You write, but to write sense, you have to read a great deal too. There are no easy answers to problems of the world, blaming one ethnic group ruling classes etc. may be a nice way out but it lacks intellectual satisfaction of solving a situation or analysing a situation.

Have you analysed how Jaffna came to be Tamil speaking; place names like Batakotte bacame Vaddukodai; alarge sub class of Koviars surprisingly close to Sinhala word Goviya came into being, a dictator by the name Sankil came into power in Jaffna in the period when Kandy’s power went to decline after Portugese occupation of maritme provinces. [Mudaliar Rasanayagam has written a good account of Jaffna, and his thesis, may not be entirely correct but must be read by likes of you.

Also do please read about the decline and fall of the Kandy Kingdom, [PAul Pieris, Colvin R De Silva, Lorna Devarajah, Davy, Robert Knox, John D’oyly et al] treaty made then broken thousands massacred in Wellassa, indentured labour brought in by hundreds of thousands, peasants, fenced out of the land that belonged to them for the plantation industry, the divide and rule and lop sided education policies that left 75% of the country Kandyan Districts and Ruhuna faring worst, near illiterate.

Also the moere recent past the rise of Tamil Nationalism by Prof Asoka Bandarage, many attempts to deny the award of independence to Sri Lanka in the 40s, honouring andd glorifying the cyanide wearing schoolboys by the FP leaders in the seventies analysed by Prof Roberts.

Do explain in detail how you “Sinhala-Buddhists” plan to “advance.” Most of the present infrastructure, including healthcare, education, and the military, was laid down by the British. That wolf in sheep’s clothing, S.W.R.D tried to put a distinctly Sinhala-Buddhist touch on all this… but anyone with 2 eyes and half a brain cell can see the consequences of that: mass exodus of the intellectuals, civil war, and two major uprisings (JVP, LTTE)… even the Jathika Chinthanaya racist Nalin De Silva, probably more educated than any of you racists, has a thorough grounding in classical & modern Western science. So much for advancing.

As for my religious faith, I simply can’t see how that is relevant at all to this or any other public discussion on peace, development or technology policy that I engage in. In the 21st Century, religion is not something to flash around as a calling card – as they did it in the Middle Ages – but something very private and personal. What I believe or don’t believe is my choice and mine alone, and if I don’t choose to disclose these details, no assortment of foxes will have the right to demand it.

I would like to think that Sri Lanka has not yet become an Absurdistan where every public and private act of individuals and institutions must have a religious basis, flavour and connotation. For purposes of this debate, I would declare myself a secular humanist. If that offends the narrow religious sensibilities of 21st Century Fox and his ilk, so be it.

I share with you the importance of liberty, pluralism, peace and ethics. Where I part ways with you is on the continued existence of the “state”. As Michel Foucault among others have shown, the enterprize of state goes hand in hand with violence.
I can no longer condone any violence.

The people of South Asia have been largely peaceable, respectful of diversity (religious, sexual, ethnic, cultural) for close to 5000 years .. I can understand why children of the colonial encounter cannot imagine life without a nation-state .. But most people can do without .. I believe.

Gandhi advocated local self-sufficiency, autonomy at the village/community level. I have faith in Gandhi.

So here is some friendly advice to the writer. Right now we have plenty of heroes so don’t try to be one yourself. You are nothing but a coward who didnot go to war and suddenly come out with your dreams of peace. You and your kind can stuff your dreams wherever you please, but not in this land of Sinhala Buddhists.

by,
sujay nayak
india

My professional training as a science writer and documentary film-maker has been to gather and analyse information, and present them in logical, coherent and accessible ways. In writing this essay, I consciously departed from all that. I’m neither political scientist nor activist to engage in ideological or technocratic discussions. So I wrote at an emotional level, looking back and looking forward.

If my views come across as naive or idealistic, I shall plead guilty as charged. My emotions are best described as cautiously optimistic, but as some readers have reminded us, our high hopes have been betrayed before. But can we afford not to dream privately and publicly at this juncture? We have suspended our dreams for too long, and it’s time to start dreaming again. There are as many kinds of dreamers as there are dreams.

One of my favourite quotes comes from the British soldier and writer T E Lawrence (of Lawrence of Arabia fame): “All men dream, but not equally…the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dream with open eyes, to make it possible.”