Opinion

The epidemiology of violence

Published

3 years ago

2023/07/6

Sahan Weerasooriya

Protesters storming the Presidential Secretariat in 2022

By Prof. Susirith Mendis

(First part of this article appeared in The Island Midweek Review of 05 June 2023)

Is civil disobedience violence or a prelude to violence?

Civil disobedience, by generally accepted definition, entails a deliberate breach of law (usually unjust), that is committed with the intention of communicating to a broad audience, including state authorities and the general public, the need for some legal or political change.

Mohandas Ramchand Gandhi internationalised the concept of non-violent struggle through non-violent civil disobedience (Sathyagraha and Sathyakriya) as an effective mode of modern political protests against the colonial rule of British in India. Gandhi’s Salt March was an act of civil disobedience – the principled refusal to comply with a law, at the risk of imprisonment or other punishment, in order to force a concession. Did the ‘aragalites’ envisage arrest and imprisonment at any time during their protests? Or were they of the firm belief that they are not breaking any law and therefore cannot and will not be arrested? Did they walk a thin red line or did they not?

Civil disobedience is a form of political protest. Martin Luther King exercised it in all his political actions by taking to the streets. But it is often emphasised that there are good pragmatic reasons for civil disobedience campaigns to adhere to non-violence.

It is useful for us to look at a recent example from France. Andreas Marcou describes this in his article titled “Violence, communication, and civil disobedience” in ‘Jurisprudence’ – an International Journal of Legal and Political Thought. He describes the events that took place in November 2018, when hundreds of thousands of French people took to the streets to protest President Emmanuel Macron’s planned tax hike for diesel and gas (déjà vu?). What began as a protest for fuel tax finally spiralled into multiple episodes of spasmodic violence. What commenced as non-violent protest within weeks of the initial protest, news outlets were brimming with pictures of burning cars, police in anti-riot gear clashing with protesters throwing projectiles, the Arc de Triomphe vandalised, and high street shops ransacked. With thousands of protesters and police officers injured, thousands were arrested and convicted, and several dead because of the protests. The current violence in Paris following the killing of a 17-year-old boy by the police is another example of the generally politically volatile French public.

Furthermore, Marcou goes on to describe how the ‘Black Lives Matter’ movement that began largely as non-violent, there have been instances of clashes with police and counter-protesters, as well as looting and other damage to property. He says that the French protest and the resurgent Black Lives Matter movement “have once again brought forward debates about violence and disobedience”. Therefore, it is apparent that non-violent protest can qualify as civil disobedience. Some experts argue that some violent protests could be classified as civil disobedience. But we still need to find the ‘thin red line’ that demarcates civil disobedience from violent protests.

It is often debated that “violent civil disobedience” – though it sounds like an oxymoron – is justified in situations where “fundamentally illegitimate regimes” are violating human rights of citizens. For instance, even the killing of a genocidal dictator (such as Hitler or Pol Pot) when thousands of innocent lives are at stake, is arguably morally defensible. However, in the context of protests against a democratically elected legitimate regime, the use of violence is hardly justifiable. I would argue on the aforesaid basis, that the ‘GotaGoHome’ protests have justification only if they remained non-violent.

Justifiable violence

In self-defence

This is the most controversial and debatable aspect of violence. Often, we find that the perpetrators of violence use ‘justifiable violence’ as the excuse for their actions.

Andrea Borghini in an article in February 2019 titled “Can Violence be Just?” commences thus: “In some, probably most, circumstances it is evident that violence is unjust; but some cases appear more debatable to someone’s eyes: can violence ever be justified?

In its most basic form, violence is justified when it is personal counter-violence. If a person punches you in the face, it may seem justified to try and respond to that with counter physical violence – i.e., a form of self-defence. Borghini further argues that “In a more audacious version of the justification of violence in the name of self-defense, violence of any kind may be justified in reply to the violence of any other kind, provided there is a somewhat fair use of the violence exercised in self-defense.”

Political violence

Usually, political violence is a means to an end where the ‘end justifies the means’. Political violence by definition is said to be considered not as an end in itself. The concept of consequentialism would justify violence if the consequences were sufficiently ‘good’ to justify the harm of violence. Utilitarianism, on the other hand, would allow for the use of violence where utility or usefulness of violence is of benefit to society.

This may be countered by the argument that anarchic violence, though political, is often chaotic and directionless and the outcome or end is unclear.

Argument for the moral grounds of political violence have been enunciated by many philosophers. Political violence is justified in the situation in which the violence is employed as a necessary means to an end, in which all other ‘means’ have been exhausted and where the violence is for the restoration of democracy from authoritarianism or fascism.

Where in the spectrum of justifiable political violence does the ‘aragalaya’ fall into? Or is it justifiable in the context of an economic crisis precipitated by a multiplicity of factors – both external and internal – in a democratic sociopolitical milieu that was not authoritarian nor fascistic? Perhaps answers to these questions may lie in one’s political perspectives.

Revolutionary violence

Where in the spectrum of political violence can we put violence that has occurred during revolutions?

The major successful revolutions have been the Russian, Chinese and Cuban in our modern history. Then we have had the Iranian and Philippine revolutions; the revolutions in Nicaragua and some Latin American countries; and the ‘colour’ revolutions in the former Soviet-East European states. The latter have been qualitatively different from the former where street demonstrations have led to violence and regime change. Where do we put what happened in Iraq, Syria and Libya? In that sense, the ‘aragalaya’ has been the most non-violent with little or no state violence unleashed to save the ruling regime.

I remember reading somewhere, about Dr. Dayan Jayatilleke’s book and its theorisation of Fidel’s ethics of violence where he writes about three key elements – which are the avoidance of (i) targeting non-combatants, (ii) physical torture, and (iii) the execution of captives. This has not been true of all revolutions. The most notable being the execution of Czar Alexander and his family.

Morality and Ethics of violence

This brings us to another concept – the morality and ethics of violence. Since this article is getting longer than I first intended, I shall try to be as brief as possible. David Rapoport states that there are three prominent views on the morality of violence. They are: (1) the pacifist position, which states that violence is always immoral, and should never be used; (2) the utilitarian position – that violence can be used if it achieves a greater “good” for society; (3) a hybrid of these two views which both looks at what good comes from the use of violence, while also examining the types of violence used.

In a provocative thesis – ‘Virtuous Violence’ by Alan Page Fiske, an anthropologist at UCLA, and Tage Rai, a psychologist and post-doctoral scholar at Northwestern University, they conclude that “across cultures and history, there is generally one motive for hurting or killing: people are violent because it feels like the right thing to do. They feel morally obliged to do it.”

Can the perpetrators who attacked and killed 12 people in the Charlie Hebdo offices in Paris on January 7th, 2015, justify themselves on the basis of the above argument? The two brothers who were responsible for the attack and killings later said that they “were defending Prophet Mohommed”.

Can the bombing of Afghanistan by the US Air Force with support from Britain, France, Australia, Canada and Germany, soon after the 9-11 bombing of the twin towers in New York be justified on the same basis?

Can the Russian invasion of Ukraine be justified on the basis of an existential threat to its territory and nationhood from the attempted expansion of NATO?

Can the attack on ‘aragalites’ in front of ‘Temple Trees’ justify the burning and looting of 70-odd houses all over Sri Lanka?

It can be all too easy to brand violence as evil, but increasingly, research is revealing this approach is being too simplistic and offers no effective means of reducing violence. A similar insight is drawn by the Harvard psychologist, Steven Pinker who argues that most perpetrators of violence throughout history are not pathological but motivated to act within their own moral framework.

Now the obvious question comes up. What is this ‘moral framework’? It obviously differs from culture to culture and societal norms of different communities. Is violence justified when defending the unarmed and unempowered? The issue of morality and ethics of violence is not as straightforward as we might wish to think. Each specific situation demands analysis of the morality of violence. We are left with an unanswered moral dilemma. “Is violence always wrong?”

Just War theory

The just war theory (JWT) is a doctrine of military ethics that aims to ensure that a war is morally justifiable through a series of criteria, all of which must be met for a war to be considered just.

It is said that JWT can be traced as far back as to Ancient Egypt. The Chinese justified war only as a last resort and only if declared by the rightful sovereign. But they added the fallacious argument that the success of a military campaign was sufficient proof that the war had been righteous. This is not surprising as we find that this argument seems to be in play in modern times as well. The outcome of World Wars I and II and the Treaty of Versailles and the Nuremburg Trials are classic examples of the persistence of the Chinese argument for a righteous war.

The Mahabharata offers the first written discussions of a “just war” (dharma-yuddha or “righteous war”). In it, one of five ruling brothers (Pandavas) asks if the suffering caused by war can ever be justified. A long discussion then ensues between the siblings, establishing criteria like proportionality (chariots cannot attack cavalry, only other chariots; no attacking people in distress), just means (no poisoned or barbed arrows), just cause (no attacking out of rage), and fair treatment of captives and the wounded.

From the Islamic concept of jihad (Arabic: “striving”), or holy war, comes the concept of Muslim legal theory which is the only type of just war in their ‘rule book’.

Most wars are justified on one or another rationale. Those who go to war always have a justification. The US involvement in the Vietnam war and the current war between Russia and the Ukraine are contrasting cases from the ends of the political spectrum.

In conclusion

I have tried in this short essay to discuss violence as an anthropological entity with a spectrum of opinions and justifications. The debate/discussion will last as long as civilisation lasts. As long as we as humans will have our primaeval, atavistic ‘tribal’ propensities. As long as we are divided by class, caste, religion, race and nationhood.

The ‘aragalaya’ must necessarily fall into some slot in these myriad human propensities for violence and non-violence. As I said at the outset, there are a few unique features in what happened from April to July 2022. It began with a non-violent peaceful right to protest. The candle-lit vigils – mostly of the middle and upper-middle class – that almost immediately changed into a spasm of violence in Mirihana when a bus was torched. In the minds of some of them, their intentions were violent right from the beginning. But for others, it was justified, non-violent protests against a regime that had deteriorated fast into economic chaos leading to civil unrest.

So, to which slot exactly, can we put the ‘aragalaya’ in this ‘epidemiology of violence’? How spontaneous was it? Were there other players in the shadows who played ‘puppets on strings’? Were there external sources who funded the ‘aragalaya’? If so, what were their motivations? Was ‘regime change’ on their agenda? Did the circumstances of those heady events demand a regime change?

Did our predominant culture, the Buddhist ethos prevent serious violence on the part of the ‘aragalites’, and more pertinently on the part of the regime? Why was not a single shot fired into the air, and failing which into the crowd, when the Presidential Residence gates were breached? Why did the President slink away quietly by the back door into political oblivion? Do the current attempts at supressing dissent ‘by legal means’ portend of more violence to come?

We shall have to await a detailed and deep analysis of what happened in those critical months in 2022 in Sri Lanka to make better sense of what really happened a year ago.

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Opinion

Palm leaf manuscripts of Sri Lanka – Part V

Published

12 hours ago

2026/06/15

Thilina Walpola

Ola leaves

Medical prescriptions were written on palm leaf manuscripts. Bhesajja Manjusa (Casket of Medicine) is the oldest medical manuscript written in Sri Lanka. There is a Sinhala translation of the Pali original in the Colombo Museum library. The manuscript of Bhesajja Manjusa held in Ayurveda Research Institute, Maharagama was included in the UNESCO Memory of the World national register in 2016.

The Bhesajja manuscripts can be found in Dalada Maligawa Patirippuwa library, Galvene purana vihara Angoda, Mettaramaya in Bambalapitiya, Colombo Valukaramaya at Pamburana, Matara and Kosgodella Raja Maha Vihara.

Sirancee Gunawardana says she has seen a medical manuscript belonging to Sirimavo Bandaranaike, handed down from her grandfather, a medical practitioner. It had prescriptions using herbs, roots, barks of trees and indigenous seeds, for ailments ranging from stomach trouble, pediatric, pregnancy, fever, headaches, cholera, smallpox, chicken pox, eye, cancer and snake bite. It was written in 1850. There are 39 other such manuscripts in the collection.

Palm leaf manuscripts mention immersion therapy and acupuncture. Sirancee has paid special attention to acupuncture. Sirancee found a very old manuscript on acupuncture in the Institute of Ayurveda, Rajagiriya. It is very well illustrated. Pelmadulla Raja Maha Vihara has a 12th century manuscript giving acupuncture points for humans, also for cock, horse, buffalo. The full manuscript is reproduced in her book. She has also included in full another acupuncture manuscript by Sadiris Perera.

Manuscripts that give remedies for snake bites were known as Sarpa Veda oth. Colombo Museum Library has one where the prescriptions are given in verse. Sirancee owned a ‘very interesting’ ola on herbal treatment of cobra and other snake bites.

The Sinhala state had its own healing system in the Udarata before the British took over the kingdom. Western medicine soon displaced the Vederala (local doctor) but some parts of the native system survived up to the middle of the 20 century.

The Report of the 1950 Commission on the Ancient system of Sinhalese Medicine (SP 17 of 1950) stated that Sihala “vedakam” was a distinct medical system with its own drugs, diagnostic methods and treatments. It was particularly effective for snake bite, fractures, rabies and cancerous tumors, said the Report.’ The Sinhala “vedakam” or “Desiya chikithsa” physicians saw themselves as a distinct group, belonging to ‘veda parampara’ through the possession of secret family recipes, the report said. A national health system cannot operate on secret prescriptions. This secrecy would have been a later aberration.

Sinhala vedakam prescriptions would have been recorded on palm leaf. The National Library of Sri Lanka has publicized the fact that it has manuscripts on Sinhala Vedakam. Hugh Neville collection has a Sinhala pharmacopeia, written in the 19th century. Pelmadulla Purana Viharaya had an ola dealing with surgical specialties, written in Sinhala, copied in 1862.

There are many palm leaf manuscripts written in Sinhala containing herbal prescriptions that have originated in Sri Lanka, said Sirancee. Firstly, there is the collection of prescriptions which the vederala carries with him for immediate use. It is a collection compiled by him or his ancestors and is known as ‘beheth vattoru potha.’ This potha contained prescriptions for emetics, purgatives, medicine for diarrhea, piles, worm treatment and blood ailments.

There is a ‘beheth vattoru pota’ in the Kosgoda vihara library. There are about 103 beheth vattoru poth in the TPP Goonetilleke collection. Historical Manuscripts Commission was shown a Udarata beheth potha, one manuscript held in a curated collection, contained the prescriptions of a physician named Hatara Korale Huhgampola Ruppege Dara Mudalihami (sic).

Elephants played a major role in the Sinhala state. There are many palm leaf manuscripts on how to manage elephants and treat their illnesses. The manuscript titled ‘Hasti Yoga Silpa’ , seen by Sirancee is in verse and has charms for protection of elephants. Harakola Sri Anandarama Viharaya in Gampola had two manuscripts on elephants, one manuscript was an Ali veda pota , the other was on elephant charms and sensitive spots.

Palm leaf manuscripts provide scattered information on music, song and dance. Alutnuwara Raja Maha Vihara had a manuscript with music notations. Sirancee Gunawardana in her book ‘Palm leaf manuscripts of Sri Lanka’ said she has not seen anything else like it and published a photograph of the manuscript in her book. Historical manuscripts Commission found a manuscript which had a stanza in very rare meter in a chant for Kataragama Deviyo.

On the subject of drums, Andreas Nell presented the Colombo Museum library with a copy of an ola titled “Bera, davul, tammata adiye upata.” The original is in the British Library. The Tupavamsa manuscript mentions 20 types of drums used in Sri Lanka. The “Isavara nartaya” manuscript in the Colombo Museum, which is in Sinhala, gives 32 tunes for drums written in kavi style.

Regarding dance, Hugh Neville collection has a manuscript titled “nrutya upata“. It has three sections, gitaya, nrutya, and pada and provides 36 different beats for the drum. Alutnuwara Raja Maha Vihara had a manuscript called Pada Natuma.

There were three other manuscripts on movement. Hugh Nevill collection had a 100-year-old manuscript on Sokari nateema. There were many palm leaf manuscripts on leekeli in Colombo Museum library. Historical Manuscripts Commission (1951) had found a manuscript, titled Pandama ganna kavi ,5 verses sung to invoke the blessing of the gods before the dancers approached the road. This would have been for a perahera.

There was some information on the song. Historical Manuscript Commission (1933) found in family collections, lots of panegyric type songs for the Udarata kings. One manuscript had verses sung at the coronation of Kandyan kings. Verses sung at the coronation of king Narendrasinha were recorded in a manuscript titled “Sringara alamkaraya” (1842).

Sri Lanka has a notable “kavi” tradition. There are many kavi manuscripts dating from the 18th and 19th centuries, in palm leaf collections. An interesting feature in these collections are the kavi to be sung at work, including songs to be sung when spinning thread.

Colombo museum library has a manuscript with two sets of “kavi“. Kavi to be sung when weeding paddy fields and “Nelum kavi” to be sung when reaping the harvest. The “Nelum kavi” manuscript was prepared by Tikiri Yadesguru in 1862.

Olas contain kavi for harvesting Kurakkan. Colombo Museum library has a manuscript on growing kurakkan (millet), how to sow the grain, protect it, fence it from wild pigs , how to put up a watch hut, how to harvest the millet and how to cook it.

Hugh Nevill collection has a “kavi” manuscript titled “Peduru Male” This manuscript relates the story of a rush mat weaving competition between a mother-in-law and a daughter in law. They first weave ordinary mats then a strong knotted mat, gold flowered mat, tasseled mat, mat with hare, mat showing a jackal about to eat the hare, then a deer mat, leopard mat, cat, rat, lion and elephant mats. Thereafter, they weave a mat with a buddha’s throne and finally a mat with loha-maha-paya and dagoba design. Sirancee observed that this ballad describes various unusual mat designs and provides information on the art of weaving rush mats.

Historical Manuscripts Commission (1933) found an architectural plan at Lankatilleke vihara, 17th or 18th century. It was the ground plan of a royal palace, a ‘raja maliga salasma’. Design was rectangular, with ornate triangular and circular buildings within the space. The plan gave the Sinhala names for special buildings and the different departments set aside for different services. This was of considerable value since these words are rarely met and indicates the functions of these apartments.

Cook books were found among curated collections. Dalada Maligawa library has a book titled ‘Supa Sastra’ containing recipes and food prepared for the king. Hugh Neville collection has a manuscript in Sinhala which gives rules for selecting a cook, how to arrange the logs in a hearth, how to make a fire and how rice should be cooked. The ola gave instruction on cooking fish, meat, broths, vegetables, sambals, chutneys and spiced curries. The ola had recipes for making milk rice, pickle, jackfruit curry, and oil cakes. There was advice on how to avoid overeating and how to distinguish poisons in food.

Traditional Sinhala society believes in astrology. Horoscopes are cast when a child is born. The chart and interpretation are inscribed on an ola. This was the tradition up to the first half of the 20 century. My horoscope, prepared in the 1940s, is on palm leaf. It is wound round and round and fastened through a slit in the leaf itself. From 1960 onwards, horoscopes were written on paper, but there are persons capable of recording them on palm leaf, if requested, even today.

Traditional Sinhala society also believes in the supernatural. There is a great fear of sorcery in our society. Yantra (talismans) are used in Sri Lanka to counter such sorcery. Yantra are mystic diagrams and geometrical designs, drawn onto strips of palm leaf or engraved onto copper or gold foil which are then rolled up and worn in a little metal case around the neck or upper arm as a protection against harm.

Yantra are meant to be protective charms primarily, but yantra are also used for curative purposes, for soliciting favors, and in rituals of revenge. Yantra were inscribed on palm leaves until recently. They are now etched on thin copper sheets.

Yantra manuscripts are profusely illustrated. They have diagrams and also ritual images drawn on them. Yantra drawings are in secret code. The Hugh Neville collection has a manuscript containing seven yantras which served as guidelines for those creating yantra images. These were kept secret by the practitioners.

LSD Peiris has one of the largest collections of Yantra manuscripts in the country. He has written a book titled ‘Yantra drawings in palm leaf, Sri Lanka.’ He has studied the subject for many years and has some interesting observations.

He says there is intricacy in the art forms way beyond what is needed, while preserving their ritual properties and intended purpose. I found the proportions and the ornamentation around the geometric outlines, the circles, ovals, squares, rectangles, diagonals and arcs very pleasing to the eye, though I could not appreciate their ritual significance.

Peiris says the script in which the text is written has ‘the authentic flavor of the Sinhala written script’. He says it is possible to locate fragments of letters from the Sinhala alphabet in the drawings. This can be seen in the fingers, toes and facial features of the figures drawn in the yantra. CONCLUDED.

REFERENCES

1st report of Historical Manuscripts Commission 1933 SP 9 of 1933

3rd report of Historical Manuscripts Commission 1951, SP 19 of 1951.

Report of the Commission on ancient system of Sinhalese medicine SP 17 of 1950

Sirancee Gunawardana Palm leaf manuscripts of Sri Lanka . 1977

L.S.D. Pieris Yantra drawing on palm leaf Sri Lanka 2018

https://www.natlib.lk/NLDSB/unesco-mow/

by KAMALIKA PIERIS

Opinion

Decoding Trump’s 12.5% “Forced Labor Tariff” on Sri Lanka

Published

12 hours ago

2026/06/15

Thilina Walpola

On June 2, 2026, the U.S. government once again proposed a new tariff on 60 economies, including Sri Lanka, because these countries have failed “to address the importation of goods made with forced labor.” The proposed additional duty on 54 economies is 12.5%. On other six economies, namely Canada, Ecuador, European Union, Indonesia, Mexico and Pakistan, the proposed additional duty is 10%. Surprisingly, Sri Lanka is in the 12.5% group.

This U.S. policy initiative marks a significant paradigm shift in international trade rules, as this is the first time that forced labour has been used as a rationale to trigger blanket retaliatory tariffs by any country. Earlier, “forced labour” was factored into bilateral trade agreements and preferential trade arrangements. For example, the European Union’s GSP labour arrangement, which was introduced in 1999, provided an additional tariff preference to developing countries which had ratified and effectively implemented the key ILO conventions, including two core conventions on forced labour. Interestingly, Sri Lanka was the first developing country to become eligible to receive tariff concessions under this arrangement. In other words, more than twenty years ago, the European Union recognized that Sri Lanka had effectively implemented core ILO conventions on forced labour and provided additional duty concessions.

So then, why did the U.S. suddenly introduce these “forced labor” tariffs?

To understand this, let’s start from that awful day in April 2025… the day President Trump announced with much glee and fanfare his sweeping “reciprocal tariffs” on over 90 countries under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA). The additional tariffs imposed ranged from 10% to 50%. Sri Lanka was hit with one of the highest additional tariffs at 44 percent! Mercifully, this was later negotiated down to 20%.

On February 20, 2026, the United States Supreme Court struck down these reciprocal tariffs and ruled that President Trump did not have the authority to impose tariffs under the IEEPA, because under the Article 1 of the U.S. Constitution the power to impose tariffs belongs exclusively to the U.S. Congress.

With that, President Trump’s executive powers on tariffs narrowed down to the Trade Act of 1974 (Trade Act), which grants the President the authority to combat unfair foreign trade practices. Section 122 of the Trade Act authorizes the President to impose temporary import surcharges to address fundamental balance-of-payments problems, up to a maximum of 150 days. Section 301 of the Trade Act authorizes the USTR to investigate and impose sanctions on foreign countries that violate U.S. trade agreements or engage in policies that are “unjustifiable,” “unreasonable,” or “discriminatory” and burden U.S. commerce.

Thus, immediately after the Supreme Court’s decision, on February 24th, President Trump imposed an additional 10% tariff on all imports from all trading partners, under Section 122. However, these tariffs cannot be extended beyond July 24, 2026, without the approval of the U.S. Congress. So, on March 12, 2026, the USTR initiated sixty investigations into the United States’ most important trading partners, from where 99.4 percent of U.S. imports are shipped. “….to determine whether the acts, policies, and practices of various economies related to the failure to impose and effectively enforce a prohibition on the importation of goods produced with forced labor are actionable under Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974.“

Sri Lanka’s Failure to Participate in Consultations and Public Hearings

After launching the 301 investigations on March 12th, the USTR requested consultations with the governments of each economy subject to investigation, and the USTR participated in confidential government-to-government consultations with 46 economies. As per available information, Sri Lanka was one of the fourteen countries that did not participate in these consultations. In addition to that, a public comment period was also opened for written submissions by all governments and other stakeholders, and the Section 301 Committee conducted a public hearing on April 28 and 29, 2026, with interested parties. Sri Lanka was once again conspicuously absent from these public hearings. It is difficult to understand why the Embassy of Sri Lanka in Washington, D.C., failed to participate in these consultations and public hearings! Participating in these consultations is an important part of the duties of Washington based diplomats. For example, at the public hearing held on April 29, Pakistan was represented by the ambassador and a leading garment exporter. Diplomats and trade experts from India, Indonesia, Egypt and other countries participated at these hearings. According to available information, by participating in these discussions and by taking appropriate follow-up measures, Pakistan, Ecuador, and Indonesia managed to get into the 10% duty category.

As these consultations are ongoing, one can only hope Sri Lanka will at least participate in the public hearings on July 7 and manage to get the duty reduced. After all, in the fight against forced labour, Sri Lanka has a much better track record than most other countries.

(The writer, a retired public servant, can be reached at senadhiragomi@gmail.com)

by Gomi Senadhira

Opinion

Nanda Pethiyagoda Wanasundera

Published

2 days ago

2026/06/14

Thilina Walpola

Nanda Pethiyagoda

A familiar presence who enlivened these pages for over 30 years is no more. Nanda Pethiyagoda Wanasundera who wrote the People and Events column for the Sunday Island under the pseudonym Nan died on Wednesday morning at the age of 93 after a short illness and was cremated the next day in accordance with her wishes. Her last two columns, which she dictated to her younger son, Rajiv, visiting his mother from the US, and to a niece a week later, appeared in April.

Nanda was already on board this newspaper when I became its editor in 1997, writing a weekly column for quite awhile. When I saw her first piece under my stewardship – I think it was on her good friend Ayya Khema of the Dodanduwa nun’s island – I found it so readable and substantial that I realized I had a treasure of a columnist on my newspaper. It remained so for early 30 years when she had written close to maybe 2,000 articles not just her People and Events for the Sunday Island but for The Island (daily) where she had a weekly column, Cassandra Cry as well as under her initials NPW.

She regarded one of my aunts, Mrs. Ratna (NQ) Dias, as her kalyana mitta (mentor or companion who supports, inspires, and guides you on the path to enlightenment) and this could not but further endear her to me. She and Ratna nenda would take a bus to Dodanduwa to visit the island hermitage and those trips were anything but comfortable.

Nanda trained and worked both as a teacher and a librarian. She taught at the Kataluwa government school in the South and later in Colombo at Bishop’s College and Buddhist Ladies College. She was thereafter the librarian at the Overseas School and the Law Faculty of the Colombo University. A loyal alumnus of Girl’s High School, Kandy, where she had both her primary and secondary education, she must surely have been the oldest old girl living at the time of her passing.

Our relationship soon moved from that of professional colleagues to personal friends. She was always immaculately groomed with a collection of Thai/Indonesian lungis matched with stylish tops. She loved to entertain her friends in her well appointed apartment at Fifth Lane, Kollupitiya, laying an elegant table with stoneware crockery and all the trimmings. Although she claimed she couldn’t cook she was supported by her loyal and efficient domestic, Karuna, who had worked in New York for her elder son. Nanda knew how to choose her menus offering us goodies Rajiv brought her from abroad.

I was fortunate to belong to one of her close knit social circles and we met regularly at each other’s homes and restaurants and always had a whale of a time sharing anecdotes and memories, often chatting on the phone of this and that and mutual friends. It is hard to accept that she is gone.

Nanda wrote fluently and had the feel for a story written in a warm and chatty style. Memories of a happy childhood near Kandy, holidays with an elder brother who was one of the first batch of Ceylon’s DROs with a remote posting, extensive travel, work experience, warm relations with a wide and varied circle of friends and acquaintances equipped her with a vast reservoir of background information to draw on.

She swam at the Ladies College pool, a short walk along the barrel drain fro her home on Fifth Lane well into her eighties, practiced yoga, read voraciously and was extremely generous to those who worked for her. It wasn’t long ago that she with Rajiv did a long drive to the rural heartland to visit Podi Hamy who had looked after her two boys and later worked as her cook in Colombo.

Nanda was a very good Buddhist who meditated, She was close to many erudite bhikkus who turned to her to write and publicize many matters of interest to Buddhists and Buddhism. Let me relate a single anecdote to complete this appreciation of a remarkable woman who added light to many lives. It illustrates her ability to deftly turn the tables on whoever when the circumstances so demanded.

Nanda and I, both friends of Capt. Elmo Jayawardena, participated in a ‘Talkmates’ program he set up to improve the English of poor speakers of the language by pairing them with good English speakers for longish telephone conversation. A young woman called Piumi was mentored by both Nanda and I.

She invited Piumi and me along with a cousin of hers to her home for lunch one day. The cousin and I were swapping yarns across the table when I used the ‘b’ word. Piumi turned to Nanda and asked her, “Madam what does ‘b—r’ mean? Nanda responded instantly saying “you better ask the person who used it!”

Touche´! Incidentally Piumi left the lunch with a very generous gift from Nanda.

Manik de Silva