Category Archives: population

March 23, 2020 · 7:15 am

Census Categorization and the Bharathas and Colombo Chetties

A Note from Fabian D. K.  Schokman of Moratuwa, 22 March 2020

Dear Michael,  Thank you for this. I believe, as with most of the “lesser minorities,” the Bharatha community did not have its own classification until the 2001 census, when there was a breakthrough mostly on account of the Chetties and their successful fight to be classed as a distinct ethnicity. Throughout census history, one can see the Chetties demanding to be classed as distinct from the Tamils. The term “race” in SL, must always be seen as a synonym for “ethnicity” and not with the same connotation it derives in the West.

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March 17, 2020 · 7:01 pm

The Bharathas of Sri Lanka: Roots and Tales

Jeremy De Lima, in The Ceylankan Number 1 of February 2020, Journal 89 Volume XXIII…… Bhāratha’s, பரதர், භාරත

  United Nations Map – (Common source material)

 India and Sri Lanka are geographically very near, but yet so far in culture, civilisation and genetic diversity. As depicted in the map above, the sub-oceanic existence of the hitherto mystical “Adams Bridge” between Dhanushkodi in India and Talaimannar in Sri Lanka has now been conclusively shown to exist through aerial mapping. It is thus reasonable to conclude that natural movement would have occurred between India and Sri Lanka over the aeons. While there is much documented history about Sinhalese and Tamils, there appears to be a relative dearth of public knowledge of a smaller migrant race called the Bhāratha’s. The writer hopes this compilation will improve the knowledge of this now vanishing group who have unobtrusively and yet so selflessly contributed so much to the history of this Island nation.

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March 8, 2020 · 1:50 pm

Defeating the Coronavirus at the Individual Level: Simple Steps

ONE: Peter Lee Goodchild’s Advice …… IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT – CORONAVIRUS

Last evening dining out with friends, one of their uncles, who’s graduated with a master’s degree and who worked in Shenzhen Hospital (Guangdong Province, China) sent him the following notes on Coronavirus for guidance.

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February 12, 2020 · 2:23 am

Wuhan: Slavoj Žižek’s Reflections against the Common Grain

Slavoj Žižek, in Die Welt, February 2020

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February 10, 2020 · 6:50 am

Coronavirus Time Bomb …. Tick, Tick, Tick

Jamie Walker, in The Weekend Australian  1/2 February 2020

Passenger A flies into Melbourne from Wuhan on January 22 before the Chinese government seals off the drab industrial city of 11 million people in a futile bid to halt the spread of the coronavirus. He doesn’t know it — because what he feels is excitement to be on holiday in faraway Australia — but he has brought the disease with him.

A masked man walks the streets of Wuhan. Picture: Getty Images A masked man walks the streets of Wuhan. Picture: Getty Images

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December 13, 2019 · 10:08 am

Gerald Peiris’s Review in 2014 of the Literature on the Death Counts during the Final Stage of Eelam War IV

  Gerald H Peiris, presenting a review article in February 2014, which is pertinent to claims TODAY. The original title runs as “Encountering ‘Death Counts’ in the Final Phase of the Eelam War” …. and appeared in both http://www.island.lk/index.php?page_cat=article-details&page=article-details&code_title=97232 …. And also at https://www.colombotelegraph.com/index.php/encountering-death-counts-in-the-final-phase-of-the-eelam-war/ …. where it drew 77 comments with the last violent chauvinist ‘gunshot’ being on 17th February 2014 (see below)

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December 11, 2019 · 1:40 pm

War Deaths enumerated by Tamil-Speaking Government Servants during 2011 Census

Extract from speech made by Gotabaya Rajapaksa at the Third Annual Defence Seminar organised by the Sri Lankan Army in 2013[1]

Pix from C’bo Telegraph

In 2011, the Department of Census and Statistics carried out an “Enumeration of Vital Events” for the Northern Province of Sri Lanka. The Enumeration was conducted between June and August 2011, with field data being collected in July. The enumerators were Government servants from the Northern Province, all 2,500 of whom were Tamil and Muslim officials. Apart from the gathering of usual census data, the enumerators paid attention to the vital events that had taken place in the North from 2005 to 2009, with a particular emphasis on the deaths that took place in the last stages of the war.

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October 16, 2019 · 2:47 am

Essays on Sinhala Buddhist Extremism towards the Muslims in Sri Lanka

 Iselin Frydenlund** presenting a review article in the Journal of Religion and Violence, Vol. 6, No. 2, 201830 … reviewing Buddhist Extremists and Muslim Minorities: Religious Conflict in Contemporary Sri Lanka. Edited by John Clifford Holt. Oxford University Press, 2016. 254 pp. Hardcover $105.00 /ISBN: 9780190624378. Paperback $35.00 / ISBN: 9780190624385.

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October 13, 2019 · 7:32 am

Sustaining a Malay Lankan Identity: A Magnum Opus on Their Heritage

Kaveesha Fernando, in Sunday Times,12 October 2019, where the title runs “Quest to preserve his heritage”
Sust
A young medical student Tuan Careem hopes that his book ‘Persaudaraan’ (brotherhood) will help rekindle an interest in Malay culture among the youth of his community.  When he was young, he spent many days in bed recovering from bouts of asthma. While many would cite similar experiences as a reason why they did not succeed in later life, young Tuan Careem does just the opposite. “I used to get sick a lot when I was small so I would have to spend a lot of time at home. My parents took me to the library and let me borrow books to keep me occupied, but unfortunately for them I read the books at an inconveniently fast rate,” grins 24-year-old Tuan.

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September 27, 2019 · 3:02 pm

The Variation in the Diffusion of Electrical Power

SWR de Samarasinghe[1]

Thanks for sharing the very informative map — in  your piece “Dark Nights in Sri Lanka: The Incidence and Spread of Electricity.”[2] The relative deprivation of north outside the Jaffna Peninsula is striking but not surprising. Sparse population, poverty and the war are key explanatory factors. Economics plays a role to the extent that the overhead cost of supplying a single dwelling or a business in these areas will be higher than in more densely populated areas and the expected income for the CEB lower. The solution is a government subsidy for the CEB. My understanding is that such a subsidization has been government policy for a long time. The social benefits are substantial and in the long term it pays off economically as well.

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