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Police Department celebrates 132nd
anniversary today The police department celebrates 132 years of service on the 3rd of September. It is not an exageration to say that the police department is a government institution that is closer to the people.The Police department has done as exceptional service not only as a protector of law and order but also been assisting the government to overcome difficulties of the times. Although the inception of the Police department can be traced back to 132 years the history of law enforcers could be traced back to the age of the Sinhala kings when the king had a number of officers to deal with offenders of the law. The invasion of the Portuguese in 1505 transformed the ancient system to one more in line with a present day police department. The advent of the Dutch in 1659 changed the system further. The Dutch deployed several soldiers to guard the city at night. The soldiers received a monthly salary for the first time. In 1806 the soldiers service that was confined to the city of Colombo was extended to other areas under a special act. In the year 1833 a police service with government wages was established. Thomas Oswin was the first inspector of Colombo. Several others were deployed to protect law and order.By 1845 the police service expanded to Kurunegala, Kandy, Negombo, Sabaragamuwa and Galle areas. Police stations were established in several major areas in the island. At the village level these functions were carried out by chief members of the village.
In 1869 during the reign of Campbell the police headquarters building was opened in Maradana together with a police hospital. The police band was formed in 1872 from recruits to the police rifle unit. A riot police unit was set up in 1833 at Kompannavediya after the riots in Kotahena. M. L. Dowbiggin who took over duties as IG held the post for 33 years. During his tenure as Deputy Inspector General the Crime Detection Bureau, Telecommunication and Transport, Child Welfare, Photography and mechnical sections, police band, police training college, police gazette, police savings unit, public relations unit and several other important units were established. Due to these changes that took place during his tenure it was hailed as an important period in the history of the police department.
When Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip visited Sri Lanka in 1954 they were met by Sir Richard Aluvihare. The police have excelled in almost every sphere of sports in Sri Lanka. The Police traffic unit carries out an invaluable service in directing and controlling traffic, preventing accidents and disseminating information to the public. In its lenghty history the service rendered by former IG W. B. Rajaguru will not go unnoticed. The increase of terrorist threat to the peace and stability of the nation has led to the setting up of a special police unit. The sacrifice of policemen who laid down their lives for the country should also be commemorated with honour and reverence. A response to Kusal Perera Continued from yesterday Whatever claim the Sri Lankan Tamils may have for the Northern Province as 'the traditional homeland of the Tamils'. They do not have an iota of historical evidence to show that the Eastern Province is also a part of their so called homeland! The Tamil politicians have only been saying that the matter is not negotiable; hardly a democratic attitude to take! However, every student who studies the History of Sri Lankan in the higher form knows that Eastern Province was a part of the Kandyan Kingdom till it was ceded to the British in 1815. The following is the historical evidence: (1). It was stated earlier that when on the orders of the King of Portugal. Governor Constantine de Sa expelled the Muslims from the territory under Portuguese control, on being appealed by the Muslims, King Senerat of Kandy gave them Digamadulla area, presently Batticaloa and Ampara Districts, for them to settle down. This fact clearly shows that Batticaloa and Ampara districts were a part of the Kandyan Kingdom in the seventeenth century. (2). When the Portuguese were becoming a threat to the security of the Kandyan Kingdom, King Rajasinha II of Kandy 'wrote to the Dutch Governor of Paliakat asking for assistance, offering them a fort at Kottiyar or Batticaloa and binding himself of pay the expenses of the fleet. This request was communicated to Anthony other Van Diemann, Director of Dutch East Indian Company in Batavia, who immediately accepted it. This was in 1636. This transaction also shows that Kottiyar in the Trincomalee district and Batticaloa which is the principal town in that district was a part of the Kandyan Kingdom in the 17th century. (3) Captain Robert Knox Sr's ship 'The Ann' landed at Kottiyar, south of Trincomalee, in February 1660 for purposes of trade and also to effect repairs to the ship. King Rajasinha's officials in the place seems to have sent the news of the arrival of the ship and its staying put at Kottiyar for a considerable length of time there. The King thereupon sent to Kottiyar no less a person than a Disava to investigate the matter. The Disawa captured Captain Knox's son Robert Jr, and several other English sailors and brought them to Colombo. The fact the King sent a Disava to Kottiyar to investigate the arrival of the English ship shows the importance he attached to the matter. A Disava is next in rank only to an Adigar. He sent an official of such high standing because Kottiyar was a part of his Kingdom. He also appears to have had his men in Kottiyar. (4) In 1797 the British defeated the Dutch and the maritime provinces came under the rule of the British. During the first year the area was administered by a military Governor on behalf of the East India Company. Its local Secretary was Sir Frederic North who later became the Governor of Ceylon when the island was declared a Crown Colony. As the local Secretary of the Company, Sir Frederic submitted to the Directors of the Company in England a lengthy memorandum running into 101 paragraphs on the Different Orders of Inhabitants in the island which is very informative. He says Inter alia: 'The Singalese or original inhabitants of the Island, form by far the most numerous population in the Kingdom of Candy, and in our territories from Chilaw by the southern coast to the Walawe river'... He say of the Tamils: 'The Malabars inhabitants of the Northern half of our territories, they are also divided into castes, but not same as Singalese' He goes on to say: 'The present disgrace of that nation at the Court of Candy has distressed it even here; and from what I have seen, I am sure that it will be difficult if not impossible to separate the policies of the inhabitants of these Settlements from those of the Great Court as it is here called'. The term 'Great Court' here means the King. 'The ancient and medieval Sinhalese were in the habit of calling their king Mahavasala or the Great Court. Incidentally, the last sentence in the above paragraph is somewhat obscure. Does it mean that even during the last days of the Kandyan Kingdom Jaffna was a vassal State of the King of Kandy? 'The followers of Budha and the other idol tors are not numerous near Colombo. They are more so I here on the Eastern side of the island they have however magnificent temples in the various parts of our territory whom I know by them peculiar dress they seems to be numerous in the neighbourhood'. This shows that even in the end of the eighteenth century the eastern part of the island was inhabited by Sinhalese Buddhists. The ancient Buddhist shrines at Seruwila, Digavapi, Tiriyai and others which are still there and also the large number of Buddhist ruins show that the Eastern Province was inhabited by Sinhalese Buddhists from ancient times upto comparatively recent times. There are also the Sinhala village names such as Wewegama, Bintenna, Potuvila, Tampalagama, Seruvila, Dighavapi which also indicate that the Eastern Province was inhabited by Sinhalese Buddhists. It was after the Wellassa rebellion (1817-1818), there the Tamils from the North began to settle down in the Eastern Province in large numbers. Rohan Gunaratne says in the Indian Intervention in Sri Lanka The Role of India's Intelligence Agencies: (Continued tomorrow) Anuradhapura, Mahavamsa and Tamil
Separatism Continued from yesterday Elizabeth Nissan also comments on Walishinghe Harischandra, who resided in Anuradhapura and spearheaded the campaign to develop Anuradhapura in terms of its past glory. Nissan presents him in an unflattering light, as a ludicrous figure, a bigot. She comments sarcastically that Harischandra wrote English in the European mode. Not only Harischandra, but all Ceylonese of the time wrote in the European mode. Walisinghe Harischandra was a part of a very successful anti-colonial nationalist struggle, in which Anurapdhpura was used as a rallying point. This was a brilliant tactical decision. The Sri Maha Bodhi was in Anuradhapura. It should be remembered that the pre-independence 'Sinhala Buddhist' movement was also this country's liberation movement. It was the 'Sinhala-Buddhist' movement which first called for independence. This movement carried the inevitable militancy and exaggeration such movement demand. Sri Lanka was trying to emerge from 400 years of colonial rule, not just a few centuries of British rule. Nissan lacks the scholarship and training to respond empathically to the phenomenon she studies. She does not need to. The contribution by Nissan and Jeganathan are openly political. Nissan declares at the conclusion of her essay: 'Unitary nations are not kingdoms, however much their leaders may draw on the idiom of kinship. Where kingdoms encompassed diversity among their peoples, modern nations tend towards exclusively on a single criterion of difference. The story of new construction of Anuradhapura as a Sacred City is equally a story of the negotiations of a new national sense of identity under colonialism and of the assertion of Sinhala hegemony over minorities in the independent state.' (Nissan p 40) This can be queried. Everybody knows that modern states are not kingdoms. But they may have a past history of successful monarchical rule. Modern states do not operate on criteria of 'difference'. Modern states have created the concept of 'citizen' precisely to eliminate all differences. Jeganathan says: 'Anuradhapura, from the end of the 19th century to the present day, remains an authoritative, collective representation of a particular kind of Sinhala Buddhist history. Nevertheless, there are many of us, both Sinhala and non-Sinhala who are critical of such a collective representation of history. These contestatory position are important in an on-going effort to build peaceful, democratic Sri Lanka. My efforts have been an attempt at such a contestation.' (Jeganathan p 130) Elizabeth Nissan's effort was initially read as a paper at the Department of Anthropology, University of Cambridge in November 1987. (Nissan p 23) Jaganathan's is a revised version of his Master's thesis which was submitted to the Department of Anthoroplogy, University of Chicago in 1990. He thanks the following, among others, for commenting on earlier versions of this paper, Quadri Ismail, Kumari Jayawardene, David Scott, and Jonathan Walters. The latest addition to this collection on sacred cities is the piece by Jonathan Walters titled 'Pushing Poson: the politics of a Buddhist pilgrimage in a post colonial Sri Lanka' published in 'Collective Identities revisited.' Vol 2, edited by Michael Roberts and issued by the Marga Institute. My comments are taken from a review by Radhika Coomaraswamy. (Daily News, 16.7.98 p 9) Apparently Walters describes the way that Poson and the Arahath Mahinda have been developed as symbols. Mahinda apparently has been blown up to epitomise the Sinhala language, the Buddhist religion and Sinhala culture.' The Arahath Mahinda has been 'Sinhalised.' We next turn to an article by Jonathan Walters titled 'Pushing Poson: the politics of a Buddhist pilgrimage in Postcolonial Sri Lanka' This is published in 'Sri Lanka: collective identities revisited. 'Vol 2 edited by Michael Roberts. (Marga Institute, 1998) This article is not about contemporary Buddhism, nor is it about current politics. It is yet another variation on a standard Tamil separatist theme. The Arahath Mahinda is, according to Walters, used to 'support the sovereignty of Sinhala Buddhist government.' (p 150) Mahinda 'Stands for the modern Sinhala Buddhist nation.'(p 151). This article is a jumble of the Arahath Mahinda, the Poson festival and Mihintale. The discussion moves to and fro between these three items. The approach is un-academic, unscholarly and highly subjective. He refer to 'Lame duck President D. B. Wijetunga' (p 149) and also mentions that before President Premadasa started patronising Mihintale, the UNP had 'ruthlessly suppressed its JVP rebellion'. (p 147) When there was a exposition of a Buddha relic from China, at Mihintale in 1961, 'beggars were cleared from the streets'. No supporting reference given. (p 145) Walters method of participant - observation has a humorous side. He had good political contacts and was invited to sit on the stage when President D. B. Wijetunga presided at Mihintale in 1994. He was unable to make it to the stage and was obliged to observe the masses from below. He made the profound discovery that the pilgrims were not interested in the political speeches. (p 155). He describes the Mihintale celebrations as a commercialised carnival, where commercial firms, public sector corporations and the head of state participate.(p 150,156). This cannot be contested. However this is well known. There is an inability to disentangle various facets in the development of the Mihintale area. There is a detailed description of Mihintale New Town. Anuradhapura and Mihintale New Towns were developed as a natural part of population increase, settlement expansion and urbanisation. Walters glosses over this. He is in any case unable to accommodate in his thinking the various layers of activity which characterise contemporary Sri Lanka. He says that Pradeep Jeganathan helped him to see that there were contradictions between Mahinda and modernisation. Thus indicating that he was in any case unable to make an independent study of his subject. (p 154) Lastly, his style of address indicates a general indifference to Sri Lankan culture. He refers to the Arahath Mahinda, breezily, throughout as 'Mahinda'. Walters focuses on the contemporary approach to the Arahath Mahinda. He refers to 'Mahinda the Missionary' and 'Mahinda, the nationalist'. He correctly links these with the anti-colonial nationalistic movement, and thereafter as a part of the populist behaviour of the successive heads of state. But he is unable to locate this in its commonsense context of pre - and post independence politics in an Asian state for him Mahinda is the 'Prometheus of Sinhala Buddhist culture'. (p 135) He ends with a discussion of the future of Mahinda in future Sri Lankan politics.(p 156) He discusses the 'problematic' of the new incarnation of Mahinda. That it may be possible for all Sinhala speaking Buddhists and Christians to relate to Mahinda (sic) but that he cannot be a 'model' for Tamil speaking Christians, Muslims and Hindus.(p 151) This is nonsense. The Arahath Mahinda brought a religion into the country, not a language. This religion was also propagated in Tamil. There is the Buddhist epic Manimekalai, in Tamil. An initial version of this paper was delivered at the Annual conference on South Asia, in Madison, USA in 1995. Walters was funded by the National Endowment of the Humanities and Whitman College, USA. 'The
era of the common man' Chapter 6 About the author Continued from yesterday Bill laboured the whole of the following day to make it so. He purchased a roll of coir matting and nailed it down in strips along the floor. He also bought chemically treated wood from one of the several furniture shops around the corner and knocked up a few handy items - a cupboard, sans door, sans lock, in which to leave his clothes, a couple of shelves on which to leave his bags, toiletries, magazines, newspapers. On the top of this he placed a framed photograph of Canon Josef Cardijn, some photographs of family, an uncle, an aunt, his brother. Above this he hung a large crucifix, the cross and the figure all carved from a dark wood. Opposite his bed, now looking fresh with new bedding, he nailed a strip of wood on which he fixed some metal hooks. On these he hung some of his clothes on hangers. He look round and was pleased with his day’s work. And rightly so, because he was by trade a cabinet maker. The small alarm clock indicated it was a little past ten. The sounds of traffic and commerce were thinning out. He showered, dined frugally on bread and curried beef, with bananas for dessert. He ought to have been tired and sleepy, but he was not. He was beginning to sweat and tiny trickled streams were running down his spine. He took his shirt off, not expecting much relief. The room was steamy. The entire building was closed. There was no window in his cubicle. Tomorrow he would get himself a table fan. There was no radio in his room, no television either: Ceylon did not have it yet, nothing with which to distract himself or assuage his, what was it? homesickness, loneliness, feeling of strangeness? He did not know. He was not an introspective man. He rarely had time for reflection. In Malvern, the suburb in Melbourne where he lived, life had been busy. As busy as a bachelor’s could be. He plied his trade, attended YCW cell meetings, coached a local under-16 football team, followed several sports though he played none. Two activities absorbed the remaining leisure time: body building and motor cycling. Of his studiously cultivated body only a shadow now remained. The past year and a half had left little leisure for that demanding hobby, and when that happened strong, well-bonded muscles go slack and lose much of their sharp definition. However some of the bulk still remained. He was still broad at the shoulders and slim at the waist. His arms and hands still manifested strength and power. Of his motor-cycling days only sweet memories remained, plus a pronounced limp. An accident? Well, it was an accident. It did not matter what had happened or who had been to blame and how many months of pain and frustration he had to spend in hospital and nursing homes, and how long he had to hobble on crutches. As he told himself and his friends a hundred times: these things happen. But no one could take away the sound of the wind whistling past his ears as he rode along the mountainous regions of Victoria and New South Wales; or the thrill of seeing snow-drifts dancing in his headlights on wintry nights, or the green, green smell of pine in his nostrils, or the sudden surge of power beneath the saddle when he opened the throttle. Ah, no one could take these things from him. Of course he could never ride again. No matter. He could re-live those rides any time he wanted. He shook himself out of a rare reverie. This high-backed chair was no good for this time of night. He needed an easy chair, like the one Fr Grutzner had in his room. Hansi putuwa, they called it in Sinhala. A chair for reclining. It also had built-in foot-rests which could be stretched out so that the legs could be rested parallel to the rest of the body. He had tried it once. Pure luxury. He would investigate the possibility of getting one. It then occurred to him that it would be a good idea to start and maintain a journal of his sojourn in Colombo. As he planned to remain for a year, it would provide an interesting record and be a source of some happiness and nostalgia in the years to come. He would use it when passing the time of day with his grandchildren, for instance. He grinned at the pleasant line of thoughts. It put him in a ruminative mood. Just about an year earlier he had passed this way on his way to Rome to attend a YCW international congress. On that occasion he had travelled by sea with the rest of the Australian contingent. He had taken the standard day tour of Colombo and Kandy, a package offered by all the major ocean liners that called at Colombo. But Bill had not gone looking for the usual tourist attractions. The great social revolution had already taken place in Ceylon. There was much talk among visitors about the era of the common man that had been ushered in by the brilliant orator, Bandaranaike. Bill had noticed, however, even through such a fleeting glimpse, that social revolutions are not accomplished completely in a flash. There had been evident industrial unrest. A strike in the port had caused more than a dozen ships to be held up outside the harbour. Outside there had been blistering evidence of Asian poverty - children in rags following tourists hands extended for a coin, women with children suckling at the breast squatting in rows along the long, grey wall. The rickshaw wallahs, the affront to human dignity, still plied their slavish trade. They waited eagerly for tourists and the inflated payment they sometimes made in foreign currency. On the way to Kandy, and even in that historic city, Bill had seen further evidence of squalor and filth and social stagnation. All that had denoted a superficial revolution, one that had barely touched the masses. The contrasts between the poor and the rich were screaming everywhere. Looking back, Bill wondered how in the name of heaven and earth he had resolved, after such a brief exposure to the country, that he had to do something for this country, these people. The rich tradition of missionary work in the Catholic Church could have been a factor in his decision. The moment he had returned to Australia he had contacted the leaders of the YCW in Colombo and offered his services, not only free but at his own expense, to the YCW. He had marvelled at the inner urge that had impelled him. It had the irresistible appeal of a siren. He wanted to give one year of his life, the life that had been spared in the motor cycle accident, to answer this call. It had become an obsession. He talked of nothing else. His friends in the movement in Melbourne had scoffed at the idea initially, but later supported him with a mighty will. He had to labour to convince his virtual foster parents, his uncle and aunt, to let him go through with it; and it had not occurred to him to do anything as important as this without their approval and blessing. One year. It had a mystic significance. Not eleven months and twenty nine days and twenty three hours. One year. One year of destiny. One year of Grace. If he fulfilled that obligation, he felt that he could sleep easy. For this, he felt persuaded, he had been called on that terrible night of the accident. Continued tomorrow |
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