Your Travels in a Militarized Society are among my favourite posts on groundviews.

I liked how you used a single place to anchor a story that crosses time.

Can you please tell me what are the names of the government ministers and the leading Buddhist monk in Sinha Rathanthunga’s book, “The Politics of Terrorism”?

All of us do not have access to the book and I’d like to know who is still in politics today that played a part in ‘83 riots that killed thousands of Tamils.

Regards,

R

Pity that this seems to be the only thing worth discussing in the whole post.

A person who was taken into custody for drinking beer in a public place was fined Rs. 10,000 by Maligakanda Magistrate Sunil Abeysinghe last Friday.

The suspect, Mohamed Piriyan, was charged under the Alcohol and Tobacco Act.

Police Sergeant Ratnayake who prosecuted said that the suspect was taken into custody by SI Premasiri while consuming beer at Siemonds Road, Maradana in a manner detrimental to the public well-being. The Magistrate severely warned the suspect before fining him.

In another case, two persons who were charged with smoking inside a Cinema in Maradana were fined Rs. 2,500 each.

Beer consumption has been affected due to its consumer practices — ie it’s more of a social drink, consumed in public, and therefore more vulnerable to NATA. Beer consumption had also increased in the late ’90s due to the introduction of 375ml bottles and cheaper cans. This was therefore a marketing-driven increase, and the NATA affect wouldn’t really have dented pre-375ml figures. However, whenever beer consumption reduces, it proportionately increases hard and illicit liquor consumption.

As a result of the Tobacco and Alcohol Control Authority coming into force, smoking in prohibited places under the Act had reduced by 90 per cent. However Health Minister Nimal Siripala de Silva has appointed a committee to amend the Act to include public places like roads and lanes which were not included in the Act The Authority hopes that with strict enforcement of this amendment, smoking in prohibited places could be reduced to nearly 100 per cent, if the Police and Excise authorities enforce the law strictly.

However, there had been a number of incidents since the Act came into force where ignorant policemen have charged people for smoking on the roads despite it not being an offence. The Courts, too, on many occasions, had fined them when the police informed the Magistrate that accused had been smoking in a prohibited area. The accused, too, had been unaware of whether he had committed an offence or not.

An OIC of a city Police station when contacted, at the very outset of the enactment of the Act, as to how they apprehend people under the Tobacco and Alcohol Control Authority Act, said that the whole thing looks so ambiguous that he was waiting until some enterprising guy challenges the whole thing in the Supreme Court and gets a ruling, so that a very clear stand would emerge and that he could act thereafter.

With the ban on drinking at prohibited places, beer consumption, too, had dropped by 40 per cent the Minister said.

Minister de Silva said that the Committee to be appointed would study the inclusion of the provision prohibiting smoking on roads in the Act. Since the Tobacco and Alcohol Act came into effect beer consumption had dropped by 40 per cent and smoking by 90 percent in the country.

He added that the government was of the view that as soon as the amendment to the Act is passed by parliament, smoking on roads would be a punishable offence.