Humans are irresistibly attracted to gambling. Despite moral reservations, many governments conduct or encourage the practice. Our country is no exception, and even has state institutions like the National Lotteries Board to exploit this natural impulse. Our state conducts several more, despite the fact that all of our four major religions expressly forbid all forms of gaming and gambling. Ironically, we even have Ministries to protect all our religions – Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism and Islam. We seem to be undeterred by this flagrant violation of a basic tenet, when It can yield substantial tax revenue.

There is a more insidious aspect to this corruption of society. The fact that those mostly addicted by the lure of an instant bonanza, are naturally those who are least able to afford it – the poorer and less literate sectors. The more affluent and educated know better! Is this any different from the State promoting other forms of vice? This is revenue collection at the price of peoples’ misery.

But there is another matter that des attention before. This is the probability of winning. In private gaming houses, I understand that the laws require that some thirty percent is paid as winnings. How do State Lotteries compare?

I have attempted, with my limited math, to examine a typical lottery. This one requires the top winner to hold a ticket with all six correct numbers surfacing in the draw. Each number is drawn from a pool of sixty numbers. I was staggered by the result of my inexpert calculation. The chance of an all correct draw is, according to my computation, is one in several million. A ticket is bought at Rs. 40 (just fifty cents at the beginning) even at the start, it was still it a massive amount of money! I wish that those persons more comfortable with numbers, may work it out.

The offer of prize money of a few million, with the grand offer of carry- over of money that was not awarded, to the following week, is not as grand as it looks at first glance. I reckon that the chance of a win is one in untold millions! Is my logic at fault, or calculation faulty? However, it is more than justified that a more competent mathematician (or audit), be commissioned to re-work the figures.

It cannot be that the Boards are unaware of them. My deductions are beyond belief- several millionth of one percent! Do the authorities consider this as reasonable? It is possibly illegal as well. Is this not a major rip-off unworthy of any State?

Older readers would remember that the first state involvement in Lotteries was the creation of the Hospital Lottery. The stated and laudable aim, was to help build new hospitals, or to refurbish existing ones.

To my knowledge, nothing of the sort has ever happened. New lotteries were spawned and the frequency increased. They are unashamedly, mere gambling exercise, designed to cheat the unwary.

The amount of money collected has to be enormous. It is true that there are operational costs, such as ticket costs, staff salaries, security, agents and retailers commissions, and the costs normally incurred by any institution. There is still a hefty margin. Where does all this go? One has to assume that foolproof procedures and strict audits are held to prevent pilferage.

The lotteries can be a very productive milch-cow. Is this why there is such an unseemly scramble for it, despite its bizarre /coupling if permitted! Foreign Affairs and Lotteries, Finance and the Government Press, Higher Education and Highways! The surprises are never – ending in this “land truly like no other.”

Dr. Upatissa Pethiyagoda ✍️

At a time when the word genocide is being used with political motive, and defencive war is being misconstrued as genocide and real and most brutal genocide is taking place on a global scale with impunity, one should reflect on genocide committed by those who falsely accusing the Sri Lankan armed forces and the government for such crimes. The British who systematically annihilated people including “babies suckling”, in Uva-Wellassa in 1818 and the LTTE, which carried out numerous massacres to drive away the Sinhalese and Muslims in the so-called border villages are now shamelessly levelling unsubstantiated allegations of genocide against the Sri Lankan military. The British, jointly with the US, massacred about a million people, including children, in Iraq on a fabricated charge of possessing weapons of mass destruction. The British helped the LTTE continue their genocide of the Sinhalese and Muslims in the North and the East in an attempt to drive them away and grab their lands, and such crimes constitute genocide according to 1948 Genocide Convention.

“Slaughter every man, woman, and child (including babes suckling at the breast)” were the orders given by Governor Robert Brownrigg (3rd British Governor of Ceylon from 1813 – 1820) to Maj. Gen. Hay MacDowell in 1818 that left the people in the agriculturally rich grain growing region of Uva-Wellassa of then Ceylon in a state of famine and starvation. The British used a scorched earth policy including mass murder and genocide of innocent Sinhala civilians to crush this rebellion. British human rights campaigners now pointing accusing fingers at Sri Lanka have forgotten the Madulla Massacre that led to razing and annihilating entire villages. In the entire Uva region members of the male population above the age of 18 were killed in revenge for resisting British imperial occupation under Governor Brownrigg.

The LTTE similarly massacred hundreds of civilians in cold blood from in many places, such as Sri Maha Bodhi, Aluth Oya, Aranthalawa (where the victims were Buddhist monks), Kattankudy mosque, Palliyagodella, Eravur, Gonagala and Kebethigollewa. Most of those killings, committed outside the war zone, were aimed at terrorising the ordinary people, and that amounts to genocide according to 1948 Genocide Convention. The LTTE carried out many bomb attacks on civilian targets, such as the Central Bus Station in Fort, the Central Bank, crowded trains and buses. In the eastern villages people were bludgeoned and slashed to death so that ammunition could be saved.

Apart from killing and injuring, the LTTE chased away Muslims and Sinhalese from the Northern province, which amounted to ethnic cleansing, an act of genocide according to the above mentioned Convention. The people who were chased away have still not returned to their homes and property, perhaps because of the memory of terror they had experienced in the North. Aren’t these acts of genocide ? The 1948 Convention defines genocide as any of five “acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group.” These five acts include killing members of the group, causing them serious bodily or mental harm, imposing living conditions intended to destroy the group, preventing births, and forcibly transferring children out of the group.

Attacks on centres of worship like temples and mosques and killing of priests are unpardonable acts of terror aimed at destroying religious groups. Similarly murdering surrendered police officers is butchery of the worst kind. It was such acts of naked terrorism and insane mass murder that made the FBI label the  LTTE “the most brutal terrorist organization in the world”.

Isn’t the UNHRC seriously interested in seeing justice done for the victims of genocide committed by the LTTE ? Perhaps, we should not make such a request to an organisation that keeps mum while genocide is  rampant in the contemporary world ? Palestinians are being systematically murdered and driven away from their country with the UNHCR doing nothing to protect them. The US president is threatening the countries which support the Palestinians.

The UNHRC must pass a resolution calling for an international investigation into genocide committed by the LTTE. Sri Lanka must call for an international investigation into it.

N. A. de S. Amaratunga ✍️

(Continued from Wednesday,July 23, 2025)

One is tempted to ask whether it is on purpose that president Anura Kumara Dissanayake has given the portfolio of Buddha Sasana, Religious and Cultural Affairs to Hiniduma Sunil Senevi instead of to a more acceptable MP with the requisite qualifications for the job, chosen from his massive parliamentary majority.

By appointing such individuals to be in charge of Buddha Sasana affairs, is President Anura Kumara Dissanayake flaunting his secularistic nonchalance towards the pivotal Article 9? Not likely, in my opinion. Having been in continuous parliamentary politics for twenty-five years, thanks exclusively to the support that the voters, the majority of whom are Sinhalese Buddhists, have extended to him to date, he would be the last to cock a snook at the place of special recognition given to Buddhism by the Constitution.

Article 9 is listed under Chapter 2 of the  Constitution which is exclusively devoted to Buddhism. The importance of the area of governance covered by that term (Buddhism) is underscored by the fact that it is placed next to the topics of primordial importance: ‘The People, the State and Sovereignty’ described in Chapter 1. Article 9 (coming under Chapter 2) states: ‘The Republic of Sri Lanka shall give to Buddhism the foremost place ….” It is not possible that the President wants to openly show contempt for Article 9 because he knows too well that it is totally compatible with secular democracy, and that it does not give Buddhism the status of a state religion that would impinge on the rights of adherents of minority religions.

But what about the novice MPs of his alliance, the NPP, who got swept into Parliament in November 2024 on the crest of a popular wave of electoral support generated by his, realistically speaking, less than unqualified success at the presidential election held hardly two months before, in September? Though the parliament is filled with them, even the ruling party hierarchy look down upon most of them as papisi (door mats) and polleli (dry coconut husks). My personal opinion is that these abysmally ignorant self-styled secularists or so-called niragamikayas of the JVP/NPP, given little significance for policy-making, have  seriously misunderstood the meaning of ‘secular’ as merely niragamika (Sinhala: without any religious affiliation). The Sinhala term is actually derived from Sanskrit; it is a combination of the two elements nir+agamika, which these newly elected parliamentarians might understand, depending on their level of general knowledge, cultural and linguistic sophistication, and common sense, as ‘without any religion’ or ‘rejecting religion altogether’, or ‘non-religious’, or ‘areligious’, or ‘irreligious’, and hence, happily ‘amoral’, or even ‘immoral’! They also seem to labour under the additional misconception that Buddhism is your typical religion with all the inherent negative attributes usually associated with all normal religions such as dogmatic beliefs that must be accepted as incontrovertible truths and followed without questioning, otherworldly attitudes that obstruct a person’s material advancement and that accommodate unconscious antisocial self-centredness.

But Buddhism is essentially a nonreligious, moral ethical philosophy (that is, Buddhist spirituality has no connection with religion). It nevertheless needs to assume the religious cultural form of a conventional religion in order to survive among actual religions. Very much the same thing may be said about Hinduism, in spite of the apparently chaotic and obscurantist (= that which prevents knowledge of facts) nature of its practical popular forms. But here I am taking you towards the deep end. Let’s swim back to the safer side.

Historically speaking, Buddhism emerged in the spiritual matrix of Hinduism. We shouldn’t forget that Siddhartha Gautama, who became the Buddha was born a Hindu. Hinduism and Buddhism are not religions. (Ask the famous Sadhguru/Jagadish Vasudev of Tamil Nadu, founder of the Isha Foundation). Hinduism and Buddhism  professed as religions  by over eighty percent (80%) of the Sri Lankan population are the most secular (liberal democracy) friendly, and, at the same time, mutually compatible  spiritual traditions that together make for  peaceful coexistence among the diverse ethnic/religious communities within multifaith Sri Lanka. Secularism is no threat either to Hindus or to Buddhists. (Actually, solidarity between these two groups is the key to Sri Lanka’s national unity.)

But unfortunately, it is a group of young Buddhist monks who rail against secularism the loudest, believing that it means total rejection of religious values in politics and in general civil society, while their Hindu, Christian, and Muslim counterparts, knowing the truth about secularism in governance, hold their peace.

Nevertheless, we cannot ignore these ‘embattled’ young monks’ patriotic intentions. They must be taught about the importance of secularism (= keeping religion and other matters separate from each other) in governance, civil administration, art, entertainment, in fact, in all spheres of human activity. AI offers the following definition: ‘Secularism is the principle of separating religion from other aspects of life, particularly government and public institutions. It advocates for a society where religious belief is a private matter and the state does not favor or discriminate against any particular religion. Secularism promotes freedom of thought, conscience, and religion for all, ensuring that individuals can hold diverse beliefs without facing coercion or disadvantage’.

However, in the real world, religion does not always manifest itself as a strictly private matter. Religions become socio-political markers that identify separate ideological groups of people. It is a well-known fact that religions promote herd mentality among individuals within a larger group. It makes them conform to beliefs, morals and ethics, and attitudes of the majority (within a community), though they do not privately subscribe to those beliefs, attitudes, etc. So, religions have great political power.  In the world today, for example, Christianity and Islam are both politically powerful in different, sometimes, mutually hostile ways, as in Western and Middle Eastern countries respectively. A common observation is that secular democracy is more prevalent in the Christian West than in the Islamic Middle Eastern states. However, secular democracy is strongest in the Hindu and Buddhist majority countries including India, Sri Lanka, Thailand, etc. Hinduism and Buddhism do not seek world dominance. They only offer a firm moral anchor for individuals and groups based on non-violence, wisdom, and universal compassion.

 A memorable instance that showed the efficacy of this attitude was when Finance Minister J. R. Jayewardene of Ceylon (Sri Lanka) who attended the San Francisco Peace Conference held in 1951 made a powerful speech in which he quoted from the Dhammapada: ‘Hatred is never appeased by hatred in this world – By non-hatred alone is hatred appeased. This is an ancient Truth’, and made a passionate appeal on behalf of Japan, which was struggling after its defeat at World War II; he requested that the demand for war reparations be disclaimed; he said his own country was not going to accept any such compensation money from Japan. Jayewardene’s words were a clarion call for the humane treatment of Japan by the victorious side as well as a morale booster for that country. The grateful Japanese built a statue of Jayewardene in his honour at the Kamakura Temple in Kanagawa in Japan, which is carefully maintained even today.

Though today we tend to look upon secularism as something modern imported from the West, a glance at our own history shows that from the very beginning, even before the advent of Buddhism, our rulers adopted a secular mode of governance that was nevertheless subject to wholesome moral standards where Brahman priests and later  Buddhist  monks played only an advisory role for the king, speaking up in the interest of public good, but never took part in governing. The Dasa Raja Dharma or the Ten Kingly Virtues are the moral and ethical duties of a ruler, which emphasise compassionate governance, social justice, and the well-being of the people. They are relevant not only for political leaders, but also for anyone in a position of authority, including business leaders and managers’, as an AI summary explains. No religion is involved here. These are secular principles of good governance. If only Anura Kumara Dissanayake cared to look at what these ten tenets of righteous government are, he would have improved his performance in no time.

In this article (published in two parts), I dwelt on the misunderstood concept of ‘secularism’ that vitiates the JVP/NPP government’s handling of Article 9 of the Constitution. However, the main thrust of president Anura Kumara Dissanayake’s address at the inauguration of the 74th Upasampada Vinayakarma ceremony of the Ramanna Nikaya was to stress his determination to stamp out the evil of  ‘nationalism’ that he seems to have identified as what has been plaguing independent Sri Lanka in the form of the so-called curse of the past 77 years. He appears to be trying to impress on his avowedly secularist party ranks, as well as the meddling outsiders (with strategic geopolitical designs on our country) who are looking over his shoulder, the strength of that resolve.

But he cannot be unaware of the fact that the Sinhala neologism jaatikavadaya was coined about two decades ago as an equivalent to the English term ‘nationalism’ perceived then (at least among us Sri Lankans) as a positive concept identical with patriotism. His current definition of nationalism as an evil that should be suppressed is in accordance with America’s negative interpretation of the concept of ‘nationalism’ in respect of nations/countries that independently choose to promote their own national interests without shaping their foreign policy to subserve ‘the five vital interests’ of the world’s only superpower. This is an idea that I owe to senior American public intellectual, social activist, and former linguistics professor Noam Chomsky.

Critics have begun to ask whether Anura Kumara Dissanayake’s erroneous substitution of jaativadaya (racism) for jaatikavadaya (nationalism), is a self-conscious ploy to please the Tamil diaspora in the West who secured for him and the alliance he leads the majority of the Tamil votes in the North and the East provinces at the presidential and parliamentary elections held respectively in September and November, 2024, as would be obvious to any unbiased observer.

by  Rohana R. Wasala ✍️