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From 19 – 27 May 2010, Groundviews ran a special edition on the end of war in Sri Lanka. Over this week alone, the site received over forty thousand readers and exclusively featured over eighty thousand words of original content, one video premiere, over a dozen photos, generating over one hundred and fifty thousand words of commentary. Tens of thousands more have read …

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It’s February 14th, Valentines day and I am browsing the net, going from one link to the other, without a particular destination, enjoying tidbits from the cyber world.

I happen to come across an interesting TED talk http://on.ted.com/88Xq. Its about a school in India (Riverside School) that starts a program called I Can, where children aged 8 – 14, in small groups are empowered and inspired to become change agents. It’s a simple concept. The children are asked to pick an issue that bothers them, that they want to change, and then they are given a week to make the change. The impact and results are amazing. From cleaning up garbage, to making cities child friendly, to stopping child …

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From the psycho-social trauma and destruction of the social fabric in Jaffna after close upon three decades of brutal war to the challenges of post-war development, entrepreneurship and economic revival, these two interviews focus on two leading Tamil civil society activists who have lived in Jaffna from when the war was still raging.

Dr. Muttukrishna Sarvananthan is the Principal Researcher at the Point Pedro Institute of Development and author of three well read articles on Groundviews. Our conversation was pegged to the socio-economic aspects of post-war scenarios in the North and East. Dr. Sarvananthan’s key ideas for post-war development are …

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Every day, we fight several battles – from inflation to traffic to our friendly neighborhood cop. Our battles are many, but our defeat in one particular battle stands out, quite spectacularly.  Sign boards saying “Mehi kunu dameema ballanta pamanai” (Only dogs may dump garbage here) are testimony that we did not go down without a fight, that we tried our best.

Whenever I see these signs on people’s walls I’m always intrigued because the garbage issue seems to be problem that never seems to go away, and in true Sri Lankan style, we are always quick to blame the Government or even cite a Western conspiracy. While the blame does partially lie in the hands of the Government, …

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My focus in this essay is not what happened in the past but what can be envisioned in the near future particularly with regard to the national question in Sri Lanka. The Sri Lankan security forces comprehensively defeated the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) one year ago. However, the transformation of peace writ small that was achieved in May 2009 to peace writ large has yet to be achieved and the steps taken in that direction are, in my opinion, inadequate. Although the simultaneous operation of so many variables in complex situations makes predictions almost impossible in social science, it is possible to identify possible future scenarios through the analysis of key drivers that undergird future changes. Here I …

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Dust is finally settling on the euphoria generated by last year’s military defeat of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE).  Old concerns naturally give way to the new and a year later, people have different realities to grapple with including how to keep their home fires burning.

For President Mahinda Rajapakse and the government elected on an overwhelming  ‘gratitude vote’ for providing political leadership to crush the Liberation Tigers militarily, the post war call is to rebuild the lives of 22 million people-beyonds the rubble of yesteryear.

If winning the war was no mean task, leading this country post war to new heights and to achieve its true potential will prove a bigger challenge. This requires a collective and concerted effort …

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About a month or so after the end of the war in Sri Lanka, R Swaminathan, former Special Secretary of the Government of India commented that there should be no rigidity in implementing measures of reconciliation, reconstruction and rehabilitation in post war Sri Lanka. He further stated that a ‘credibly delivered’ political solution was an essential component to the end of the kind of conflict that Sri Lanka had experienced and without this, the future appeared disturbing at best. The sentiment was echoed by the blogger Cerno, although in more vernacular terms: “Sri Lanka: Now the Hard Part Begins”. Now, we all know this to be true. No avenue in a process of critical reasoning can conclude that …

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Vikalpa, the sister site of Groundviews with citizen journalism in Sinhala, produced this mini-documentary on Jaffna a year after the war ended. Vikalpa also produced a series of interviews in Tamil, Sinhala and English on the end of war, that will be progressively made available on its YouTube channel, embedded below….

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After reading Colombo goes under water, and not for the first time, Deshan Tennekoon sent these images of Colombo’s flooding yesterday.

These pictures were taken between 10.00am and 11.30am on the 14th of May 2010 after Colombo experienced rains for about 2 hours. It speaks volumes of the continued failure of the CMC to deal with drainage and flooding issues for the last 20 – 30 years.

Furthermore, I was trying to get from my house to work and the following roads were blocked due to flooding,

1. Duplication Road
2. Reid Avenue
3. Horton Place
4. Both Viharamahadevi – Museum Roundabouts
5. Thurstan Road
6. Thunmulla Junction

It continues to rain and Colombo continues to flood!

View Colombo flooding in a larger map

Update, 15 May 2010: Taken by Deshan Tennekoon, more photos of the flooding published on Groundviews …

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“Counter-terrorism is terrorism’s best ally.” –Joseba Zulaika in “Terrorism: The Self-Fulfilling Prophesy” (2009)

On April 12, 2010 the majority of citizens of the island’s two main linguistic communities celebrated the “Sinhala and Tamil New Year” and the categorical end of war and terrorism with considerable optimism, despite lack of a clear political solution to the ‘ethnic conflict’. The New Year celebrations, the first since the end of the State’s 30 year war with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), were in the wake of recently concluded parliamentary elections that returned the ruling party to power. President Rajapaksa, who in January had already won the Presidential elections for another 6 year term, noted that the New Year brings into focus shared …

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Large crowds rush to Jaffna every day. Some of them have never been there before. The 30 years war is over and thanks to president Rajapakse, (General Fonseka is already forgotten), they are now at last free to visit those territories the Tigers once claimed as theirs. They are eager to visit the many places of worship including a few recently discovered ones. They are genuinely happy to be there, moving from Nallur to Mavattapuram, Keerimalai, Nagadeepa, Dambakola Pattuna and   Kandarodai.

Dambakola Pattuna in Madagal is where Theri Sangamitha is said to have landed with the sacred Bo sapling. A new dagoba has been built there and a statue of bikkuni  Sangamitha has been installed in December 2009, by the first …

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Renton de Alwis was one time Chairman for Sri Lanka Tourism Promotion Bureau. As noted on this website, he has over 35 years experience in marketing, communications and tourism related areas, having worked in an international environment covering over 30 countries.

In this interview we talk about the future of tourism in Sri Lanka. Renton comes out strongly in favour of the greening of Sri Lanka and eco-tourism in line with our traditions and culture. I asked him about the Akon incident, but he said he didn’t know enough to comment. After speaking at length about the environment, …

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I experienced three disturbing scenarios within the last 5 months. In no particular order they are as follows.

1. I recently visited Sri Lanka after seven years. End of it I was overwhelmed by nostalgia and wanting to go back home. When I left my country for higher studies I had plans to come back. Right after the PhD, I wanted to stay a little longer and get some more research experience. So I took a postdoctoral position at a prestigious university. Of course I had to give up my probationary lecturer position and pay back the bond. After coming back from the recent visit, I searched for suitable jobs with enough chance to do scientific research in Sri Lanka. I actually …
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Are we Sri Lankans laid back as a nation? I have a sneaky feeling that we are, particularly, during New Year celebrations. No doubt, it is a wonderful tradition for family and friends to get together and celebrate. But aren’t the celebrations carried too far, in terms of time! In fact, it has become an excuse for dragging the holiday period further by several more days on account of transport issues and fuel shortages.

In our ancient past, life moved at an easy pace. There was adequate time for fulfilling customs and rituals according to astrological times such as ceasing work, ceasing cooking, lighting the hearth, partaking of meals, bathing, anointing with oil and starting work.

Isn’t it a little anachronistic for …

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[Editor's note: Devanesan Nesiah provides a rejoinder to Tissa Devendra's vehement response to his article 'Rebuilding Sri Lanka' that was published first on Groundviews and then later in the Island.]

The venomous response of Devendra in the Island of 16th March does not merit a reply but I need to set the record straight. As I said in my original entry, “The primary fault is with neither the visitors nor the locals” which is very different to what Devendra seeks to imply. He takes offence over my citing the critical observations of a very distinguished Sinhalese. Rebuilding Sri Lanka requires self-critical acknowledgement of the damage done to the Sri Lankan nation over the decades by the racist policies of Sinhalese, Tamil …

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A perceptive and sensitive Sri Lankan has noted;

“It is reported that the people of the North, especially in the Jaffna district, have developed a feeling of dissatisfaction, disaffection and contempt towards the people of the South, who post the end of the war are now engaging in pilgrimage and sightseeing related visits to the North in large numbers, and in the process totally disregarding the need for privacy, encroaching on meagre infrastructure resources and services of the district, causing significant negative impact on the environment/cleanliness and pollution in the area, and behaving in a manner unacceptable by the cultural and religious values of the Northerners.

These negative feelings are expressed in relation to the following issues highlighted in support of the …

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Prof. Kumar David, an electrical engineer by training, regular columnist in traditional print media and a frequent commentator on Groundviews, talks about what’s left of leftist politics in Sri Lanka, the end of war and its impact on Tamil diaspora juxtaposed against th autocratic and essentially one-party rule in Sri Lanka.

I also asked him about the growing web and Internet censorship, which in a recent column he had referred to as a disturbing retrogression into a Lanka Internet Dark Age (LIDA).

A visibly shaken wife in tears, Anoma Fonseka told the media “this is the gift my husband got for finishing a 30 year war”. Gen Sarath Fonseka was arrested, or detained, or taken into custody or may have been even abducted by a military group late in the evening on Monday from his office, in Colombo. What ever label one gives for such exercises, they eventually end up as legal arrests in Sri Lanka, as was earlier proved in the case of Uthayan and Sudar Oli editor N. Vidyadaran’s abduction, on 26 February, 2009 while the war was on and Gen Fonseka was the army commander.

Apparently the end of the war has not changed it to be any better. As …

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It is over. We have a winner, and we have a loser. The margin of victory has many messages. In mature democracies, play leading up to the climax is performed in a slightly different way, and it is customary for the loser to telephone and congratulate the winner on the morning after. We saw none of that here. The night before we saw the rise of a special tribe, whose characteristics were identified by their motto declared the morning after, if you met any of them at breakfast: “I don’t particularly like the guy who won, but I like even less the guy who lost”. That declaration is usually followed by the obligatory joke about “military intelligence” being an oxymoron. …

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