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| Friday, 15 March 2002 |
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Voice of an enlightened parliamentarian Garu Kathanayakathumani! (Mr. Speaker) Reviewed by Dr Nandana Karunanayake Democracy is the worst form of government except for all those other forms that have
been tried from time to time. Democracy is good. I say this because other systems are worse.
The country still believes in and trusts parliament as the foundation of democracy in the country. The people expect their elected representatives to speak on their behalf and make their voice known and heard in parliament. However, only a few, both in the ruling camp and the opposition benches, live upto the expectations of the people. Without a streak of doubt, one can vouch for the fact that 'WIJAMU'is a true and genuine representative of the people. The people of the Uva province have consistently elected him to parliament since 1977. WIJAMU's Garu Kathanayakathumani!" is a collection of a few selected speeches he had made in parliament during a short span on three years in the period from August 1994 through the end of December 2001. This collection of speeches proves the fact that "WIJAMU" is a consummate intellectual possessing a thorough grounding in the principles of democracy and the norms of civility. He rises to his feet in parliament and speaks eloquently for hours and hours on without sounding boring or monotonous. He keeps his audience - be in parliament or in a radio or TV programme - spellbound. His speeches are spiced with the appropriate quotations from the classical Sinhala literature or the melodious Sanskrit or Pali stanzas. He is a master of rhetoric and affirms to Plato's maxim "rhetoric is the art of ruling the minds of men". The ruling party in a democratic nation is responsible to the people. The ruling party must answer questions about its policies and may ultimately be repudiated by parliament. In such a context, the opposition has a crucial role to play in ensuring accountability. "WIJAMU" never failed to accomplish his responsibilities as an opposition member from August 1994 through the end of December 2001. "Garu Kathanayakathumani!" is a living testimony to his contribution as a responsible, committed and enlightened parliamentarian. WIJAMU's speeches are replete with wisdom, foresight and much wit. Peggy Nooman, US Presidential Speech Writer(R) said in 1988 that a great speech is literature. This is true when we analyse WIJAMU's speeches recorded in "Garu Kathanayakathumani!". "Garu Kathanayakathumani!" contains seven long speeches WIJAMU had made over a period of just three years. The first speech made on 06th November 1997 is titled "Wyawastha Sansodhanayath Asthagathawu Wagai (The Constitutional Amendment Has Come to Nothing) and runs to seventeen pages. The second selection in the book is titled 'Ingirisi Nadagama' (The Mockery of English) and makes pun of the servile and imitative attitudes of those who flaunt their knowledge of English as a mere ornament and a means of class superiority. WIJAMU pooh-poohs those who flaunt their mastery of the English language, just to oppress the less fortunate ones and to run down the local values and the culture. In his piece titled "Ingirisi Nadagama", WIJAMU succeeds in satirising and ridiculing the colonial mentality and the dependent psyche of the English freaks. But he points out the importance of English as a link language and as a means of obtaining a vast resource of knowledge that is not normally available in either Sinhala or Tamil. WIJAMU's eloquence is at its best in this piece. Says, WIJAMU, in his speech, Some people who revere and genuflect to English blindly and naively have no regard at all for the country or the nation. They are a hybrid and vulgarised stock. They have no sense of the religion or the religious values. Nor do they have any regard for the national languages or the nation. Our myopic and irrational attitudes towards teaching and learning of English have resulted in a preponderant majority of the population being illiterate in English/Today English is confined to a microscopic minority of the elite society. Faulty and short-sighted policies have favoured only a select minority of the supra class who have been privileged to learn and master the English language and enjoy all the perks. What a pity! The same opportunities have been conveniently denied to the majority of the people in the rural and remote districts. "WIJAMU is one politician who possesses a good command of the English language. Some people tend to think, of course erroneously and without a tinge of truth, WIJAMU is against English. Not at all. WIJAMU is very much keen on making every Sri Lankan literate in English and paves way for the Sinhala educated youth in the country to acquire a working proficiency in the English language and face the challenges of a global and market-driven economy. Only then, says WIJAMU, can the youth reap the benefits of free education. It is apt to record that WIJAMU conceived a strategic plan in 1993-94 when he was the Minister of Education to teach English throughout the country. He recruited retired English teachers and others who are proficient in English to conduct classes for adults and others. He also worked out a scheme to make all the English trained teachers to be English graduates by year 2000. Alas, his plan did not materialise as there was a change of government. He introduced an incentive scheme for English teachers to sit for the English language paper at the GCE (AL) and offered extra increments to those who passed the subject. He had many other schemes and strategies to make English a viable medium of communication but not a medium of class hatred or oppression. The third speech included in the collection has the title "Clipping the Wings of the Bribery Commission and Smashing the Eathernware in an Empty House". WIJAMU brings home the fact that the Bribery Commission has been made ineffective through a carefully engineered modus operandi. He refers to a number of questionable tender deals and appeals the authorities to reactivate the Bribery Commission, so that it could deal with any alleged acts of bribery or corruption. His plea is to make the Commission an independent and apolitical body. The fourth speech carries the title "Yojanawaliya Kokatath Thailayakda? (Is the Package of Proposals a Panacea?). It is the speech made by WIJAMU on 06 November 1998. One thing that permeates all his speeches is the richness of facts and the persuasive appeal presented in an inimitable style, seasoned with proverbs, folk-tales and the quotations. One must read his speeches carefully, lest one should not miss the nuances, metaphors and the allegories. A scholar steeped deeply in the oriental literature, enriched and sustained by his in-depth reading of the Western classical literature, and above all being at ease with the common man's idiom and the ways of life, WIJAMU makes even his arch political enemies listen to him and reflect on the points raised in the speech. Such is WIJAMU's oratorical skills tempered by tolerance and a well-chosen vocabulary. All in all, Garu Kathanayakathumani! (Mr. Speaker) is a scintillatingly refreshing collection of parliamentary speeches, seasoned with superb wit and measured sarcasm. Garu Kathanayakathumani! is a must for both novice and veteran parliamentarians and provincial politicians who could, without doubt, glean many lessons and hints as to how they should address an issue while gaining the rapt attention of the political friends and foes alike. Young and fledgling media persons must never miss this book, for it can be a good and reliable handbook for them. The book can also be valuable to many others who must learn and practise the art of speech-making, reminding them constantly of the need for presenting the right message to the right audience in right time in right proportions. Garu Kathanayakathumani! can be a good reading matter for other book lovers. Ranjith Amarakeerthi Palihapitiya deserves our appreciation for a good job of compiling the collection. ================================== An account of a remarkable scholar The Way We Grew Reviewed by Sumana Saparamadu
This memoir takes its place on my bookshelf alongside two other memoirs of persons born and bred in Galle about the same time contemporaries in age but vastly different in the way they grew up in the milieus they were born into. "Those Long Afternoons" is EFC (Lyn) Ludowyk's reminiscences of his childhood in a particular environment within the Galle Fort. In "Family Memoirs" Majorie de Mel, recalls her early years at Closenburg Galle. "The Way We Grew", records the way of life in a village of a particular caste, at a time when villages were demarcated on caste lines. I enjoyed reading "The Way We Grew, my pleasure enhanced by my familiarity with the places mentioned-Kalegana, Bope, Koggala, Richmond College. Being able to place the actors in their locale made the reading more interesting. When Devendra began these notes, he was "on my way to the 60th year", and he was recalling events and incidents that happened over 40 odd years ago. The notes made in 1960 and 1961 were taken up again 9 years later "to add little bits" he had remembered and "expand on some things written earlier", and the manuscript was put away. His children knew it was somewhere, though they had never seen it. It was after his death in 1972 while sorting out his papers that they came across the manuscript. Many years passed before the sons decided to publish their father's notes, as he had written them," warts and all" as son Somasiri says in the introduction. The notes, appropriately titled The Way We Grew, published last year to coincide with the centenary of Devendra's birth, has now reached a wider public than they were intended for his grandchildren. I am quite indifferent to this esoteric stuff." This difference in dates isn't surprising. I know of men and women born 25 and 30 years after Devendra, whose fathers registered their births many months later, making them younger by six or seven months. The reminiscences end with Devendra leaving the village at the age of 17 or 18 to take up a teaching post at Sri Siddhartha College Balapitiya. The sons continue the story of his life from there, and Tissa his eldest son writes on the life he gave his own children placing the writer in perspective as a parent. What strikes the reader is the poverty Devendra and his siblings grew up in. Their fortitude and their resilience is amazing. To have grown up in that environment and reached the heights that D. T. Devendra did is indeed an achievement. Son Tissa was right when he told his father that his life was full of human interest and should be recorded. The Devendra brothers should seriously set about bringing out a Sinhala translation of their father's memoir. It will have more appeal to the Sinhala reader, specially the rural readers,as they can relate to the way of life unfolded here. Period dramas are very popular on the small screen. Here is ample, authentic material for a scriptwriter and a sensitive director to make a teledrama with popular appeal, based on the way of life in the village D.T. Devendra was born and bred. Over to you, Tissa and Somasiri. |
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Produced by Lake House |
The above quotations serve as a curtain-raiser to my review of W. J. M.
Lokubandara's recently published book titled "Garu Kathanayakathumani" (Mr.
Speaker). A handful of politicians take to writing, and in that respect W. J. M.
Lokubandara or popularly and endearingly called and known as WIJAMU stands out as a unique
personality in many respects: politician, author, art critic, orator, radio artiste and
intellectual. "Garu Kathanayakathumani!" is a true replica of his myriad skills,
all combined into the role of a politician. 
"Last night (December 13, 1960) Tissa my elder son said that he thought
the story of my life has much of human interest and that I should sit down to writer
it." With these words D. T. Devendra, teacher, Buddhist worker, researcher,
archaeologist and writer began recording reminiscences of his childhood and adolescence in
a village-Kalegana-four miles from Galle Fort. 
