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.
Filed under caste issues, centre-periphery relations, communal relations, cultural transmission, economic processes, education, heritage, historical interpretation, island economy, landscape wondrous, life stories, population, religiosity, self-reflexivity, sri lankan society, travelogue, unusual people, world events & processes
Cuba reveals Exemplary Humanism in the Face of the Coronavirusa
News from Cuba, 16 March 2020 = Cuba gives permission for cruise ship carrying COVID-19 patients to dock citing solidarity and health as a human right
A British cruise ship carrying five passengers who have tested positive for the coronavirus is to dock in Cuba after being turned away by other countries. The MS Braemar, which is carrying six hundred passengers, most of whom are British, had been stranded at sea for two days while trying to find a country which would allow it to dock.
Woman-on-woman … Modern Day ‘Arabian’ Slavery in New york
Hassina Leelarathna, in Ft.lknews, 17 March 2020, with this title “New Jersey woman in same-sex marriage with Sri Lankan gets stiff prison sentence for cycle of abuse”……………… http://www.ft.lk/news/New-Jersey-woman-in-same-sex-marriage-with-Sri-Lankan-gets-stiff-prison-sentence-for-cycle-of-abuse/56-697349
A Jordanian-born New Jersey woman who entered into a same sex marriage with a Sri Lankan and forced her to work as a housekeeper and nanny for almost a decade without pay has been sentenced to five years and 10 months in federal prison (10 March). A federal judge also sentenced Alia Imad Faleh Al Hunaity, aka Alia Al Qaternah, 44, a naturalised US citizen, to three years of supervised release and ordered her to pay restitution of $ 1.2 million.
Dinesh Gunawardena in Forthright Challenge to UNHRC and Yahapalana ‘Mangalaya’
Neville Ladduwahetty, in Island, 3 March 2020, where the title runs “Fundamental Rights, Human Rights and other rights”
At the 43rd Session of the Human Rights Council, held in Geneva, Sri Lanka’s Minister of Foreign Relations Dinesh Gunawardena, on 26th February, 2020, placed on record a clear, firm and unambiguous statement that Sri Lanka was withdrawing from co-sponsorship of UNHRC Resolution 40/1 and its precedent 30/1, on grounds that “Constitutionally, the resolution seeks to grant upon Sri Lanka obligations that cannot be carried out within the constitutional framework and it infringes the sovereignty of the people of Sri Lanka and violates the basic structure of the constitution”.
Dire Situation in Lombardy … … Hear Ye ! Hear Ye!
This is from a Doha resident now stuck in Italy. … circulated by GEETH KARUNATILLEKA of ADELAIDE:
“I am writing to you from Bergamo, Italy, at the heart of the coronavirus crisis. The news media in the US has not captured the severity of what is happening here. I am writing this post because each of you, today, not the government, not the school district, not the mayor, each individual citizen has the chance, today to take actions that will deter the Italian situation from becoming your own country’s reality. The only way to stop this virus is to limit contagion. And the only way to limit contagion is for millions of people to change their behavior today.
Coronavirus: Advice from the Wuhan Heartland
| This, by far, is the most clearly spelt-out parcel of information I’ve received yet… From a young researcher who had been transferred from Shenzhen to Wuhan to collaborate with the task force that is fighting the coronavirus epidemic, we receive and willingly transmit to all of this clear, simple and accessible information, which describe exactly what it is. the virus, how it transfers from one person to another and how it can be neutralized in everyday life. |
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Filed under welfare & philanthophy, world events & processes
Sri Lanka as A Resplendent Isle from Way Back in Time
Pauline Gunewardene, being …. a talk originally titled “A Brief History of Sri Lanka,” and presented at the Mind Cafe Mental Health Conference o at the Marriott in Weligama, 3-10 August 2019…… and subsequently placed in the first CEYLANKAN for 2020 with the title “Resplendent Lanka – “only forty leagues from Paradise”
The ancient land of Lanka, known in ages past as the Resplendent Isle, the Pearl of the Indian Ocean — some of the many names given to it by travellers who came under its spell. Lanka is its original name and means island while Sri means resplendent and also used as an honorific.
Ibn Battuta 
Marco Polo
Filed under Uncategorized
Port City Colombo 2014-2040 Clarified
Filed under accountability, centre-periphery relations, China and Chinese influences, economic processes, energy resources, environmental degradation, Indian Ocean politics, land policies, landscape wondrous, modernity & modernization, politIcal discourse, power politics, self-reflexivity, sri lankan society, the imaginary and the real, transport and communications, travelogue, truth as casualty of war, world events & processes
Hugh Karunanayake: A Pioneer for Ecumenical Ceylonese Studies in the Sydney Circuit
“Our First Chairman” — being the lead essay in the latest CEYLANKAN published in 2020
Hugh Karunanayake was elected Chairman of our Society at the public meeting held on 28th February 1998. It was Hugh together with his friend Chris Puttock who took the original initiative to form the Society. The foundation meeting held in the evening of 30th August 1997, was at his residence and it led to the eventual formation of the Society.
Filed under Australian culture, British colonialism, citizen journalism, communal relations, cultural transmission, education, European history, heritage, historical interpretation, landscape wondrous, life stories, literary achievements, modernity & modernization, patriotism, politIcal discourse, self-reflexivity, sri lankan society, travelogue, world events & processes
