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Chanaka Bandarage The current Northern Provincial Council (NPC) is a racist government. The NPC discriminates against the Sinhalese in the North. At the moment the NPC does not have the Land and Police powers (under the 13th Amendment, the Land and Police powers were granted to the provincial governments; but JR Jayawardane, realising the danger, effected measures to stop the final grant). At the moment the central government holds these two powers. Even without having these

Chanaka Bandarage The current Northern Provincial Council (NPC) is a racist government. The NPC discriminates against the Sinhalese in the North. At the moment the NPC does not have the Land and Police powers (under the 13th Amendment, the Land and Police powers were granted to the provincial governments; but JR Jayawardane, realising the danger, effected measures to stop the final grant). At the moment the central government holds these two powers. Even without having these

Chanaka Bandarage Introduction The Sinhalese are continuously being denied from settling in the North by Tamil politicians. This has been a systematic, very successful campaign by them for more than 60 years. The irony is that the Southern politicians do not want to acknowledge and rectify this racist policy. The recent rhetoric of some TNA MPs and the Chief Minister of the Northern Provincial Council is clear that they are hell bent on preventing the Sinhalese from reloc

චානක බණ්ඩාරගේ 27/10/2017 දින ලංකාවෙබ් හී පළවූ ‘Sinhalese should be allowed and encouraged to settle in the North’ යන ලිපියේ සිංහල පරිවර්තනය, මුල් ලේඛකයා විසින්ම හැඳින්වීම සිංහලයන් උතුරේ පදිංචිවීමට එරෙහිව උතුරේ දේශපාලනඥයෝ කටයුතු කරත්. මෙය දැනට වසර 60ක පමණ කාලයක සිට ඔවුහු ඉතා සාර්ථක ලෙස කරගෙන යන්නකි. කණගාටුවට කරුණ වන්නේ දකුණේ නායකන් උතුරේ දේශපාලනඥයන්ගේ මෙම ජාතිවාදී වැඩපිළිවෙලට ඉඩ දී බලාසිටීමය. ඇතැම් TNA ම

Chanaka Bandarage The British ruled Sri Lanka (then Ceylon) for 150 years. During that period both the Sinhalese and the Tamils lived as British subjects. There are no records that the Tamils like now were then demanding more power for themselves. When Sri Lanka received independence in 1948, the British acknowledged that the North and the East are parts of the Sri Lankan state and never contemplated an India/Pakistan type partition to give the North to the Tamils (this was t

Chanaka Bandarage Reports by the Parliament’s six sub committees Undoubtedly the reports published in 2016 by the Parliament’s six sub committees on constitutional reform are most damaging and frightening. They threaten the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the nation. Among the proposals are giving land and police powers to the provinces. This means the Chief Minister of the Northern Province will be able to decide not only who can own land in that province, but,

චානක බණ්ඩාරගේ, ශ්‍රී ලංකා සහයෝගිතා කණ්ඩායම srilankasupportgroup@bigpond.com යෝජනාවලට අනුව, නව ආණ්ආණ්ඩුක්‍රම ව්‍යවස්‌ථාවෙන් අවසානයේදී බිහි වෙන්නේ ඊලාම් රාජ්‍යයකි: 1987, 13වෙනි සංශෝධනයෙන් පසුව වත් නොලැබුණු ඉඩම්, පොලිස්‌, මුදල් බලතල පළාත් සභාවලට දීමට යාම. රටේ ඉඩම් අයිතිය/පාලනය සහ කළමනාකරණය මුළුමනින්ම පළාත්සභා වලට. එනම්, උතුරේ මහා ඇමතිට ඕන නම් තමිල්නාඩුවේ අයට වුනත් ඉඩම්? සිංහලයන්ට උතුරු/නැගෙනහිර අළුතෙන් ඉඩම් අයිතිවාසිකම් අහිමි වේවි? පොලිස්‌ – පළාත් 9 ට වෙනම ස්වාධින පොලිස් සේව

Chanaka Bandarage Prabhakaran was hell-bent on distorting Sri Lanka’s history. He launched a campaign with Anton Balasingham in the helm to attack Mahavansa. The LTTE discounted Vijaya’s arrival (more than 2500 years ago) and stressed that Tamils are Sri Lanka’s indigenous people. According to them, Buddhism existed in Sri Lanka prior to Mahindagamanaya and that a Tamil Buddhist civilization existed in the ancient North and East of Sri Lanka. Though it is very well accepted

Chanaka Bandarage This write-up is posted in Lankaweb with a view to further clarify the article that I posted in Lankaweb on 10 March 2020, titled ‘Distortion of Our History’. I reproduce from the Grade 6 and 10 textbooks where the historyis wrong or questionable (the Sinhala texts below): Please note that the italicized texts are my own comments. Currently, there are 5 history textbooks used by students. They are distributed free of charge by the government to all Sri Lanka

Chanaka Bandarage This Part is prepared basically to respond to comments made by readers in the two earlier articles about this topic. Within our country, we can say anything. We can glorify ourselves and of course, everyone will be happy. But, the facts asserted must be 100% true. Also, the rest of the world must accept them. What we must bear in mind is that the world at large has not yet accepted our recent findings – eg, Sri Lanka had an advanced civilization before othe

Chanaka Bandarage The government should be commended for imposing a 24 hour, island-wide curfew. It was a brave decision. Sri Lanka is possibly the first country in the world to impose a 24 hour, island-wide curfew. We are also one of the first countries in the world to shut down schools. Many countries have followed our successful examples. Avoidance of close contact between peoples is the best way to stop the spreading of the deadly virus. In 3rd world countries, where peo

Chanaka Bandarage The previous government signed an agreement with a Chinese bank to obtain funds to build a Light Rail system from Malabe to Fort via Borella. This is only the first stage of the proposed project. The idea was to eventually cover the whole of Colombo with Light Rail. The estimated cost for stage 1 is somewhere around US$ 2.2 billion. Obviously the end cost would be much higher. After the new government came to power (in November 2019), this project has been

Chanaka Bandarage After the war, all governments have miserably failed to settle the displaced Sinhalese (numbering about 50,000) in the Northern province. In the past five years, the governments have embarked on a massive ‘Sanhindiyawa’ campaign, placing lots of onus on the Sinhalese to embrace Tamil culture and Tamil way of life. For this, a ministry of National Language and Social Integration was created. It ran racist policies against the Sinhalese. State-owned TV and ra

Chanaka Bandarage Is Sunil Rathnayake innocent? If Sunil Rathnayake received a Presidential pardon just because the previous President pardoned convicted Tamil Tigers, it is not a good reason for the pardon. ‘Two wrongs don’t make a right’. The President, who is also the ex-Defence Secretary, would not have released Sunil Rathnayake unless that was the right thing to do. It is important to bear in mind that there are several military men currently held in the prison for wron

Chanaka Bandarage Muslim bashing is fashionable in Sri Lanka. Muslim bashing is considered politically correct in Sri Lanka. Muslims are a minority in this country. They comprised less than 10% of the population. Muslims congregate in groups. They wear garments that are specific to them. They live within closely knitted communities. They help each other out. They give priority to their religion and religious customs. These characteristics have made them the envy of the Sinhal

Chanaka Bandarage Even before the Portuguese’ arrival, Pettah had been a major trading place. Due to its proximity to Colombo Port (Kolom Thota), the Kotte kings erected warehouses in Pettah to store spices, vegetables, fruits, grains, ivory and timber geared for export. Pettah (also, Fort) used to station tusker elephants that Sri Lanka (then Sinhale) exported to the world. During the Dutch and the British periods, Pettah emerged as the country’s main trading hub. It contin

Chanaka Bandarage Galle Face Green was established in 1859 by Governor Sir Henry Ward, for the sole purpose of recreation. A 1.6 km long promenade was constructed along the oceanside, especially with the purpose of ladies and children to saunter and take in the air. Galle Face originally was spread over a much larger area than it exists today. Records indicate that its northern boundary extended up to Beira Lake (near Gangaramaya temple). The very large Green was used for va

Chanaka Bandarage The writer had worked numerous times with the Great SL Gunasekera, and takes pride identifying himself as a close friend of SL. For over 30 years SL was engaged in the struggle against Tamil separatism in Sri Lanka. Many times he was the lone voice against Tamil terrorism, especially in the legal scene. SL wrote vigorously in multiple journals and attended meetings and forums. He represented the country at Thimpu Talks, on behalf of all peoples of Sri Lanka.

Chanaka Bandarage Article 70 (1) of the Constitution – ‘The President may by Proclamation, summon, prorogue and dissolve Parliament’. The law is very clear, the President has clear power to dissolve the Parliament (Article 33 (1) also provides this power. Accordingly, the President issued a gazette notification on 2 March 2020 dissolving the Parliament. In the said gazette notification the President fixed 12 March 2020 to 19 March 2020 as the nomination period for the elec

Chanaka Bandarage General Spitting and expectorate (eg. phlegm, mucus) People do not care about spitting in public places. They have become accustomed to it. They will continue to do it freely and openly, without fear. It is very bad for sanitary and health reasons. Their actions cause environmental pollution/public nuisance. It is very bad for tourism. Given the Corono Pandemic, it is of paramount importance that public spitting is made illegal. Those who continue to spi