Features

Where the hell have all devils gone?

Published

7 months ago

2025/05/15

Sahan Weerasooriya

‘Hello darkness, my old friend, I’ve come to talk with you again’

–– The Sound of Silence

A drive through the city of Colombo is far less frazzling around midnight, when most asphalt cowboys (read private bus drivers) are in dreamland, and others move like a breeze, having to mind only an occasional wheeled contraption trying to break the sound barrier or policemen in high-vis jackets with flashing traffic wands.

Driving back home after work, some time ago, at an ungodly hour, as usual, yours truly beheld something that opened the floodgates of nostalgia. A devil was staring at him through the rear windshield of a vehicle. An electrifying sight—indeed!

It was actually a sticker of a colourful, apotropaic devil mask—fascinatingly fanged, adorably goggle-eyed, and so endearingly familiar to southerners who grew up among devils, so to speak.

A little over a year ago, a devil beckoned to the writer similarly on the Southern Expressway while he was on his way to Matara with his family for the traditional New Year, which invariably makes him succumb to the irresistible pull of his southern roots.

Well past the witching hour, tossing and turning in bed, in Matara, the writer found something amiss in an otherwise perfect southern night. There was no rub-a-dub of yak bera (low-country drum). During his childhood, pulsating tom-tom beating at thovil or devil dances in his neighbourhood would lull him to sleep.

On that sleepless night, the writer kept thinking to himself, “Where the hell have all the devils gone?”

Coexistence with devils

We, the southerners, evince a proprietary interest in yakas or devils. They may frighten others, but they are no match for the southern exorcists or kattadiyas, who claim to be capable of taming or even banishing them—for a hefty fee, of course. Devil dances are the events where yakas that possess humans are exorcised; they are humiliated in every conceivable manner before being driven out; no yaka with an iota of self-respect would take such mortification lying down if it was capable of striking back. So, a logical conclusion may be that the devils are scared of the southern kattadiyas!

During the writer’s growing-up years, the township of Matara encompassed only a small urban area, beyond which lay rural backwaters, where humans and yakas had opted for an uneasy coexistence, with the latter often overstepping their limits, warranting the intervention of devil dancers.

The writer, as a child, used to think that beyond the area illuminated by household lights in the neighbourhood, all the starving devils in the country converged for the night, keeping a sharp lookout for the brats who dared venture out after dusk. So, he and his elder brother carefully avoided crossing the border demarcated by garden lights lest they should provoke demonic retaliation or even end up as the dinner of the supposedly evil ones.

Cane that drove out fear of devils

The credit for making the writer and his brother overcome their fear of yakas should go to their mother or her unforgiving cane, to be exact. She was not equal to the task of catching them during daytime, try hard as she might, for their mischief or misbehaviour. So, cases against them were heard in absentia in the daylight hours and sentences were duly passed, and all that remained to be done upon their return home at dusk was to mete out punishment, which was severe.

Those were the pre-Child Protection Authority hotline days, and flight was the only option the hapless brothers were left with. So, a scared duo would show their mother a clean pair of heels each, but, darn it, their sprints would end where the dark territory of the devils began!

With the passage of time, the two brothers would summon the courage to cross the line of control between human territory and that of the yakas, and their mother gradually lost interest in the nightly sprints. Otherwise, she would surely have gone on to clinch an Olympic medal for running, a couple of decades before Susanthika! (In ‘My Family and Other Animals’, Gerry Durrell quotes his elder brother as having said that they can be proud of the way they have brought up their mother!)

Conquering fear: Ultimate test

Making an occasional foray into the devils’ territory at night was one thing, but overcoming the fear of demons once and for all was quite another; the ultimate test of masculinity for teens, in that part of the country, sans proper street lighting at the time, was returning home all alone well past midnight after watching a horror movie at a cinema in the nearby town. There were occasions when the writer had to come back home all alone on bicycle or using shank’s pony, passing two cemeteries with large tombs, which, he thought, had been purpose-built for scaring brats who dared wander after nightfall!

‘The Exorcist’ was a scary flick that made any mid-teen worry about the prospect of having to walk the dark roads that lay between the cinema and his home, after the 9.30 pm show––all alone. The snakelike tongue the possessed girl flicked from time to time almost touched the petrified faces of the writer and his friends occupying the front-row seats. Equally blood-curdling were the films like ‘A Nightmare on Elm Street’. Dracula also would unnervingly affright them initially to the extent of making them see, on their way back home at night, the blood-sucking creature’s ghastly visage everywhere like a politician’s grinning mug on election posters defacing wayside walls. But later Dracula became a joke, for he/it overdid bloodletting like the violent characters in Tarantino’s edge-of-the-seat thrillers full of gratuitous gory scenes. Subsequently, horror movies became so funny that Hitchcock’s ‘Psycho’ amused the writer instead of giving him heebie-jeebies. (Hitchcock is heard saying in an audio recording in the BBC archives that he intended ‘Psycho’ as a comedy, but people took it for a horror movie, and he kept quiet!)

Witnessing the banishment of devils

Years prior to the late arrival of television in Sri Lanka were characterised by a chronic lack of entertainment, and the yakas were considerate enough to move in to fill that vacuum, from time to time, with demonic possessions, which necessitated all-night devil dances. They were the events that provided the writer, his brother and their friends an up-close look at numerous devils, especially Mahasona and Ririyaka, who were in fact the devil dancers wearing magnificent wooden masks representing the anthropomorphic personifications of different yakas.

Frantic yet spellbinding dancing lasted for hours on end to the accompaniment of hypnotically rhythmic drum beating, which reached a crescendo towards the wee hours. The exorcists would go into deep trances then, muttering gobbledygook, which apparently only they and the southern devils understood.

The disease-causing devils were identified, summoned and banished much to the relief of the possessed and family members. Thovil could be considered kangaroo trials for devils. Those ceremonies were well choreographed and highly entertaining; they included scenes that provided comic relief in the form of dialogues between yakas and devil dancers, who ridiculed the former much to the amusement of the spectators. Obscenities that some tipplers who were sozzled to the gills hurled at the devils from the audience made thovil even more entertaining like stormy parliamentary sessions.

Seeing and surviving real yakas

The writer’s encounters with the real yakas happened in the late 1980s, when the southern parts of the country ran red with youthful blood due to the JVP’s reign of terror and the savage counterterror operations carried out by the then UNP government.

Two macabre scenes are etched in the writer’s memory. One day, while travelling from Matara to Peradeniya in 1988, he counted more than 30 blindfolded, mutilated corpses of youth along the way—about 10 being burnt on the roadside at the Ahangama junction, six under the Panadura bridge and the others at different locations along the Kandy-Colombo road up to the Galaha Junction. (Crowds near heaps of corpses, which bore unmistakable marks of torture, would make buses slow down or even stop.) On that day, the writer boarded a Colombo-bound bus, which left Matara at dawn after the curfews imposed by the government and the JVP were lifted. The clunker stopped at an eatery in the Ahangama town, where there was a heavy military presence, as the bus crew thought that no other restaurant would be open beyond that point.

A little distance away from the eating house, about 10 corpses were in flames on a tyre-pyre on the roadside, and a revolting stench of burning human flesh pervaded the air, but the passengers were tucking into buns, etc., and sipping tea quietly while beholding the gruesome scene. It was a sign of the public being desensitised to the horrors of mindless violence unleashed by the Red, Green and Khaki yakas.

The real devils were the JVP killers and the counterterror operatives who went on killing sprees and ran dungeons like the Eliyakanda torture camp or the K-Point in Matara.

Hell must have been empty at that time, for all the devils were in this country preying on the youth!

Death-dealing JVP sparrow units armed with an assortment of weapons unleashed hell in the South, which was a hotbed of terror and counterterror. The JVP ordered poll boycotts, ca’cannies, work stoppages and protests at gunpoint, and noncompliance as well as dissent was suppressed in the most brutal manner.

Many civilians who dared exercise their franchise in defiance of the southern terrorists’ calls for poll boycotts died violent deaths at the hands of the JVP death squads, some of whose victims were burnt alive. Not to be outdone, the then UNP regime set in motion its Caravan of Death, which left streets strewn with corpses of young men and women.

‘The Mountain of Death’

The writer remembers a piteous sight he witnessed more than 30 years ago in a far-flung part of the Ratnapura District. He was a member of a media team, tasked with reporting on the digging up of a mass grave on the mist-clad summit of picturesque Suriyakanda.

The skeletal remains of over one dozen schoolboys from Embilipitiya abducted, tortured, murdered and buried by the counterterror units deployed by the UNP government were found buried in a deep pit.

The mass grave was located away from the winding main road, and only four-wheel drives could reach it. Nylon boot laces used to truss up the victims were still intact. The exhumation process proved extremely tedious. Dusk was falling with a thick blanket of an unforgiving fog enveloping the mountaintop reducing visibility to near zero. The then Opposition politicians and others engaged in the exhumation of what remained of children’s corpses had to call it a day and return to Colombo.

The media team headed for Suriyakanda again the following morning itself. At several places near Pelmadulla, where they broke the journey, they found rotting corpses removed from nearby cemeteries and dumped on the roadside by pro-UNP thugs as a warning. Worse, cattle bones had been dumped into the partially dug up mass grave on the Suriyakanda summit. However, digging continued without any untoward incident thereafter and parts of more human skeletons were unearthed; all of them were dispatched to the Embilipitiya Court under magisterial supervision and subsequently sent for forensic examination. Some of those who were involved in the mass murder were brought to justice.

Mass displacement of yakas

Much is spoken these days about the displacement of humans and animals like elephants, but that of the southern devils has gone unnoticed! In Matara, urbanisation has led to a sprawling conurbation that encompasses what used to be the countryside, which was home to many yakas.

Urbanisation causes residential areas to shrink and eventually make way for the expansion of commerce. The spread of banlieues and rurban areas has pushed the devils further into the hinterland in the South. Humans’ insatiable greed for land has not spared even cemeteries where some awe-inspiring, old mausolea once stood majestically, intensifying the thrill we, as schoolboys, used to get from horror flicks. This detestable graveyard grab, as it were, however, exemplifies a saying popular among the southerners; roughly rendered into English it means that the people who are scared of devils do not build houses on cemeteries.

Unbridled urbanisation, the advancement of medicine, increasing accessibility to healthcare, and the proliferation of education, which inculcates scientific reasoning and critical thinking in the public, must have caused the mass displacement of yakas. Alas, whatever the reasons, Matara has become much poorer without its demons (not the gun-toting ones)—at least for those who grew up among them.

by Prabath Sahabandu

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Features

Trade preferences to support post-Ditwah reconstruction

Published

14 hours ago

2025/12/15

Sahan Weerasooriya

Ditwah disaster

The manner in which the government succeeded in mobilising support from the international community, immediately after the devastating impact of Cyclone Ditwah, may have surprised many people of this country, particularly because our Opposition politicians were ridiculing our “inexperienced” government, in the recent past, for its inability to deal with the international community effectively. However, by now it is evident that the government, with the assistance of the international community and local nongovernmental actors, like major media organisations, has successfully managed the recovery efforts. So, let me begin by thanking them for what they have done so far.

Yet, some may argue that it is not difficult to mobilise the support for recovery efforts from the international community, immediately after any major disaster, and the real challenge is to sustain that support through the next few weeks, months and years. Because the recovery process, more specifically the post-recovery reconstruction process, requires long-term support. So, the government agencies should start immediately to focus on, in addition to initial disaster relief, a longer-term strategy for reconstruction. This is important because in a few weeks’ time, the focus of the global community may shift elsewhere … to another crisis in another corner of the world. Before that happens, the government should take initiatives to get the support from development partners on appropriate policy measures, including exceptional trade preferences, to help Sri Lanka in the recovery efforts through the medium and the long term.

Use of Trade Preferences to support recovery and reconstruction

In the past, the United States and the European Union used exceptional enhanced trade preferences as part of the assistance packages when countries were devastated by natural disasters, similar to Cyclone Ditwah. For example:

After the devastating floods in Pakistan, in July 2010, the EU granted temporary, exceptional trade preferences to Pakistan (autonomous trade preferences) to aid economic recovery. This measure was a de facto waiver on the standard EU GSP (Generalised Scheme of Preferences) rules. The preferences, which were proposed in October 2010 and were applied until the end of 2013, effectively suspended import duties on 75 types of goods, including textiles and apparel items. The available studies on this waiver indicate that though a significant export hike occurred within a few months after the waiver became effective it did not significantly depress exports by competing countries. Subsequently, Pakistan was granted GSP+ status in 2014.
Similarly, after the 2015 earthquakes in Nepal, the United States supported Nepal through an extension of unilateral additional preferences, the Nepal Trade Preferences Programme (NTPP). This was a 10-year initiative to grant duty-free access for up to 77 specific Nepali products to aid economic recovery after the 2015 earthquakes. This was also a de facto waiver on the standard US GSP rules.
Earlier, after Hurricanes Mitch and Georges caused massive devastation across the Caribbean Basin nations, in 1998, severely impacting their economies, the United States proposed a long-term strategy for rebuilding the region that focused on trade enhancement. This resulted in the establishment of the US Caribbean Basin Trade Partnership Act (CBTPA), which was signed into law on 05 October, 2000, as Title II of the Trade and Development Act of 2000. This was a more comprehensive facility than those which were granted to Pakistan and Nepal.

What type of concession should Sri Lanka request from our development partners?

Given these precedents, it is appropriate for Sri Lanka to seek specific trade concessions from the European Union and the United States.

In the European Union, Sri Lanka already benefits from the GSP+ scheme. Under this arrangement Sri Lanka’s exports (theoretically) receive duty-free access into the EU markets. However, in 2023, Sri Lanka’s preference utilisation rate, that is, the ratio of preferential imports to GSP+ eligible imports, stood at 59%. This was significantly below the average utilisation of other GSP beneficiary countries. For example, in 2023, preference utilisation rates for Bangladesh and Pakistan were 90% and 88%, respectively. The main reason for the low utilisation rate of GSP by Sri Lanka is the very strict Rules of Origin requirements for the apparel exports from Sri Lanka. For example, to get GSP benefits, a woven garment from Sri Lanka must be made from fabric that itself had undergone a transformation from yarn to fabric in Sri Lanka or in another qualifying country. However, a similar garment from Bangladesh only requires a single-stage processing (that is, fabric to garment) qualifies for GSP. As a result, less than half of Sri Lanka’s apparel exports to the EU were ineligible for the preferences in 2023.

Sri Lanka should request a relaxation of this strict rule of origin to help economic recovery. As such a concession only covers GSP Rules of Origin only it would impact multilateral trade rules and would not require WTO approval. Hence could be granted immediately by the EU.

United States

Sri Lanka should submit a request to the United States for (a) temporary suspension of the recently introduced 20% additional ad valorem duty and (b) for a programme similar to the Nepal Trade Preferences Programme (NTPP), but designed specifically for Sri Lanka’s needs. As NTPP didn’t require WTO approval, similar concessions also can be granted without difficulty.

Similarly, country-specific requests should be carefully designed and submitted to Japan and other major trading partners.

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

by Gomi Senadhira

Features

Lasting power and beauty of words

Published

14 hours ago

2025/12/15

Sahan Weerasooriya

Novelists, poets, short story writers, lyricists, politicians and columnists use words for different purposes. While some of them use words to inform and elevate us, others use them to bolster their ego. If there was no such thing called words, we cannot even imagine what will happen to us. Whether you like it or not everything rests on words. If the Penal Code does not define a crime and prescribe a punishment, judges will not be able to convict criminals. Even the Constitution of our country is a printed document.

A mother’s lullaby contains snatches of sweet and healing words. The effect is immediate. The baby falls asleep within seconds. A lover’s soft and alluring words go right into his or her beloved. An army commander’s words encourage soldiers to go forward without fear. The British wartime Prime Minister Winston Churchill’s words still ring in our ears: “… we shall defend our Island, whatever the cost may be, we shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender …”

Writers wax eloquent on love. English novelist John Galsworthy wrote: “Love is no hot-house flower, but a wild plant, born of a wet night, born of an hour of sunshine; sprung from wild seed, blown along the road by a wild wind. A wild plant that, when it blooms by chance within the hedge of our gardens, we call a flower; and when it blooms outside we call a weed; but flower or weed, whose scent and colour are always wild.” While living in a world dominated by technology, we often hear a bunch of words that is colourless and often cut to verbal ribbons – “How R U” or “Luv U.” Such words seem to squeeze the life out of language.

Changing medium

Language is a constantly changing medium. New words and forms arrive and old ones die out. Whoever thought that the following Sinhala words would find a place in the Oxford English Dictionary? “Asweddumize, Avurudu, Baila, Kiribath, Kottu Roti, Mallung, Osari, Papare, Walawwa and Watalappan.” With all such borrowed words the English language is expanding and remains beautiful. The language helps us to express subtle ideas clearly and convincingly.

You are judged by the words you use. If you constantly use meaningless little phrases, you will be considered a worthless person. When you read a well-written piece of writing you will note how words jump and laugh on the paper or screen. Some of them wag their tails while others stand back like shy village belles. However, they serve a useful purpose. Words help us to write essays, poems, short stories and novels. If not for the beauty of the language, nobody will read what you write.

If you look at the words meaningfully, you will see some of them tap dancing while others stand to rigid attention. Big or small, all the words you pen form part of the action or part of the narrative. The words you write make your writing readable and exciting. That is why we read our favourite authors again and again.

Editorials

If a marriage is to succeed, partners should respect and love each other. Similarly, if you love words, they will help you to use them intelligently and forcefully. A recent survey in the United States has revealed that only eight per cent of people read the editorial. This is because most editorials are not readable. However, there are some editorials which compel us to read them. Some readers collect such editorials to be read later.

Only a lover of words would notice how some words run smoothly without making a noise. Other words appear to be dancing on the floor. Some words of certain writers are soothing while others set your blood pounding. There is a young monk who is preaching using simple words very effectively. He has a large following of young people addicted to drugs. After listening to his preaching, most of them have given up using illegal drugs. The message is loud and clear. If there is no demand for drugs, nobody will smuggle them into the country.

Some politicians use words so rounded at the edges and softened by wear that they are no longer interesting. The sounds they make are meaningless and listeners get more and more confused. Their expressions are full of expletives the meaning of which is often soiled with careless use of words.

Weather-making

Some words, whether written or spoken, stick like superglue. You will never forget them. William Vergara in his short essay on weather-making says, “Cloud-seeding has touched off one of the most baffling controversies in meteorological history. It has been blamed for or credited with practically all kinds of weather. Some scientists claim seeding can produce floods and hail. Others insist it creates droughts and dissipates clouds. Still others staunchly maintain it has no effect at all. The battle is far from over, but at last one clear conclusion is beginning to emerge: man can change the weather, and he is getting better at it.”

There are words that nurse the ego and heal the heart. The following short paragraph is a good example. S. Radhakrishnan says, “In every religion today we have small minorities who see beyond the horizon of their particular faith, not through religious fellowship is possible, not through the imposition of any one way on the whole but through an all-inclusive recognition that we are all searchers for the truth, pilgrims on the road, that we all aim at the same ethical and spiritual standard.”

There are some words joined together in common phrases. They are so beautiful that they elevate the human race. In the phrase ‘beyond a shadow of doubt’, ‘a shadow’ connotes a dark area covering light. ‘A doubt’ refers to hesitancy in belief. We use such phrases blithely because they are exquisitely beautiful in their structure. The English language is a repository of such miracles of expression that lead to deeper understanding or emphasis.

Social media

Social media use words powerfully. Sometimes they invent new words. Through the social media you can reach millions of viewers without the intervention of the government. Their opinion can stop wars and destroy tyrants. If you use the right words, you can even eliminate poverty to a great extent.

The choice of using powerful words is yours. However, before opening your mouth, tap the computer, unclip a pen, write a lyric or poem, think twice of the effect of your writing. When you talk with a purpose or write with pleasure, you enrich listeners and readers with your marvellous language skills. If you have a command of the language, you will put across your point of view that counts. Always try to find the right words and change the world for a better place for us to live.

By R. S. Karunaratne
karunaratners@gmail.com

Features

Why Sri Lanka Still Has No Doppler Radar – and Who Should Be Held Accountable

Published

2 days ago

2025/12/14

Thilina Walpola

Eighteen Years of Delay:

Cyclone Ditwah has come and gone, leaving a trail of extensive damage to the country’s infrastructure, including buildings, roads, bridges, and 70% of the railway network. Thousands of hectares of farming land have been destroyed. Last but not least, nearly 1,000 people have lost their lives, and more than two million people have been displaced. The visuals uploaded to social media platforms graphically convey the widespread destruction Cyclone Ditwah has caused in our country.

The purpose of my article is to highlight, for the benefit of readers and the general public, how a project to establish a Doppler Weather Radar system, conceived in 2007, remains incomplete after 18 years. Despite multiple governments, shifting national priorities, and repeated natural disasters, the project remains incomplete.

Over the years, the National Audit Office, the Committee on Public Accounts (COPA), and several print and electronic media outlets have highlighted this failure. The last was an excellent five-minute broadcast by Maharaja Television Network on their News First broadcast in October 2024 under a series “What Happened to Sri Lanka”

The Agreement Between the Government of Sri Lanka and the World Meteorological Organisation in 2007.

The first formal attempt to establish a Doppler Radar system dates back to a Trust Fund agreement signed on 24 May 2007 between the Government of Sri Lanka (GoSL) and the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO). This agreement intended to modernize Sri Lanka’s meteorological infrastructure and bring the country on par with global early-warning standards.

The World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) is a specialized agency of the United Nations established on March 23, 1950. There are 193 member countries of the WMO, including Sri Lanka. Its primary role is to promote the establishment of a worldwide meteorological observation system and to serve as the authoritative voice on the state and behaviour of the Earth’s atmosphere, its interaction with the oceans, and the resulting climate and water resources.

According to the 2018 Performance Audit Report compiled by the National Audit Office, the GoSL entered into a trust fund agreement with the WMO to install a Doppler Radar System. The report states that USD 2,884,274 was deposited into the WMO bank account in Geneva, from which the Department of Metrology received USD 95,108 and an additional USD 113,046 in deposit interest. There is no mention as to who actually provided the funds. Based on available information, WMO does not fund projects of this magnitude.

The WMO was responsible for procuring the radar equipment, which it awarded on 18^th June 2009 to an American company for USD 1,681,017. According to the audit report, a copy of the purchase contract was not available.

Monitoring the agreement’s implementation was assigned to the Ministry of Disaster Management, a signatory to the trust fund agreement. The audit report details the members of the steering committee appointed by designation to oversee the project. It consisted of personnel from the Ministry of Disaster Management, the Departments of Metrology, National Budget, External Resources and the Disaster Management Centre.

The Audit Report highlights failures in the core responsibilities that can be summarized as follows:

· Procurement irregularities—including flawed tender processes and inadequate technical evaluations.

· Poor site selection

—proposed radar sites did not meet elevation or clearance requirements.

· Civil works delays

—towers were incomplete or structurally unsuitable.

· Equipment left unused

—in some cases for years, exposing sensitive components to deterioration.

· Lack of inter-agency coordination

—between the Meteorology Department, Disaster Management Centre, and line ministries.

Some of the mistakes highlighted are incomprehensible. There is a mention that no soil test was carried out before the commencement of the construction of the tower. This led to construction halting after poor soil conditions were identified, requiring a shift of 10 to 15 meters from the original site. This resulted in further delays and cost overruns.

The equipment supplier had identified that construction work undertaken by a local contractor was not of acceptable quality for housing sensitive electronic equipment. No action had been taken to rectify these deficiencies. The audit report states, “It was observed that the delay in constructing the tower and the lack of proper quality were one of the main reasons for the failure of the project”.

In October 2012, when the supplier commenced installation, the work was soon abandoned after the vehicle carrying the heavy crane required to lift the radar equipment crashed down the mountain. The next attempt was made in October 2013, one year later. Although the equipment was installed, the system could not be operationalised because electronic connectivity was not provided (as stated in the audit report).

In 2015, following a UNOPS (United Nations Office for Project Services) inspection, it was determined that the equipment needed to be returned to the supplier because some sensitive electronic devices had been damaged due to long-term disuse, and a further 1.5 years had elapsed by 2017, when the equipment was finally returned to the supplier. In March 2018, the estimated repair cost was USD 1,095,935, which was deemed excessive, and the project was abandoned.

COPA proceedings

The Committee on Public Accounts (COPA) discussed the radar project on August 10, 2023, and several press reports state that the GOSL incurred a loss of Rs. 78 million due to the project’s failure. This, I believe, is the cost of constructing the Tower. It is mentioned that Rs. 402 million had been spent on the radar system, of which Rs. 323 million was drawn from the trust fund established with WMO. It was also highlighted that approximately Rs. 8 million worth of equipment had been stolen and that the Police and the Bribery and Corruption Commission were investigating the matter.

JICA support and project stagnation

Despite the project’s failure with WMO, the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) entered into an agreement with GOSL on June 30, 2017 to install two Doppler Radar Systems in Puttalam and Pottuvil. JICA has pledged 2.5 billion Japanese yen (LKR 3.4 billion at the time) as a grant. It was envisaged that the project would be completed in 2021.

Once again, the perennial delays that afflict the GOSL and bureaucracy have resulted in the groundbreaking ceremony being held only in December 2024. The delay is attributed to the COVID-19 pandemic and Sri Lanka’s economic crisis.

The seven-year delay between the signing of the agreement and project commencement has led to significant cost increases, forcing JICA to limit the project to installing only one Doppler Radar system in Puttalam.

Impact of the missing radar during Ditwah

As I am not a meteorologist and do not wish to make a judgment on this, I have decided to include the statement issued by JICA after the groundbreaking ceremony on December 24, 2024.

“In partnership with the Department of Meteorology (DoM), JICA is spearheading the establishment of the Doppler Weather Radar Network in the Puttalam district, which can realize accurate weather observation and weather prediction based on the collected data by the radar. This initiative is a significant step in strengthening Sri Lanka’s improving its climate resilience including not only reducing risks of floods, landslides, and drought but also agriculture and fishery“.

Based on online research, a Doppler Weather Radar system is designed to observe weather systems in real time. While the technical details are complex, the system essentially provides localized, uptotheminute information on rainfall patterns, storm movements, and approaching severe weather. Countries worldwide rely on such systems to issue timely alerts for monsoons, tropical depressions, and cyclones. It is reported that India has invested in 30 Doppler radar systems, which have helped minimize the loss of life.

Without radar, Sri Lanka must rely primarily on satellite imagery and foreign meteorological centres, which cannot capture the finescale, rapidly changing weather patterns that often cause localized disasters here.

The general consensus is that, while no single system can prevent natural disasters, an operational Doppler Radar almost certainly would have strengthened Sri Lanka’s preparedness and reduced the extent of damage and loss.

Conclusion

Sri Lanka’s inability to commission a Doppler Radar system, despite nearly two decades of attempts, represents one of the most significant governance failures in the country’s disastermanagement history.

Audit findings, parliamentary oversight proceedings, and donor records all confirm the same troubling truth: Sri Lanka has spent public money, signed international agreements, received foreign assistance, and still has no operational radar. This raises a critical question: should those responsible for this prolonged failure be held legally accountable?

Now may not be the time to determine the extent to which the current government and bureaucrats failed the people. I believe an independent commission comprising foreign experts in disaster management from India and Japan should be appointed, maybe in six months, to identify failures in managing Cyclone Ditwah.

However, those who governed the country from 2007 to 2024 should be held accountable for their failures, and legal action should be pursued against the politicians and bureaucrats responsible for disaster management for their failure to implement the 2007 project with the WMO successfully.

Sri Lanka cannot afford another 18 years of delay. The time for action, transparency, and responsibility has arrived.

(The views and opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the policy or position of any organization or institution with which the author is affiliated).

By Sanjeewa Jayaweera