skill, and with admiration, by the distinguished librarian, late Ian Goonetilleke. This is a rich resource. Professor Lakshman Marasinghe’s essay in a book on legal personalities supplements the autobiography with interesting insights on his work as a legal scholar and jurist. Sir Ivor was a controversial figure during the time he spent in the island, then Ceylon, where he had an important impact on public life and the education sector. His views and his engagement in the political life of the country, attracted criticism, but also admiration.

Sir Ivor began his tenure as Vice Chancellor of the University of Ceylon in the University of Colombo of today. He recalls in his autobiography how the law creating the University of Ceylon was passed on April 2, 1942, three days before the Japanese air raid on Colombo. He unfurled the university’s flag on June 12 on the grounds of College House. He remarks wryly, “being a little sentimental, [seeing] the flag sagging at one end [he] climbed the tower and adjusted it with a safety pin.” No Kandyan dancers, drummers and fanfare at this event.

An educationist of colonial times like Rev. W S Senior of Trinity College Kandy, when he left the island, could record in poetry, “my soul you will break with longing – it can never be goodbye.” Sir Ivor, the legal scholar, jurist, educationist, and administrator, could say with somewhat clinical objectivity, “I am in no way tied to Ceylon and can leave when the spirit moves.” Yet he had a vision and commitment to laying the foundation for a national university, which he believed could become “one of the finest small universities in the world.

Sir Ivor believed that a residential University in an attractive environment was one of the essential attributes of a great university. He was, as he describes himself, “a Cambridge [university] man.” His appreciation of the physical environs of that University created a desire to build a university campus on a site in Peradeniya, which he thought was one of “the most beautiful environments in the world for a university.”

The architecture and landscaping of this university continues to be a model for well-planned and attractive landscaped surroundings, creating a near perfect environment for scholarship and learning. His contribution in this regard has outlived Sir Ivor, even if the values on governance and university education that inspired him have been challenged in the realities of our nation’s post independence experience. However, if Sir Ivor’s surprising inclination to “pull down” College House and construct a women’s hostel had been realised, Colombo University would not have even that colonial heritage of great beauty on its campus surrounded by a wilderness of concrete box like structures.

Sir Ivor had a spectacular student career, receiving first class honours at every level. His approach to study is perhaps relevant to all law students who want to achieve academic honours in their law schools. He was a disciplined workaholic, even as a student. He saved his lunch money to buy books, and “study took precedence over everything.” He studied with “regularity and consistency,” developed a timetable for this, studied the “technique of examinations,” striving to obtain “not only a first, but a brilliant first.” Yet he did not believe only in examination success and paper qualifications. He believed that a residential University could create an environment for extra curricular activities providing an education that was interdisciplinary, stimulating interest in poetry, philosophy, and the arts. His own scholarship crossed the boundaries of law, politics, and political science. He gave up mathematics to study law. He thought “the boundaries between academic subjects very artificial, for knowledge … knows no boundaries.”

The Law Department of Peradeniya is the first to integrate an interdisciplinary perspective, an initiative very much in harmony with Sir Ivor’s concept of a good legal education. Law schools, have, in general adopted what legal theory in the Anglo American tradition describes as “Austinian positivism” that teaches students how to learn and analyse the content of laws. However, in the early years the focus on reference and reading meant that students read widely and understood the core norms and concepts that linked law and administration of justice. This approach produced lawyers of great professional skill and eminence at a time when legal education was exclusively in English. It has had serious drawbacks for teaching and research in a challenging environment where very little literature is available in local languages, and most lawyers obtain a monolingual legal education with lecture notes in Sinhala or Tamil. Sir Ivor was uncompromising in his commitment to excellence in teaching and research. When my husband, as one of the young lecturers in the Law Department, was to go to Oxford for post-graduate studies, Sir Ivor advised him to read for a taught post-graduate degree in Civil law, (the BCL). Undertaking research he said, was the post qualification obligation of all University teachers, and a law teacher could then apply for a higher doctorate! This advice was clearly based on his personal experience as a scholar and jurist.

Though Sir Ivor’s scholarship and vision span law, politics and an interdisciplinary perspective, he was cynical about all “isms” – Marxism, nationalism, communalism, considering them political rhetoric. He had a poor and mistaken impression of the country’s cultural heritage. He thought that transferring the University to Peradeniya could help “a cultural desert in Ceylon to blossom like a rose.” Yet he established a Faculty of Oriental Studies in the University of Ceylon, encouraged the development of these disciplines, and stressed the importance of scholarship and learning that was sensitive to local social and economic realities. He supported the creation of a university endowment fund, and a museum for sculpture, paintings and objects of art. He thought “pious benefactors” from the private sector would contribute to such a fund, and wanted the sales of his autobiography used for such an initiative. I believe that late Ian Goonetilleke who treasured his own stunning collection of artworks by George Keyt and many other reputed Sri Lankan artists, was inspired by Sir Ivor’s vision to donate this priceless collection to the University of Peradeniya. An Ivor Jennings memorial lecture is surely an occasion to also pay tribute to that joint vision. Universities are receiving substantial funds from Government to improve their infrastructure. Is it not possible to give a museum project maximum priority in university planning, supplementing this with support from “pious benefactor” alumni in business and the professions?

Values on university autonomy free from political interference were very much the foundation for Sir Ivor’s vision of university education. The 1942 University Ordinance, which he drafted, also incorporated the concept. This law established Councils, Senates and Faculty Boards, modelled on the institutional arrangements of British universities. For Sir Ivor, the institutions, (still embedded in our university system, in 1978/1985 legislation), could provide academics with the tools to resist abuse of political and official authority and interference in university administration. When the University of Ceylon Bill was being debated in the legislature, Sir Ivor who sat behind the Minister C.W.W. Kannangara, drafted quick amendments that prevented clauses being introduced that could erode university autonomy. Though he and the Minister opposed each other in the Committee on Education on the proposals for free education, they shared the same perspective on the importance of maintaining the autonomy of universities in the area of higher education.

Academics from the university community in Peradeniya gave leadership when university autonomy was under attack in the late 1960s and 1970s. The current Universities Act with strong provisions on this principle, was adopted once again in 1978 with the contribution of senior academics from Peradeniya University. It was intended to restore the autonomy of universities. It was unfortunately amended in 1985, creating new provisions on the appointment and dismissal of Vice Chancellors with an expanded regulatory role for the University Grants Commission. These changes undermined the authority of the highest university bodies (Councils and Senates) and has encouraged political interference.

Two university Vice Chancellors have been recently removed without, it is alleged, following even the required procedures. A few academics have publicly challenged these actions. But we have, in general, become accustomed to erosion of university autonomy by political authorities, even though the institutional arrangements introduced in 1942 by Sir Ivor continue to be part of our university system. State universities are being blamed for not sustaining excellence in education and contributing to human resource development. No link is made to the toxic impact of politicization of university education.

Constitutionalism and the Sri Lankan People

Constitutionalism, as law students know, refers to the theoretical underpinnings of Constitutional law. The theories in turn impact on the institutional arrangements for governance, and the concepts incorporated in Constitutions. Constitutions and their theoretical concepts are often dismissed as irrelevant for the People. Yet, governance impacts on peoples’ lives. Constitutions and the people are therefore all connected.

Nelson Mandela referring to Constitution making in South Africa in 1996, said that a Constitution is “a law that embodies the nation’s aspirations.” Sir Ivor Jennings wrote an Article published in the Ceylon Daily News three decades earlier in 1962 commenting that, “any lawyer can draft a Constitution for anywhere. The difficulty is to persuade a people to make it work.” The “aspirations” justification for Constitution making in Mandela’s words, places the concept of the “Sovereignty of the People” at the centre of Constitution making. Sir Ivor’s comment focuses on the responsibility of both rulers and the governed to make Constitutions work.

The weeks and months prior to the Presidential elections 2019 witnessed an outpouring of public anger against politicians and our legislators. A constant refrain is the failure and defects of democracy, and Constitutionalism as lawyers know it, and a desire to replace it with new institutions and “strong individual leadership.” Another discourse calls for rejection of any links to Constitutional norms and standards derived from what are described as implanted and alien “colonial” or “Western elitist” norms and standards of governance. The idea of governance based on “jathika chinthanaya” or national conscience advocated the need to link political ideology with a local, rural, traditional culture. This has now been reinvented in a new discourse on the need to reject for all time “Suddha law.” This is a phrase used by the monk Gnanasara when he disrupted Court proceedings and was convicted of contempt of court. The public display of abuse of power, arrogant, irresponsible and corrupt governance, selfish political leadership and waste of national resources despite regime changes, has created a demand by some for a complete rejection of Constitutional theories and the institutions of governance.

Such trends are visible in other countries too. The furore over Brexit in the United Kingdom and the conflict between Parliament and the Prime Minister is sometimes traced to the absence of a written Constitution with specific provisions on how to cope with challenging problems of governance. Sir Ivor Jennings, the British constitutional lawyer and jurist, drafted written Constitutions for many countries, and wrote his seminal work on “The Law and the Constitution.” He would have contested the suggestion that Constitutional law and Constitutionalism could only be embedded in a written Constitution. From his perspective, governance that limited State power, and based on written or unwritten Constitutions was the responsibility of the rulers and the governed.

(Excerpted from “Inaugural Sir Ivor Jennings lecture of the Department of Law University of Peradeniya,” included as part of the new book “Perspectives of Constitutional Reforms in Sri Lanka” edited by Dr. Hiran W. Jayewardene and Sharya Scharenguivel. Published by International and Contemporary Law Society).

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Features

The invisible crisis: How tour guide failures bleed value from every tourist

Published

6 hours ago

2026/03/4

Sahan Weerasooriya

(Article 04 of the 04-part series on Sri Lanka’s tourism stagnation)

If you want to understand why Sri Lanka keeps leaking value even when arrivals hit “record” numbers, stop staring at SLTDA dashboards and start talking to the people who face tourists every day: the tour guides.

They are the “unofficial ambassadors” of Sri Lankan tourism, and they are the weakest, most neglected, most dysfunctional link in a value chain we pretend is functional. Nearly 60% of tourists use guides. Of those guides, 57% are unlicensed, untrained, and invisible to the very institutions claiming to regulate quality. This is not a marginal problem. It is a systemic failure to bleed value from every visitor.

The Invisible Workforce

The May 2024 “Comprehensive Study of the Sri Lankan Tour Guides” is the first serious attempt, in decades, to map this profession. Its findings should be front-page news. They are not, because acknowledging them would require admitting how fundamentally broken the system is. The official count (April 2024): SLTDA had 4,887 licensed guides in its books:

* 1,892 National Guides (39%)

* 1,552 Chauffeur Guides (32%)

* 1,339 Area Guides (27%)

* 104 Site Guides (2%)

The actual workforce: Survey data reveals these licensed categories represent only about 75% of people actually guiding tourists. About 23% identify as “other”; a polite euphemism for unlicensed operators: three-wheeler drivers, “surf boys,” informal city guides, and touts. Adjusted for informal operators, the true guide population is approximately 6,347; 32% National, 25% Chauffeur, 16% Area, 4% Site, and 23% unlicensed.

But even this understates reality. Industry practitioners interviewed in the study believe the informal universe is larger still, with unlicensed guides dominating certain tourist hotspots and price-sensitive segments. Using both top-down (tourist arrivals × share using guides) and bottom-up (guides × trips × party size) estimates, the study calculates that approximately 700,000 tourists used guides in 2023-24, roughly one-third of arrivals. Of those 700,000 tourists, 57% were handled by unlicensed guides.

Read that again. Most tourists interacting with guides are served by people with no formal training, no regulatory oversight, no quality standards, and no accountability. These are the “ambassadors” shaping visitor perceptions, driving purchasing decisions, and determining whether tourists extend stays, return, or recommend Sri Lanka. And they are invisible to SLTDA.

The Anatomy of Workforce Failure

The guide crisis is not accidental. It is the predictable outcome of decades of policy neglect, regulatory abdication, and institutional indifference.

1. Training Collapse and Barrier to Entry Failure

Becoming a licensed National Guide theoretically requires:

* Completion of formal training programmes

* Demonstrated language proficiency

* Knowledge of history, culture, geography

* Passing competency exams

In practice, these barriers have eroded. The study reveals:

* Training infrastructure is inadequate and geographically concentrated

* Language requirements are inconsistently enforced

* Knowledge assessments are outdated and poorly calibrated

* Continuous professional development is non-existent

The result: even licensed guides often lack the depth of knowledge, language skills, or service standards that high-yield tourists expect. Unlicensed guides have no standards at all. Compare this to competitors. In Mauritius, tour guides undergo rigorous government-certified training with mandatory refresher courses. The Maldives’ resort model embeds guide functions within integrated hospitality operations with strict quality controls. Thailand has well-developed private-sector training ecosystems feeding into licensed guide pools.

2. Economic Precarity and Income Volatility

Tour guiding in Sri Lanka is economically unstable:

* Seasonal income volatility: High earnings in peak months (December-March), near-zero in low season (April-June, September)

* No fixed salaries: Most guides work freelance or commission-based

* Age and experience don’t guarantee income: 60% of guides are over 40, but earnings decline with age due to physical demands and market preference for younger, language-proficient guides

* Commission dependency: Guides often earn more from commissions on shopping, gem purchases, and restaurant referrals than from guiding fees

The commission-driven model pushes guides to prioritise high-commission shops over meaningful experiences, leaving tourists feeling manipulated. With low earnings and poor incentives, skilled guides exist in the profession while few new entrants join. The result is a shrinking pool of struggling licensed guides and rising numbers of opportunistic unlicensed operators.

3. Regulatory Abdication and Unlicensed Proliferation

Unlicensed guides thrive because enforcement is absent, economic incentives favour avoiding fees and taxes, and tourists cannot distinguish licensed professionals from informal operators. With SLTDA’s limited capacity reducing oversight, unregistered activity expands. Guiding becomes the frontline where regulatory failure most visibly harms tourist experience and sector revenues in Sri Lanka.

4. Male-Dominated, Ageing, Geographically Uneven Workforce

The guide workforce is:

* Heavily male-dominated: Fewer than 10% are women

* Ageing: 60% are over 40; many in their 50s and 60s

* Geographically concentrated: Clustered in Colombo, Galle, Kandy, Cultural Triangle—minimal presence in emerging destinations

This creates multiple problems:

* Gender imbalance: Limits appeal to female solo travellers and certain market segments (wellness tourism, family travel with mothers)

* Physical limitations: Older guides struggle with demanding itineraries (hiking, adventure tourism)

* Knowledge ossification: Ageing workforce with no continuous learning rehashes outdated narratives, lacks digital literacy, cannot engage younger tourist demographics

* Regional gaps: Emerging destinations (Eastern Province, Northern heritage sites) lack trained guide capacity

1. Experience Degradation Lower Spending

Unlicensed guides lack knowledge, language skills, and service training. Tourist experience degrades. When tourists feel they are being shuttled to commission shops rather than authentic experiences, they:

* Cut trips short

* Skip additional paid activities

* Leave negative reviews

* Do not return or recommend

The yield impact is direct: degraded experiences reduce spending, return rates, and word-of-mouth premium.

2. Commission Steering → Value Leakage

Guides earning more from commissions than guiding fees optimise for merchant revenue, not tourist satisfaction.

This creates leakage: tourism spending flows to merchants paying highest commissions (often with foreign ownership or imported inventory), not to highest-quality experiences.

The economic distortion is visible: gems, souvenirs, and low-quality restaurants generate guide commissions while high-quality cultural sites, local artisan cooperatives, and authentic restaurants do not. Spending flows to low-value, high-leakage channels.

3. Safety and Security Risks → Reputation Damage

Unlicensed guides have no insurance, no accountability, no emergency training. When tourists encounter problems, accidents, harassment, scams, there is no recourse. Incidents generate negative publicity, travel advisories, reputation damage. The 2024-2025 reports of tourists being attacked by wildlife at major sites (Sigiriya) with inadequate safety protocols are symptomatic. Trained, licensed guides would have emergency protocols. Unlicensed operators improvise.

4. Market Segmentation Failure → Yield Optimisation Impossible

High-yield tourists (luxury, cultural immersion, adventure) require specialised guide-deep knowledge, language proficiency, cultural sensitivity. Sri Lanka cannot reliably deliver these guides at scale because:

* Training does not produce specialists (wildlife experts, heritage scholars, wellness practitioners)

* Economic precarity drives talent out

* Unlicensed operators dominate price-sensitive segments, leaving limited licensed capacity for premium segments

We cannot move upmarket because we lack the workforce to serve premium segments. We are locked into volume-chasing low-yield markets because that is what our guide workforce can provide.

The way forward

Fixing Sri Lanka’s guide crisis demands structural reform, not symbolic gestures. A full workforce census and licensing audit must map the real guide population, identify gaps, and set an enforcement baseline. Licensing must be mandatory, timebound, and backed by inspections and penalties. Economic incentives should reward professionalism through fair wages, transparent fees, and verified registries. Training must expand nationwide with specialisations, language standards, and continuous development. Gender and age imbalances require targeted recruitment, mentorship, and diversified roles. Finally, guides must be integrated into the tourism value chain through mandatory verification, accountability measures, and performancelinked feedback.

The Uncomfortable Truth

Can Sri Lanka achieve high-value tourism with a low-quality, largely unlicensed guide workforce? The answer is NO. Unambiguously, definitively, NO. Sri Lanka’s guides shape tourist perceptions, spending, and satisfaction, yet the system treats them as expendable; poorly trained, economically insecure, and largely unregulated. With 57% of tourists relying on unlicensed guides, experience quality becomes unpredictable and revenue leaks into commission-driven channels.

High-yield markets avoid destinations with weak service standards, leaving Sri Lanka stuck in low-value, volume tourism. This is not a training problem but a structural failure requiring regulatory enforcement, viable career pathways, and a complete overhaul of incentives. Without professionalising guides, high-value tourism is unattainable. Fixing the guide crisis is the foundation for genuine sector transformation.

The choice is ours. The workforce is waiting.

This concludes the 04-part series on Sri Lanka’s tourism stagnation. The diagnosis is complete. The question now is whether policymakers have the courage to act.

For any concerns/comments contact the author at saliya.ca@gmail.com

(The writer, a senior Chartered Accountant and professional banker, is Professor at SLIIT, Malabe. The views and opinions expressed in this article are personal.)

Features

Recruiting academics to state universities – beset by archaic selection processes?

Published

1 day ago

2026/03/3

Thilina Walpola

by Kaushalya Perera

Time has, by and large, stood still in the business of academic staff recruitment to state universities. Qualifications have proliferated and evolved to be more interdisciplinary, but our selection processes and evaluation criteria are unchanged since at least the late 1990s. But before I delve into the problems, I will describe the existing processes and schemes of recruitment. The discussion is limited to UGC-governed state universities (and does not include recruitment to medical and engineering sectors) though the problems may be relevant to other higher education institutions (HEIs).

How recruitment happens currently in SL state universities

Academic ranks in Sri Lankan state universities can be divided into three tiers (subdivisions are not discussed).

* Lecturer (Probationary)

– recruited with a four-year undergraduate degree. A tiny step higher is the Lecturer (Unconfirmed), recruited with a postgraduate degree but no teaching experience.

* A Senior Lecturer can be recruited with certain postgraduate qualifications and some number of years of teaching and research.

* Above this is the professor (of four types), which can be left out of this discussion since only one of those (Chair Professor) is by application.

State universities cannot hire permanent academic staff as and when they wish. Prior to advertising a vacancy, approval to recruit is obtained through a mind-numbing and time-consuming process (months!) ending at the Department of Management Services. The call for applications must list all ranks up to Senior Lecturer. All eligible candidates for Probationary to Senior Lecturer are interviewed, e.g., if a Department wants someone with a doctoral degree, they must still advertise for and interview candidates for all ranks, not only candidates with a doctoral degree. In the evaluation criteria, the first degree is more important than the doctoral degree (more on this strange phenomenon later). All of this is only possible when universities are not under a ‘hiring freeze’, which governments declare regularly and generally lasts several years.

Problem type 1

– Archaic processes and evaluation criteria

Twenty-five years ago, as a probationary lecturer with a first degree, I was a typical hire. We would be recruited, work some years and obtain postgraduate degrees (ideally using the privilege of paid study leave to attend a reputed university in the first world). State universities are primarily undergraduate teaching spaces, and when doctoral degrees were scarce, hiring probationary lecturers may have been a practical solution. The path to a higher degree was through the academic job. Now, due to availability of candidates with postgraduate qualifications and the problems of retaining academics who find foreign postgraduate opportunities, preference for candidates applying with a postgraduate qualification is growing. The evaluation scheme, however, prioritises the first degree over the candidate’s postgraduate education. Were I to apply to a Faculty of Education, despite a PhD on language teaching and research in education, I may not even be interviewed since my undergraduate degree is not in education. The ‘first degree first’ phenomenon shows that universities essentially ignore the intellectual development of a person beyond their early twenties. It also ignores the breadth of disciplines and their overlap with other fields.

This can be helped (not solved) by a simple fix, which can also reduce brain drain: give precedence to the doctoral degree in the required field, regardless of the candidate’s first degree, effected by a UGC circular. The suggestion is not fool-proof. It is a first step, and offered with the understanding that any selection process, however well the evaluation criteria are articulated, will be beset by multiple issues, including that of bias. Like other Sri Lankan institutions, universities, too, have tribal tendencies, surfacing in the form of a preference for one’s own alumni. Nevertheless, there are other problems that are, arguably, more pressing as I discuss next. In relation to the evaluation criteria, a problem is the narrow interpretation of any regulation, e.g., deciding the degree’s suitability based on the title rather than considering courses in the transcript. Despite rhetoric promoting internationalising and inter-disciplinarity, decision-making administrative and academic bodies have very literal expectations of candidates’ qualifications, e.g., a candidate with knowledge of digital literacy should show this through the title of the degree!

Problem type 2 – The mess of badly regulated higher education

A direct consequence of the contemporary expansion of higher education is a large number of applicants with myriad qualifications. The diversity of degree programmes cited makes the responsibility of selecting a suitable candidate for the job a challenging but very important one. After all, the job is for life – it is very difficult to fire a permanent employer in the state sector.

Widely varying undergraduate degree programmes.

At present, Sri Lankan undergraduates bring qualifications (at times more than one) from multiple types of higher education institutions: a degree from a UGC-affiliated state university, a state university external to the UGC, a state institution that is not a university, a foreign university, or a private HEI aka ‘private university’. It could be a degree received by attending on-site, in Sri Lanka or abroad. It could be from a private HEI’s affiliated foreign university or an external degree from a state university or an online only degree from a private HEI that is ‘UGC-approved’ or ‘Ministry of Education approved’, i.e., never studied in a university setting. Needless to say, the diversity (and their differences in quality) are dizzying. Unfortunately, under the evaluation scheme all degrees ‘recognised’ by the UGC are assigned the same marks. The same goes for the candidates’ merits or distinctions, first classes, etc., regardless of how difficult or easy the degree programme may be and even when capabilities, exposure, input, etc are obviously different.

Similar issues are faced when we consider postgraduate qualifications, though to a lesser degree. In my discipline(s), at least, a postgraduate degree obtained on-site from a first-world university is preferable to one from a local university (which usually have weekend or evening classes similar to part-time study) or online from a foreign university. Elitist this may be, but even the best local postgraduate degrees cannot provide the experience and intellectual growth gained by being in a university that gives you access to six million books and teaching and supervision by internationally-recognised scholars. Unfortunately, in the evaluation schemes for recruitment, the worst postgraduate qualification you know of will receive the same marks as one from NUS, Harvard or Leiden.

The problem is clear but what about a solution?

Recruitment to state universities needs to change to meet contemporary needs. We need evaluation criteria that allows us to get rid of the dross as well as a more sophisticated institutional understanding of using them. Recruitment is key if we want our institutions (and our country) to progress. I reiterate here the recommendations proposed in ‘Considerations for Higher Education Reform’ circulated previously by Kuppi Collective:

* Change bond regulations to be more just, in order to retain better qualified academics.

* Update the schemes of recruitment to reflect present-day realities of inter-disciplinary and multi-disciplinary training in order to recruit suitably qualified candidates.

* Ensure recruitment processes are made transparent by university administrations.

Kaushalya Perera is a senior lecturer at the University of Colombo.

(Kuppi is a politics and pedagogy happening on the margins of the lecture hall that parodies, subverts, and simultaneously reaffirms social hierarchies.)

Features

Talento … oozing with talent

Published

1 day ago

2026/03/3

Thilina Walpola

Talento: Gained recognition as a leading wedding and dance band

This week, too, the spotlight is on an outfit that has gained popularity, mainly through social media.

Last week we had MISTER Band in our scene, and on 10th February, Yellow Beatz – both social media favourites.

Talento is a seven-piece band that plays all types of music, from the ‘60s to the modern tracks of today.

The band has reached many heights, since its inception in 2012, and has gained recognition as a leading wedding and dance band in the scene here.

The members that makeup the outfit have a solid musical background, which comes through years of hard work and dedication

Their portfolio of music contains a mix of both western and eastern songs and are carefully selected, they say, to match the requirements of the intended audience, occasion, or event.

Although the baila is a specialty, which is inherent to this group, that originates from Moratuwa, their repertoire is made up of a vast collection of love, classic, oldies and modern-day hits.

The musicians, who make up Talento, are:

Prabuddha Geetharuchi:

Geilee Fonseka: Dynamic and charismatic vocalist

Prabuddha Geetharuchi: The main man behind the band Talento

(Vocalist/ Frontman). He is an avid music enthusiast and was mentored by a lot of famous musicians, and trainers, since he was a child. Growing up with them influenced him to take on western songs, as well as other music styles. A Peterite, he is the main man behind the band Talento and is a versatile singer/entertainer who never fails to get the crowd going.

Geilee Fonseka (Vocals):

A dynamic and charismatic vocalist whose vibrant stage presence, and powerful voice, bring a fresh spark to every performance. Young, energetic, and musically refined, she is an artiste who effortlessly blends passion with precision – captivating audiences from the very first note. Blessed with an immense vocal range, Geilee is a truly versatile singer, confidently delivering Western and Eastern music across multiple languages and genres.

Chandana Perera (Drummer):

His expertise and exceptional skills have earned him recognition as one of the finest acoustic drummers in Sri Lanka. With over 40 tours under his belt, Chandana has demonstrated his dedication and passion for music, embodying the essential role of a drummer as the heartbeat of any band.

Harsha Soysa:

(Bassist/Vocalist). He a chorister of the western choir of St. Sebastian’s College, Moratuwa, who began his musical education under famous voice trainers, as well as bass guitar trainers in Sri Lanka. He has also performed at events overseas. He acts as the second singer of the band

Udara Jayakody:

(Keyboardist). He is also a qualified pianist, adding technical flavour to Talento’s music. His singing and harmonising skills are an extra asset to the band. From his childhood he has been a part of a number of orchestras as a pianist. He has also previously performed with several famous western bands.

Aruna Madushanka:

(Saxophonist). His proficiciency in playing various instruments, including the saxophone, soprano saxophone, and western flute, showcases his versatility as a musician, and his musical repertoire is further enhanced by his remarkable singing ability.

Prashan Pramuditha:

(Lead guitar). He has the ability to play different styles, both oriental and western music, and he also creates unique tones and patterns with the guitar..