When I was a school boy, hailing from a not too affluent family, One rupee was a lot of money. It was a princely sum and one could do quite a number of things, like settling the debt of 20 cents owing to the gram seller, whom one had judiciously avoided meeting.
Now all these are only dim memories of a bygone era. Today, people talk in lakhs and millions and even billions. It is in this context that I am writing this letter.
How much exactly is a billion? The concise Oxford Dictionary defines a billion as million (in US and Franco), thousand million. All this is rather confusing. The Govt. tells us that it is spending billions of rupees an year on account of the ongoing war.
A few days ago there was a radio announcement in Sinhala that all ranks in the Sri Lanka Army were going to contribute a day's pay for the reconstruction of the Sri Dalada Maligawa and that the total amount would be Koti dhaatak (18 Kotiyas).
A news item in one daily paper of 28/01/1998 states the sum to be so collected would be 18 million. Here, a 'Kotiya' is equivalent to 1 million which is as I understand obviously wrong, in that a 'Kotiya' is 10 million or 100 lakhs. Then the word milliyana is used in Sinhala. This must be the equivalent of 10 lakhs - a lakh being 100000.
I wish a knowledgeable person would enlighten the public on these matters.
Fifty years ago at the celebration in London of the regaining of sovereignty by Sri Lanka, I stood within two yards of the then British Prime Minister, Clement Attlee, and our High Commissioner Sir Claude Corea.
On February 4, 1998 in Colombo at 6 a.m. I was barely able to walk 200 yards on Dharmapala Mawatha, the Police, clearly carrying out orders, did not allow me to approach Green Path, Colombo 7, on foot.
A short story and poetry competition organised by the English Writers' Cooperative of Sri Lanka has been given much publicity.
They are charging a fee for every entry - Rs. 50 for a short story and Rs. 30 for a poem. According to their press release, published in all the newspapers: "Fee-please pay either in cash or by cheque made out to the English Writers Cooperative of Sri Lanka."
On Tuesday. January 17,1998, I took two entries (not my own) to the English Writers Cooperative of Sri Lanka at the address given in the newspapers, which was in Rosmead Place, Colombo 7.
The
gate of the palatial upstair house was padlocked. When I rang the bell
on the gate, an old woman appeared and asked me what I wanted. When I told
her that I wanted to hand over two entries for the competition and also
pay the fee of Rs. 100 in cash, she told me "Nona telephone ekay.
Mata deela yanna." (Madam is on the telephone. Give them to me).
When I requested a receipt, so that I would have proof of payment, she went into the house. "Godak vela yayi enna. Onanang thiyala yanna naththam thappalen evanna." (it will take a long time. If you want keep it with me otherwise send it by post).
Then came another woman and the first opened the gate for her and told her "I wanted a receipt." She said that all the people who came left their entries and paid the money without problem. I could do what I liked. When I insisted that I would like a receipt, she walked into the house saying loudly, "Eya rekulasi katha karanawa." (She's laying down the rules).
When I told the other woman that I would like some gum to paste the envelopes of the entries (I had wanted to enclose the receipts for the entry fee) she went into the house and brought some gum. I kept the envelopes on the gate post, pasted them and handed them over to the woman, who said she was Kamala, along with the Rs 100.
Then Kamala, tongue in cheek told me that if I wanted she would sign on a piece of paper that I gave her the "Small' sum of Rs 100. And I told her quite shortly that she could keep it and walked off. I was only sorry that I had paid money and got insulted in the bargain. Is this the way a reputed group deals with the public? Who are the committee members? For what will the entry fee be used? Can someone enlighten me?
May I refer you to 'Is it not unfair' - the letter by Lucian Peiris in The Sunday Times of 1st February. Mr. Peiris should have verified his facts before writing a letter of this nature. It was George III and not George IV who reigned in England at the time the 1815 convention was signed.
The criticism levelled against the opinions expressed by Buddhist Prelates and The National Joint Committee as ''quite unfair and ungracious coming from a Buddhist country'', is utterly ridiculous. Doesn't the writer conclude that such opposition to the visit of Prince Charles is unbuddhistic and that some high and mighty bureaucrats endorsing the visit of the Prince is Buddhistic? Aren't such arguments baseless?
The British could never have entered Kandy in 1815 without the support of the Kandyan chiefs. They very well knew that a conquest by the force of arms would be futile. So they waited for the opportune moment. They came in on the pretext of friendly intervention with the Kandyans to depose the tyrant monarch and restore peace. John D'Oyly's cunning pledges and promises persuaded the Kandyans to agree. At the end of this episode D'Oyly's conspiracy amounting to sheer hypocrisy worked its way. The Kandyans stood helpless and bewildered!
Mr.Peiris seems to regard the Waste Land Ordiance very lightly. He says it caused some misfortune. We know then that the Waste Land Ordinance sounded the death knell of the incumbency of viharas, peasants and land owners whose sole existence depended on land and land alone. The landless peasants were forced to seek their livelihood as labourers mostly under those who were completely alien to everything that is ours. ''Land for whose retention in their hands an ocean of blood was shed by the Sinhala people changed hands.
This sacred soil of our ancestors, now forcibly taken by imperialists were sold to British syndicates for the planting of rubber, coffee and tea''. For whose benefit and for whose misfortune was it that nearly 900,000 acres went to the foreigners? These planters in turn sold produce and sent the money across to fill the coffers of England. The cultivation of rice, our staple food was neglected. For the first time in our history rice had to be imported.
Rape of our fertile virgin lands by these unscrupulous foreigners resulted in soil erosion of our hill slopes that ruined our paddy lands. Lands that were thus acquired were fenced in and the villagers lost their grazing grounds for their cattle. Today there is a hue and cry by environmentalists regarding the devastation of our forests. The onslaught of our virgin forests began with the work of these imperial foreigners. This in turn resulted in the drying up of our water-resources that fed the paddy lands.
Mr.Peiris says if not for the Waste Land Ordinance our hills of the central province would still be under heavy forest cover. This is nonsense. Have not Japan, Thailand and China that never went under a Western power, progressed on modern lines?
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