Midweek Review

All praise for Lanka’s saviours!

Published

3 years ago

2023/03/15

Sahan Weerasooriya

Julie Chung with Ranil Wickremesinghe, a week after Parliament elected him President

By Shamindra Ferdinando

President Ranil Wickremesinghe, who is also the Finance Minister, recently named three persons – all women -whose intervention supposedly brought relief to bankrupt Sri Lanka.

UNP leader Wickremesinghe paid glowing tributes to Indian Finance and Corporate Affairs Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, US Secretary of State Janet Yellen, and IMF Managing Director and Chairman of the Executive Board Kristalina Ivanova Georgieva-Kinova. The IMF Chief is Bulgarian.

Wickremesinghe declared that Sri Lanka would have experienced extreme difficulties if Sitharaman, Yellen and Georgieva-Kinova had not thrown their weight behind Sri Lanka.

The President said so at an event held at the Waters Edge Hotel, Battramulla, on March 08 to mark International Women’s Day.

It would be pertinent to mention that Sitharaman, Yellen and Georgieva-Kinova are all economists. The Indian Minister, and the IMF Chief, received top posts, in 2019, before the economic crisis gripped Sri Lanka, whereas Yellen was sworn in as US Treasury Chief, on January 26, 2021. Yellen is the first person, in American history, to have led the White House Council of Economic Advisors, the Federal Reserve, and the Treasury Department.

Wickremesinghe attended the event, on the invitation of actress turned lawmaker Geetha Kumarasinghe, Minister of Women and Child Affairs. Kumarasinghe successfully contested the Galle District, at the last parliamentary elections, on the SLPP ticket, after she was previously ousted from Parliament on the basis that she was a dual citizen. Kumarasinghe thereafter gave up her foreign citizenship, which she had obtained when she was married to a foreigner.

Wickremesinghe declared that Sitharaman loaned Sri Lanka USD 3 bn in spite of Colombo being declared bankrupt. in April 2022. Wickremesinghe described Sitharaman’s response to the Sri Lanka crisis as very brave. The UNP leader said that there was a need for him to explain the situation on the ground because if India didn’t make available USD 3 bn, within three to four months, our country would have simply collapsed.

US Ambassador, in Colombo, Julie J. Chung, whose interventions in not so ‘mysterious ways’ in support of a high profile protest campaign, that led to President Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s ouster, on July 14, 2022, was among the guests. Wickremesinghe succeeded Premier Mahinda Rajapaksa on May 12, three days after the latter resigned. Wickremesinghe received appointment as the Minister of Finance, Economic Stability and National Policies, on May 25. We will give the benefit of any doubt we now have about New Delhi being aware of the not so mysterious interventions here, by Washington, as we are almost certain that mandarins in New Delhi would be naturally aware how gleefully the West is looking forward to a bust up between China and India as it would be like disposing two their certain successors in the world

The US support for Sri Lanka, at the IMF, seems natural against the backdrop of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Director William Joseph Burns’s recent clandestine visit to Colombo, in the dead of night. The US group flew in two C 17 Globemasters iii, on February 14, around 7-7.45 pm, and departed on the following day, around 3-3.40 pm. But the country is still in the dark as to what was unloaded from those two giant flying Trojan Horses, just as much as the human cargo. Beware when Americans bear gift horses!

The continuing foreign exchange crisis is broadly attributed to flawed policies, such as tax cuts, debt monetization, banning fertiliser and agrochemical imports, real appreciation of the exchange rate, etc. However, the issues at hand can be also characterized as a liquidity trap in the foreign exchange market, enforced by the economic structure and exploitative market structure, in the import and export sector of the economy, in the long run.

Wickremesinghe’s references to Sitharaman, Yellen and Georgieva-Kinova should be examined, taking into consideration early Indian and US support for the USD 2.9 bn IMF bailout package for Sri Lanka. All stakeholders made such a noise, over the IMF facility spread over a period of four years, that some ordinary people may have felt the country was down on its knees, before the Washington-based lender, for the first time.

In fact, we have secured IMF packages on 16 previous occasions and could have avoided the crisis if President Gotabaya Rajapaksa took the warning signs seriously and the plotters, surrounding him, had not overwhelmed him with the help of outside evil forces. Unfortunately, the wartime Defence Secretary, who handsomely won the November 2019 presidential election, allowed the deterioration. The sharp drop in tourist arrivals, in the wake of the April 2019 Easter Sunday attacks, and the overall shrinking of the global economy, due to the Covid-19 pandemic, made matters worse for Sri Lanka.

What may have sealed his fate must have been how those conveniently called peaceful protesters, by the likes of Julie Chung, and local NGO quislings, etc., went on the rampage across the country, with meticulous intelligence, from the evening of last May 09, targeting Opposition politicians and their supporters. In fact that afternoon/evening, the US Ambassador even issued a media release, literally ordering the armed forces and the police not to touch those “peaceful protestors”. How convenient?

This also brings us to the question whether our comrades, too, had done a deal with the real devils in Washington. Can anyone imagine how these comrades, who literally burnt down the country, in the wake of the JRJ government, under military pressure from Delhi, signed the Indo-Lanka Accord that brought in the controversial 13th Amendment, are now pretending to be innocent babes and got their proxy Harini to say it is alright to fully implement that piece of legislation, almost in unison with Ranil Wickremesinghe!

And who could have furnished so many foot soldiers to cause so much spontaneous havoc across the country and, especially, against government politicians, many of whom have still not recovered? We do accept the fact that like all politicians in general they were no angels, either, but they had come up playing the available corrupt system through legitimate elections.

Dr. Indrajit Coomaraswamy, one-time Governor of the Central Bank of Sri Lanka (July 2016-Dec 2019), blamed the current crisis on the failure on the part of successive governments to manage the expenditure since the country gained Independence. Sri Lanka had been plagued by a toxic combination of populist politics and an entrenched entitlement culture among the people, Dr. Coomaraswamy told the writer, in response to a query posed during Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s presidency. Dr. Coomaraswamy added: “Time and again, the electoral calendar has undermined fiscal discipline.”

However, according to critics Dr. Coomaraswamy only told one side of the truth. What he didn’t say was that as the CB Governor, he was also directly responsible for the Yahapalana government borrowing a record USD 12.5 billion from the international bond market, at high interest rates, from private lenders, primarily in the West. So what did that government achieve with such huge borrowings? All that the Yahapalana regime achieved, with all that money, we cannot see, except to lay the foundation for the current debt crisis?

Central Bank Governor, Dr. Nandalal Weerasinghe, too, delivered a lecture, to the members of Parliament, on the same lines. Dr. Weerasinghe launched a no holds barred attack on the irresponsible political party system, several weeks after Wickremesinghe succeeded Gotabaya Rajapaksa.

Pointing out that measures that had been taken by the Yahapalana government (2016-2019), following an agreement with the IMF, were disregarded by those who regained power, in 2019/2020, Dr. Weerasinghe said if the government/Opposition reneged on the latest arrangements, the country would face a similar crisis, in three years. Dr. Weerasinghe issued the warning on August 31, 2022, in the presence of Speaker Mahinda Yapa Abeywardena.

A fraudulent partnership

President Wickremesinghe has now appreciated the role played by three economists in Sri Lanka’s economic recovery. The President should also take tangible measures to investigate political parties, and individuals, responsible for the economic meltdown.

A group, representing trade union and civil society, collective, recently raised quite an important issue that had been largely ignored by successive governments, over the past decades. They called for tangible measures to tackle the well-organized influential public–private sector partnership engaged in ‘over invoicing’ and ‘under invoicing’ of imports/exports, with the blessing of successive governments.

Their invitation for a discussion with the print and electronic media didn’t attract sufficient attention. The briefing, and discussion, at the Centre for Society and Religion, Maradana, Colombo, attracted just a few journalists. However, economic analyst Dhanusha Pathirana, civil society activist Tharindu Uduwaragedara and Attorney-at-Law Lakmali Hemachandra explained how ‘over invoicing’ and ‘under invoicing’ contributed to the economic crisis.

They didn’t mince their words when they discussed the ongoing high profile operation that involved both the private and the public sector.

Pathirana asserted that a sharp reduction of capital, as a result of mispricing by importers, in respect of duty/tax free goods and taxable imports, was far more serious than the parking of funds overseas by exporters.

The group underscored the need to examine capital flows, through four forms of trade mis-invoicing, namely import over-invoicing and under-invoicing and export over-invoicing and under-invoicing.

Responding to queries raised by the writer, they alleged that regulatory mechanisms were not being implemented, regardless of the continuing economic decline. The failure on the part of the government to act on such disclosures is really disturbing. The country is in such a precarious state, those having regulatory powers should go flat out against the culprits, unless they were part of the fraudulent capitals flows.

Pathirana was adamant that absolutely nothing had been done so far to address the issue at hand.

Culpability of Cabinet

The Parliament continues to ignore extremely serious disclosures, pertaining to economic mismanagement. Shocking revelations that had been made before the Committee on Public Enterprises (COPE) in late May, last year ,hadn’t been investigated at all. Instead, the Wickremesinghe-Rajapaksa government has sought to manipulate the parliamentary watchdog, much to the dismay of the public. In fact, the powers that be had no qualms in interfering in all three watchdog committees, especially the Committee on Public Finance.

The COPE, during the courageous leadership of Prof. Charitha Herath was told how the then Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa, who also served as the Finance Minister, in spite of receiving warnings in March-April 2020, on the impending financial crisis of unprecedented magnitude, chose to ignore the advice.

Mahinda Rajapaksa held the Finance portfolio till early July 2021. By the time Basil Rajapaksa succeeded, the economy had suffered irreparable damage.

The parliamentary watchdog was told how the International Monetary Fund (IMF) had warned the then Governor of the Central Bank, Prof. W. D. Lakshman, and Treasury Secretary S.R. Attygalle, of the country’s inability to procure loans, unless the country undertook debt restructuring, immediately.

The COPE members received a briefing, on the circumstances leading to the crisis, when senior officials of the Central Bank appeared before the all-party body. CBSL Governor Dr. Weerasinghe declared that the IMF warning hadn’t been heeded at all.

The COPE received confirmation of what has been widely speculated, hours after Wickremesinghe was sworn in as the new Finance Minister.

Janakantha Silva, Director Legislative Services/Director Communication, Parliament, quoted Dr. Weerasinghe as having told COPE that following technical talks held in terms of the Finance Act, pertaining to the IMF’s stand, recommendations were made to the then Premier and other senior officials. Dr. Weerasinghe has stated that the relevant decisions should have been made by the Premier, in his capacity as the Finance Minister and the entire Cabinet of Ministers.

The IMF has made its position clear after having asserted Sri Lanka lacked debt sustainability.

Asserting the failure on the part of those who managed the economy for causing a massive crisis, Prof. Charitha Herath called it a crime. The first time entrant to Parliament recommended the setting up of a Special Parliamentary Select Committee to probe those who neglected their responsibilities, thereby causing the current debilitating crisis. Prof. Herath blamed those few who managed the economy during that period.

But, absolutely nothing has been done. The disclosures before COPE had been quite conveniently forgotten.

SLPP National List MP Basil Rajapaksa succeeded Mahinda Rajapaksa, in July 2021, as the Finance Minister, whereas President Gotabaya Rajapaksa brought in SLPP National List MP Ajith Nivard Cabraal as the Governor of the Central Bank, in Sept 2021. Cabraal quit in March, 2022 to pave the way for Dr. Weerasinghe, the former Bank Deputy Governor, to return from retirement in Australia, as its new Governor.

Dr. Harsha de Silva has repeatedly pointed out how the then Finance Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa delegated his responsibilities to the then State Finance Minister Cabraal, who refrained from briefing the Parliament as regards the actual situation. Dr. de Silva is on record as having said that the IMF’s declaration of debt sustainability should be examined against the backdrop of the revenue cut imposed on the recommendation of the then Secretary to the President and one time Central Banker and Treasury Secretary Dr. P.B. Jayasundera that deprived the Treasury of Rs 600 mn in taxes.

Dr. de Silva asked who decided on the tax cut in spite of the IMF specifically advising the government not to do so. The top SJB spokesperson has asked who decided on such a reckless course of action.

When the COPE raised a contentious issue of the Central Bank wasting precious funds to prevent depreciation of the Sri Lanka Rupee, Dr. Weerasinghe said this was the responsibility of the Monetary Board, comprising five persons. The then Monetary Board member Dr. Ranee Jayamaha has revealed that the then Governor Prof. W.D. Lakshman, Treasury Secretary S.R. Attygalle, and nominated member Samantha Kumarasinghe, decided on that course of action in spite of her and Sanjiva Jayawardena, PC, opposing them. They had registered their protest in writing.

However, can Dr. Jayamaha and President’s Counsel Jayawardena absolve themselves of the responsibility? They remain members of the Monetary Board.

The proposed Special Parliamentary Select Committee should have also summoned Dr. P.B. Jayasundera, deposed President’s Secretary. But, the Yahapalana decision to repeal the time-tested Exchange Control Act No 24 of 1953 remains a mystery. A section of the Opposition alleges enactment of Foreign Exchange Act, No. 12 of 2017, during Wickremesinghe tenure as the Prime Minister, facilitated ‘parking’ of export proceeds, overseas, to the tune of billions of USD. Justice Minister Dr. Wijeyadasa Rajapakse, PC, is on record as having said that well over USD 50 bn had been stashed overseas. But what has he done to convince the Cabinet-of-Ministers to restore the repealed Act.

Former State Minister Jayantha Samaraweera (National Freedom Front) recently told this writer that Basil Rajapaksa, in his capacity as the Finance Minister, rejected their leader Wimal Weerawansa’s proposal to restore the old Act.

The Yahapalana government passed the new Act on July 25, 2017. The Samagi Jana Balavegaya (SJB), as well as the SLFP, voted for the new Act. Altogether 94 voted for the new Law, whereas 18 voted against. Then Speaker Karu Jayasuriya certified the new Act.

Contrary to reports, the new Act was brought in during the late Mangala Samaraweera’s tenure as the Finance Minister. Samaraweea succeeded Finance Minister Ravi Karunanayake, on May 22, 2017.

Another matter that needed attention is Sri Lanka’s International Sovereign Bonds (ISBs) as of USD 15.5, USD 12.5 had been obtained during the Yahapalana administration (2015-2019) or, in other words, in Wickremesinghe’s tenure as the Prime Minister.

In late January, 2022, the then Governor Ajith Nivard Cabraal told US-based CNBC that Sri Lanka had to pay USD 12.5 bn of debt in ISBs’ over the next seven years. Cabraal resigned three months later.

The country is in a catch-22 situation. Caught up in US Indo-Pacific strategy, the political leadership here is struggling to avoid the scheduled Local Government polls for obvious reasons. Contrary to the US call for holding of LG polls, the superpower perhaps may facilitate their overall strategy. A certain defeat at the mini-polls is sure to weaken Wickremesinghe’s hold, hence the decision to sabotage the polls. Regardless of the Opposition efforts to galvanize public protests to pressure the government over the LG polls, the incumbent administration seems confident a gradual turnaround of the economy may facilitate its efforts to keep the situation under control, for the time being.

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Midweek Review

Year ends with the NPP govt. on the back foot

Published

6 days ago

2025/12/24

Sahan Weerasooriya

President Dissanayake addresses Parliament as PM Dr. Harini Amarasuriya looks on. Dissanayake is the leader of both the JVP and NPP

The failure on the part of the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP)-led National People’s Power (NPP) government to fulfil a plethora of promises given in the run up to the last presidential election, in September, 2024, and a series of incidents, including cases of corruption, and embarrassing failure to act on a specific weather alert, ahead of Cyclone Ditwah, had undermined the administration beyond measure.

Ditwah dealt a knockout blow to the arrogant and cocky NPP. If the ruling party consented to the Opposition proposal for a Parliamentary Select Committee (PSC) to probe the events leading to the November 27 cyclone, the disclosure would be catastrophic, even for the all-powerful Executive President Anura Kumara Dissanayake, as responsible government bodies, like the Disaster Management Centre that horribly failed in its duty, and the Met Department that alerted about the developing storm, but the government did not heed its timely warnings, directly come under his purview.

The NPP is on the back foot and struggling to cope up with the rapidly developing situation. In spite of having both executive presidency and an overwhelming 2/3 majority in Parliament, the government seems to be weak and in total disarray.

The regular appearance of President Dissanayake in Parliament, who usually respond deftly to criticism, thereby defending his parliamentary group, obviously failed to make an impression. Overall, the top NPP leadership appeared to have caused irreparable damage to the NPP and taken the shine out of two glorious electoral victories at the last presidential and parliamentary polls held in September and November 2024 respectively.

The NPP has deteriorated, both in and out of Parliament. The performance of the 159-member NPP parliamentary group, led by Prime Minister Dr. Harini Amarasuriya, doesn’t reflect the actual situation on the ground or the developing political environment.

Having repeatedly boasted of its commitment to bring about good governance and accountability, the current dispensation proved in style that it is definitely not different from the previous lots or even worse. (The recent arrest of a policeman who claimed of being assaulted by a gang, led by an NPP MP, emphasised that so-called system change is nothing but a farce) In the run-up to the November, 2024, parliamentary polls, President Dissanayake, who is the leader of both the JVP and NPP, declared that the House should be filled with only NPPers as other political parties were corrupt. Dissanayake cited the Parliament defeating the no-confidence motions filed against Ravi Karunanayake (2016/over Treasury Bond scams) and Keheliya Rambukwella (2023/against health sector corruption) to promote his argument. However, recently the ongoing controversy over patient deaths, allegedly blamed on the administration of Ondansetron injections, exposed the government.

Mounting concerns over drug safety and regulatory oversight triggered strong calls from medical professionals, and trade unions, for the resignation of senior officials at the National Medicines Regulatory Authority (NMRA) and the State Pharmaceutical Corporation (SPC).

Medical and civil rights groups declared that the incident exposed deep systemic failures in Sri Lanka’s drug regulatory framework, with critics warning that the collapse of quality assurance mechanisms is placing patients’ lives at grave risk.

The Medical and Civil Rights Professional Association of Doctors (MCRPA), and allied trade unions, accused health authorities of gross negligence and demanded the immediate resignation of senior NMRA and SPC officials.

MCRPA President Dr. Chamal Sanjeewa is on record as having said that the Health Ministry, NMRA and SPC had collectively failed to ensure patient safety, citing, what he described as, a failed drug regulatory system.

The controversy has taken an unexpected turn with some alleging that the NPP government, on behalf of Sri Lanka and India, in April this year, entered into an agreement whereby the former agreed to lower quality/standards of medicine imports.

Trouble begins with Ranwala’s resignation

The NPP suffered a humiliating setback when its National List MP Asoka Ranwala had to resign from the post of Speaker on 13 December, 2024, following intense controversy over his educational qualification. The petroleum sector trade union leader served as the Speaker for a period of three weeks and his resignation shook the party. Ranwala, first time entrant to Parliament was one of the 18 NPP National List appointees out of a total of 29. The Parliament consists of 196 elected and 29 appointed members. Since the introduction of the National List, in 1989, there had never been an occasion where one party secured 18 slots.

The JVP/NPP made an initial bid to defend Ranwala but quickly gave it up and got him to resign amidst media furor. Ranwala dominated the social media as political rivals exploited the controversy over his claimed doctorate from the Waseda University of Japan, which he has failed to prove to this day. But, the JVP/NPP had to suffer a second time as a result of Ranwala’s antics when he caused injuries to three persons, including a child, on 11 December, in the Sapugaskanda police area.

The NPP made a pathetic, UNP and SLFP style effort to save the parliamentarian by blaming the Sapugaskanda police for not promptly subjecting him for a drunk driving test. The declaration made by the Government Analyst Department that the parliamentarian hadn’t been drunk at the time of the accident, several days after the accident, does not make any difference. Having experienced the wrongdoing of successive previous governments, the public, regardless of what various interested parties propagated on social media, realise that the government is making a disgraceful bid to cover-up.

No less a person than President Dissanayake is on record as having said that their members do not consume liquor. Let us wait for the outcome of the internal investigation into the lapses on the part of the Sapugaskanda police with regard to the accident that happened near Denimulla Junction, in Sapugaskanda.

JVP/NPP bigwigs obviously hadn’t learnt from the Weligama W 15 hotel attack in December, 2023, that ruined President Ranil Wickremeinghe’s administration. That incident exposed the direct nexus between the government and the police in carrying out Mafia-style operations. Although the two incidents cannot be compared as the circumstances differ, there is a similarity. Initially, police headquarters represented the interests of the wrongdoers, while President Wickremesinghe bent over backwards to retain the man who dispatched the CCD (Colombo Crime Division) team to Weligama, as the IGP. The UNP leader went to the extent of speaking to Chief Justice Jayantha Jayasuriya, PC, and Speaker Mahinda Yapa Abeywardena to push his agenda. There is no dispute the then Public Security Minister Tiran Alles wanted Deshabandu Tennakoon as IGP, regardless of a spate of accusations against him, in addition to him being faulted by the Supreme Court in a high-profile fundamental rights application.

The JVP/NPP must have realised that though the Opposition remained disorganised and ineffective, thanks to the media, particularly social media, a case of transgression, if not addressed swiftly and properly, can develop into a crisis. Action taken by the government to protect Ranwala is a case in point. Government leaders must have heaved a sigh of relief as Ranwala is no longer the Speaker when he drove a jeep recklessly and collided with a motorcycle and a car.

Major cases, key developments

Instead of addressing public concerns, the government sought to suppress the truth by manipulating and exploiting developments

* The release of 323 containers from the Colombo Port, in January 2025, is a case in point. The issue at hand is whether the powers that be took advantage of the port congestion to clear ‘red-flagged’ containers.

Although the Customs repeatedly declared that they did nothing wrong and such releases were resorted even during Ranil Wickremesinghe’s presidency (July 2022 to September 2024), the public won’t buy that. Container issue remains a mystery. That controversy eroded public confidence in the NPP that vowed 100 percent transparency in all its dealings. But the way the current dispensation handled the Port congestion proved that transparency must be the last thing in the minds of the JVPers/NPPers holding office.

* The JVP/NPP’s much touted all-out anti-corruption stand suffered a debilitating blow over their failure to finalise the appointment of a new Auditor General. In spite of the Opposition, the civil society, and the media, vigorously taking up this issue, the government continued to hold up the appointment by irresponsibly pushing for an appointment acceptable to President Dissanayake. The JVP/NPP is certainly pursuing a strategy contrary to what it preached while in the Opposition and found fault with successive governments for trying to manipulate the AG. It would be pertinent to mention that President Dissanayake should accept the responsibility for the inordinate delay in proposing a suitable person to that position. The government failed to get the approval of the Constitutional Council more than once to install a favourite of theirs in it, thanks to the forthright position taken by its civil society representatives.

The government should be ashamed of its disgraceful effort to bring the Office of the Auditor General under its thumb:

* The JVP/NPP government’s hotly disputed decision to procure 1,775 brand-new double cab pickup trucks, at a staggering cost exceeding Rs. 12,500 mn, under controversial circumstances, exposed the duplicity of that party that painted all other political parties black. Would the government rethink the double cab deal, especially in the wake of economic ruination caused by Cyclone Ditwah? The top leadership seems to be determined to proceed with their original plans, regardless of immeasurable losses caused by Cyclone Ditwah. Post-cyclone efforts still remain at a nascent stage with the government putting on a brave face. The top leadership has turned a blind eye to the overwhelming challenge in getting the country back on track especially against the backdrop of its agreement with the IMF.

Post-Cyclone Ditwah recovery process is going to be slow and extremely painful. Unfortunately, both the government and the Opposition are hell-bent on exploiting the miserable conditions experienced by its hapless victims. The government is yet to acknowledge that it could have faced the crisis much better if it acted on the warning issued by Met Department Chief Athula Karunanayake on 12 November, two weeks before the cyclone struck.

Foreign policy dilemma

Sri Lanka moved further closer to India and the US this year as President Dissanayake entered into several new agreements with them. In spite of criticism, seven Memorandums of Understanding (MoUs), including one on defence, remains confidential. What are they hiding?

Within weeks after signing of the seven MoUs, India bought the controlling interests in the Colombo Dockyard Limited for USD 52 mn.

Although some Opposition members, representing the SJB, raised the issue, their leader Sajith Premadasa, during a subsequent visit to New Delhi, indicated he wouldn’t, under any circumstances, raise such a contentious issue.

Premadasa went a step further. The SJB leader assured his unwavering commitment to the full implementation of the 13th Amendment to the Constitution that was forced on Sri Lanka during President JRJ’s administration, under the highly questionable Indo-Lanka Accord of July, 1987, after the infamous parippu drop by Indian military aircraft over Jaffna, their version of the old gunboat diplomacy practiced by the West.

Both India and the US consolidated their position here further in the post-Aragalaya period. Those who felt that the JVP would be in a collision course with them must have been quite surprised by the turn of events and the way post-Aragalaya Sri Lanka leaned towards the US-India combine with not a hum from our carboard revolutionaries now installed in power. They certainly know which side of the bread is buttered. Sri Lanka’s economic deterioration, and the 2023 agreement with the IMF, had tied up the country with the US-led bloc.

In spite of India still procuring large quantities of Russian crude oil and its refusal to condemn Russia over the conflict in Ukraine, New Delhi has obviously reached consensus with the US on a long-term partnership to meet the formidable Chinese challenge. Both countries feel each other’s support is incalculably vital and indispensable.

Sri Lanka, India, and Japan, in May 2019, signed a Memorandum of Cooperation (MoC) to jointly develop the East Container Terminal (ECT) at the Colombo Port. That was during the tail end of the Yahapalana administration. The Gotabaya Rajapaksa administration wanted to take that project forward. But trade unions, spearheaded by the JVP/NPP combine, thwarted a tripartite agreement on the basis that they opposed privatisation of the Colombo Port at any level.

But, the Colombo West International Terminal (CWIT) project, that was launched in November, 2022, during Ranil Wickremesinghe’s presidency, became fully operational in April this year. The JVP revolutionary tiger has completely changed its stripes regarding foreign investments and privatisation. If the JVP remained committed to its previous strategies, India taking over CDL or CWIT would have been unrealistic.

The failure on the part of the government to reveal its stand on visits by foreign research vessels to ports here underscored the intensity of US and Indian pressure. Hope our readers remember how US and India compelled the then President Wickremesinghe to announce a one-year moratorium on such visits. In line with that decision Sri Lanka declared research vessels wouldn’t be allowed here during 2024. The NPP that succeeded Wickremesinghe’s administration in September, 2024, is yet to take a decision on foreign research vessels. What a pity?

The NPP ends the year on the back foot, struggling to cope up with daunting challenges, both domestic and external. The recent revelation of direct Indian intervention in the 2022 regime change project here along with the US underscored the gravity of the situation and developing challenges. Post-cyclone period will facilitate further Indian and US interventions for obvious reasons.

****

Perhaps one of the most debated events in 2025 was the opening of ‘City of Dreams Sri Lanka’ that included, what the investors called, a world-class casino. In spite of mega Bollywood star Shah Rukh Khan’s unexpected decision to pull out of the grand opening on 02 August, the investors went ahead with the restricted event. The Chief Guest was President Anura Kumara Dissanayake, who is also the Finance Minister, in addition to being the Defence Minister. Among the other notable invitees were Dissanayake’s predecessor Ranil Wickremesinghe, whose administration gave critical support to the high-profile project, worth over USD 1.2 bn. John Keells Holdings PLC (JKH) and Melco Resorts & Entertainment (Melco) invested in the project that also consist of the luxurious Nüwa hotel and a premium shopping mall. Who would have thought President Dissanayake’s participation, even remotely, possible, against the backdrop of his strong past public opposition to gambling of any kind?

Don’t forget ‘City of Dreams’ received a license to operate for a period of 20 years. Definitely an unprecedented situation. Although that license had been issued by the Wickremesinghe administration, the NPP, or any other political party represented in Parliament, didn’t speak publicly about that matter. Interesting, isn’t it, coming from people, still referred by influential sections of the Western media, as avowed Marxists?

By Shamindra Ferdinando

Midweek Review

The Aesthetics and the Visual Politics of an Artisanal Community

Published

6 days ago

2025/12/24

Sahan Weerasooriya

Through the Eyes of the Patua:

Organised by the Colombo Institute for Human Sciences in collaboration with Millennium Art Contemporary, an interesting and unique exhibition got underway in the latter’s gallery in Millennium City, Oruwala on 21 December 2025. The exhibition is titled, ‘Through the Eyes of the Patua: Ramayana Paintings of an Artisanal Community’ and was organized in parallel with the conference that was held on 20 December 2025 under the theme, ‘Move Your Shadow: Rediscovering Ravana, Forms of Resistance and Alternative Universes in the Tellings of the Ramayana.’ The scrolls on display at the gallery are part of the over 100 scrolls in the collection of Colombo Institute’s ‘Roma Chatterji Patua Scroll Collection.’ Prof Chatterji, who taught Sociology at University of Delhi and at present teaches at Shiv Nadar University donated the scrolls to the Colombo Institute in 2024.

The paintings on display are what might be called narrative scrolls that are often over ten feet long. Each scroll narrates a story, with separate panels pictorially depicting one component of a story. The Patuas or the Chitrakars, as they are also known, are traditionally bards. A bard will sing the story that is depicted by each scroll which is simultaneously unfurled. For Sri Lankan viewers for whom the paintings and their contexts of production and use would be unusual and unfamiliar, the best way to understand them is to consider them as a comic strip. In the case of the ongoing exhibition, since the bards or the live songs are not a part of it, the word and voice elements are missing. However, the curators have endeavoured to address this gap by displaying a series of video presentations of the songs, how they are performed and the history of the Patuas as part of the exhibition itself.

The unfamiliarity of the art on display and their histories, necessitates broader explanation. The Patua hail from Medinipur District of West Bengal in India. Essentially, this community of artisans are traditional painters and singers who compose stories based on sacred texts such as the Ramayana or Mahabharata as well as secular events that can vary from the bombing of the Twin Towers in New York in 2001 to the Indian Ocean Tsunami of 2004. Even though painted storytelling is done by a number of traditional artisan groups in India, the Patua is the only community where performers and artists belong to the same group. Hence, Professor Chatterji, in her curatorial note for the exhibition calls them “the original multi-media performers in Bengal.”

‘The story of the Patuas’ also is an account of what happens to such artisanal communities in contemporary times in South Asia more broadly even though this specific story is from India. There was a time before the 21st century when such communities were living and working across a large part of eastern India – each group with a claim to their recognizably unique style of painting. However, at the present time, this community and their vocation is limited to areas such as Medinipur, Birbhum, Purulia in West Bengal and Dumka in Jharkhand.

A pertinent question is how the scroll painters from Medinipur have survived the vagaries of time when others have not. Professor Chatterji provides an important clue when she notes that these painters, “unlike their counterparts elsewhere, are also extremely responsive to political events.” As such, “apart from a rich repertoire of stories based on myth and folklore, including the Ramayana and other epics, they have, over many years, also composed on themes that range from events of local or national significance such as boat accidents and communal violence to global events such as the tsunami and the attack on the World Trade Centre.”

There is another interesting aspect that becomes evident when one looks into the socio-cultural background of this community. As Professor Chatterji writes, “one significant feature that gives a distinct flavour to their stories is the fact that a majority of Chitrakars consider themselves to be Muslims but perform stories based largely on Hindu myths.” In this sense, their story complicates the tension-ridden dichotomies between ethno-cultural and religious groups typical of relations between groups in India as well as more broadly in South Asia, including in Sri Lanka. Prof Chatterji suggests this positionality allows the Patua to have “a truly secular voice so vital in the world that we live in today.”

As a result, she notes, contemporary Patuas “have propagated the message of communal harmony in their compositions in the context of the recent riots in India and the Gulf War. Their commentaries couched in the language of myth are profoundly symbolic and draw on a rich oral tradition of storytelling.” What is even more important is their “engagement with contemporary issues also inflects their aesthetics” because many of these painters also “experiment with novel painterly values inspired by recent interaction with new media such as comic books and with folk art forms from other parts of the country.”

From this varied repertoire of the Patuas’ painterly tradition, this exhibition focusses on scrolls portraying different aspects of the Ramayana. In North Indian and the more dominant renditions of the Ramayana, the focus is on Rama while in many alternate renditions this shifts to Ravana as typified by versions popular among the Sinhalas and Tamils in Sri Lanka as well as in some areas in several Indian states. Compared to this, the Patua renditions in the exhibition mostly illustrate the abduction of Sita with a pronounced focus on Sita and not on Ravana, the conventional antagonist or on Rama, the conventional protagonist. As a result, these two traditional male colossuses are distant. Moreover, with the focus on Sita, these folk renditions also bring to the fore other figures directly associated with her such as her sons Luv and Kush in the act of capturing Rama’s victory horse as well as Lakshmana.

Interestingly, almost as a counter narrative, which also serves as a comparison to these Ramayana scrolls, the exhibition also presents three scrolls known as ‘bin-Laden Patas’ depicting different renditions on the attack on New York’s Twin Towers.

While the painted scrolls in this collection have been exhibited thrice in India, this is the first time they are being exhibited in Sri Lanka, and it is quite likely such paintings from any community beyond Sri Lanka’s shores were not available for viewing in the country before this. Organised with no diplomatic or political affiliation and purely as a Sri Lankan cultural effort with broader South Asian interest, it is definitely worth a visit. The exhibition will run until 10 January 2026.