Category Archives: rehabilitation

June 13, 2022 · 9:12 pm

Gamini Goonetilleke’s Medical Services Across Battle Zones during the Eelam Wars

Vijitha Yapa, reviewing The Extra Mile …. with highlighting emphasis imposed by The Editor Thuppahi

The ‘ethnic conflict’ in Sri Lanka had another side to it: writers in uniform whose existence was known only by a name in some instances have come forward to record their memoirs. General Kamal Gunaratne, now Secretary of Defence, led the way with his classic Road to Nandikadal. The book estab­lished records and remains a bestseller as he wrote not only about victories, but also mistakes made – and what really went on in the army.

However, the book authored by Dr. Gamini Goonetilleke explains how he didn’t fight the same war with guns, but syringes and a surgeon’s skills instead.

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June 9, 2022 · 1:00 pm

A Practical Channel of Charity for Sri Lankan Families in Need

elanka Notice

Dear Fellow Sri Lankan – in Australia …. and globally …..

The following is an initiative of eLanka, the leading website for the Sri Lankan expats in Australia and globally. We have created via our eLanka Shop several Grocery packs which you can purchase online and then we will delivery free of charge anywhere in Sri Lanka.

Have a look at the pricing and different packages we have on eLanka Shop. https://elankashop.com/ (People can order online).

Delicious Sri Lankan food on Lotus leafe.

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May 29, 2022 · 8:18 pm

The Murugappans of Lanka and Biloela …. And Gross Australian Generalizations about Sri Lankan Situations

Nick Gibbs, in 7 News, 24 May 2022, where the title runs thus “Biloela ready to Welcome Home the Murugappans”

Supporters of the Tamil family held in immigration detention believe their plight changed votes in Qld as the town of Biloela prepares to welcome them home.

 

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May 24, 2022 · 8:50 pm

Rukshan sings for Sri Lanka’s Resurrection

Item in The Island, 24 May 2022, with this headline “Bring back Paradise”

Maestro Rukshan Perera is one artiste who is regularly in the news, and grabs the spotlight, in a big way, every time an important event, or a disaster, takes place in the country, or in the world.

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May 20, 2022 · 3:00 pm

The Galoya Valley Scheme & the People who made it a Reality

KK De Silva, who was an employee of the RVDB from 1967-1979

 

 

 

 

 

Introduction

 Sir James Emerson Tennent, Colonial Secretary from 1845 to 1850, at page 432 of his book, Account of the Island of Ceylon ….. Vol. II says that on a visit to the Horra-bora Tank (Soraborawewa ), then in ruins, he was so impressed with its magnificense & potential for rice cultivation that after subsequent inspections of other ancient tanks in the Northern Division , he proposed in 1848 that measures be taken to restore important ancient reservoirs by legislative action; his proposal was approved, but action delayed due to unavoidable circumstances, possibly the 1848 uprising, & legislation was introduced later, when Sir Henry Ward was Governor, by way of the Irrigation Ordinance No. 9 of 1856 . Soraborawewa was restored in 1876. (Arumugam,1969).

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May 6, 2022 · 8:23 pm

The Rajapaksa Family face Populist Power

Banyan ... with what seems to be a title ” Unhappy Families”

As the sun goes down the numbers swell on Galle Face Green, a promenade facing the Indian Ocean in downtown Colombo where families and lovers typically come to stroll and fly kites. These days it hosts a more purposeful crowd. Families are there, but so are farmers, students and their professors, Buddhist monks, Catholic nuns, Muslims and members of Sri Lanka’s Tamil minority. A makeshift settlement has sprung up. There are teach-ins at the “People’s University” and slapstick plays for children. The capital’s classiest choir has even led a rousing rendition of “Do you hear the people sing?”. This is Gota Go Gama: “Gota Go Village”. “Gota” is short for Gotabaya. The whole carnival takes aim at the president, the 72-year-old Gotabaya Rajapaksa, and his family: Go, Gota, just go.

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April 16, 2022 · 11:42 pm

Rebutting Brigadier Ranjan De Silva’s Pro-American Line of Advocac

Fair Dinkum has sent a memorandum in vehement criticism of my Aloysian schoolmate, Brigadier Ranjan De Silva’s Arguments (see below) …… Michael Roberts

The unjustified slurs and smears the Brigadier brings on China cannot go by unchallenged.

First, China didn’t “grab” a harbour of land in Sri Lanka. The word “grab” is a loaded term designed to smear China. There is a history and a context to this [project] which the Brigadier fails to explain. I won’t do so here because all of this has been well documented in many credible sources.

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April 14, 2022 · 7:24 pm

Female Leaders at the Grassroots in a COVID-19 World

Samanthi Gunawardana & Nedha De Silva, at https://lens.monash.edu/@celebrating-influential-women/2021/03/08/1382925/listening-to-women-in-grassroots-leadership-in-a-covid-19-world  …………. “It is a virus, we can get it anywhere, [but] we have a responsibility, and if we let go of workers now when they need us the most, what is the point?” – Chandra Devanarayana, Revolutionary Existence for Human Development, Sri Lanka

Long before COVID-19 hit Sri Lanka’s shores, grassroots women’s organisations fought poverty pay, long hours, and unsafe working conditions in the country’s garment manufacturing districts.

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April 10, 2022 · 8:38 pm

Blanketing Operations in the British Heights revealed by Lord Naseby

Shamindra Ferdinando

Member of House of Lords, Michael Naseby, has assured [us] that he will try very hard to convince the UK to make public the sections of the Colombo British High Commission dispatches censored by London, pertaining to the last phase of the Vanni offensive. Lord Naseby gave this assurance at the launch of his memoirs, ‘Paradise Lost, Paradise Regained’ at the BMICH on Tuesday (29).

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April 4, 2022 · 1:23 pm

Lord Naseby’s Book Launch …. House of Lords, 26 February 2022

The initial launch of Paradise Lost. Paradise Regained by Lord Michael Naseby scheduled in Colombo in 2020 was scuttled by the covid pandemic …. so the launch was taken up recently in the House of Lords in London (alas, amidst severe political and economic turmoil in the island).

Left: Lord Michael Naseby (seated)

John Rajan Yorke leaning across table; Amal Abeyawardene (at right)

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