Morning Spice by Ginger
Grave cr imes and blind eyes

Grave crimes appear to follow each other like the monsoon rain. They seem to be passed off without much concern by the powers that - be for some reason or other. Very often when gang leaders are eventually caught the police find a host of stolen items over a fair period with them. This would mean that those thefts had gone undetected. With the police saddled with other work and the patronage the underworld has got for the last twenty years as most gangsters are somebody's gunda we might have to think in terms of an alternative service to crack down on gangsters and conmen.

Ginger has always wondered why there have been no detective agencies in this country when there is such scope for them. The security services multiplied so fast that at one time Ginger wondered whether there wasn't. A single individual who did not have a security service and yet many of them survived. This seems to be about the best time for those with any sleuthing talents to set up such agencies. People often want their stolen stuff back and there a whole heap of unsolved murders, there are those who want to know whether their spouses are getting naughty and last but not least many firms and banks would like to know whether any employees are up to any shady business or not. Of course the credentials of who ever starts it must be really sound.

Alzheimer's disease
If you are taking your young ones from one country to another or migrating you better think a little over it. Its all very nice thinking of greener pastures and seeing whats on the other side of the hill but your children may be running smack into some serious health problems. The latest is that they could be candidates for Alzheimer's disease.

For a long time doctors have been of the opinion that environment has a lot to do with Alzheimer's disease and a change of environment could bring on the symptoms of the disease. Now a recent study reveals that Japanese males living in Hawaii are twice as likely to develop Alzheimer's disease than those living in Japan. They feel that a change in diet when you are young and the brain is developing could contribute to the incidence of the disease.

Line boys
Who are line boys? No they were not those born on some coolie line in Sri Lanka on the subcontinent during the days of the white Sahib. In retrospect they were associated with one of the bravest fighting units that upheld blightly in some pretty tight situation. They were the children of those who belonged to Gurkhas.

The Gurkhas are from Nepal but the line boys were not from Nepal. They were born in the line rooms of the barracks where the married Gurkhas lived. They used the term in a disparaging sense as these children who ultimately became recruits acquired bazar habits which their parents who came from the hills did not have.

It wasn't a sterile period for the FP

This refers, to Prof. A. J. Wilson's reply which appeared on 10. 05. 98 in the Sunday editon of 'The Island' refers. In short, the professor has failed to answer my pertinent question 'What did the FP get from the liberal Dudley?' But in one sentence I answered the whole question. It is quoted for clarity 'They got three illegal regulations which were never implemented for which a monk was killed' If one examines his five point answer to my query it is an indictment against the FP and not a defence. Let us take one by one.

1. According to Dr. Wilson the FP leader Mr. Chelvanayakam has asked the Prime Minister Dudley Senanayake for the portfolio of Home Affairs. But Mr. C. had to reconcile with the portfolio of local government. This is the sterility number one.

2. His second point is that Mr. Thiruchelvam was asked to draft the famous regulation under the Tamil language (Special Provisions) Act of 1958. In this connection, the reader should remember that the FP had already compromised its policy of 'parity' when it entered into a pact with S.W.R.D. Bandaranaike in 1957. This shift in policy embarrassed the LSSP before the Sinhala Electorate. People in the South asked a very cogent question from the LSSP. They asked why does the LSSP still pursues parity when the accredited leaders of the Tamils have given it up?

Drafting of regulations under the Act is proof that the FP was prepared to find a solution to the language question within the framework of the two language Acts. Professor admits that the regulations were not implemented. Another proof for sterility. To cover up this folly he tries to shift the blame elsewhere by saying that the regulations were superseded by the 1972 Constitution. To say the least it is a deliberate distortion of facts. What did really happen? U.F. Government gave those two language laws constitutional status by incorporating them in the Republican Constitution. Furthermore, for and a precedent was created for the Speaker to have the both documents certified. These improvements were made by the UF government without the support of the TULF which boycotted the constituent assembly when their proposal to divide the country into five parts in three of which the Tamil minority would be in a majority was rejected. Later, Colvin R de Silva said, 'I did not allow that dynamite to have too much effect.'

As a professor of political science and constitutional advisor to the FP, leader Dr. Wilson is well aware that nowhere in the world the regulations made under a law are incorporated in constitutions regulations are often changed. Thus the regulation procedure has been made easier. If the regulations are incorporated in constitutions the very purpose of enacting regulations is defeated.

3. Third, was the question of giving back the nationalised schools. As usual, Dudley backed out this promise too. Yet another sterility.

4. District councils too ended in a miscarriage. However, this para is interesting in a different context. Professor speaks about the existence of a secret pact between Dudley and Chelva. Even certain cabinet ministers were not aware of it. That means it had been signed behind the back of the people. So much so for Dudley's liberalism! This secret pact was one reason, which made the LSSP to oppose the regulations.

5. Fifth, one mentions about the temporary halt to colonization and relief to Tamil public servants. In this connection the learned professor should not forget the relief process that commenced with the formation of the coalition government in 1964. Shortly after assumption of office as Minister of Finance, Dr. N.M.Perera with the concurrence of the Prime Minister, Mrs. Bandaranaike, issued instructions to take back the Tamil public servants who were compulsorily retired due to non-proficiency in the official language. There were other problems like the promotion to E.C.C. Grade II too.

A committee was appointed to recommend corrective measures early. It must be remembered that these measures were taken amidst severe opposition which came from the Sinhala extremists like Philip Gunawardena and K.M.P. Rajaratne. What was the response of the FP? Did they strengthen the hands of N.M. against the Sinhala extremists? No. They joined hands with liberal Dudley and toppled the government within months. That is the record of FP's political morality. Hence the sterility.

Ranjith Chandrasekera
Kurunegala

On Buddhism and decay

Please permit me some space to correct some errors in Dr. Kingsley Heendeniya’s article "Is Buddhism in Decay" (The Island) 29.5.98). I refer primarily to the parts concerning Bundala and the hermitage there. To be charitable to him they could be due to the length of time involved coupled with senile forgetfulness or else as a result of getting his information at second hand.

Let me begin by saying that there were two hermitages in the jungles of Bundala. In the course of his article the doctor confuses these two — it was the first hermitage that was close to the road leading to the fishing wadiya. It was abandoned due to the intrusion of elephants and is now in ruins it is near the second hermitage that muddy water collects under a culvert where according to the good doctor the monk Ven. Nyanavira bathed.

As a person from Bundala who had looked after the foreign monks who came there I can say without any hesitation that no monks bathed there. One could often see buffaloes wallowing in it. The Medawewa which is within sight of the hermitage never dried up and the monks sometimes go there. However, their most popular place of bathing was the sea. Treating the monk for lumps of inspissated mud in his ears must be like the good doctor’s claim that the brackish Bundala water and the dry climate was soothing to another monk’s ulcerative colitis! Up to now, what I had heard had been that the dry climate of the area was good for people having lung ailments.

However, we must not forget that the doctor was a MOH and that most of them did not select public health for the love of the subject but because they were assigned such posts on their positions in the pass list.

The doctor refers to the people of Bundala as "very poor villagers". Let me remove this misconception of his by assuring him that the people of Bundala are and had been land owning farmers from pre-Dutugemunu times. They had known no other occupation. Actually, one reason for building the hertimage in Bundala was the ability of the Bundala villager to give the monk in the hermitage a substantial dana even during severe droughts when people in other villages nearby did not have enough to eat. The monks who came there always went out with their begging bowls for their alms. It was only when they were ill that they remained in the hermitage and suitable meals were taken to them by the villager whose turn it was to offer dana.

The Bundala hermitage is under the control of the Dodanduwa Island hermitage and at that time the Kapakaru Dayaka was one Mr. Perera, a Hambantota businessman who had a paddy husking mill in town. Any monk coming to reside in the Bundala hermitage or leaving it had to meet Mr. Perera if only to take over or hand over the hermitage key. He was responsible for the safety and the welfare of the monk, arrange his dana and look after his health. For this purpose he visited Bundala regularly. The villagers gave him unstinted support. No outsider had ever offered even one dana to the monk residing there.

So, as I said in the beginning, there are inaccuracies and improbabilities in the article which we could, with Meththa, take with a pinch of salt which is found abundantly in Bundala.

J. G. Kasun Chamara,
Hambantota.

Kadugannawa Pass an eye-sore

It is unfortunate that the Kadugannawa Pass, world famous for its beauty and scenic atmosphere has now become an eyesore. The look-out points are blocked by shabby shopping venders. The so-called protected high-way is blocked by rows of vehicles parked on the road. In the nights, the glittering lights from the shops blind the drivers causing accidents.

The garbage collected from the shops are strewn everywhere that gives a pungent smell specially during the rainy days. During early mornings, the road is engulfed in a column of dieseling fumes that is a silent killer for all of us. I wonder what plans are ahead to prevent this menace?

Dr. A. S. Abeyratne,
Kiribathgoda.

Nugegoda Post Office - a shame!

On June 17, 1998 I went to the Nugegoda Post Office to buy some stamped envelopes.

I was the second in the queue. Soon some others crowded round the counter without forming in the queue, to buy stamps, send telegrams and have their foreign letters stamped. But the Counter Clerk ignored all these and first attended to his friends inside the post office. He then came to those who had crowded round the counter and not in the queue while we who were in the queue were languishing for about an hour.

Why cannot this Post Master enforce the queue system? Then all would be treated equally without any discrimination.

I wanted to buy four stamped envelopes and the Counter Clerk had to resort to his calculator to multiply Rs. 1.75 by 4.

To what depths the postal service has dropped?

P. M. Gunasekera,
Boralesgamuwa.

Death in a gas chamber

According to Minister of Health Nimal Siripala de Silva "The cost factor prevents the ministry from resorting to other methods." Does he mean other methods of killing dogs or other methods of stray dog population control?

Would it not be far more economical to advocate the sterilization of animals as a means of stray dog control and thereby rabies control? While the rabies vaccination program undertaken by the government is commendable it does nothing to control the stray dog population - other than killing them by horribly barbaric methods. What guarantee is there that, once a 'pet' dog has been given the rabies vaccine, that dog will not keep producing litters?

These litters are then abandoned and create another new generation of 'stray dogs.' Consider this: dogs produce litters approximately once every four to fire months; four to five puppies per litter. Calculate how many puppies one female can produce during her lifetime! It is the uneducated human who considers it an evil to sterilize an animal, but not an evil to abandon puppies at railway lines, at markets and on the street. It is the human that has allowed their pets (by not sterilizing/neutering) to produce unwanted litters and thereby created this stray dog population.

Would it not be far more humane to embark on a sterilization program and education and address the problem at its root cause. Why has this option - probably the best for man and god not been implemented. It is also essential that an education program be implemented in regard to the benefit of sterilization/neutering. Perhaps the authorities are not aware that various animal welfare & protection associations and animal lovers have been carrying out sterilization programs, despite of financial difficulties and other support systems.

Why does the Ministry not join hands with and support these groups in this humane method of stray dog and rabies control? When there is an alternative why do we have to make these animals suffer?

Animal lover,
Colombo 5.

Rupavahini playing "football with viewers

I am in complete agreement with Mr. Fernando from Negombo regarding his views on the Rupavahini programme of telecasting sports. But Mr. Fernando, you and I cannot expect anything better, knowing the calibre of those responsible for these programmes.

The only problem is this dog-in-the-manger attitude where they, being state-sponsored, grab everything and do what they like, making us, who by our annual licensing fees sustain them to some extent, look like dumb puppies. The great all-knowing sahibs there, are beyond correction. They are a law unto themselves! an instance of dwarfs in borrowed giants' robes overacting their part.

One can imagine the number of local advertisements that interfere to the extent of veritable viewer frustation, in addition to the so-called news broadcast stopping what is offered as the live telecast of matches between Sri Lanka and other nations! Probably they are incapable of doing some adjustments in their programmes."

Titus Fernando,
Battaramulla.