Features

The early days, 1954-59: Gaining entrance to Cambridge

Published

3 years ago

2022/09/11

by Nimal Wikramanayake

Should I Write my Memoir? Like Winnie the Pooh, I thought a thought. Should I write my memoir and tell the world about the difficulties a brown-skinned man from an Asian country had to undergo in the legal profession in Melbourne? I abhor the use of the word “coloured”, for that would make my white Australian friends colourless. Would people be interested in what I had to undergo? Would they empathize with my annoyance, frustration and anger?

But as Tattersall’s declares when it sells its lottery tickets: “You’ve got to be in it to win it” I thought that unless I wrote this work and had it published, I would never know whether people would be interested in it or not. There have been many occasions when I have been angry with the way I have been discriminated against in Australia.

There have been many occasions when I have been frustrated at the way I have been treated in the legal profession as a whole. There have been many occasions when I have felt that a large mountain had been placed in my path. Like Sisyphus of Greek mythology, I have tried to push my rock up the mountain and on some occasions I have managed to clamber up over the top. But on these occasions, I have been pushed back down the mountainside, clutching my rock. I have tried as far as is humanly possible to keep bitterness out of this work. So without further ado, here is my story.

When I commenced writing this work I was in a quandary as to whether I should name the miscreants who did me much despite, as they say in the classics, but after discussing this matter with my friends I decided that I would not descend to their level. Therefore, save for the racists I refer to later in this work, they will remain nameless.

Coincidences

In 1983, my wife, Anna Maria, and I made one of our rare visits to the cinema to see the film Chariots of Fire. The film was about the exploits of the 1924 British team at the Olympic Games in Paris. One of the heroes of the film was Harold Abrahams, the son of a Jewish merchant, who had the temerity, as a Jew, to go to Cambridge University to study law and later became a member of the celebrated 1924 British Olympic team.

There were a number of coincidences between Abrahams’ life and mine, except that I was not a celebrated athlete. The first coincidence took place when, in the film, young Harold Abrahams was being dropped off at his college, Gonville & Caius (pronounced Keys), Cambridge University, on, I believe, Trumpington Street, but as Trumpington Street was too narrow to permit adequate filming, the beginning of the film commenced at Trinity Hall, the college where I studied law over 30 years later. Trinity Hall was situated behind Gonville & Caius at the bottom of Garret Hostel Lane.

The second coincidence took place when Abrahams met with racial discrimination at Cambridge and, on one occasion, frustrated and angry, he remarked to a friend of his that “the Anglo-Saxons would let me walk up to the trough but would not let me drink from it” For my part, I am fascinated by the use of the delightful word “Anglo-Saxon” The person who created this definition should be given a gold medal. It has a beautiful sound and is as dead as the races it depicts.

The Angles were an ancient race in England – long dead. The Saxons suffered the same fate under William the Conqueror. Abrahams added, “I will teach these people a lesson. I will run them off their feet.” I met with racial discrimination in Melbourne but I could not run the perpetrators of this discrimination off their feet, either literally or metaphorically.

I found this statement of Abrahams quite interesting for, at that time, Sir Rufus Isaacs KC, a member of the Jewish tribe, had been one of the leading lawyers of the English Bar. A few years earlier, he was a great rival of Sir Edward Carson and FE Smith, later Lord Birkenhead. Sir Rufus Isaacs, later Lord Reading, was Viceroy of India from 1921 to 1926 when Abrahams went to Cambridge.

I suffered no racial discrimination at Cambridge, and I often wondered whether, if I had migrated to England rather than to Australia, I would have received greater recognition in England than in Australia, being an Oxbridge man.

Apart from several incidents of racism in the courts and at the Victorian Bar, I must confess that I was accepted by some members of the Victorian Bar quite warmly. I will set out the incidents of racism later on when I recount my experiences at the Victorian Bar and in the Law Courts. However, just as Abrahams pointed out, for my part, in the legal profession in Melbourne, the powers that be had led me to the trough many times, but had not permitted me to drink from it.

Neither my dear friend and mentor, the late Louis Voumard QC, nor I were ever considered fit to be appointed to the Supreme Court in Victoria, although we were outstanding barristers, because we did not have the proper social and political connections. Many others far less able were elevated to that high office because they had the right connections.

When I finished writing this work, I gave it to my dear friend Ross Howie SC to review it. He reminded me of the sign that appeared on Olde English Inns -“Good wine needs no bush” He said that it was for others to talk about my ability.Nonetheless, I would like to tell you about some of the things I feel most proud of in my life.

In 1996, I published my work Voumard: The Sale of Land as a supplemental book and sent a complimentary copy to Mr Douglas Grahame QC, the Solicitor-General for the State of Victoria. I received a warm letter from him in which he stated that the Victorian legal profession owed me a debt of gratitude, not only for writing this work but for doing so to the same high standard maintained by the late Louis Voumard QC.

In 1999, I wrote Conveyancing Manual Victoria with Dan Fitzgerald, and asked Mr Justice Robert Brooking, one of the great commercial judges in the Supreme Court of Victoria, whether he would honour me by writing a preface for this work. His Honour agreed, and not only did he write a preface for this work but gave high praise of my knowledge of property law.

In 2008, Mr Justice Peter Young, the Chief Judge of the Court of Equity in New South Wales, and a few years later a member of the Court of Appeal in New South Wales, caused a survey to be made of the top twenty legal books written in Australia, and had this survey published in the Australian Law Journal in July 2008. His Honour included my work Voumard: The Sale of Land in this list. It must be noted that none of the other works on property law were included in this list, although the authors of these works received judicial appointments.

In 2011, 1 was invited by the Chief Justice of Fiji to sit on the Court of Appeal in Fiji. A few years earlier, three distinguished Australian lawyers sat on the same court: Mark Weinberg QC, later Mr Justice Weinberg of the Court of Appeal in Victoria, Mr Justice Handley of the Court of Appeal in New South Wales, and Mr Justice Mason, a justice of the Court of Appeal in New South Wales. Although I run the risk of repetition, I need only add that a number of writers of minor works on property law have all received judicial appointments.

I must state categorically that I am neither angry nor bitter about this, for I have learned to accept the fact there are certain things in life that cannot be changed. In Melbourne, at least, the legal profession and Victorian legal powers that be are still not colour-blind, for they will not recognize the fact that an Asian man or woman has any talent or ability. In Australia, things are upside down. In England I am a WOG – a Worthy Oriental Gentleman -which is not a term of approbation but a patronizing reference to people from the Indian sub-continent. In Australia, this word is used with reference to southern Europeans.

Here, people from China and the Far East, in deference to their American cousins, are called Asians although they come from the Far East and not from Asia. Columbus set off to look for the spice trade in Asia – India and Sri Lanka – not China and Vietnam. The Portuguese found these Asian lands in 1506 when Vasco de Gama sailed around the Cape of Good Hope and arrived on the west coast of India. China and Vietnam are in the Far East.

And by the way, another coincidence with Harold Abrahams was the fact that a relation of his, Sir Sidney Abrahams, was Chief justice of Ceylon from 1937 to 1939. The British government did not believe that a Sri Lankan was capable of holding such a high office and never appointed a Sri Lankan as Chief justice of the Island of Ceylon.The fourth coincidence was an Australian connection that was thrown into this strange mix.

In 1936, a young Australian by the name of Mark Anthony Lyster Bracegirdle arrived in Ceylon to work on a tea plantation and learn the trade of a tea planter. He went to the Relugas Estate in Madulkelle near Matale in Ceylon and began his life in Ceylon on that estate.

He was appalled at the inhumane conditions of the Indian Tamil labourers and collaborated with the LSSP (Lanka Sama Samaja Party), the Trotskyite Party in Ceylon (popularly known as the Fox Trotskyite party), to organize protest meetings against this inhumane treatment. These Indian Tamils were indentured labourers who were brought by the British from South India in the middle of the nineteenth century to labour on their plantations in Ceylon, as the Sinhalese refused to work on them.

The slave trade had recently been abolished in England as a result of the exertions of Wilberforce, and the British needed alternative cheap labour. These labourers had to walk from South India, then cross the Palk Strait to get to north-western Ceylon, and then walk several hundred miles from the north of the Island to the tea plantations in the hill country. During these marches, many thousands died along the way. The British took these South Indian ‘coolies’ to labour in Fiji, the West Indies and South Africa, and except in Sri Lanka, where they are still coolies, these labourers are now an integral part of the higher echelons of society in these countries.

The word “coolie” is what the British called them. The West Indies has produced some great cricketers from the descendants of these indentured labourers with the likes of Alvin Kallicharran, Rohan Kanhai, Shivnarine Chanderpaul, among others. They also have risen to social prominence in Fiji, South Africa and the West Indies.

When I returned to Ceylon in 1958, my father and two of his friends owned a 900-acre tea plantation in Maskeliya called “Theberton Estate.” Maskeliya is 3,000 feet above sea level and has a cool temperate climate somewhat akin to Melbourne in May. In 1963, the Indian Tamil labourers on the estate struck for better living conditions. I was briefed to go up to Maskeliya to appear in a mediation in an attempt to settle this industrial dispute. I visited the “lines”, the living quarters of the estate workers, and was appalled at their living conditions. They were living in corrugated iron sheds, with many families to a shed.

There were no beds for them and they slept on the cold cement floor with no blankets or sheets. The families were separated from each other by wooden partitions which offered no privacy at all. There was no heating and no hot water. There were a few taps of cold water and a few latrines in each shed.

I was intent on improving their working conditions and made a number of concessions at the mediation but, to my surprise, my concessions were rejected by the directors, including my father. One of the other owners, who was a senior lawyer, appeared at the next mediation and rejected my recommendations. The strike was broken and no change was made in the living conditions of the workers.

To return to my story, the British inhabitants of Ceylon were furious that their standing in the country was being damaged by a fellow “white man”. They prevailed upon the British Colonial Governor, Sir Reginald Stubbs, to have Bracegirdle deported. He agreed and signed the deportation order on April 22, 1937, giving Bracegirdle 48 hours to leave the island on the SS Mooltan. The LSSP hid Bracegirdle from the police, but he was located and arrested a short time later. A Writ of Habeas Corpus was served on the Colonial government by Bracegirdle’s lawyers.

The case came up for hearing before the Chief Justice, Sir Sidney Abrahams, and two Burgher judges of Dutch descent, whose ancestors had migrated to Ceylon from Holland many years before. One of the Dutch Burgher judges was Mr Justice Maartensz. Ceylon’s leading lawyer. H V Perera KC, who was instrumental in shaping the law in Ceylon for nigh on 50 years, was briefed to appear for Bracegirdle.

Mr Perera was Ceylon’s equivalent of Sir Owen Dixon in Australia. He opened his case by informing the judges that Bracegirdle had renounced his Australian citizenship and if he was deported by the Colonial government, he would have no country to go to and would have to roam the world as a stateless person.Hearing this statement, Mr Justice Maartensz piped up, “What you are saying, Mr Perera, is that he will be like the wandering Jew.”

Quick as a flash, Sir Sidney Abrahams came back with the retort: “Or the flying Dutchman’

The court ordered Bracegirdle’s release, holding that there was no merit in the deportation order. In 1938 he left Ceylon to live out his days in England. After the war, Bracegirdle qualified as an engineer and settled in Gloucestershire. He died on June 2, 1999. The case is reported in (1937) 39 New Law Report at 193.

Sir Sidney Abrahams returned to England in 1939. Although I run the risk of repetition, in colonial Ceylon the Chief Justice was always an Englishman, because the Colonial government believed that the natives weren’t competent enough to hold such a high appointment.

The beginning

My tale is a long one and, as Maria said in The Sound of Music, “Let’s start at the very beginning”. Let me go back to the month of August 1954 when I was 21-years old and was letting life slip through my fingers. I was not interested in studying and spent my evenings at the Sinhalese Sports Club running up expensive club liquor bills which, surprisingly, my father paid.

About this time, my father met a friend of his, Sir Ivor Jennings, who had been the Vice Chancellor of the University of Ceylon and who had recently been appointed Master of Trinity Hall, Cambridge. Sir Ivor promised Dad that if I passed my GCE A Level and the Trinity Hall entrance examination, he would give me a place at Trinity Hall.

This was well-nigh impossible for someone like me who had not, at the age of 21, passed the GCE A Level which was a two-year course. I then had to to sit for a place at Trinity Hall, the most exclusive college in Cambridge, and compete with more than 300 of the best students in England for one place in a 100. Trinity Hall had only 300 students for the three years of its graduate courses, compared to Kings College and Trinity College which had more than 1,500 students in each College.

We arrived in England in September and I enrolled at the University Tutorial College in London to prepare for the GCE A Level. The exam was at the end of November; I had just over two months to prepare for it. Two of the subjects were completely new – Economics and Economic History. It was then that a miracle happened. When I enrolled at the college, I was assigned a tutor. We hit it off straight away. He was a former Polish fighter pilot who had flown Spitfire planes during the World War II, a Mr Matuczeski. Not since my kindergarten days had I met a teacher who was interested in my welfare and been kind to me. I looked forward to my twice weekly tutorials with him, and with his guidance, I passed the examination in December.

My next hurdle was in February 1955: the Trinity Hall entrance examination. My first paper on General Knowledge was a complete failure, or so I thought. I had to answer five questions and I spent nearly two hours on one question, writing a long dissertation on one of my heroes Salah al-Din or Saladin as he was known to the Occidentals. I went into raptures about this magnificent Seldjuk Turk leader. It was only later that I learned that the professors were astonished that a young Sinhalese boy from the East knew so much about Saladin.

Next I had to go for a viva voce examination. It was held by a distinguished gentleman who sat at a desk taking notes. On the side of the table sat a jolly old gentleman. I was laughing and chatting with the old man and very obsequious towards the gentleman at the desk. It was only later I learned that the jolly old man was the great Tell Ellis-Lewis, the editor of Winfield on Tort, and the distiguished gentleman seated at the desk was his assistant. Anyway, I passed the entrance examination and got my place at Trinity Hall.

(To be continued)

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Features

The State of the Union and the Spectacle of Trump

Published

2 hours ago

2026/03/1

Thilina Walpola

A Grim Handshake: The President and the Chief Justice at the State of the Union

President Donald J. Trump, as the American President often calls himself, is a global spectacle. And so are his tariffs. On Friday, February 20, the US Supreme Court led by Chief Justice John Roberts and a 6-3 majority, struck down the most ballyhooed tariff scheme of all times. Upholding the earlier decisions of the lower federal courts, the Supreme Court held that Trump’s use of ‘emergency powers’ to impose the so called Liberation Day tariffs on 2 April 2025, is not legal. The Liberation Day tariffs, which were comically announced on a poster board at the White House Rose Garden, is a system of reciprocal tariffs applied to every country that exported goods and services to America. The court ruling has pulled off the legal fig leaf with which Trump had justified his universal tariff scheme.

Trump was livid after the ruling on Friday and invectively insulted the six judges who ruled against Trump’s tariffs. There was nothing personal about it, but for Trump, the ever petulant man-boy, there isn’t anything that is not personal. On Tuesday night in Washington, Trump delivered his first State of the Union address of his second presidency. The Chief Justice, who once called the State of the Union, “a political pep rally,” attended the pomp and exchanged a grim handshake with the President.

Tuesday’s State of the Union was the longest speech ever in what is a long standing American tradition that is also a constitutional requirement. The Trump showmanship was in full display for the millions of Americans who watched him and millions of others in the rest of world, especially mandarins of foreign governments, who were waiting to parse his words to detect any sign for his next move on tariffs or his next move in Iran. There was nothing much to parse, however, only theatre for Trump’s Republican followers and taunts for opposing Democrats. He was in his usual elements as the Divider in Chief. There was truly little on offer for overseas viewers.

On tariffs, he is bulldozing ahead, he boasted, notwithstanding the Supreme Court ruling last Friday. But the short lived days of unchecked executive tariff powers are over even though Trump wouldn’t let go of his obsessive illusions. On the Middle East, Trump praised himself for getting the release of Israeli hostages, dead or alive, out of Gaza, but had no word for the Palestinians who are still being battered on that wretched strip of land. On Ukraine, he bemoaned the continuing killings in their thousands every month but had no concept or plan for ending the war while insisting that it would not have started if he were president four years ago.

He gave no indication of what he might do in Iran. He prefers diplomacy, he said, but it would be the most costly diplomatic solution given the scale of deployment of America’s fighting assets in the region under his orders. In Trump’s mind, this could be one way of paying for a Nobel Prize for peace. More seriously, Trump is also caught in the horns of a dilemma of his own making. He wanted an external diversion from his growing domestic distractions. If he were thinking using Iran as a diversion, he also cannot not ignore the warnings from his own military professionals that going into Iran would not be a walk in the park like taking over Venezuela. His state of mind may explain his reticence on Iran in the State of the Union speech.

Even on the domestic front, there was hardly anything of substance or any new idea. One lone new idea Trump touted is about asking AI businesses to develop their own energy sources for their data centres without tapping into existing grids, raising demand and causing high prices and supply shortages. That was a political announcement to quell the rising consumer alarms, especially in states such as Michigan where energy guzzling data centres are becoming hot button issue for the midterm Congress and Senate elections in November. Trump can see the writing on the wall and used much of his speech to enthuse his base and use patriotism to persuade the others.

Political Pep Rally: Chief Justice John G. Roberts sits stoically with Justices Elena Kagan, Bret Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett, as Republicans are on their feet applauding.

Although a new idea, asking AI forces to produce their own energy comes against a background of a year-long assault on established programs for expanding renewable energy sources. Fortunately, the courts have nullified Trump’s executive orders stopping renewable energy programs. But there is no indication if the AI sector will be asked to use renewable energy sources or revert to the polluting sources of coal or oil. Nor is it clear if AI will be asked to generate surplus energy to add to the community supply or limit itself to feeding its own needs. As with all of Trump’s initiatives the devil is in the details and is left to be figured out later.

The Supreme Court Ruling

The backdrop to Tuesday’s State of the Union had been rendered by Friday’s Supreme Court ruling. Chief Justice Roberts who wrote the majority ruling was both unassuming and assertive in his conclusion: “We claim no special competence in matters of economics or foreign affairs. We claim only, as we must, the limited role assigned to us by Article III of the Constitution. Fulfilling that role, we hold that IEEPA (International Emergency Economic Powers Act) does not authorize the President to impose tariffs.”

IEEPA is a 1977 federal legislation that was enacted during the Carter presidency, to both clarify and restrict presidential powers to act during national emergency situations. The immediate context for the restrictive element was the experience of the Nixon presidency. One of the implied restrictions in IEEPA is in regard to tariffs which are not specifically mentioned in the legislation. On the other hand, Article 1, Section 8 of the US Constitution establishes taxes and tariffs as an exclusively legislative function whether they are imposed within the country or implemented to regulate trade and commerce with other countries. In his first term, Trump tried to impose tariffs on imports through the Congress but was rebuffed even by Republicans. In the second term, he took the IEEA route, bypassing Congress and expecting the conservative majority in the Supreme Court to bail him out of legal challenges. The Court said, No. Thus far, but no farther.

The main thrust of the ruling is that it marks a victory for the separation of powers against a president’s executive overreach. Three of the Court’s conservative judges (CJ Roberts, Neil Gorsuch, and Amy Coney Barrett) joined the three liberal judges (all women – Sonia Sotomayor, Elana Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson) to chart a majority ruling against the president’s tariffs. The three dissenters were Brett Kavanugh, who wrote the dissenting opinion, Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito. Justices Gorsuch, Kavanaugh and Barrett were appointed by Trump. Trump took out Gorsuch and Barrett for special treatment after their majority ruling, while heaping praise on Kavanaugh who ruled in favour of the tariffs. Barrett and Kavanaugh attended the State of the Union along with Roberts and Kagan, while the other five stayed away from the pep rally (see picture).

The Economics of the Ruling

In what was a splintered ruling, different judges split legal hairs between themselves while claiming no special competence in economics and ruling on a matter that was all about trade and economics. Yale university’s Stephen Roach has provided an insightful commentary on the economics of the court ruling, while “claiming no special competence in legal matters.” Roach takes out every one of Trump’s pseudo-arguments supporting tariffs and provides an economist’s take on the matter.

First, he debunks Trump’s claim that trade deficits are an American emergency. The real emergency, Roach notes, is the low level of American savings, falling to 0.2% of the national income in 2025, even as trade deficit in goods reached a new record $1.2 trillion. America’s need for foreign capital to compensate for its low savings, and its thirst for cheap imported goods keep the balance of payments and trade deficits at high levels.

Second, by imposing tariffs Trump is not helping but burdening US consumers. The Americans are the ones who are paying tariffs contrary to Trump’s own false beliefs and claims that foreign countries are paying them. 90% of the tariffs have been paid by American consumers, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Small businesses have paid the rest. Foreign countries pay nothing but they have been making deals with Trump to keep their exports flowing.

According to published statistics, the average U.S. applied tariff rate increased from 1.6% before Trump’s tariff’s to 17%, the highest level since World War II. The removal of reciprocal tariffs after the ruling would have lowered it to 9.1%, but it will rise to 13% after Trump’s 15% tariffs. The registered tariff revenue is about $175 billion, 0.6% of U.S. gross domestic product. The tariff monies collected are legally refundable. The Supreme Court did not get into the modalities for repayment and there would be multiple lawsuits before the lower courts if the Administration does not set up a refunding mechanism.

Lastly, in railing against globalization and the loss of American industries, Trump is cutting off America’s traditional allies and trading partners in Europe, Canada and Mexico who account for 54% of all US trade flows in manufactured goods. Cutting them off has only led these countries to look for other alternatives, especially China and India. All of this is not helping the US or its trade deficit. The American manufacturers (except for sectoral beneficiaries in steel, aluminum and auto industries), workers and consumers are paying the price for Trump’s economic idiosyncrasies. As Roach notes, the Court stayed away from the economic considerations, but by declaring Trump’s IEEPA tariffs unconstitutional, the Court has sent an important message to the American people and the rest of the world that “US policies may not be personalized by the whims of a vindictive and uninformed wannabe autocrat.”

by Rajan Philips

Features

The Victor Melder odyssey: from engine driver CGR to Melbourne library founder

Published

3 hours ago

2026/03/1

Thilina Walpola

Victor Melder in Library

He celebrated his 90th birthday recently, never returned to his homeland because he’s a bad traveler

(Continued from last week)

THE GARRAT LOCOS, were monstrous machines that were able to haul trains on the incline, that normally two locos did. Whilst a normal loco hauled five carriages on its own, a Garrat loco could haul nine. When passenger traffic warranted it and trains had over nine carriages or had a large number of freight wagons, then a Garret loco hauled the train assisted by a loco from behind.

When a train was worked by two normal locos (one pulling, the other pushing) and they reached the summit level at Pattipola (in either direction), the loco pushing (piloting) would travel around to the front the train and be coupled in front of the loco already in front and the two locos took the train down the incline. With a Garraat loco this could not be done as the bridges could not take the combined weight. The pilot loco therefore ran down single, following THE TRAIN.

My father was stationed at Nawalapitiya as a senior driver at the time, and it wasn’t a picnic working with him. He believed in the practical side of things and always had the apprentices carrying out some extra duties or the other to acquaint themselves with the loco. I had more than my fair share.

After the four months upcountry, we were back at Dematagoda on the K. V. steam locos. From the sublime to the ridiculous, I would say after the Garret locos upcountry. Here the work was much easier and at a slower pace, as the trains did not run at speed like their mainline counterparts. The last two months of the third year saw us on the two types of diesel locos on the K.V. line, the Hunslett and Krupp diesels, which worked the passenger trains. For once this was a ‘cushy, sit-down’ job, doing nothing exciting, but keeping a sharp lookout and exchanging tablets on the run. The third year had come to an end and ‘the light at the end of tunnel was getting closer’.

Victor M’s Sri Lanka Ranjana medal

The fourth year saw us all at the Diesel loco shed at Maradana, which was cheek by jowl with the Maradana railway station. The first three months we worked with the diesel mechanical fitters and the following three months with the electrical fitters. Heavy emphasis was placed on a working knowledge of the electrical circuits of the different diesel locos in service, to ensure the drivers were able to attend to electrical faults en-route and bring the train home. This was again a period of lectures and demonstrations

We also spent three months at the Ratmalana workshops, where the diesels were stripped down to the core and refitted after major repairs, to ensure we had a look at what went on inside the many closed and sealed working parts. This was again a 7.00am to 4.00pm day job. Back again at the Diesel shed, Maradana, saw us riding as assistants for the next three months on all the diesel locos in service – The Brush Bragnal (M1), General Electrical (M2), Hunslett locos (G2) and Diesel Rail Cars.

After the final written test on Diesel locos, we began our fifth and final year, which was that of shunting engine driver. The first six months were spent at Maligawatte Yard on steam shunting locos and the next three months shunting drivers on the diesel shunting locos at Colombo goods yard. The final three months were spent as assistants on the M1 and M2 locos working all the fast passenger and mail trains.

Cartoon to celebrate Victor’s 60th wedding anniversary

I was finally appointed Engine Driver Class III on July 6, 1962, as mentioned earlier I lost eight months of my apprenticeship due to being ill and had to make up the time. This appointment was on three years’ probation, on the initial salary of the scale Rs 1,680 – 72 – Rs 2,184, per annum.

Little did the general traveling public realize that they had well trained and qualified engine drivers working their trains to time Victor was stationed in Galle until December 1967, when he resigned from the railway to migrate to Melbourne, Australia to join the rest of his family. He was the last of 11 siblings to leave Ceylon. Their two elder children were born in Galle. Victor and Esther had three more children in Australia. The children, three boys and two girls) were brought up with love and devotion. They have seven grandchildren and two great grandchildren. They meet often as a family.

He worked for the Victorian State Public Service and retired in 1993 after 25 years’ service. At the time of retirement, he worked for the Ministry for Conservation & Environment. He held the position of Project Officer in charge of the Ministry’s Procedural Documents.

He worked part-time for the Victorian Electoral Office and the Australian Electoral Office, covering State and Federal Elections, from 1972 to 2010. From 1972 to 1982 and was a Clerical Officer and then in 1983 was appointed Officer-in-Charge, Lychfield Avenue Polling Booth, Jacana which is my (the writer’s) electorate.

As part of serving the community Victor participated in a number of ways, quite often unremunerated. He worked part-time for the Department of Census & Statistics, and worked as a Census Collector for the Census of 1972, 1976, 1980 and then Group Leader of 16 Collectors in his area for the 1984, 1988, 1992, 1996, 2000, 2004, 2008 and 2012.

In 1970, Victor began this library, now known as the ‘Victor Melder Sri Lanka Library’, for the purpose of making Sri Lanka better known in Australia. On looking back he has this to say: “Forty-five years later, I can say that it is serving its purpose. In 1993 President Ranasinghe Premadasa of Sri Lanka bestowed on me a national honor – ‘Sri Lanka Ranjana’ for my then 25 years’ service to Sri Lanka in Australia. I feel very privileged to be honored by my motherland, which I feel is the highest accolade one can ever get.”

There were many more accolades over the years:

15.10. 2004, Serendib News, 2004 Business and Community Award.

4.2.2008, Award for Services to the SL Community by The Consulate of Sri Lanka in Victoria (by R. Arambewela)

2024 – SL Consul General’s Award

In 2025 , Victor was one of the ten outstanding Sri Lankans in Australia at the Lankan Fest.

An annual Victor Melder Appreciation award was established to honour an outstanding member by the SriLankan Consulate.

The following appreciation by the late Gamini Dissanayake is very appropriate.

Comment by the late Minister Gamini Dissanayake, in the comment book of the VMSL library.

A man is attached to many things. Attachments though leading to sorrow in the end

are the living reality of life. Amongst these many attachments, the most noble are the attachments to one’s family and to one’s country. You have left Sri Lanka long ago but “she” is within you yet and every nerve and sinew of your body, mind and soul seem to belong there. In your love for the country of your birth you seem to have no racial or religious connotations – you simply love “HER” – the pure, clear, simple, abstract and glowing Sri Lanka of our imagination and vision. You are an example of what all Sri Lankan’s should be. May you live long with your vision and may Sri Lanka evolve to deserve sons like you.

With my best Wishes.

Gamini Dissanayake, Minister from Sri Lanka.

15 February 1987.

The Victor Melder Lecture

The Monash council established the Victor Melder Lecture which is presented every February. It is now an annual event looked forward to by Melbournians. A guest lecturer is carefully chosen each year for this special event.

Victor and his library has featured on many publications such as the Sunday Times in 2008 and LMD International in 2026.

“Although having been a railway man, I am a poor traveler and get travel sickness, hence I have not travelled much. I have never been back to Sri Lanka, never travelled in Australia, not even to Geelong. I am happiest doing what I like best, either at Church or in this library. My younger daughter has finally given up after months of trying to coax, cajole and coerce me into a trip to Sri Lanka to celebrate this (90^th) birthday.

I am most fortunate that over the years I have made good friends, some from my school days. It is also a great privilege to grow old in the company of friends — like-minded individuals who have spent their childhood and youth in the same environment as oneself and shared similar life experiences.”

Victor’s love of books started from childhood. Since his young years he has been interested in reading. At St Mary’s College, Nawalapitiya, the library had over 300 books on Greek and Roman history and mythology and he read every one of them.

He read the newspapers daily, which his parents subscribed to, including the ‘Readers Digest’.His mother was an avid fan of Crossword Puzzles and encouraged all the children to follow her, a trait which he continues to this day.

At his workplace in Melbourne, Victor encountered many who asked questions about Ceylon. Often, he could not find an answer to these queries. This was long before the internet existed. He then started getting books on Ceylon/SriLanka and reading them. Very soon his collection expanded and he thought of the Vicor Melder SriLanka Library as source of reference. It is now a vast collection of over 7,000 books, magazines and periodicals.

Another driver of his service to fellow men is his deep Catholic faith in which he follows the footsteps of the Master.

Victor was baptized at St Anthony’s Cathedral, Kandy by Fr Galassi, OSB. Since the age of 10 he have been involved with Church activities both in Sri Lanka and Australia. He remains a devout Catholic and this underlies his spirit of service to fellowmen.

He began as an Altar Server at St Mary’s Church, Nawalapitiya, and continued even in his adult life. In Australia, Esther and Victor have been Parishioners at St Dominic’s Church, Broadmeadows, since 1970.He started as an Adult Server and have been an Altar Server Trainer, Reader and Special Minister He was a member of the ‘Counting Team’ for monies collected at Sunday Masses, for 35 years.

He has actively retired from this work since 2010, but is still ‘on call’, to help when required. To add in his own words

“My Catholic faith has always been important to me, and I can never imagine my having spent a day away from God. Faith is all that matters to Esther too. We attend daily Mass and busy ourselves with many activities in our Parish Church.

For nearly 25 years, we have also been members of a religious order ‘The Community of the Sons & Daughters of God’, it is contemplative and monastic in nature, we are veritable monks in the world. We do no good works, other than show Christ to the world, by our actions. Both Esther and I, after much prayer and discernment have become more deeply involved, taking vows of poverty, obedience and chastity, within the Community. Our spirituality gives us much peace, solace and comfort.”

“This is not my CV for beatification and canonization. My faith is in fact an antidote for overcoming evil, I too struggle like everyone else. I have to exorcise the demons within me by myself. I am a perfect candidate for “being a street angel and home devil” by my constant impatience, lack of tolerance and wanting instant perfection from everyone. “

The above exemplifies the humility of the man who admits to his foibles.

More than 25 years ago The Ceylon Society of Australia was formed in Sydney by a group of Ceylon lovers led by Hugh Karunanayake. Very soon the Melbourne chapter of the organization was formed, and Victor was a crucial part of this. At every Talk, Victor displayed books relevant to the topic. For many years he continued to do so carrying a big box of books and driving a fair distance to the meeting place. Eventually when he could no longer drive his car, he made certain that the books reached the venue through his close friend, Hemal Gurusinghe.

He also was the guest speaker at one of the meetings and he regaled the audience with railway stories.

Victor has dedicated his life on this mission, and we can be proud of his achievements. His vision is to find a permanent home for his library where future generations can use it and continue the service that he commenced. The plea is to get like-minded individuals in the quest to find a suitable and permanent home for the Victor Melder Srilankan Library.

by Dr. Srilal Fernando

Features

Sri Lanka to Host First-Ever World Congress on Snakes in Landmark Scientific Milestone

Published

3 hours ago

2026/03/1

Thilina Walpola

Dr. Anslem de Silva

Sri Lanka is set to make scientific history by hosting the world’s first global conference dedicated entirely to snake research, conservation and public health, with the World Congress on Snakes (WCS) 2026 scheduled to take place from October 1–4 at The Grand Kandyan Hotel in Kandy World Congress on Snakes.

The congress marks a major milestone not only for Sri Lanka’s biodiversity research community but also for global collaboration in herpetology, conservation science and snakebite management.

Congress Chairperson Dr. Anslem de Silva described the event as “a long-overdue global scientific platform that recognises the ecological, medical and cultural importance of snakes.”

“This will be the first international congress fully devoted to snakes — from their evolution and taxonomy to venom research and snakebite epidemiology,” Dr. de Silva said. “Sri Lanka, with its exceptional biodiversity and deep ecological relationship with snakes, is a fitting host for such a historic gathering.”

Global Scientific Collaboration

The congress has been established through an international scientific partnership, bringing together leading experts from Sri Lanka, India and Australia. It is expected to attract herpetologists, wildlife conservationists, toxinologists, veterinarians, genomic researchers, policymakers and environmental organisations from around the world.

The International Scientific Committee includes globally respected experts such as Prof. Aaron Bauer, Prof. Rick Shine, Prof. Indraneil Das and several other authorities in reptile research and conservation biology.

Dr. de Silva emphasised that the congress is designed to bridge biodiversity science, medicine and society.

“Our aim is not merely to present academic findings. We want to translate science into practical conservation action, improved public health strategies and informed policy decisions,” he explained.

Addressing a Neglected Public Health Crisis

A key pillar of the congress will be snakebite envenoming — widely recognised as a neglected tropical health problem affecting rural communities across Asia, Africa and Latin America.

“Snakebite is not just a medical issue; it is a socio-economic issue that disproportionately impacts farming communities,” Dr. de Silva noted. “By bringing clinicians, toxinologists and conservation scientists together, we can strengthen prevention strategies, improve treatment protocols and promote community education.”

Scientific sessions will explore venom biochemistry, clinical toxinology, antivenom sustainability and advances in genomic research, alongside broader themes such as ecological behaviour, species classification, conservation biology and environmental governance.

Dr. de Silva stressed that fear-driven persecution of snakes, habitat destruction and illegal wildlife trade continue to threaten snake populations globally.

“Snakes play an essential ecological role, particularly in controlling rodent populations and maintaining agricultural balance,” he said. “Conservation and public safety are not opposing goals — they are interconnected. Scientific understanding is the foundation for coexistence.”

The congress will also examine cultural perceptions of snakes, veterinary care, captive management, digital monitoring technologies and integrated conservation approaches linking biodiversity protection with human wellbeing.

Strategic Importance for Sri Lanka

Hosting the global event in the historic city of Kandy — a UNESCO World Heritage site — is expected to significantly enhance Sri Lanka’s standing as a hub for scientific and environmental collaboration.

Dr. de Silva pointed out that the benefits extend beyond the four-day meeting.

“This congress will open doors for Sri Lankan researchers and students to access world-class expertise, training and international partnerships,” he said. “It will strengthen our national research capacity in biodiversity and environmental health.”

He added that the event would also generate economic activity and position Sri Lanka as a destination for high-level scientific conferences, expanding the country’s international image beyond traditional tourism promotion.

The congress has received support from major international conservation bodies including the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), Save the Snakes, Cleveland Metroparks Zoo and the Amphibian and Reptile Research Organization of Sri Lanka (ARROS).

As preparations gather momentum, Dr. de Silva expressed optimism that the World Congress on Snakes 2026 would leave a lasting legacy.

“This is more than a conference,” he said. “It is the beginning of a global movement to promote science-based conservation, improve snakebite management and inspire the next generation of researchers. Sri Lanka is proud to lead that conversation.”

By Ifham Nizam