Features

Plantation workers being taken for a ride once again

Published

1 year ago

2024/09/13

by Vijaya Kumar

Plantation workers are once again being taken for a ride. When Ranil Wickremesinghe announced on May Day a 1,700-rupee daily wage for plantation workers, one thought that these very productive workers are at last about to receive a somewhat reasonable wage. The companies through the Planters’ Association (PA) made the routine noises of the industry’s imminent collapse as they could not pay such a wage and as usual, went to courts. This is what they did three years ago as well when the government raised the daily wage to Rs. 1000. They paid it after a delay of six months but we then saw an arbitrary increase of about 10-15% at estate level of the norm to be collected and also the insidious practice of paying half day wage if the norm was not achieved – an illegal procedure not seen in any other industry. This time, too, the employers went to court, which stayed implementation of the wage increase decision – Rs 1350 basic wage plus a special allowance of Rs 350. The government which was keen on gathering estate votes at the Presidential Elections was able to get a Wages Board decision with the same basic wage but the Rs 350 allowance had now become a productivity allowance, which being unspecified could be manipulated by the Employer. However, the government acted too late, so that estate workers will not get the benefit of the new wage before the election. What happens thereafter nobody knows, but the PA going to Court cannot be ruled out.

Not only do the Regional Plantation Companies (RPC) pay workers starvation wages, they are actively trying to convert them into informal employees. They keep claiming that workers need to increase their productivity, not recognising the massive increase in productivity shown by a workforce decreased from 4 lakhs in 1992 to 1 ¼ lakhs today producing the same amount of tea annually. The Outgrower system which they boast of as being a Win-Win situation for the worker involves handing over a plot of land on a temporary basis which the worker is supposed to work on some days of the week. The RPC supplies inputs such as fertiliser and buys the leaves collected paying her for the bought leaf, less cost of inputs provided. Another practice RPCs resort to is exchanging workers between two estates they own with transport provided where workers are employed as contract labour on higher pay but without statutory benefits. Both these methods mean workers lose their EPF and ETF for the days worked and a reduction of benefits such as gratuity and maternity leave if the RPCs succeed in their attempts at introducing a minimum number of days of work to qualify for these benefits. Workers often get their children to work on outgrower plots to increase their incomes so that the RPCs are indirectly encouraging child labour.

RPCs have no excuse for not increasing the wages of the people whose sweat and tears directly contribute to their profits since their earnings from tea have increased by between 65 – 100%, thanks to the devaluation of the rupee consequent to the economic crisis. The RPCs only interest is in their profits and not in their workers as is shown by the malnutrition and stunting of children data detailed in a World Bank report of 2017. Stagnant wages and the massive food inflation caused by the economic crisis have further increased malnutrition and stunting in the estates.

Estate workers have throughout been mistreated by private management. The norm which was previously fixed in consultation with the workers was on average 18 pounds or 9 kg until we went metric in the late ’70s was converted to 18 kg and is today on average 24 kg. Plantation workers enjoyed a Cost-of-Living (C-o-L) allowance of 4 cents increase for every unit rise in the C-o-L index at the time of private management taking over. This was replaced by a collective agreement with biennial wage negotiations, contributing to a continuous fall in real wages and living standards for estate workers. The only management techniques the PA knows is to pay poverty level wages to estate workers and convert them from permanent staff into informal workers to boost profits. RPCs make a minimal contribution to the Plantation Human Development Trust (PHDT), which is supposed to improve welfare in the plantations.

Estate schools were taken over by government but they suffer from a lack of investment and difficulties in retaining teachers. Health services are in a deplorable state. Maternity wards and dispensaries are mostly non-functional, the Assistant Medical Practitioner rarely appears as he now looks after 3-4 estates and no ambulance is available. More than two-thirds of families still live in line rooms as they were excluded from Premadasa’s ‘one million’ house project and housing schemes begun later are slow. The President’s promise of grouping them into villages with their own 7 perch plot is impracticable as these villages cannot be improved as rates cannot be collected unless RPCs are made to contribute a fixed percentage of their turnover for the village’s upkeep. A better idea would be to expand the nearest Pradeshiya Sabha to include estate houses. This would also contribute to better relationship between the communities.

The problem with RPCs is that they are run by accountants who put pressure on managers to increase profits every year. RPCs use every trick in the trade to hide profits at estate level and show them at holding company level such as payment of management fees to holding company, purchasing from sister firms at higher than market prices and using estate income to provide a highly paid management with numerous perks. RPCs should be subject to Government Audit for 2 years on a rotational basis or the Government could introduce the Indian method of requiring a change in the Auditor every three years. While workers are denied wage increases, those of managers and higher management are regularly increased. These bloated payments increase the cost of production which is then used to justify their inability to raise wages. In India, Annual Reports must give details of earnings of the highest paid 10 employees and of any employee earning Rs (Sri Lankan) 3 million a month (recently increased from Rs 1.8 m) and of any part-time employee earning over Rs (Sri Lankan) 3 million a year. It is necessary to introduce similar regulations here.

When workers were agitating for a Rs 1000 daily wage in 2015 RPCs claimed that they were making losses and if granted, the companies would not be able to run the estate and would hand them back to government. However, a year later the PA fought tooth and nail against and sabotaged Ravi Karunanayake’s 2017 Budget Proposal to limit the estates managed by a single company to 5,000 acres. Furthermore, although around 10 estates each were allocated to 22 RPCs in 1992, two companies, Hayleys and Richard Pieris between them manage almost half the estates today.

The handing over of estates to private management took place in 1992 not because the nationalised estates were mismanaged but because there was a backlog in tea sales as two of our major export markets, Iran and Iraq were at war with each other while the other major market, Russia and the Eastern European countries were in crisis with the fall of communism. JR who was trying to privatise the estates took the opportunity to hand it over to private management. We were told that they would use their management expertise to transform the plantations into efficient prosperous entities. We now know that their management expertise is restricted to keeping worker wages low and removing social protection and welfare from them.

Vijaya Kumar is a Professor Emeritus in Science of the University of Peradeniya

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Features

Crucial test for religious and ethnic harmony in Bangladesh

Published

2 hours ago

2026/02/12

Sahan Weerasooriya

A political protest that led to governmental change in Bangladesh mid last year. (photograph: imago)

Will the Bangladesh parliamentary election bring into being a government that will ensure ethnic and religious harmony in the country? This is the poser on the lips of peace-loving sections in Bangladesh and a principal concern of those outside who mean the country well.

The apprehensions are mainly on the part of religious and ethnic minorities. The parliamentary poll of February 12th is expected to bring into existence a government headed by the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) and the Islamist oriented Jamaat-e-Islami party and this is where the rub is. If these parties win, will it be a case of Bangladesh sliding in the direction of a theocracy or a state where majoritarian chauvinism thrives?

Chief of the Jamaat, Shafiqur Rahman, who was interviewed by sections of the international media recently said that there is no need for minority groups in Bangladesh to have the above fears. He assured, essentially, that the state that will come into being will be equable and inclusive. May it be so, is likely to be the wish of those who cherish a tension-free Bangladesh.

The party that could have posed a challenge to the above parties, the Awami League Party of former Prime Minister Hasina Wased, is out of the running on account of a suspension that was imposed on it by the authorities and the mentioned majoritarian-oriented parties are expected to have it easy at the polls.

A positive that has emerged against the backdrop of the poll is that most ordinary people in Bangladesh, be they Muslim or Hindu, are for communal and religious harmony and it is hoped that this sentiment will strongly prevail, going ahead. Interestingly, most of them were of the view, when interviewed, that it was the politicians who sowed the seeds of discord in the country and this viewpoint is widely shared by publics all over the region in respect of the politicians of their countries.

Some sections of the Jamaat party were of the view that matters with regard to the orientation of governance are best left to the incoming parliament to decide on but such opinions will be cold comfort for minority groups. If the parliamentary majority comes to consist of hard line Islamists, for instance, there is nothing to prevent the country from going in for theocratic governance. Consequently, minority group fears over their safety and protection cannot be prevented from spreading.

Therefore, we come back to the question of just and fair governance and whether Bangladesh’s future rulers could ensure these essential conditions of democratic rule. The latter, it is hoped, will be sufficiently perceptive to ascertain that a Bangladesh rife with religious and ethnic tensions, and therefore unstable, would not be in the interests of Bangladesh and those of the region’s countries.

Unfortunately, politicians region-wide fall for the lure of ethnic, religious and linguistic chauvinism. This happens even in the case of politicians who claim to be democratic in orientation. This fate even befell Bangladesh’s Awami League Party, which claims to be democratic and socialist in general outlook.

We have it on the authority of Taslima Nasrin in her ground-breaking novel, ‘Lajja’, that the Awami Party was not of any substantial help to Bangladesh’s Hindus, for example, when violence was unleashed on them by sections of the majority community. In fact some elements in the Awami Party were found to be siding with the Hindus’ murderous persecutors. Such are the temptations of hard line majoritarianism.

In Sri Lanka’s past numerous have been the occasions when even self-professed Leftists and their parties have conveniently fallen in line with Southern nationalist groups with self-interest in mind. The present NPP government in Sri Lanka has been waxing lyrical about fostering national reconciliation and harmony but it is yet to prove its worthiness on this score in practice. The NPP government remains untested material.

As a first step towards national reconciliation it is hoped that Sri Lanka’s present rulers would learn the Tamil language and address the people of the North and East of the country in Tamil and not Sinhala, which most Tamil-speaking people do not understand. We earnestly await official language reforms which afford to Tamil the dignity it deserves.

An acid test awaits Bangladesh as well on the nation-building front. Not only must all forms of chauvinism be shunned by the incoming rulers but a secular, truly democratic Bangladesh awaits being licked into shape. All identity barriers among people need to be abolished and it is this process that is referred to as nation-building.

On the foreign policy frontier, a task of foremost importance for Bangladesh is the need to build bridges of amity with India. If pragmatism is to rule the roost in foreign policy formulation, Bangladesh would place priority to the overcoming of this challenge. The repatriation to Bangladesh of ex-Prime Minister Hasina could emerge as a steep hurdle to bilateral accord but sagacious diplomacy must be used by Bangladesh to get over the problem.

A reply to N.A. de S. Amaratunga

A response has been penned by N.A. de S. Amaratunga (please see p5 of ‘The Island’ of February 6th) to a previous column by me on ‘ India shaping-up as a Swing State’, published in this newspaper on January 29th , but I remain firmly convinced that India remains a foremost democracy and a Swing State in the making.

If the countries of South Asia are to effectively manage ‘murderous terrorism’, particularly of the separatist kind, then they would do well to adopt to the best of their ability a system of government that provides for power decentralization from the centre to the provinces or periphery, as the case may be. This system has stood India in good stead and ought to prove effective in all other states that have fears of disintegration.

Moreover, power decentralization ensures that all communities within a country enjoy some self-governing rights within an overall unitary governance framework. Such power-sharing is a hallmark of democratic governance.

Features

Celebrating Valentine’s Day …

Published

2 hours ago

2026/02/12

Sahan Weerasooriya

Valentine’s Day is all about celebrating love, romance, and affection, and this is how some of our well-known personalities plan to celebrate Valentine’s Day – 14th February:

Merlina Fernando (Singer)

Yes, it’s a special day for lovers all over the world and it’s even more special to me because 14th February is the birthday of my husband Suresh, who’s the lead guitarist of my band Mission.

We have planned to celebrate Valentine’s Day and his Birthday together and it will be a wonderful night as always.

We will be having our fans and close friends, on that night, with their loved ones at Highso – City Max hotel Dubai, from 9.00 pm onwards.

Lorensz Francke (Elvis Tribute Artiste)

On Valentine’s Day I will be performing a live concert at a Wealthy Senior Home for Men and Women, and their families will be attending, as well.

I will be performing live with romantic, iconic love songs and my song list would include ‘Can’t Help falling in Love’, ‘Love Me Tender’, ‘Burning Love’, ‘Are You Lonesome Tonight’, ‘The Wonder of You’ and ‘’It’s Now or Never’ to name a few.

To make Valentine’s Day extra special I will give the Home folks red satin scarfs.

Emma Shanaya (Singer)

I plan on spending the day of love with my girls, especially my best friend. I don’t have a romantic Valentine this year but I am thrilled to spend it with the girl that loves me through and through. I’ll be in Colombo and look forward to go to a cute cafe and spend some quality time with my childhood best friend Zulha.

JAYASRI

Emma-and-Maneeka

This Valentine’s Day the band JAYASRI we will be really busy; in the morning we will be landing in Sri Lanka, after our Oman Tour; then in the afternoon we are invited as Chief Guests at our Maris Stella College Sports Meet, Negombo, and late night we will be with LineOne band live in Karandeniya Open Air Down South. Everywhere we will be sharing LOVE with the mass crowds.

Kay Jay (Singer)

I will stay at home and cook a lovely meal for lunch, watch some movies, together with Sanjaya, and, maybe we go out for dinner and have a lovely time. Come to think of it, every day is Valentine’s Day for me with Sanjaya Alles.

Maneka Liyanage (Beauty Tips)

On this special day, I celebrate love by spending meaningful time with the people I cherish. I prepare food with love and share meals together, because food made with love brings hearts closer. I enjoy my leisure time with them — talking, laughing, sharing stories, understanding each other, and creating beautiful memories. My wish for this Valentine’s Day is a world without fighting — a world where we love one another like our own beloved, where we do not hurt others, even through a single word or action. Let us choose kindness, patience, and understanding in everything we do.

Janaka Palapathwala (Singer)

Janaka

Valentine’s Day should not be the only day we speak about love.

From the moment we are born into this world, we seek love, first through the very drop of our mother’s milk, then through the boundless care of our Mother and Father, and the embrace of family.

Love is everywhere. All living beings, even plants, respond in affection when they are loved.

As we grow, we learn to love, and to be loved. One day, that love inspires us to build a new family of our own.

Love has no beginning and no end. It flows through every stage of life, timeless, endless, and eternal.

Natasha Rathnayake (Singer)

We don’t have any special plans for Valentine’s Day. When you’ve been in love with the same person for over 25 years, you realise that love isn’t a performance reserved for one calendar date. My husband and I have never been big on public displays, or grand gestures, on 14th February. Our love is expressed quietly and consistently, in ordinary, uncelebrated moments.

With time, you learn that love isn’t about proving anything to the world or buying into a commercialised idea of romance—flowers that wilt, sweets that spike blood sugar, and gifts that impress briefly but add little real value. In today’s society, marketing often pushes the idea that love is proven by how much money you spend, and that buying things is treated as a sign of commitment.

Real love doesn’t need reminders or price tags. It lives in showing up every day, choosing each other on unromantic days, and nurturing the relationship intentionally and without an audience.

This isn’t a judgment on those who enjoy celebrating Valentine’s Day. It’s simply a personal choice.

Melloney Dassanayake (Miss Universe Sri Lanka 2024)

I truly believe it’s beautiful to have a day specially dedicated to love. But, for me, Valentine’s Day goes far beyond romantic love alone. It celebrates every form of love we hold close to our hearts: the love for family, friends, and that one special person who makes life brighter. While 14th February gives us a moment to pause and celebrate, I always remind myself that love should never be limited to just one day. Every single day should feel like Valentine’s Day – constant reminder to the people we love that they are never alone, that they are valued, and that they matter.

I’m incredibly blessed because, for me, every day feels like Valentine’s Day. My special person makes sure of that through the smallest gestures, the quiet moments, and the simple reminders that love lives in the details. He shows me that it’s the little things that count, and that love doesn’t need grand stages to feel extraordinary. This Valentine’s Day, perfection would be something intimate and meaningful: a cozy picnic in our home garden, surrounded by nature, laughter, and warmth, followed by an abstract drawing session where we let our creativity flow freely. To me, that’s what love is – simple, soulful, expressive, and deeply personal. When love is real, every ordinary moment becomes magical.

Noshin De Silva (Actress)

Valentine’s Day is one of my favourite holidays! I love the décor, the hearts everywhere, the pinks and reds, heart-shaped chocolates, and roses all around. But honestly, I believe every day can be Valentine’s Day.

It doesn’t have to be just about romantic love. It’s a chance to celebrate love in all its forms with friends, family, or even by taking a little time for yourself.

Whether you’re spending the day with someone special or enjoying your own company, it’s a reminder to appreciate meaningful connections, show kindness, and lead with love every day.

And yes, I’m fully on theme this year with heart nail art and heart mehendi design!

Wishing everyone a very happy Valentine’s Day, but, remember, love yourself first, and don’t forget to treat yourself.

Sending my love to all of you.

Features

Banana and Aloe Vera

Published

2 hours ago

2026/02/12

Sahan Weerasooriya

To create a powerful, natural, and hydrating beauty mask that soothes inflammation, fights acne, and boosts skin radiance, mix a mashed banana with fresh aloe vera gel.

This nutrient-rich blend acts as an antioxidant-packed anti-ageing treatment that also doubles as a nourishing, shiny hair mask.

* Face Masks for Glowing Skin:

Mix 01 ripe banana with 01 tablespoon of fresh aloe vera gel and apply this mixture to the face. Massage for a few minutes, leave for 15-20 minutes, and then rinse off for a glowing complexion.

* Acne and Soothing Mask:

Mix 01 tablespoon of fresh aloe vera gel with 1/2 a mashed banana and 01 teaspoon of honey. Apply this mixture to clean skin to calm inflammation, reduce redness, and hydrate dry, sensitive skin. Leave for 15-20 minutes, and rinse with warm water.

* Hair Treatment for Shine:

Mix 01 fresh ripe banana with 03 tablespoons of fresh aloe vera gel and 01 teaspoon of honey. Apply from scalp to ends, massage for 10-15 minutes and then let it dry for maximum absorption. Rinse thoroughly with cool water for soft, shiny, and frizz-free hair.