Features

Purism in the era of mass politics

Published

4 years ago

2022/01/30

by Uditha Devapriya

In claiming that all mainstream parties have failed the country, the JVP-NPP has made a necessity out of virtue. The JVP has always touted itself as the better alternative, and in the present conjuncture, it feels it’s the best alternative we have.

That may explain why its manifesto, “Rapid Response”, reads like a rushed job, full of rhetoric but no real substance. It’s the policy statement of a party which tries to please everyone and ends up pleasing no one. This is a necessary offshoot of how it perceives itself: since it considers itself superior to every other outfit, it assumes that people will vote purely or exclusively on the strength of their dissatisfaction with mainstream politics.

The JVP-NPP’s political vision is, essentially, the leftwing version of Mangala Samaraweera’s Radical Centre. Like that initiative, the JVP-NPP concentrates on political systems rather than ideologies, and engages with corruption to the exclusion of more structural issues. That is why its pamphlet has more, much more, to say about bribery than about the state of the economy, the latter of which it views through the prism of post-1977 liberalisation.

This is a far cry from the approach taken by the Latin American Left, an irony considering that the JVP-NPP has more or less recommended Pink Tide strategies.

“Developments in Latin America are being closely watched by progressive groups and movements globally. Peru recently voted in a left-wing teacher as President after a closely fought election. Boric has been congratulated by the old guard of the left from Cuba, Venezuela, and Mexico. Colombia and Brazil are due to have elections in 2022 and in both countries, left-wing leaders are sensing possible victory. Most importantly, these shifts are signalling a deep dissatisfaction with the status quo and a desire for political and economic models that are less divisive and unequal.”

Laudable and accurate, but have leftwing outfits in Sri Lanka taken stock of these “developments”? We need to ask three questions here: what lessons the Sri Lankan Left should learn from the second Pink Tide, whether the Left has learnt them, and what course of action the Left, particularly the JVP-NPP, should go for to go ahead.

The way I see it, the second Latin American Pink Tide taught us three lessons. First, it saw a return to fundamental economic concerns: Peru’s Pedro Castillo, a member of that country’s marginalised indigenous community, dwelt on immediate priorities, like income and wealth inequalities and the country’s dependence on imports, putting them at the forefront of his presidency. Second, as the Mexican election showed, the Left in the region encompassed not just orthodox Marxists, but also social democrats, centre-left reformists and populists, though the latter’s backtracking, as seen in Gabriel Boric’s statements about Venezuela and Nicaragua, remains open to question.

Thirdly, and most importantly, the Latin American Left consistently portrayed itself, not as the moral superior to other political formations, but as the only viable alternative to the status quo. If ever a JVP-NPP outfit made an appearance in the Pink Tide last year, it was in Chile, where certain leftist commentators claimed that there was no “essential difference” between Boric and his rightwing opponent. Indeed, unimpressive as Boric’s compromises on foreign policy were, his camp considered these as being necessary expedients in the larger fight against rightwing neo-Pinochetianism. The tactic, in other words, wasn’t to be morally or ethically superior, but to win the race and end the war.

Perhaps the biggest issue with the first Latin American Pink Tide was its failure to connect with the European Left and to make headway with forces that had elected it to power, namely peasants and urban workers. Opposed and then supported by reactionary forces, it caved into the demands of corporate interests and ensured its own demise, culminating in Jair Bolsonaro’s election in 2019. By the looks of it, those leading the second Pink Tide seem to have learnt their lesson there, opting for a “Back to Basics” approach that highlighted material issues affecting ordinary people. Themes like bribery and corruption did enter the fray, but these did not swamp other, more important concerns.

Latin America has always been a wide canvas, a potpourri of political systems and cultures. What bound it together was its staunch anti-imperialist legacy, reinforced by decades of besiegement from its big neighbour to the north. In organising a viable opposition, then, progressive forces didn’t so much adhere to orthodox prescriptions as adapt theory to context, making use of mass electoral politics. From Cuba to Nicaragua, it was mass politics, and popular hatred of authoritarian rule, that helped overthrow rightwing regimes. This is something the heirs of Fidel Castro and Hugo Chavez have understood well.

Has the Sri Lankan Left picked up these lessons? History should tell us that it has not. The Old Left, which gained a reputation for debating important issues like free education and independence in and fighting over them outside the legislature, later disintegrated into almost never-ending sectarian squabbles. To its credit, the LSSP and the Communist Party acknowledged that it could not set aside Sri Lanka’s legacy as Asia’s oldest democracy in its agenda, and that any transformation of society had to involve mass politics. In ignoring these imperatives, conversely, the breakaway Left engineered its own demise long before the LSSP’s and the Communist Party’s fallout from the 1977 election.

The New Left, namely the JVP, suffered from another failure: its inability to tolerate dissent, within or without. From its inception, it embraced an adventurist spirit which caused it to shift to the extreme left under a leftwing government and to the extreme right under a rightwing government. After 1994, it entered the democratic mainstream, though without acknowledging the failures of its past, and over the next two decades it chose to pander to a burgeoning middle-class. These developments compelled it to compromise on its radical potential. Not surprisingly, the JVP-NPP today stands as a case in point for how the centre-left can lose track when responding to shifting class demographics.

The problem with oppositional forces calling themselves progressive in Sri Lanka is their almost casual disregard for mass electoral politics. The irony is that those among them who came to power, the JVP included, could not have done so without electoral politics. The yahapalana regime, for instance, would not have been able to defeat the Rajapaksas on the strength of reformist rhetoric alone; it had to listen to voters, and it had to pay attention to their more genuine concerns. In doing so, it had to pander to those concerns.

That explains why Maithripala Sirisena distanced himself from left-liberal talk of cutting down Sri Lanka’s security apparatus, declaring in an interview with Padma Rao Sunderji that any withdrawals from the north and east would be phased out and not immediate. The UNP faction of the yahapalana regime, by contrast, failed to grasp this, which explains its fallout. Slow as it was, the SLFP realised the pitfalls of the UNP’s approach and extricated itself from the UNP’s embrace, saving itself with a last-minute alliance with the SLPP.

Now, the paradox at the heart of oppositional politics in Sri Lanka today, which one simply does not find among the Latin American Left, is the disconnect between its advocacy for a fairer, better order and its casual indifference to electoral politics. Hence, while calling for the government to resign and pave the way for better leadership, the JVP-NPP’s Anura Kumara Dissanayake rejects offers to ally with not just the SJB – which has its own problems regarding its direction – but also the FSP. The latter, for its part, has been more forthcoming about its policy stances, which would make it the ideal partner for the JVP-NPP, but which has otherwise been ignored and cast aside.

Indeed, instead of listening to the people, which is what any sane opposition, leftwing or otherwise, should be doing, these outfits are gambling on the support of particular social groups, especially the forever upward-aspiring middle classes.

It’s a testament to the power and influence of Sri Lanka’s suburban and urban middle class that it continues to pull the strings of every other oppositional outfit. From the SJB’s Ranilist wing to Champika Ranawaka’s 43 Senankaya, everyone is coveting support from this class, and everyone is adjusting to its demands. To give just one example of how much the middle-class has altered the political landscape, Ranawaka’s turnaround over the abolition of the Executive Presidency, which his allies dismiss as a molehill that Marxists have turned into a mountain, echoes the Sinhala nationalist middle-class’s shift from constitutional reform to what they see as the immediate priority of overthrowing the Rajapaksas.

I have outlined the dangers of pandering to these groups from a Left perspective before in this paper, but the point needs reiterating: as long as the crisis we are in continues to radicalise the middle-class, the Left can and will win by tapping into their discontent and taking advantage of their stances on issues like political corruption. Yet the moment their radicalism slips up, obviously once the crisis comes to an end, the Left might be forced to take stands antithetical to their progressive foundation. This is where the JVP-NPP is going wrong, where the FSP has not gone wrong, and where the Left in general needs to course correct and return to a saner, and commonsensical, approach.

To usher in our own Pink Tide, we need to think beyond the rhetoric of political corruption, going back to the basics. To that end the JVP-NPP needs to wake up, and fast.

The writer can be reached at udakdev1@gmail.com

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Features

Crucial test for religious and ethnic harmony in Bangladesh

Published

19 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

19 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

20 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.