Morning Spice by Ginger
Reluctance to invest on sharesWhy has there been a reluctance on the part of the public to get into the stock market. Ginger is talking about the small-timer but they do affect share prices to some extent in the final analysis. Their real incomes have changed almost overnight. Nobody who gets involved in the stock market ever looks forward to the dividends as a means of existence. The returns on those that declare dividends are much less than the going interest as they sell for well over their par value as a rule. The purpose is to make substantial capital gains if possible.
Recently two factors have hamstrung the smaller investor considerably. In the first instance the interest rate on fixed deposits have come down rather sharply and so as incomes have been reduced considerably there is less spare cash to invest on shares and such like. The other reason is that the cost of living has risen to such unprecedented heights that many people do not have the wherewithal to last the month quite apart from investing in the stock markets.
Weird medical cures
Some cures by modern scientists can sound a bit weird. Now take the case of those who have congenitally enlarged hearts. What do you think the doctors would recommend for that condition. Plenty of rest or exercise or a carefully selected diet? The latest remedy to relieve this condition is something you would never have guessed.Booze seems to be the best thing for most health problems these days. Scientists have proved that injecting alcohol into a congenitally enlarged heart can by inducing a heart attack relieve shortness of breath, any pain in the chest and other symptoms because ethanol alcohol which is about 200% proof kills overgrown heart muscle thus enabling blood to flow more freely.
Pol Pot - the other side
There may have been another side to Pol Pots character. He is supposed to have butchered over two million people. But his widow who recently remarried says that there was a softer side to his character and that he was an excellent father and a loving husband. Anyway all that did not prevent the good lady taking the plunge a second time.Mea Son was obviously sympathetic to the rebel cause and did not let the massacres weigh on her conscience. She married Tep Khunnal a former Khemer Rouge rebel. They defected to the Cambodian government recently and then fled to a refugee camp in Thailand after that.
Certain statements made by President Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga recently deserves comment, purely because of the irrationality of such statements.
She is quoted in the Daily News of 8th January 98 as stating at a P.A. Provincial Council election meeting at Nattandiya thus (Page 17): 'Finally, I would like to make a categorical request to the people of Wayamba. We are carrying on a peaceful election campaign. If anybody tried to resort to acts of violence from our party, tie such a person to a tree and send a message to me. I will see that such persons are taken into custody. We don't believe in violence like the UNP'.
What a practical proposition it is! Who is the P.A. supporter, or for that matter, an ordinary citizen, who would dare to apprehend a P.A. politician or a PA big wig who would indulge in violence and tie him to a tree. Suppose if he had done such an unimaginable task. Would he or she be able to contact the President when the North East Governor Gamini Fonseka had complained he could not contact her for official matters.
Would it be correct on her part to instigate more violence when the accepted course of action would be to report any such violence to the police. However the gravamen of the charge is that the police had not taken action to apprehend the culprits who had perpetrated violence against candidates of parties opposed to the P.A. despite complaints made and culprits identified.
We have it on record that the P.A.'s Deputy Minister of Fisheries, Milroy Fernando admitting that a series of violent acts committed by a particular P. A. M.P. in the Puttalam District had brought disrepute to the P.A. and that he had brought them to the notice of the President and other P.A. highups. Still no action.
The President exhorting people to catch offenders, tie them to a tree and tell her so that she would do the rest.
Now, who is fooling whom?
A concerned citizen
The sermons of Gangodawila Soma Thera
The Article in the Mid-week Island of January 13,1999 by Mr. Amarasiri Weeraratne encapsulates some of the more noteworthy prejudices resulting from a misunderstanding of what Rev. Soma is preaching so tirelessly. Judging from his increasing popularity, only a few persons have raised the following questions resulting from obviously not paying close attention to the Reverend's well-chosen words. The main mix-apprehensions are dealt with below. (I am writing this comment as a person who listens regularly with careful attention and after discussions with him revealing the depth of his Dhamma knowledge).
1. SINHALA CHAUVINISM? It is an uncontestable fact that the Sinhala people have protected. Through History the true (Theravada) Buddhism. It flows from this that the Sinhala people being the majority community is the reason why Sri Lanka is known as a Buddhist country. This has to be acknowledged along with the other historically proven fact that the Sinhala Buddhists permit the minorities to live freely practising their respective religions and customs. Rev. Soma is preaching only to: the Buddhist majority in this Island nation who happen to be Sinhala as well as to other races who are Buddhists or interested in the religion. It is a misunderstanding to consider this as a message to only Sinhala people based on a biological prejudice of racial purity. The argument once advanced about 'pure' races is for sometime now, dead as the proverbial Dodo!
2. ARE HINDU GODS DENIGRATED? No. On every occasion Rev. Soma tells Buddhists not to worship Hindu Gods beseeching favours, the Rev. is careful to say that his message is to Buddhists only, while Hindus should be allowed to worship these Gods in their customary manner. Therefore what the Rev. is doing is preaching the true Theravada Buddha Dhamma; emphasising existance of Dukka (Unsatisfactoriness and emancipation from craving by meritorious deeds (Kusala Kamma) to obtain through self-reliance eventual release from Dukka. He is preaching the Buddha Dhamma when he warns of the danger in promoting Craving which will lead (in the opposite direction to Nibbana) to the various Hells described in Buddhist Cosmology. It is relevant to recount the last words of the Lord Buddha meant as a guide for the future: 'All component things are subject to decay, exert yourself with diligence.'
It is a measure of Rev. Soma's increasing popularity that Buddhists all over the world are prepared to listen to the Buddha Word. Furthermore, it is an indication of the thirst for knowledge of what Buddhism really is in order to experience the exhilaration and of true freedom (Vimukthi).). Incidentally, the fact that the advice not to so worship Hindu Gods is practical and acceptable is proven beyond doubt by the popularity of famous Temples like Vajiraramaya in Bambalapitiya, Col 4. which does not have a single Devalaya!
3. AGAINST SINHALA BIRTH CONTROL ? No- another misunderstanding' unlike, His Holiness the Pope who wants Catholics to strictly abstain from Birth control evidently not to diminish their population numbers. The Ven. Soma is tolerant and talking of reasonable ethnic ratios, a cry even heard from minorities. In implementation of Birth-control all communities must participate, to prevent the decimation of one community.
ETHICAL MESSAGE : More Buddhist Monks together with preachers of all religions would do well to attack the sharply declining moral standpoints we are witnessing. Considering the disintegration we see of the family and moral values especially our young people should be protected by the emphasis on virtue (Sila) placed by all Religions as a necessary Foundation for any further Moral progress.
Asoka Jayasinha
Society moving towards selfish way of life
Recently I was at St. Lucia's Cathedral following a Sunday Mass when my umbrella which I had left on the bench fell down. Even before I could bend down and pick it up, a small child of about five years who was seated with his parents a few pews behind me darted and picked up the umbrella and handed it over to me. I was very much touched by that child's action. For that child to have done that, the source and cause would have been his parents.
Today, one finds that even some of the grown up boys and girls do not bother to say even sorry when they knock down something from a person. The society on the whole seems to be moving towards an indisciplined, unmannered selfish way of life.
If we want a fair and just society, we must begin at the beginning. The child, who will be the maker and supporter of the society and even the ruler, will have to be brought up in the correct way. For that the parents, or rather those who are going to be parents, should be educated and trained, to bring up children in the correct way.
Parents, like the politicians, are the only people who do not need any qualifications to engage in the profession of producing and bringing up children. Even to become a labourer one has to have some qualification. But not for bringing up children, the future pillars and rulers of the society. Some people have learned to train their dogs but not their children!
Very soon we will find that boys and girls of nine and ten years dating each other. And we will be very proud that we are advanced like the West. Advancement to us has become aping the West.
Parents send their children to learn all sort of activities-games, dancing, sewing, cookery, elocution, acting and so on, but not send them to learn first aid, or have them to learn to look after babies, to feed them, to bathe them and such matters which will enable the youths to bring up their children in the correct way when they have children.
So, like people without any training jumping into the field of politics and making a mess of the society, people also jump into the field of parenthood without any training and make a mess of themselves, their children and the society, because we are said to be having the freedom to do anything though one does not have the freedom even to go about on the streets without an identity card!
All our thoughts and actions seem to be really messed up.
Arul,
Colombo 13.
At most channel centres (CC) appointments for the consultation of specialists are given in the morning starting by about 6 a.m. But there are some that issue numbers from early hours and appointments are given according to these numbers from about 9 or 9.30 a.m. This makes it necessary for relatives of patients to make three visits.
If, due to large numbers, it is not possible to give appointments over the phone as done in other countries these CC should do away with the issue of numbers and in the very making the go back to the earlier system of giving appointments in the very first instance unless they take a sadistic pleasure in making the relatives of patients make three visits.
If I remember right the govt. had plans to introduce legislation to control the activities of nursing homes. If so can't the Ministry of Health direct these channel centres to adopt methods that cause least inconvenience to patients and relatives.
S. Abeywickrama,
Nugegoda.
Remedies for election violence
It is timely that Mr. Walter Rupasinghe made aware of the laws relating to conducting of Provincial Councils election. Now that the law is known what is required is to get it enforced. Most of the offences that could be readily proved comes under section 74. Instead of lamenting and appealing it should be possible for either an individual; or an organization that is canvassing for a fair and free election to go to the courts and obtain a writ on the commissioner for elections and the Inspector General of Police to implement the law. If they do not carry out their duties then get an injunction to stop holding of the poll. If that too fails file an election petition to declare the election null and void. When there are remedies politically enlightened, people should make use of them.
T. B. M. Ekanayake,
Kandy.
What has happened to the Employees Trust Fund?
My small company has been a contributor to the Employees Provident Fund from the time we started our business in 1962 and to the ETF from 1981. Our company has received the statement of year end balances very promptly from the EPF with statements received upto Dec. 1997.
We were glad to see very prominent notices published by the Central Bank in all the newspapers calling for details of remittances sent by employers in order to finalize the member statements for the year 1998. In sharp contrast we have not received our statements of balances even for the year 1995. Since some firms have received their statements for 1995 we made inquiries from the General Manager of the ETF and all he said was that we must bear up and wait some more!
The same employers who send contributions to EPF also send contributions to ETF. If EPF which has been in existence from 1958 is able to send statements to members very soon after the end of the year, there is no reason why the ETF should be over 3 years behind. The government should scrap the ETF which is clearly an inefficient organization and hand over its functions to the EPF Management. The inefficiency of the ETF is bringing the government into disrepute.
R. M. S. Perera,
Randombe.
Flair for sensation and untruth
Heinrich Boll's beautiful and sensitively written book about an unusually honest girl driven to murder by a sensation - Seeking press that gives its own interpretation to an evening she spent with a man, was alas not translated into a good film, though Schlondorf and a well-known female director had directed it. The film was shown at the German Cultural Institute on the 29th October.
And when it ended with a funeral service (an event not contained in the book) where the priest spoke of safeguarding the freedom of the press, it seemed to negate all that B'oll said in his book, for here was a press that had destroyed an unusually honest girl, so much so that even after murdering the press reporter who intrudes into her flat to go further with his interpretation of her, she walks the streets 'in order to find repentance and cannot find it.' Eventually she herself surrenders to the Police.
I don't think that in the foreseeable future Sri Lankan journalists will reach this flair for sensation and untruth, though they give a twist to political news out of party loyalties.
Chitra Jayasuriya,
Moratuwa.
To watch a beast or a bird being killed for its flesh would be disgusting and repulsive to any human being. Please go to your nearest abattoir and watch the proceedings there to get a confirmation of the truism of this statement. Man even finds the exhibitionist display of blood soaked carcasses hanging at the butcher's shop nauseous and nauseating.
But it is not so with cats and canines or lions and leopards. That is because they are intended by nature to be meat eaters while man has been designed to be a herbivore. But despite being the most intelligent being on earth, man unfortunately is the only animal that acts contrary to nature and defies its rules. One cannot masticate and bite a piece of meat or fish without immediately been reminded of how it came to be on his plate at that moment. It would make him subconsciously visualise the horrific and blood curdling scenario of slaughtering. Of course, meat eating men have successfully developed the art of suppressing and pushing into a far corner of his mind while consuming flesh this gruesome mental picture of killing.
When this process of suppressing goes on over a period of long years, often from childhood days, man becomes insensitive and thick skinned towards violence, killing and blood-shed. Man by nature is a compassionate being. But his sense of love, 'maithri' and sympathy with others' sensibilities, all remain buried as a result. Mark it, all this state of affairs is brought about by man's meat eating habit which is contrary to nature as stated above.
In a sense, therefore, it is logical to deduce that most of the instances of human conflicts in the present day world is the direct result of man's meat eating habit because thereby he is made to be insensitive and indifferent to pain and suffering of others. This statement may seem startling and strange at first but is nevertheless evidently and logically true. It can therefore be said and said meaningfully that the first victim of man's conduct of meat eating is no other one than oneself! What is a pity that man has not so far given up eating animal flesh.
Dharmapala Senaratne,
Attorney-at-Law.
I write with reference to K.J. Silva's comment titled 'Harassment of women' published in The Island of Wednesday 20 January 1999. My disagreement with the author's comments cannot be expressed in strong enough words. The author, whether it be male or female is of little consequence, essentially proposes the view that women who suffer harassment in the form of rape abuse have only themselves to blame. The writer poses the question 'Are most of our women properly dressed?' and answers the question 'emphatically' in the negative. The conclusion to be drawn from the argument is that women who concern themselves with their looks, wear perfume and seek to 'imitate' western culture by wearing figure hugging clothes, mini-skirts and the like are inviting harassment. Modern woman is as free as any man and it is loathsome to see instances where men treat women like cattle, for this is what K.J.Silva is doing. Let women be and let mankind be more responsible for his actions rather than hiding behind thin veils of excuses. Come on Sri Lanka, it is one world; let us not draw divisions between East and West but accept change for what it is - a necessary and natural process.
Jivaka Jayasundera,
London.
The move by National Front for the Preservation of the Rights of Up Country Sinhala people (Island 31/12/98) to make a public agitation against the legal appointment of special Gramaseva Officers for the Tamil folk of India origin is to be highly deprecated by all peace loving people.
The Front's demands for cancellation of lands granted to Tamil labourers, enforcement of law requiring such labourers to communicate in the Sinhala language etc., have communal overtones and portend danger for up country Tamils. At a time when the government is all out to assuage the woes of the Tamils, such agitation by Sinhala chauvinists detract from its peace efforts. It is fervently hoped that a fair and just government would not hesitate to take punitive action against the so-called front and nip in the bud its parochial and sectarian demands.
C.R.
A recent letter by Mr. S. H. de Silva, Colombo 5 under the above heading in your 'Opinion' column indicates a wrong web address of Greenwich Observatory.
The correct address is http://www.greenwich2000.com/ and not http://www.greenwhich2000.com/. The mistake [greenwich(correct) and greenwhich(incorrect)] is a simple one but you will never be able to access the Greenwich Web site with that mistake.
Piyadasa Edirisuriya,
Monash University,
Melbourne, Australia.
LELETTER
Payment of statutory duesGenerally, the public at large is willing to pay all statutory dues, such as, Income Tax, GST, National Security Levy, PAYE Tax, etc. on the due dates. However, I am of the opinion that it is the responsibility of the respective Department to give updated information pertaining to the last date for payment, date beyond which penalty would be levied, etc., to the public.
I quote below the following instances:
(1) Notices are inserted in the newspapers by the Dept. of Inland Revenue, advising the public to make certain statutory payments by the 15th of the particular month. However, if the 15th of that month falls on a public/bank holiday, Saturday or Sunday, no information is given to the public pertaining to the last date for payment beyond which penalty would be levied.
I admit that the Department of Inland Revenue is not authorised to extend the last date for payment. However, they could always give a concession by stipulating a date beyond which penalty would be imposed. For e.g.: 15th of January 1999 was a statutory holiday and was also the last date stipulated for many tax payments, but no concession was granted by the Dept. of Inland Revenue.
In this instance, I appreciate the Dept. of Revenue, Western Provincial Council, who have mentioned the last for payment as 15.1.99 and also stated that penalty would be levied beyond 20.1.99. In fact, this procedure has been adopted by this Department right from the beginning.
(2) The last General Elections were held on 16.8.94 and the last date to pay the Income Tax 1st instalment for 1994/95 was 15.8.94. Due to the imposition of curfew following the Elections the Banks were closed and the respective cheque payments made by the public had realised only on 22.8.94.
The Dept. of Inland Revenue had issued notices of late payment imposing penalty thereon, and due adjustments were done on appeals made by the public. However, the Department could have avoided all this problem if they had carefully analysed the situation before issuing Notices of late payments.
(3) On 1.5.94, the then President- His Excellency , Mr. D. B. Wijetunge, announced a concession on PAYE tax recoveries for the year of assessment 1993/94 by raising the annual income limit to Rs. 144,000. Since PAYE Tax for the said year had already been paid with Annual Return also submitted, the Dept. of Inland Revenue requested the employers to refund the excess recoveries to the employees and deduct same from the PAYE tax dues for 1994/95. This was done accordingly and the Annual Return for 1994/95 was also submitted before 30.4.95.
Subsequently, the Dept. issued Notices of underpayment for the year of assessment 1994/95 with penalty imposed thereon. Here again, the Dept. could have avoided troubling the public, by analysing the situation beforehand.
(4) When Income Tax is overpaid for a particular year of assessment, the excess payment could be carried forward to the next year of assessment. Therefore, the Dept. of Inland Revenue should scrutinise the Annual Returns in a sequence order. There have been instances, when the Dept. has checked a particular year without scrutinising the previous year and penalty has been imposed for underpayment.
(5) Trust Fund payments for a particular month should be made before the last day of the subsequent month. All of us are aware of the bomb blast on 31.1.96 which demolished the Central Bank and several surrounding buildings. Even payments made on that morning were not credited to the Account due to this incident. However, notice of late payment with penalty thereon were issued by the Department.
(6) The Colombo Municipal Council was kind enough to grant a concession to the public by accepting their rate payments at any branch of the Bank of Ceylon or Peoples' Bank within the Colombo Municipal Limits (other than Peoples' Bank, Town Hall Branch) with effect from June 1997. However, certain branches of these Banks, especially in the Fort area refused to accept the rate payments and the public were turned away for reasons unknown. This is an example for lack of proper co-ordination.
This letter is not sent with the intention of criticising the relevant authorities. Whilst understanding the paramount responsibility imposed on these Departments in collecting the statutory dues on time, we would appreciate if adequate care is exercised by them in avoiding unnecessary inconvenience to the public.
S. R. Balachandran,
Council Member,
The National Chamber of Commerce of Sri Lanka.
