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| Saturday, 7 August 2004 |
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Patriotic characters like Sunderalingam needed today - Alavi Mowlana by Alavi Mowlana, Governor, Western Province This article is concurrent with the commemorative ceremony due to be held today at the Eheliyagoda Community Development Hall to honour S. Sunderalingam, Attorney-at-Law and former Chairman of the Leela Holdings, Colombo, who died a year ago. War is a disastrous and bitter experience. The destruction it brings about is tremendous. It is a worldwide challenge today. Therefore it has to be eschewed forthwith. But it is not an easy task. It demands high morals within mankind. Man has to be refined to shed various differences such as race, caste, religion and language and trained to co-exist in a spirit of humanism and fraternity. That is the way to peace. S. Sunderalingam, Attorney-at-Law and Chairman of the Leela Group of Companies, who died a year ago, was in fact a man of such qualities who cherished the beauty of diversity and truly yearned for peace. Sunderalingam, born in Kankesanturai in the Northern Peninsula of Jaffna as the elder son of S.T. Sinnadurai and Soupakyam, migrated to Colombo to do business. He was an old boy of Ananda College, Colombo. It was remarkable that the late Sinnadurai admitted his children to Sinhala colleges in Colombo to receive a Sinhala medium education at a time when the high rankers both of Sinhala and Tamil communities sought admission of their children to English seats of learning in Jaffna for a better English education. He expected his children to converse in Sinhala fluently. He made it a point to board his son Sunderalingam under the tutelage of Ven. Professor Bambarende Siri Seevali Thera at Vidyalankara Pirivena, Colombo, to learn Sinhala. He also made his children learn Buddhist philosophy. The late Ven. Wellawatte Vibhavi Nayaka Thera, Parivenadhipathi of Dharmodaya Pirivena, Wellwatte accomplished that task. S.T. Sinnadurai, proprietor of several enterprises in Colombo such as Leela Stores, New Leela Press, etc., was closely associated with leading poets and writers, P.V. Lanarolle, Piyadasa Palansuriya, Meemana Prematilleke, Sagara Palansuriya, Sirisena Maitipe and Somaweera Chandrasiri were among them. Sinnadurai was an ardent lover of Sinhala newspapers like Sinhala Bauddhaya initiated by Anagarika Dharmapala and Sinhala Jathiya edited by Piyadasa Sirisena, all of which he used to read with keen interest to make himself truly Sinhala oriented. He entered into clashes with white rulers to preserve the sanctity of the Bodhi-Tree neighbouring his business premises, where bullock carters used to tether their oxen and erected a fence surrounding the bo-tree. This businessman, born a Hindu devotee made it a point to venerate the Bodhi-Tree every morning and founded the Pettah Bodhiraja Society avowed to protect the Bodhi-Tree and became the Society's first Honorary Treasurer. It was the late Sinnadurai, the father of the late Sunderalingam who pioneered the cause of bringing the Pettah Bodhi-Tree to the present State of a Buddhist place of worship fledged with a shrine room and a dagoba. The late Sinnadurai was the founder of the renowned Leela Panchanga Almanac and the Leela Diary. The Leela Diary which is almost an encyclopedia by itself is a monument to the innovative aptitude of the late Sinnadurai. Sinnadurai made it a habit to accompany his children to Buddhist places of worship such as Dharmodaya Pirivena, Wellawatte, Sri Mangalaramaya, Mahawa, Kurundankulama, Anuradhapura and Saddharma Vivekasramaya and rendered an invaluable service to the uplift of those places. He was the only Tamil in Sri Lanka who was honoured with the award of Anagarika Dharmapala Gold Medal. His children including the late Sunderalingam walked in the footsteps of their father and rendered a yeoman service with generosity for the benefit of numerous national and religious activities throughout the island. Janavijaya Chetiya, Samangala, Deniyaya, Palamugedera Sri Mangalaramaya Sathara Maha Devalaya, two storeyed pilgrims' rest and the Shrine Room, Sanghawasaya of Sri Dharmodaya Pirivena, Wellawatte, the Dhamma School of Sri Saddharmawansa Vivekasramaya, Anuradhapura, the Buddhist, Hindu, Islamic and Catholic places of worship under the Community Development Foundation of Eheliyagoda, Bodhimalu Viharaya and Sanghawasaya of Pokunuvita, Horana, Sarananda Pirivena, Mavupiya Sevana of Meepagama, Kalavana and the Bodhi Raja Viharaya Devala Complex are some of the religious institutions blessed with the magnanimity of the Sinnadurai family. In recognition of such service, the Sri Lanka Ramanna Maha Nikaya bestowed the honorary title of Sasana Sobhana Lanka Putra on Sunderalingam and his brothers S. Deshabandu, J.P. and S. Dhanabala, J.P. The Jayawardenapura Commemorative Foundation honoured Sinnadurai Arulanandam by bestowal of the title of Dharma Prasada Deshabandu Lanka Puthra. The late Sunderalingam and all his brothers were well versed in Sinhala, Tamil and English. They not only possessed an adequate knowledge of the four religions, Hindu, Buddhism, Islam and Christianity but also inculcated in them the principles professed by those faiths. The Sinnadurai children led by the late Sunderalingam, born Hindus in the Northern Peninsula and later mixed up with the Sinhalese of the South to co-exist by rendering invaluable service to the people belonging to diverse communities deserve the praise and felicitation of the entire nation. If our Society is composed of patriotic characters of the calibre of Sunderalingam, who could look back, understand the present and foresee the future, blessed will be this country full of peace and prosperity. (Translated by Somadasa Wijeratne) |
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