Archive for March, 2011

  • 31 Mar, 2011
  • 53 Comments
  • Colombo,
    Jaffna,
    Peace and Conflict,
    Sport

World Cup cricket aiding reconciliation in Sri Lanka: Fact or fiction?

Screen shot 2011-03-31 at 7.45.36 AM

Groundviews is running a poll on its Facebook page (direct link to poll here) on whether its readers feel that the current interest in cricket can help reconciliation in Sri Lanka over the long-term. The visit of the Sri Lankan cricket captain, our beloved spin-bowler Murali and Ian Botham to areas most ravaged by the North was heavily covered by the media. Kumar Sangakkara’s statement after visiting the North resonated with many and was very widely featured across Facebook and Twitter, “[The people of the north] have been deprived for 30 years of everything that we’ve taken for granted in Colombo. Sometimes Colombo seemed a world away from the war. We’ve never felt it as much as the communities in the North and East did. And sometimes we have to understand that we owe them our very lives and all the comforts we enjoy,” said Sangakkara.” As was noted at the last World Cup, Sri Lanka’s cricket team is “…is a…

Continue reading »

A Home for Books

BOOKS

Original photo courtesy Tarika Wickremeratne For as long as I can remember we have had books in the house. To my child’s eye it seemed that every room was spilling over with books. Books in bedrooms, living room, dining room, kitchen and even bathroom. Most of the books belonged to my father – his study held his law books and his other books were distributed among the other rooms – Dictionaries (the love of his life), classics, spirituality, fiction, art etc. They were housed in various book cupboards, either inherited from his parents or bought from various furniture auctions held on Saturdays and that were common enough during the 60s and 70s. Most of them were of the art deco style, glass fronted wooden cupboards with an abstract wooden design against the glass, others were plain and serviceable. If the book cupboards had keys they were never locked. We were never told which books we could or couldn’t read and…

Continue reading »

Sri Lanka’s Libyan Spring

Screen shot 2011-03-28 at 10.26.52 AM

Watching Rupavahini news these days gives way for all sorts of unintended jests. Like when  we see Right Rev. Malcolm Ranjith Pieris exhorting Sri Lankan Catholics to show their solidarity with Buddhist brethren by refraining from consuming meat and liquor during the upcoming Vesak season. Of course the good Cardinal may be putting Jesus’ eternal words of  “Turning the Other Cheek” in to practice by ignoring various angry remarks by Sinhala Buddhist supremacist websites and truculent nationalist Buddhist monks directed against him and Church in general in the recent past . Or when we have Education Minister Bandula Gunawardene threatening sue Sirasa network over some supposedly “investigative “reporting done by that television channel over the manner in which the pious minister celebrated his birthday in the company of some 140 Buddhist monks. And on top of all this we have an “analyst” lecturing us on the affront to the human dignity caused by allied bombardment on Gaddafi’s strongholds in Libya….

Continue reading »

Groundviews now formatted for iPad

photo

After our launch of Sri Lanka’s as well as South Asia’s first citizen journalism app for Apple’s iPhone 4, we are now pleased to launch a version of the site tailored for Apple’s iPad. Leveraging Onswipe for WordPress, the site content now viewed on an iPad 1 or iPad 2 is beautifully rendered and provides easy access to share content through Twitter, Facebook as well as via email. There is no app to download or settings to fiddle around with. Users on any iPad have to just navigate to www.groundviews.org to consume our critically acclaimed content, including reader generated comments, presented in a visually stunning interface. Repost This Article

Continue reading »

Democracy, Economic Growth And Terrorism: The Sri Lankan Case

5189229766_5310326e78_b

Photo courtesy Vikalpa This article will briefly discuss alternative explanations to the two youth insurrections and the separatist movements that occurred in post-independence Sri Lanka.[1] While the most recent conflict between the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) is more widely known, there have been two additional, and equally destructive insurgencies in Sri Lanka that are largely ignored by policy makers as well as academics today. The first Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) (Marxist) insurrection in 1971 was followed by a second bloodier insurrection from 1987-1989. All three insurrections carved deep social, ethnic and political divisions within Sri Lanka. The conflict between the LTTE and the state led to the death of nearly 80,000- 100,000 people and the victimization of many more. The obscure JVP insurrection in the late 1980s led to the death of nearly 45,000 to 65,000 youth in the country (Gunesekara 1998:10). Both groups engaged terrorism when confronting the state[2]. The JVP was led by ‘Sinhalese educated youth’…

Continue reading »

Small Country Diplomacy

Colonel-Gaddafi

Bosom buddies, Libya’s Qadaffi and Sri Lanka’s President, courtesy Sunday Times Of late there have been several critical comments levied against the manner in which Sri Lanka has conducted her diplomatic relations.  Traditional alliances with the Western world have become somewhat stilted, new alliances have been forged, while fortunately the tempo of our relations with the SAARC countries, our regional neighbours, have remained stable.  The shifts in the balance of power relations have created a certain amount of suspicion and hostility among the Western Powers.  The entry of China, the bête noir of India, has also introduced heightened alertness, but not disharmony into the Indo- Lanka relations.  Sri Lanka needs to fine tune her diplomatic skills as we are dependent on the West for much of our trade, financial aid and investments as much as we are on India, especially with the need to keep the regional balance. Some of the charged atmosphere in Sri Lanka’s international relations, have not…

Continue reading »

In conversation with Dr. Paikiasothy Saravanamuttu

Screen shot 2011-03-21 at 1.33.45 PM

Almost one year ago, Groundviews first featured an interview with Dr. Paikiasothy Saravanamuttu. At the time, just after the parliamentary elections leading from the decisive presidential election, the government was riding a wave of popular support. In the year that passed, from the reprehensible 18th Amendment and grotesque examples of the government’s wastefulness, democratic governance that instead of improvement and progress, shows decline and decrepitude. The recipient of the first Citizens Peace Award, Dr. Saravanamuttu (Sara), the Executive Director of the Centre for Policy Alternatives (the institutional base of this site), in this interview speaks about the enduring challenges facing democracy and human rights in Sri Lanka, nearly two years after the end of war. The conversation begins with an excerpt from Sara’s acceptance speech at the Citizens Peace Award, and a question as to why so very few listen to him in Sri Lanka today, and worse, care to know about that which he flags. Going beyond a simplistic championing of…

Continue reading »

Sri Lanka’s and South Asia’s first citizen journalism iPhone app

latestsm

19 March 2011, Colombo, Sri Lanka: Groundviews is proud to launch today Sri Lanka’s as well as South Asia’s first citizen journalism app for Apple’s iOS platform. The Groundviews app works on the iPod Touch, iPad and is optimised for the iPhone 4′s Retina display. “This inovative app enables those, particularly in the diaspora, to more easily access updated content published on the site” said Sanjana Hattotuwa, founding Editor of Groundviews. “Based on our experience in developing this app, we welcome inquiries to help develop similar iOS apps for other citizen journalism and mainstream media initiatives”. Apple has around 25% of the smartphone market in the US alone, and its mobile app store is the world’s largest with around 350,000 apps downloaded well over two billion times. The Groundviews app is free and allows a user to, Read all the latest updates to the site Read all the special editions, including the critically acclaimed End of War Special Edition Read…

Continue reading »

Violence Against Women and Girls in Sri Lanka: No April Fools joke

Screen shot 2011-03-19 at 12.17.57 PM

Interviews published on this site with Kumudini Samuel, founder of Women and Media Collective and with Sunila Abeysekara, a leading human rights activist, addressed the prevalence of Gender Based Violence both during war and in post-war Sri Lanka, particularly in the North and East. Addressing the same vexed issue is a production slated for 1st April titled V Day – A Memory, a Monologue, a Rant and a Prayer: Writings to End Violence Against Women and Girls. Supported by the Forum Against Gender Based Violence in Sri Lanka, Groundviews caught up briefly with the director of this production, Hans Billimoria, to ask him why he chose this theme, what V-Day would be about, and why it was important to flag this issue in Sri Lanka. Listen to the podcast (~15 mins): here For a related contribution by Hans to , click on These Sri Lankan whores! Serve them right! Repost This Article

Continue reading »

How Decent a Society are we?

Rape1

Editors’ note: This article was first published in the Daily Mirror on the 18th of March 2011. Groundviews invites its readers for further discussion and debate. Avishai Margalit the Israeli philosopher wrote a treatise on the Decent Society from which I have quoted often. In it he defines a civilized society as one in which people do not humiliate each other and a decent society as one in which institutions do not humiliate people.  My reason for frequently citing this is that throughout the yet to be resolved conflict in Sri Lanka and in parts of the country that were not direct theatres of armed conflict, issues of human dignity and decency abounded and yet do so be it on the basis of ethnicity, religion, class and dissent from the prevailing orthodoxy.  Now as we are faced with the challenge of moving beyond the post-war to the post-conflict and with it an unprecedented opportunity to forge reconciliation and unity, Margalit’s…

Continue reading »

Caste in Sri Lanka and India

jaffna_high_caste_tamil_women

There was an interesting work shop on ‘Conceptualizing Caste in Sri Lanka’ at the ICES on Tuesday 15th March 2011. It was noted that caste is a tabooed and under-researched subject in Sri Lanka, unlike in India, Nepal and elsewhere in South Asia. We tend to dismiss caste as insignificant and irrelevant, except perhaps in remote rural areas. In consequence, caste related problems are evaded and not addressed. It was noted by Prof. Tudor Silva that the British brought sanitary labourers from South India into selected Urban centres, and these then constituted the underclass of those towns, doubly despised on account of ethnicity and caste. Prof. Ranweera Banda, based on his research in Panama in Ampara district, found that the people of that locality were of mixed Sinhalese –Tamil origin at all social and caste levels. However, the social and caste elite opted to identify with the Sinhalese upper castes, embracing the appropriate cultural practices needed for such identification. This…

Continue reading »

Jaffna: Moments of Nostalgia

"Let's unite to celebrate Sri Lanka Cricket" reads the hoarding in Tamil

“I worked hard for that FIRST KISS And a heart don’t forget something like that Like an old photograph Time can make a feeling fade But the memory of a FIRST KISS Never fades away!” ~ Samuel Timothy McGraw ~ American Country Musician and Actor I always feel enchanted, whenever I travel to Jaffna by bullock cart, bicycle, car, foot, helicopter, jeep, motorbike, plane, ship, train or even through Kilali lagoon during difficult times. Journey to Jaffna ~ may it be before the war, during the war or after the war, I always cherish the memories of Jaffna which is closer to my heart. Jaffna which is beautifully called “Yaazhpaanam” in Tamil. It is famous for its unique architecture, tradition, cuisine, rituals and festivals. According to 2007 statistics, Jaffna district’s population was 650,720 (1,85,405 families). Jaffna district is geographically divided into Valikaamam, Vadamaraatchchi, Thenmaraatchchi and Jaffna Islands. It has an area of 1,025 square kilometres (approximately 395.8 square miles). Jaffna…

Continue reading »

Jaffna and the Vanni today: The reality beneath the rhetoric

4671791672_d87e631ed7_b

Photo credit: Indi Samarajiva, 2010 The drive along the A9 from Vavuniya to Killinochchi is brought to a temporary halt at the ‘exit-entry point’ at what used to be the forward defence line at Omanthai. On the side of the dusty dirt road, in a series of sheds, military personnel are stationed with the sole purpose of ensuring that both locals and international staff members of non-governmental and international non-governmental organisations and even UN agencies, possess the required clearances issued by the Ministry of Defence (MOD) to cross into the North. All foreigners, that is those holding non-Sri Lankan passports, even tourists, have to obtain a MOD clearance to pass through Omanthai. One could be excused for thinking this was 2002, when entering the Vanni was much like entering a foreign territory. Yet it is 2011, more than a year and a half since the end of the war between the government and the LTTE. In 2011, more so than…

Continue reading »

New Festival to Promote Unity in Sri Lanka

Screen shot 2011-03-16 at 3.14.17 PM

16 March 2011, Colombo, Sri Lanka: A press conference was held in Colombo earlier today to launch the latest fixture on Sri Lanka’s ever busier festival calendar. Organisers of The Boycott Festival issued a brief statement and then invited the press to enjoy the refreshments in the ballroom. The Boycott Festival will take place over five days, beginning today and ending after a lunch banquet on Sunday. A full list of objections may be obtained by emailing endorsement@boycott.com. In their statement the festival organisers said they were angry and upset with what has taken place and continues to take place in our country. They admitted that worn down by the last six – and also the last thirty – years, they could no longer muster enthusiasm for anything and would really prefer not to. They were tired, they said, and couldn’t face the journey to the festival site. They would not be attending. Director Karthika Peiris said ‘As ever, we…

Continue reading »

Old Mannar Road and IDPs Access

35287799

Photo of Mannar-Puttalam road, courtesy Panoramio Environmentalists have gone to courts demanding that the road connecting Mannar and Puttalam that runs through the Wilpattu National Park be permanently closed. The opening of the old Mannar-Puttalam Road on January 24 2010 was seen as a crucial step in supporting the Northern IDP return process, especially for Muslims displaced from Mannar district. The Southern-most division of Mannar, Musali had the largest concentration of Northern Muslims and was the only Muslim majority division prior to the expulsion in 1990. This road provides easy and low cost access from Puttalam to Musali in Southern Mannar as opposed to the other route that goes via Medawachchiya, which takes double the time (Puttalam- Medawachchiya – Marichchukadi 235km vs Puttalam – Wilpattu – Marichchukadi – 77km) and triple the cost, from Rs. 320 versus Rs. 100. Saving Rs. 220 per trip means a lot to the IDPs. For this cost, an IDP family struggling to have one…

Continue reading »
Page 1 of 3123

About Groundviews

Located at the Centre for Policy Alternatives in Colombo, Sri Lanka, Groundviews is a citizen journalism website that uses a range of genres and media to highlight critical perspectives on governance, reconciliation, human rights, the arts and literature, democracy and other issues. The site has won two international awards, including the prestigious Manthan Award South Asia in 2009. The grand jury's evaluation of the site noted, "What no media dares to report, Groundviews publicly exposes. It's a new age media for a new Sri Lanka... Free media at it's very best!"

cezarneaga.eu