Category Archives: commoditification

March 26, 2025 · 1:34 pm

Deeply Lankika: John De Silva

Responding to a Request from An Aloysian Schoolmate and Friend named Roberts, John de Silva, aka “Johnny,” provided these fascinating genealogical details…… Michael Roberts

 UNIQUE FAMILY CONNECTIONS

I am not too sure if I had sent you details of where I came from! In other words, who were my parents and who were their parents. This is often a mundane Family Tree exercise and bears not much significance in the scheme of things. However, I feel that my family connections are unique when it comes to the Island of Sri Lanka.

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February 22, 2025 · 10:13 am

Migration Scams Rampant in Sri Lanka

Niruni de Mel in The Island, 16 February 2024 … where the title runs thus: “Scammed and Stranded: The Dark Side of Sri Lanka’s Migration Industry”

A fisherman from the quiet town of Mannar sold his mother’s, sisters’, and sister-in-law’s jewelry and, with a loan from his brother, paid a migration agent Rs. 12.8 million for a Canadian visa. Months later, he discovered the agent had vanished, leaving his family in crippling debt and his dreams in ruins. His story is not unique. Across Sri Lanka, countless desperate individuals fall prey to fraudulent migration schemes, losing their life savings in the process.

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February 4, 2025 · 6:55 pm

CR De Silva: Basic Sources on the Advent of the Karava & Salagama Castes in Sri Lanka

CR De Silva in Memo responding to a Query from Shihan De Silva in UK

The evidence as to from what parts of India the KSD (Karava, Salagama, Durawa) castes arrived in Sri Lanka is not totally clear, but there are some indications in Portuguese sources. I have no data on the origins of the Durava.

However, here is what I have traced on the Salagamas. It suggests that the Salagamas came from the South Indian Malabar or Kerala coast and that the Karavas migrated from the eastern shores of the South Indian coast (currently Tamilnadu). Given that caste identity was connected to occupation, we should note that changes in occupation could have enabled some individuals to move from their caste identities especially during migration.

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January 15, 2025 · 10:56 am

Marakkalayaa & Thambiyaa: Epithets That Bind Us Across Time

Sent by FIRAZATH HUSSAIN, an Old Mate from the Fort of Galle
 
Read slowly to be more meaningful
In the heart of the isle, where the oceans meet,
lies stories of traders, their journeys replete.
𝑴𝒂𝒓𝒂𝒌𝒌𝒂𝒍𝒂𝒚𝒂, a name of the seas,
Born from the waves, carried by the breeze.

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December 19, 2024 · 3:37 pm

Beyond Imagination – Chandra Schaffter’s Life of Service

Ravi RUDRA has composed an extensive web-item describing Chandra Schaffter’s services to Sri Lanka,  S. Thomas College, cricket, hockey, the Tamil Union CC’, insurance services in the island and humakind in general. The account includes photographs and is so extensive that it is best presented in segments. THIS is the first instalment. As this segment includes heaps of photographs, it will take me time to insert all of them…. so the present version is incomplete .…. Editor, TPS 

Compilation by Ravi RUDRA …. with this title ‘The Phenomenal Journey of Mr. CHANDRA SCHAFFTER 94* Story of Vision, Resilience, Disappointments and Success” …. 1 December 2024 

Mr. Chandra Thomas Adolphus Schaffter (born 3 April 1930) ‘The Father of Sri Lanka Insurance & Much, Much More’

“If you cannot do something for those who work for you, but you seek to get the best out of them and not worry about them, then, I don’t think life is worth living. What I am today, I owe it first to God and then to my School”– Chandra Schaffter

 Legendary Thomian (Jan 1937–March 1950)

“I was very fortunate to attend S. Thomas’ College because I had a good education and a good foundation. I lost my mother when I was only 3 and my father when I was 11, so I never had real parental guidance in that sense.But my school masters, especially in my early years, and some of my relatives were very helpful in making me find my way around.

S. Thomas’ was a great place to be in, as you learnt a lot of good values which you don’t see in the outside world. This up-bringing has stood me and many Thomians in good stead.”– Chandra Schaffter

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December 14, 2024 · 12:14 am

Sri Lanka’s Tea Plantation Industry As Featured in Thuppahi aka TPS

A PARTIAL BIBLIOGRAPHY

https://thuppahis.com/2017/02/18/james-taylor-and-the-ceylon-tea-industry/

https://thuppahis.com//2017/02/21/the-tea-business-in-ceylon-and-the-life-and-times-of-tony-peries/

https://thuppahis.com/2017/07/18/ceylon-tea-and-its-surrounds-richard-simons-tour-de-force/

 

 

 

 

 

 

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December 13, 2024 · 7:01 pm

The Murrays: Among the Pioneer Planters in British Ceylon

TPS presents here an item which bore the original title “The Scotts, The Murrays And The Polkes – Scions Of Pioneer Planters’ In Ceylon” (2020)


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Encylopaedia of Ceylon – Ceylon Tea Industry Souvenir 196

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December 5, 2024 · 7:32 pm

The IMF’s Vice-Like Grip on Sri Lanka’s Testicles … Continues

Darini Rajasingham-Senanayake, whose chosen title runs thus‘ ‘The IMF’s Remarkable Timing and a President’s Mandate for Debt Justice” …. with highlighting imposed by The Editor Thuppahi**

At Annual Meetings in Washington in October International Monetary Fund head, Kristalina Georgieva claimed Sri Lanka as a debt restructuring ‘success’ story.[i]  Left unsaid was that Sri Lanka’s external debt had apparently ballooned from $26 billion to a purported whopping $100 billion during two years of “reforms’ under the IMF’s Extended Fund Facility (EFF)![ii]

A month later, the island’s newly elected Cabinet led by President Anura Kumara Dissanayaka signed off on an official “bond exchange” with International Sovereign bondholders (ISB). The President had done a U-turn on election pledges to re-negotiate agreements with the IMF and ISB that were widely perceived to be detrimental to the county.

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December 4, 2024 · 1:02 am

James Taylor Memorabilia: A Historical ‘Nugget’

Michael Roberts

 Those with some knowledge of island Lanka’s history over the last two centuries know that one of the most significant figures in its history was the Scottish plantation manager James Taylor (1835-92) because he was the entrepreneur who pioneered the cultivation of tea in the hill-country during the mid-19th century when coffee was the reigning plantation crop. This initial work bore full fruit –literally and figuratively–when the coffee leaf disease decimated the coffee plantation industry in the 1870s and 80s.

Buddhika Dassanayake in Lanka has now added a ‘gold nugget‘ in the world of historical memorabilia: by securing a scrap of a letter by James Taylor recommending one of his working class aides—a kangany (in effect ‘sergeants’ within the plantation coolie labour force).

 

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December 2, 2024 · 6:40 pm

SriLankan Airlines Boosts Its Melbourne Links: Hodi Heleyi Aakaasey Heleyiyaa

A News Item ….. Free-to-Air so to speak

SriLankan Airlines recently celebrated the seventh anniversary of its Melbourne-Colombo route, launched in 2017.Since then, the airline has successfully connected many Sri Lankan expatriates and students to Melbourne while providing seamless travel options for tourists travelling between Melbourne, Sri Lanka, and beyond, particularly destinations across India.

 

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