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Review
'A remarkable woman politician'

Pulsara Liyanage, Vivi: A Biography of Vivienne Goonewardena. Colombo, Women's Education and Research Centre, 1998.

Biographies of Sri Lankan political figures have most often been written by personal admirers of the subject of the biography, or by loyalists of the political party or grouping to which the subject belonged. Consequently, political biography in this country has tended to become a species of hagiography.

Pulsara Liyanage has considerable admiration for Vivienne Goonewardena, but although her heart is with the left, she is not, as far as I know, a card-carrying member of any of its parties. This has given her a measure of independence that has enabled her to raise political issues and explore aspects of Vivi's life that a party-liner might have avoided. Her biography is of modest proportions (around a hundred pages long), but it has many virtues, as well as some shortcomings. In spite of the latter, we should be grateful to her for undertaking this biography and to the Women's Education and Research Centre for publishing it.

Vivi was undoubtedly one of the most remarkable women to have figured in the political arena of this country. Her career, during her long life, covered the gamut of the LSSP's existence, from its hopeful rosy dawn to the sunset of its decline. It was important that the record of that life should be preserved for the future.

Where the biography comes off best is in drawing an arresting picture of Vivi's personality and in narrating the drama of her life - the drama of an adventurous, militant and courageous spirit. In this aspect of her book the author has used the reminiscences of the people she interviewed revealingly to illuminate her subject, and to bring out the always close links between the personal and the political in Vivi's life.

The Vivi who at the age of 66 stood up to a police bully at the cost of being thrown on the floor, kicked and trampled (the government of the day later rewarded the bully in defiance of a Supreme Court judgment) seems to have been latent already in the child who defended the small daughter of a domestic help at the cost of being punished. Or the headgirl of Musaeus who not only sold suriya mal against the poppy but organised a disruption of the two minutes' silence - to be punished again. Or the young woman who insisted on marrying Leslie across the caste and religious barriers of their families, leading to an almost Romeo and Julietesque series of adventures: Vivi's incarceration at home, stolen meetings, and secret missives through the medium of an itinerant bookseller. These were a good preparation, one would think, for the years when she would have to lead an underground political existence. Vivi's political understanding and commitment matured in the course of her life, but the essential spirit of the fighter against unjust authority and for the weak and defenceless seems to have been implanted in her very early.

Pulsara's narrative glows with warmth and colour in this account of a woman's lifelong struggle, and one forgives the occasional unevennesses of the writing because one is carried along by the momentum of the story. There is a variety of incidents recounted in the book that will bring alive the impulsive and passsionate Vivi for anybody who knew her. When she and Leslie were underground in Bombay, with a warrant hanging over Leslie's head, he was always cautious and prudent. But one day in Bombay she rushed out and joined a procession of school boys who were shouting 'Long live the revolution!' because she found the slogan irresistible: the result was that they had to change their dwelling-place in a hurry.

The difference between Leslie's reserved and disciplined temper and Vivi's warm and outgoing one may help to explain why the marriage, in spite of its romantic beginnings, seems to have cooled in later years. Pulsara deals, with a mix of frankness and reticence, with the personal and political relationship with NM that was perhaps the closest and most important in the latter part of Vivi's life.

Where I find the book less satisfying is in Pulsara's treatment of the political differences within the Sri Lankan left. It was inevitable that she would have to depend on both published material and interviews for information on events that took place before she was born. But she has treated some of these sources too uncritically without forming her own independent judgment. This, I think, is due not only to her self-effacement as a biographer. It comes also from what seems to be a deep-seated regret on her part when confronted with internal divisions in the left. It's revealing that the word 'sadly' occurs more than once in her writing in these contexts. She doesn't seem to take into account the reality that a movement as strongly rooted in ideology as the left would inevitably be marked by a history of factional struggles that are related to the conficts of larger social forces.

It's for this reason that I find unsatisfactory her account of the first LSSP split in 1940 after the resolution condemning the Third International, on which the Stalinists were expelled. Today, when the Soviet Union is no more and even many of those who worshipped Stalin have disowned him, this may seem an abstract and theoretical question. It wasn't so in 1940. Whether the LSSP should have accepted the more sectarian aspects of Trotskyism is another matter; but if the party hadn't eluded the embraces of the Comintern, it would have found itself in 1942 supporting the British war effort and opposing the 'Quit India' movement. But perhaps Pulsara thinks that would have been the right thing to do. She cites Lerski, in what seems to me a thoroughly superficial and ill-informed book, to say that the LSSP opposed the war when 'not only leftists but also all true democrats in the world participated actively in anti-fascist fronts'. This is simply not true. Without going any further, there is the example of the Indian national movement which launched the 'Quit India' struggle when the Japanese stood on the borders of India, rightly believing that Britain's difficulties were India's opportunity. Nehru, in spite of his anti-fascism and his attachment to parliamentary democracy, did not differ from this view.

Nor were there any qualms in the LSSP about opposition to the war. But the 1964 coalition with the SLFP did create a three-way cleavage in the party. Here, as Pulsara records, Vivi was actively and vigorously in support of the coalition, while Leslie was with the centrist position which had reservations about it. Probably, as Pulsara suggests, NM's influence over Vivi pulled her in that direction. But there seems to be some truth in Vasudeva Nanayakkara's view, recorded in the book.

According to him Vivi was not an ideologue but an activist, a very practical person in politics. Therefore seeing how well Philip was able to bring effective reforms from within the SLFP earlier, Vivi felt they could do better than Philip in coalition with the SLFP.

While seeking to explain Vivi's motivations, however, her biographer remains disturbed by the outcome of the coalition - in particular, the acceptance of 'Sinhala only', which involved an overturning of the LSSP's earlier language policy, and the failure of Colvin's 1972 constitution to address the problems of the Tamil people and their desire for regional autonomy. She has put these questions to Hector Abhayawardhana and records his answers.

I have known Hector as the most independent and original mind among the LSSP's Old Guard. But there seems to be a point beyond which party loyalty submerges these qualities. On the first question, Hector says that a blatantly racist slogan during the 1966 protest march was 'suddenly shouted from the back of the procession and the leaders could not do anything about it'. This may have been so, but what was racist wasn't just one slogan but the whole content and direction of the LSSP's policy and propaganda of that period.

On the 1972 constitution, 'Hector sadly acknowledges their mistake but said they just failed to realise its implications at the time it was being drafted.' Can we believe that Colvin drafted the constitution in a fit of absence of mind - the veteran politician who in 1956 had prophesied that one language would lead to two countries? The most charitable explanation one can give is that the LSSP consciously and deliberately bartered away Tamil rights for a share of power that they thought would enable them to push the government in the direction of socialism. This was admitted by Bernard Soysa speaking in the 'Constituent Assembly' of 1972: 'It was quite obvious that, as far as we were concerned, the content of social justice on the plane of democratic rights in regard to language, had to be subordinated to the question of the economic transformation that is necessary for the establishment of socialism.' The LSSP accentuated the ethnic polarisation of Sri Lankan politics: the fallacy lay in supposing that 'the establishment of socialism' could be divorced from the upholding of democratic rights, including those of the minorities.

Hector Abhayawardhana has not only been Pulsara's main guide to LSSP history but has also contributed an introduction. In it, recalling the LSSP's Indian endeavour in the 'forties, he writes:

Not all the efforts of numerous political readership that subsequently emerged could rewrite the meaning of the creation of Pakistan. Among the principal Congress leaders only Mahatma Gandhi could communicate his bitter feelings of resentment to the people. Almost helpless and utterly alone, he turned to plough a lonely furrow, barefooted, through the desolate villages of Noakhali, seeking to give heart to the desperate Muslims of Bihar for whom Pakistan was nothing more than a grotesque mockery, a chimerical gamble. But for Gandhi. Rabindranath Tagore's 'Ekla Chalo' had long been a favourite hymn. 'If no one heeds your call, walk alone' walk alone!'

Vivienne Goonewardena was passionately fond of this hymn. Some time before her death, I happened to accompany her to a recital in Colombo of Rabindra Sangeeth. There was a perceptible hush when the singer presented 'Ekla Chalo' to the audience. But soon there was a soft intruding voice, just audible enough for her immediate vicinity. Vivienne was repeating the hymn to herself.

That is eloquently and movingly said. But Hector doesn't seem to be aware of the irony of his own story. In 1955 and 1956, and for a few years after, the LSSP leadership stood up courageously, even heroically, to the high tide of Sinhala linguistic nationalism. Thereafter they surrendered to it. That was not only the tragedy of the LSSP. Vivi included. It was a national tragedy with whose consequences we are still living today.

Regi Siriwardena.

Life-giving Madhu Church raises peace hopes

by Amal Jayasinghe in Madhu
The centuries-old Roman Catholic church in this pilgrim town is believed to bless child-less couples with parenthood. The faithful are now banking on it for another miracle - peace in Sri Lanka.

Government forces wrested control over the land encompassing the 17th century Dutch-colonial period church on Monday raising hopes of staging the country's most important Christian festival here and, with that, an end to fighting.

Madhu is known throughout majority Buddhist Sri Lanka for a statue of Our Lady of the Rosary which is thought to have miraculous healing powers.

Believers flock here to make vows for better health as well as to have offspring. But prolonged fighting between government forces and Tamil rebels in the area has turned the flood of devotees into a trickle in recent years.

The Roman Catholic church believes the statue could reunite the country, heal ethnic wounds and possibly end the Tamil separatist war which has killed more than 55,000 people in the past 27 years.

Madhu has already proved a haven for more than 25,000 sheltering in refugee camps after fleeing years of seemingly unending fighting between government forces and the rebels.

"These people here are fed up with war", said church administrator Father A. P. Devasagayam. "People are desperate but most of them are resigned to their fate".

Most of those seeking shelter at the church are Hindus who are a national minority but form the majority in the north-east of the country. There are no religious tensions between Catholics and the Hindus here because they all respect the church.

Church sources in the capital Colombo, 300 kilometres (187 miles south of here by road, believe the Madhu statue could bring peace and many are already discussing plans to tour it in the rest of the country.

Dozens of Sri Lankan soldiers who took part in a three-day drive to capture the area from the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) lined up outside a church counter here Tuesday to buy candles and offer them on the altar for good luck.

Weapons and military uniforms are banned from the church.

Father Devasagayam, who has been working here since 1995, said the Tamil Tiger guerrillas had tried to hold recruitment drives within the church compound but were discouraged by priests.

"We have this tradition that there will be no military activity here", Devasagayam said.

When army officers knocked on Father Devasagayam's door Monday afternoon, he was taken by surprise.

The defence ministry says 19 rebels were killed in three days of fighting but there were no deaths among government troops.

Tamil student Sathyaseelan Selvam, 20, said he did not join the guerrillas for fearing of getting hurt in battle.

As the army took control of the area more and more civilians were crossing over from neighbouring areas still held by the LTTE, and the priest said his immediate concern was to feed more than 20,000 Tamil men, women and children.

He also feared the military presence in the area could provoke the Tamil Tigers to launch counter attacks which could put the civilians as well as the church in the middle of the firing.

Civilians said they were afraid of the military presence because most of them had never seen government soldiers from the majority Sinhalese community before in an area that was dominated by the Tiger guerrillas.

This pilgrim town, one of the few population centres held by the LTTE till Monday, had been used by them earlier this year to welcome visitors, and LTTE political leaders had met with visiting clergy to offer peace talks.

Church officials said the opening of easy access to the church could ensure the free flow of the faithful and may hold hopes of peace. But for many analysts, an early peace in Sri Lanka could only be a miracle. (AFP)

People and Events
Briton of the millenium

by Nan
Guess who? Who else but Wiliam Shakespeare as voted in a recently conducted BBC poll. 'Briton of the Millenium - a richly deserved honour conferring with ripple effect kudos on all wielders of the pen! Would Shakespeare be elevated to Person of the Millenium status too? My choice for that honoured position is Mahatma Gandhi. The selection would be very interesting if and when it is made and by whom, since bias is almost inevitable. We Asians do emerge rather prejudiced when a western nation does the choosing.

71st Annual Academy Awards

It is Shakespeare who has swept the boards in the Oscar awards of 22 March, Shakespeare in Love was nominated for 13 Academy Awards and won 7. Elizabeth, another film set against the backdrop of Elizabethan England was nominated for best picture. Gwyneth Paltrove sobbed as she received her award for best actress having portrayed the rich Venetian woman who inspires the struggling-to-write young Shakespeare in the film. Dame Judi Dench became best supporting actress playing Queen Elizabeth I for just 15 minutes, I believe.

Marc Norman and Tom Stoppard won the award for best original screenplay for their collaborative script Shakespeare in Love. No sooner was the nomination announced than author Faye Kellerman filed a suit accusing the two of plagiarism. She contends that the script of the award winning film is lifted off her book The Quality of Mercy. The synopsis we've read of her book casts strong doubts since her story deals with Shakespeare's efforts to solve a friend's murder while his love interest masquerades as a man and helps Jews flee the Spanish Inquisition. Imaginations do run riot!

'Teaching and Learning' Shakespeare

Shakespeare is eternal, Shakespeare is perennial. True, he's been a bugbear to crammers of English lit for the ALs and a torture to teachers who try to get giddy girls and sports crazy boys to appreciate the famous soliloquys "To be or not to be" and "Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow creeps in this petty pace from day to day". When however the teacher persists, the students do appreciate the Bard and get to understand him. It is best to lead the young to Shakespeare through the sonnets rather than throwing them in the deep end of the great tragedies. Love and being compared to a summer's day and the profundity of

"So long as men can breathe or eyes can see
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee."

Strikes a chord in their scatterbrains. They also come to understand universal truths such as

"For sweetest things turn sourest by their deeds
Lilies that fester smell far worse than weeds."

A teacher comes to realize what a classic is and the terms "for all time', and 'truly great' when she notes her pupils, struggling initially to understand Shakespeare language and trying to picture the Elizabethan milieu and depth of meaning, gradually gain enlightenment as it were, and appreciate the wonder of his plays. And this mind you, with kids we've done all their subjects in either Sinhala or Tamil. That to me is the greatness of the playwright - that he can win young minds over, obstacled as they are with poor English and a natural aversion for anything older than 10 years.

As Jane Austen said, "One gets acquainted with him without knowing how"

True he was Shakes Perera to us in school way back when we did our OLs but Macbeth did grow upon us and we became sensitive to the deterioration of the noble lord to mass murderer and the steel hearted Lady Macbeth to troubled sleepwalker moaning her bloodstained hands that "all the perfumes of Arabia would not sweeten." Young and so full of life as we were, we appreciated the nuances and shared the despair "And all our yesterdays have lighted fools

"The way to dusty death."

We thrilled to Laurence Olivier's Hamlet and Orson Well's Othello. Cherished are memories of walking along the Avon in Stradford and seeing Twelfth Night right there in Shakespeace country. We were a batch of touring librarians from several countries: east, west, north and south. Many, I must say, had only heard of Shakespeare and went through his house and Anne Hathaways' cottage with mere tourist interest. But the theatre in the evening bowled them over. To us who had read English literature it was a lifetimes's experience.

Mitchiko Katukani - a writer of the New York Times Service refers in an article titled All the World's in Love with Shakespeare to Gay Taylor who in his book Reinventing Shakespeare says that the Bard owed much of his success to happy incidents in history such as England winning the war over France, "The fruit not of his genius but of the virility of British imperialism, which propelled the English language into every continent."

Maybe so. But add to that the richness of Shakespeare's language, the poetic devices, his imagination, the depth and development of characterization, the universal themes dealt with and we see truly how and why Shakespeare's popularity has endured through the centuries.

America reportedly dropped Shakespeare from university curriculums - the quintessential Dead White Malc - and went contemporary. But they are going back to the greatest writer in the English language and even in the 1990s the most produced playwright in America is Shakespeare.

"Myriad minded Shakespeare" as Coleridge called him is very much with us in our day to day life. Young lovers, more so the star-crossed, are Romeo and Juliet; a miser is a Shylock; a self absorbed doubter Hamlet. We use the expressions 'primrose path', 'sound and fury' 'toil and trouble' which are all Shakespearean. Ambition is always 'vaulting ambition overriding itself to fall on the other." We glow when the beloved whispers that "custom cannot stale nor age wither (our) infinite charms."

The school curriculum is being overhauled with the new education proposals getting under way. We do hope English literature will be introduced to all students: science, arts and commerce, at the pre-OL stage. Every child should get a taste of the classics in both the native language and English.

What is this life if we go through it without once having read Shakespeare.

To teacher with gratitude

Girls' High School Kandy Old Girls Association came up with a novel idea - to felicitate past principals and teachers of the school. A major undertaking but seen through successfully on Sunday March 28.

KHS, as we conveniently refer to the old school, celebrates 120 years this year and as a commemorative gesture, the OGA decided to gather together past teachers who responded to their letter of invitation. No easy task this, since school records had to be gone through meticulously, addresses found and letters sent out.

Around 150 gathered on the 28th, two past principals - Ms Hema Jayasinghe and Ms Tikiri Ekanayake - past teachers, the Kandy OGA and representatives from the Colombo branch of the OGA.

The President of the OGA, Principal/KHS, Ms Mallika Amunugama, in her welcome address briefly traced the history of the school and the year long events planned to celebrate 120 years of contribution to education in the Island, Marjorie Ekanayake Peiris recounted incidents, both profound and amusing of her many years of association with the school as schoolgirl living right next to the school, teacher and active old girl. So did the two ex-principals, mentioning also the pluses and minuses of being head of a growing, very dynamic premier girls' school.

The patron of the Colombo Branch of the OGA stressed the depth of gratitude all students of KHS should have towards the Methodist missionaries who started the school and continued it with dedication.

They loved their adopted country and its people; ensuring a good education and the inculcation of correct values in the girls in their care. They never ever attempted conversion to the Christian faith. They closely allied themselves with the families of their students and were there to sympathize in sorrow and rejoice in good happenings like weddings.

A Spot of Goodness In Troubled Times

What was most beautiful about the event on Sunday was the sincere fellowship and easy togetherness of the gathering - old and young; teachers and their students; Sinhala, Tamil and Muslim; the housewife and those who reached the top of their professional ladders such as Hema Jayasinghe, retired Deputy Director of Education.

The most senior teacher present was Mrs. Kotigala Tambimuttu, still very beautiful and brisk. What kept her looking and feeling so young, we queried. "Doing all the housework myself and looking after the grandchildren when asked to do so," she replied.

Each teacher was gifted a China plaque with the school crest on it green valley, dark blue mountain, light blue sky and the yellow rays of the sun with the motto - adeo auxillium - my help cometh from the Lord.

Memories

Singing the school song took us back as it always does 40 years and more. It is so apt, another gift of the missionaries.

Forty years on when we think of times olden
Mem'ry will picture our girlhood's bright years
Forty years on in the dim distance golden
Laughter still ringing, forgotten the tears

Proud to the last of our school honours won
Meeting with zest our opponents at netball,
Those were great matches we played on the pitch
Dancing and games and debates in the school hall

If but our lives could be once more so rich
Forty years on when afar and asunder
Parted are those who are singing today
When we look back and forgetfully wonder

What we were like in our work and our play
Then it may be there will often come o'er us
Glimpses of notes like the catch of a song
Visions of girlhood shall float them before us
Echoes of dreamland shall bear them along.

We sang the song lustily as madcap schoolgirls, wondering when we did give it a thought, why we were singing of forty years hence. Now the full significance of the words and poignancy comes over us, mixed generously with gratitude. We are what we are - decent human beings in a country gone mad, because of our home backgrounds and schools such as KHS.

NPW

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Were whales dynamited for ambergris?

by A Special Corr.
Recent reports of two dead whales being washed ashore at Ambalangoda may have been as a result of these creatures being dynamited by unscrupulous fishermen. Authorities have received information that certain fishermen in the area had encountered these whales at sea, and passing over them as they basked or dived beneath their boats, had dropped powerful explosive charges that had either killed or incapacitated them. They are then believed to have clambered on and made deep incisions on the carcasses in an attempt to probe into the cavernous interior and get at the substance "ambergris" which forms in the stomach of sperm whales. These incisions were observed on the carcasses when they eventually washed ashore on the beach at Ambalangoda.

Ambergris-described as an ash grey strongly scented substance often washed ashore, has been sought after by beachcombers and fishermen from time immemorial. A few specialist dealers are involved in a surreptitious trade in the substance which is known to have application in the cosmetics industry. The ambergris known locally as "ambara" is greatly prized on account of the high value it fetches. Even a few grammes can fetch tens of thousands of rupees and finds worth upto three or four lakhs or even more have been reported in the past. It is believed that presently a good find of ambergris can fetch over a million rupees. Local people report that certain traders seeking to buy the ambergris moved into the area as soon as news of the whale strandings got around. The smaller of the two whales washed ashore at Ambalangoda had been cut and disembowelled by local people searching for ambergris. The larger whale washed ashore previously and had been buried locally and people were reported to be wary of attempts to remove the carcass in the belief that they could eventually recover the ambergris. Although under Police custody the carcasses had been hacked by local souvenir hunters. Museums Department officials had turned up and apparently taken some interest.

Police sources also indicated that reports of two other whale carcasses being washed ashore this season at other points on the south coast gave cause for concern that they too may have been dynamited or killed by fishermen. If this is correct then this would be an alarming trend that must be stopped immediately by law enforcement agencies. It is not only the killing of the whales, but also the availability of dynamite in coastal areas that must be investigated. The dynamite is used by divers for the illegal salvage of wrecks along the coast which are in the statutory custody of the Receiver of Wrecks. These wrecks which are plundered for brass fittings and steel, are also very valuable as refuges for fish and marine creatures. Acting as aggregation devices, they can function as artificial reefs of great value to marine species and commercial fishermen, as well as the tourism industry for recreational diving. There being no basis for the issue of explosives for illegal activities, possession and use of explosives in coastal areas at a time of national security crisis, poses a major problem. Little is done by local Police (who are well aware of these activities) to arrest these persons. It is clear that though there is some residue of public awareness from the NARA campaigns of the early 1980s, there was a need to inculcate a new awareness especially amongst the youth and to strengthen enforcement with severe penalties.

One of the major shortcomings in this context is that presently there appears to be little capability on the government side to identify and study the whales, According to Dr. Hiran Jayewardene' IOMAC and the Ocean Centre were attempting to revive a National Marine Mammal Programme (which was active in the 1980s) with the help of NGOs co-operating with government institutions like NARA, the National Museums Department etc. One of the requirements in the context of the recent reports would be to revive the focus on development of requisite veterinary expertise for carrying out post-mortems to scientifically establish causes of death, which would help in better management. He also said that the programme would seek to build a fresh cadre of young people who could develop required expertise in all aspects of marine mammal conservation and management in the country to take the place of the pioneering marine mammal teams of NARA. Their work in the 1980s had shown that the marine mammal resources of Sri Lanka were significant and there was a multi-million dollar potential for earnings from tourism through development of whale and dolphin watching off our resort areas. A new programme for a perspective and strategy on ocean development for Sri Lanka beyond the year 2000 was presently underway.

This programme would inter alia take account of these and other requirements for greater commercial returns from the ocean sector in our development. The legal and regulatory framework was also being reviewed to take the place of statutes like the old Whaling Ordinance which were carry-overs from another era. Even recent legislation lacked the necessary sophistication to provide for a modern management regime for marine areas and conservation of resources. Quite apart from biodiversity and conservation issues, this was important from an economic policy and commercial standpoint, Dr. Jayewardene emphasized that a whale remaining alive for several decades in our offshore waters, was potentially worth much more than one which was dead or killed for what its body would yield.

The Prince of Glory

by Rev. Shelton A. de SiIva
Methodist Church

When I survey the wondrous Cross
On which the Prince of Glory died,
My richest gain I count but loss
And pour contempt on all my pride.
Isaac Watts - MHB 182

There are many who do not belong to the Christian faith who admire this hymn and are greatly inspired by it. By the time Isaac Watts wrote this poem, the Cross had in Christian devotion become a "Wondrous Cross". But to the Jew and the Roman the cross was a symbol of torture and degradation. The Jew regarded the cross with such loathing that in Deuteronomy 21/22 it is said, "Cursed is he who dies on the gibbet of the cross". Not only was the victim accursed, but his very body on the cross desecrated the Sabbath, and the body had to be removed before the Sabbath began at 6 p.m. on every Friday evening. It is this that made the Jewish authorities ask that Jesus' body should be removed before sundown. The usual way to do this was to break the legs of the victim and make him bleed to death. In the case of Jesus we are told that the soldiers found that he was dead. To make sure of His death, however, they pierced his heart with a spear, and we are told that blood and water came from the wound. So to call it a 'wondrous cross' was not how it was regarded on the day Jesus was crucified; it was an accursed cross.

Most pictures of the crucifixion show a neatly clothed man hanging gracefully on three nails. But crucifixion was a barbarous event used by the Romans as a deterrent to rebellion. The victim was bullied and humiliated. As he was caught he fought with all his might against being nailed, as once he was nailed, he was helpless. Two soldiers sat on his chest, two on his hands and two on his feet while he was being nailed down. Meanwhile, the victim railed obscenities against God and the Roman Emperor. As Joy Davidman (the wife of C. S. Lewis) puts it, "Few of us would dare to have a real picture of the crucifixion on our bedroom walls". A crucified slave beside a Roman road screamed until his voice died, and then hung, a filthy festering clot of flies, sometimes for days - a living man whose hands and feet were swollen masses of gangrenous meat. This is what our Lord took upon himself "that through death he might destroy him who had the power of death, that is, the devil; and deliver them, who through the fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage". (Heb: 2/14)

We do not have to sidestep the challenge of these words by raising the issue of a personal devil, or by saying that Jesus was spared the terrors of crucifixion by his early death. It is enough that the Bible gives us no account of his fight against the soldiers who crucified him or his curse of the High Priest who used political leverage to get him crucified. Pilate, we are told, got him whipped with a 'cat-o-nine tails' - with iron and bone at the end of the thongs hoping that the pitifulness of the victim would make the high priest let him go. "I see no cause of death in him". The soldiers were apparently embarrassed by the docility of the victim, and made a game of putting a crown of thorns on his head; putting a purple cloth - the sign of royalty - on him, and bent the knee to him, and when they rose from the posture, giving him a thundering slap to show how his subjects accepted him. Jesus put up no fight, and lay quietly on the cross and allowed himself to be nailed. No curses - the only words against the soldiers were "Father forgive them, they know not what they do". They did not know that in cooperating in the extinction of the Light of the World, they were committing a crime that History will remember till the end of time.

All this is very well - but why do Christians accept the cross as a sign of their emancipation from sin and death, and the Resurrection as a foretaste of Eternal Life? Why do they call him the Prince of Glory? Because this crucifixion was not the termination or liquidation of a political rebel or a naive political leader, or a man with such inflated ideas of himself that he thought he was the Son of Man, or the Messiah of God. Behind the Crucifixion was a man who sided with the poor - "Blessed are the poor" - who respected women. Women were there not merely to propagate the race or keep house for the family. Doing this was a worthy occupation, but the better part (as portrayed in the story of Mary and Martha) was for a woman to share the intellectual and spiritual life of her fellowmen and be a helpmeet in all aspects of life. At a time when no decent rabbi even spoke to his sister in the streets, Jesus befriended women and treated them with great respect. His greatest friend was a former prostitute, Mary of Magdala. When all the disciples left him and fled, the women were there to share his pain and humiliation at the foot of the cross, hear his last words, and finally take his body away for burial. I regard Jesus as the first founder of women's emancipation.

Again, Jesus was against all suffering and evil. Whenever he confronted people who believed that they were possessed by devils, and made sick or blind or lame, he went out of his way to heal them. This brought the anger of the Jewish leaders on his head, because he did his healing even on the Sabath Day. He spoke against those who saw evil and did nothing to alleviate it. In the parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus, he condemned the Rich Man. Jesus had said: "in as much as you do it to the least of these my brothers you do it unto me'. The rich man had not seen in the poor Lazarus an occasion to practice neighbour love. In the parable of the Pharisee and the publican, he made it clear that the Pharisee did many things he could be proud of, but it was the humility of the tax-gatherer who threw himself on God's mercy that put him on a right relationship with God.

Jesus spoke of forgiveness as being essential to the good life. On the cross he forgave. Jesus spoke of Reconciliation; on the cross he was reconciled to his mother. Jesus spoke of the responsibility we have for our parents. On the cross he gave his mother into the keeping of his best friend. But to understand why God raised him on the third day we must go to Gethsamane. Jesus was not a superman with nerves of steel who could face all problems unafraid. On the contrary, he was a very sensitive person who was terrified that God may want him to drink the bitter cup of suffering. At Gethsamane he implored his Father 'with cries and tears' as the Epistle to the Hebrews puts it, to save him from the cross. He who said that if one had faith the size of a mustard seed one could move mountains and he asked us to pray to God who would answer our prayers, had his own prayer for God's help and intervention in his agony, unanswered. But that did not make him lose his faith in God or man. Any literary critic will tell you that if the story of Jesus was a made up story that pretended to be history, no one would put it into his mouth the words, "My God, my God, why hast thou abandoned me?" Because if God had really abandoned him, his life and ministry was a huge mistake. That is why God in his own time and in his own way raised Jesus from the dead. It was not the raising of a sadistic Himmler who practiced genocide against the Jews. It was the raising of a man who dared to affirm that behind the universe was a God of Love who demonstrated the love of God to the end.

And this is why we call him 'the Prince of Glory' and say, "Were the whole realm of nature mine, That were an offering far too small; Love so amazing, so divine, demands my soul, my life, my all!" We may never possess the whole world to bargain with, but even if we did, we could do nothing that showed us that behind this universe was a God of Love, as did Jesus' death on the cross.

That is why the litmus test of a Christian is not his social service, or the strength of his theology or the depth of his prayer life, or whether he has had the correct kind of baptism or belongs to the 'true church', but on his surveying the cross and realizing that something wonderful was enacted on it which has saved us - and all mankind from the power of evil and the power of death and has opened to us the gates of immortality.

We can therefore meaningfully sing,
"Were the whole realm of nature mine
That were an offering far too small,
Love so amazing, so divine,
Demands my soul, my life, my all."
Isaac Watts 1674 -l748
(MHB 182)

A vision for an integrated development of the built environment for the 21st century-Sri Lanka

by Elmore M. Perera,
BSc. (Cey); Dip PMD (U.Conn); TREND (U. Conn), F.C.M.A. (UK),
Attorney-at-Law, Former Surveyor General,
Former Vice President, OPA, Founder National Director, CCF, Former Addl Director (Training) SLIDA

1. The question presently uppermost in the minds of most Sri Lankans is "What have we to show after 51 years of independence?"

2. Those who remember the conditions that prevailed in Ceylon as it then was and the character, nature and values of the average Ceylonese at or around the time we achieved independence, acknowledge that much change has taken place but how much of such change could justifiably be considered as "development" is not immediately evident. The conclusion is virtually irresistible that the politicians-whether they be green, blue, red, purple or whatever-who were entrusted with the responsibility for "development", have failed the people of this beautiful country of ours.

3. Prof. G. L. Peiris was reported in the Sunday Observer of 5th April 1992 to have said that "The most flagrant manifestations of dishonesty in public life no longer evoke the slightest response or make the least impression; they are taken for granted and pass us by. We make no protest, nor do we attempt to assert, by word or conduct, our notions of right and wrong. As a nation we are fast losing the capacity to feel and express outrage, and we are developing instead an infinite capability to reconcile ourselves to any situation". After a glimmer of hope in 1994, a sense of futility or even folly of even an expression of concern in the face of transparent manifestations of dishonesty in public life has virtually numbed if not paralyzed society where social values have crumbled and given place to money values.

4. The constant bickering taking place to justify the misdeeds of the present by a favourable comparison with what has taken place in the past, has taken us nowhere and resulted in a widespread sense of despondency, hopelessness and apathy. We will do well to heed the warning of Winston Churchill who said "If we were to open a quarrel between the past and the present, we shall surely find that we have lost the future".

5. The absence of peace and harmony resulting from rampant violence and aggression is identified as the root cause for most of our misfortunes. The problem, however, lies deeper and outbreaks of violence are really the symptoms of more deep-seated social and economic causes that are endemic. In a multi-ethnic, multi-religious society such as ours, politicians have from time to time mobilized inter group differences in their quest for power. It is therefore apparently odd that politicians who have largely been responsible for the aggravation of these problems should also profess that they alone have the key to their solution.

6. Professionals who are not so tainted indeed have a responsibility to make use of their expertise to address these problems. They have, no doubt, already sought, in some way, to do this, but with no significant impact. Perhaps, the reason is that there has only been a superficial diagnosis of the problem because, while being multi-faceted in the ultimate analysis, the cause is the intractable moral problem of all human beings, for which no instant solution has been found anywhere in the world.

7. These problems will remain unsolved and get further aggravated unless and until an elite group like the professionals and/or scientists give the lead and commence the task of the moral regeneration of society. Involvement with political issues would be inevitable but professionals and scientists must remain untainted by the negative aspects of politics, especially the use of power where moral responsibility is pivotal to its proper exercise.

8. Professionals and Scientists need to be careful in how they interact with political groups that may have questionable objectives and dubious standards of conduct. It is important to maintain a certain independence and objectivity of judgment. There are significant areas of policy making where the professional/scientist can make a positive contribution to the solution of socio-economic problems. However, the central issue is the proper awareness of the public interest and paying the attention to moral and ethical values. Professionals and scientists are judged by the moral values which they uphold, not so much by the excellence of their expertise.

9. Amidst this impending gloom, the Sri Lanka Institute of Architects has placed before us a "Vision"-a vision for the Integrated Development of the built environment for the 21st century.

10. The goal for the Vision has been set out in the following terms:

"Sri Lanka is on the threshold of being plummeted into a new age, a new era, a new world. The aspirations of the youths are high but the opportunities to achieve the aspirations are extremely low, mainly due to a poorly focussed education and low job opportunities both unable to keep pace with the unnatural and overheated exposure to New Technology. From the experiences of the developed world, the result in many cases of such accumulating stresses is the ultimate manifestation of crime and violence that require very serious study and thought".

"If Sri Lanka is to have any recognition in the fast developing world, it needs a concerted approach to understand and formulate a sustainable balance, not only between Development and Environment, but also between Physical Development and Culture. What is needed is not an aping of the Western cultures and living standards practised in the past, but developing a positive and strong understanding of our past and present resources so that the 21st Century will be a smooth natural evolution of our glorious past."

"If it is to succeed, the transition needs systematic and co-ordinated programmes which will encompass a total vision for the future of Sri Lanka. A vision that will bring about and reinforce a Traditional Quality of Life, where man and environment live in a Symbiotic relationship through the promotion of health, education and sustainabledevelopment. And strategy where Sri Lankans of the future could be proud of life styles which continues to uphold those glorious principles while progressing into the 21st Century."

11. A remarkable feature of this "Vision" is the departure from the common tendency of professionals to restrict themselves to the limited area of their own specialisation. The Vision places unequivocal emphasis on the integrated developed of areas such as Agriculture, Animal Husbandry, Biological Diversity, Energy Sources such as Wind, Solar, Bio-gas and Flowing water; Environmental Conservation, Industries, Local and Foreign Tourism; National Security, National Transportation Network; Sports and Recreational facilities; Survey Plans and Maps; Water Management; Provinces, Districts, Townships and Service Centres. The need for the active intervention of an Inter-professional Body such as the OPA and/or the Sri Lanka Association for the Advancement of Science has been clearly acknowledged.

12. To speak of "development" today is to undertake an especially difficult task. In recent years, the entire field of development has been in considerable disarray, both theoretical and practical. The conventional wisdom of the 1960's has, by and large, been discredited as theories which were expected to lead to dramatic improvement in the lot of the world's poor have proved ineffective or even counter-productive. The "success stories" of several developing countries have turned out, over a longer period of time and under more stringent analysis, to be less than successful in human terms.

13. It is critical that we have a better understanding of precisely what we mean when we speak of "development", before we attempt to chart "the way to Social-Economic Development".

14. What is the nature of under-development? Why have we failed despite 51 years of "effort" and 4 decades of "Development Aid", to better the life of our peoples? What went wrong? One may well answer "Nothing went wrong;;. Everything went according to expectations! Whose expectations? Certainly not our expectations, but the expectations of those who control the world's finance, trade and industry.

15. Yes, nothing went wrong. What was wrong and is wrong is our understanding of our position. It was a wrong understanding of the extent of our freedom to shape our future free from the "constraints" of colonialism that led us to expect the realisation of our "paradise" as a result of our "freedom" to shape our future free from the shackles of colonialism. We did not understand the true position, that we were moving out of transparent, straight forward colonial exploitation into a more disguised, more efficient, multi-national exploitation. Even the most radical political leaders made the mistake of maintaining that the winning of what they called bourgeois-dmocratic freedom was, even though a small step, yet a step forward. But it was not! In the circumstances, it was a step backward.

16. If we had realised the true position, we might, short of altering the basis of economic relationships in our societies so as to prevent exploitation, at least have entered upon our futures with our eyes wide open and our wits truly on the alert-so as to protect ourselves, to some extent, from the "aid" and the "advice" of our exploiters, however camouflaged they might be. We may have curbed somewhat the fierce appetites for profit and, by permitting a limited and carefully controlled exploitation of ourselves, ensured in return, not the illusory spurious wealth but the real ability and the wherewithal to build our country for ourselves.

17. This, incidentally, provides the answer to another question - a rhetorical question, which is often so cleverly flung at us both by the apparently benevolent "donors" and the "development wallahs" having vested interests. What's wrong with our inviting powerful multi-nationals or Western capital to invest to develop Sri Lanka? What's wrong is that we do not impose the necessary controls. We do have controls but it is the necessary controls that are generally missing. Unaware or insufficiently aware of the nature of the relationships between ourselves and those who "assist" us, we are unable to decide on the appropriate controls.

18. Yes, we have been developed. We have been developed as the other side of the coin of wealth and industrialisation, the other side of the coin of the wealthy first world. We have been developed as the source of the cheap raw materials essential to it, as the source of excellent low-cost finished articles and components, of cheap luxury foods, of cheap expendable labour.

19. And what of our Scientists and Professionals? Naturally, they cannot expect to escape the consequences of their country's distorted "development" and impoverishment. Research libraries are starved of essential journals, research laboratories of basic equipment, young graduates of the necessary post-graduate training. Older, trained scientists and professionals are suffocated in a flood of barely competent foreign experts, entering the country with and as the major part of the foreign aid inflow. Incredibly unsatisfying work conditions, aggravated by steadily falling living standards, force scientists and technologists out of their own country into the advanced industrialised States, where their talents are given scope and proper reward. Third world countries have thus become a source also of low-cost, high-performance Scientists, Physicians, Surgeons, Engineers, Surveyors and the like trained personnel. Yes we HAVE been "developed". That is why we are a poor nation.

20. It is rather difficult to be very original in the field of "development". It is, however, sometimes useful to go back to first principles and try to define what we mean by "development". It is a word which is oftentimes misunderstood or even misinterpreted - deliberately or othrwise. This lack of clarity led to a number of refinements to that definition, making the concept of "development" much more complicated but also much more valid. One such refinement was the PQLI - Physical Quality of Life Index which attempted to measure real prosperity, real development rather than purely per capita income.

21. The UNDP's human development index basically combines three key variables, viz.

(1) Life expectancy - the longer you live the more choices you have.

(2) Education attainment, as measured in its simplest form by literacy, and

(3) Purchasing power - people's ability to actually buy goods.

The hypothesis is that if you have a longer life, if you are better educated and if you have better purchasing power, then your level of human development is higher than if you did not.

22. This Human Development Index is perhaps the best measure of development and the best guide to what development is. It undoubtedly could be refined further by including numerous other variables but the hard fact is that it is quite difficult even to just get reliable, comparable statistics for even those three dimensions.

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