The book that I wrote entails reflections on the ethics of violence as part of political transformation. It did not come entirely out of an academic exercise. It came as the result of an attempt to apply ideas and also to reflect on action and the deflection of those ideas by reality. Sri Lanka as […]

There is a hope that Sri Lanka is on the verge of economic take-off, which is yet to happen. The government takes the public position that all is well with its plans to make the country an economic success story. The growth figure of 7 to 8 percent is given as proof that development is […]

“They will capture me,
They will put me In jail;
They may torture me and they may even kill me.
Then they will have my dead body, not my obedience”
(Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi in South Africa in early 1900s)
Ever since the beginnings of chronicling our history, while it’s the survivor who always pens it, the written tale of our […]

1. In the meeting of the Commonwealth Heads of Government in Trinidad and Tobago in 2009 agreed to the “Affirmation of Commonwealth Principles”. They also mandated the Commonwealth Eminent Persons Group to report on making the Commonwealth more relevant to its times and its people.
The Report of the Commonwealth Eminent Persons Group recommended the appointment […]

POSITIVE CHANGES NEED TO BE SUPPORTED BY PROPER PROCESSES
Although commentators not affiliated to the government are inclined to be severely critical of it for its many lapses, there is another side to the story. This can be seen in the government media which presents a story that is fulsome in praise of the
present developments in […]

“Our challenge is strongly to encourage the Sri Lankan government to embrace reconciliation,
accountability, and respect for human rights, while trying not to push the country towards Burma-like isolation from the west” Patricia A. Butenis Former US Ambassador in Sri Lanka as revealed in Wikileaks cables.
The Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission (LLRC) presented its final report […]

The occasion was the annual Budget Speech in Parliament. Unlike in the Westminster- system days, and
in terms of age-old traditions of parliamentary practices, the Finance Minister, in this instance His Excellency the President of Sri Lanka (as he could not trust to give this vital portfolio away to any other member of his sixty one-strong […]

Last attempt 
The Norwegian government’s effort to facilitate a peace process in the period 2002-06 was the last attempt to achieve peace in Sri Lanka’s war through peaceful means. The publication of an evaluation report by the Norwegian government to assess what happened during that period and to
draw relevant lessons for the future has rekindled debate […]

‘Tis all a Chequer-board of Nights and Days,
Where Destiny with men for Pieces plays
Hither and thither moves, and checks, and slays,
And one by one in the Closet lay”
-Omar Khayyam .The Rubaiyat
This column dedicated to the notion of making Sri Lanka the Wonder of Asia turns its spotlight today on the cancer of casinos and gambling […]

“There is a tide in the affairs of men. 
Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune;
Omitted, all the voyage of their life 
Is bound in shallows and in miseries.
On such a full sea are we now afloat,
And we must take the current when it serves,
Or lose our ventures.” – Brutus, in Julius Caesar, Act 4
Winning […]