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Lanka’s role in Saarc

Heritage For Coexistence: Situating Sri Lanka’s Role in the SAARC region:

Excerpts from the D.A. Rajapaksa memorial lecture 2008 by Sudharshan Seneviratne, Director General, Central Cultural Fund and Professor of Archaeology. University of Peradeniya

We are gathered here today to commemorate the revered memory of a son of mother Lanka who represented and empowered the ‘voiceless in the South’. In addition to the silent service D. A. Rajapaksa rendered to the poorer village folk in the South, he also endowed to this nation a leader who has embarked on a mission to liberate the voiceless from the oppression of totalitarianism and consequently be the ‘voice of the voiceless’.


D.A. Rajapaksa rendered a yeoman service to the Nation

What D. A. Rajapaksa envisioned for the south as a region-building process, is now being translated into a nation-building process by his descendants. I therefore consider it timely that we dedicate the sentiments expressed in this lecture, not only to celebrate the fond memory of D. A. Rajapaksa, but also recognize the futuristic role this country is destined to play in the international arena in general and our region in particular under the stewardship of his eldest son, the President of Sri Lanka and incumbent Chairman of the SAARC.

I wish to dwell into this subject as a Sri Lankan, South Asian and internationalist. Firstly, we are fortunate indeed to be born to an island society because it compels our vision to be focused beyond the narrow confines of its shorelines and be non-parochial. Secondly, we are the proud inheritors of a heritage that has blended external and indigenous elements into a uniquely Sri Lankan personality and gifted to the world a colourful island culture that has so vibrantly incorporated tradition with modernity.

Thirdly, South Asia today is at the threshold of either choosing socio-economic prosperity within the Global system or terrorist anarchy perpetrated by fundamentalists of different shades. More than any other member nation in the SAARC region, with the exception of Afghanistan, we have withstood for over three decades the bloody carnage unleashed first by southern terrorists followed by northern terrorists led by the LTTE.

More than any other member nation in the SAARC region, with the exception of Afghanistan, we have withstood for over three decades the bloody carnage unleashed first by southern terrorists followed by northern terrorists led by the LTTE.

We have drawn upon the strength of our historical legacy, social and cultural base including material gifts endowed by nature to absorb the ravages of terrorism that would have destabilised any other country by now.

Our Motherland yet boasts of a high literacy rate and education, a good per capita income level in relation to most countries in the region, commendable health conditions and infrastructure development. Above all the present regime has, both, through political wisdom and military strategy proved to the world that it is capable of ending the curse of terrorism on its own terms.

The experience of survival we have gained through these destructive years makes us the role model for our partner countries in taking that vital decision of defeating terrorism for a better tomorrow. Therefore both, historically and geographically, we are destined to play a more decisive role in our cultural zone, the SAARC region. Above all with our President as Chairman of the SAARC, we must accept this role with humility and carry out that mission to its logical conclusion and present the region with a new road map of sustainable peace, coexistence and prosperity.

Sri Lankan mosaic

Let us first look at the key words in this presentation. They are: Sri Lanka and the SAARC region, heritage and co-existence. These key words provide the basis for an understanding of Sri Lanka’s role, which is pivotal for being a major player in the region with a vision for the future.

It is not an exaggeration to state that the historical and cultural mosaic of Sri Lanka in fact represents the personality of the SAARC within one single geographical entity. Transoceanic routes brought into this island diverse language, ethnic, cultural and technological groups throughout its history from east Africa, Europe, West Asia, South Asia, South East Asia and the Far East. As a consequence, in its small geographical boundaries the personality of this island society boasts of all such representative cultures characterizing a unique mosaic of diversity reflecting the very nature of the SAARC countries.

Sri Lanka is located at the southern end of the Indian sub continent in the SAARC region. The history of humans in Sri Lanka dates back to 30,000 BC.

During the subsequent Historic Period, large monasteries, inland and port cities, massive hydraulic systems, aesthetically beautiful gardens and other religious and secular monuments were constructed while the culture in general was flavoured by Buddhist and Hindu traditions.

The post 13th Century era witnessed the intrusion of Islamic traditions through the spice trade and a new third dimension was introduced to the cultural mosaic of this island. Subsequently governance through western mercantile communities and the Colonial regimes of Portugal, Holland and England left behind a permanent legacy on the art and architecture, music, language, religion, culture, society, economy and the political structure of Sri Lanka.

Three Centuries of Western influence on this island society introduced a strong cosmopolitan flavour into its personality that has given Sri Lanka an identity somewhat different from its other South Asian neighbours. The Sri Lankan mosaic therefore symbolizes an island society representing a unique multi-cultural and multi-ethnic diversity natured by a rich cultural legacy inherited from its past, which in need is the combined personality of the SAARC as well.

Redefining South Asia

From the sublime let me now deal with the reality of SAARC. How do we identify and determine the geographical region South Asia? The physical area covering the present SAARC geo-political region, until the introduction of Afghanistan into its fold, was a Colonial construct. It largely incorporated British Colonial possessions and protectorates of the pre 1949 period, namely Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka forming its component countries.

Is this regional identity logical? Should we pose the question about the illogical character of the Colonial definition which is a narrow and vertical presentation? How are we to overlook the reality of a historical connectivity through our shared culture for over 3000 years? If so, should we not redefine SAARC on a broader historical and cultural map? It is therefore an imperative that we recognize the actual geopolitical and cultural reality of the region and redefine South Asia so as to incorporate an expanded region.

The South-central physical zone dominates the Asian landscape in a unique manner. Its clearly demarcated physical area is also an entity that has its own cultural personality. It is a historically evolved region representing a varied and rich cultural and natural landscape. The social philosophies and the culture of Hinduism, Buddhism and Islam horizontally connected us with their rich civilisations and we are indeed proud inheritors of that vibrant and diverse heritage of plurality.

From the western sector, we now have Afghanistan incorporated to the SAARC. This is indeed a welcome development, but a small consolation. Afghanistan should have received full member status much earlier. The rich tradition of the Vedic civilisation, Mediterranean and Central Asian cultures, Mahayana Buddhism and later Islam traditions that filtered through Afghanistan enriched our region and even regions beyond that through the Silk Route.

The South-central physical zone dominates the Asian landscape in a unique manner. Its clearly demarcated physical area is also an entity that has its own cultural personality. It is a historically evolved region representing a varied and rich cultural and natural landscape.

This is sufficient justification for the incorporation of Afghanistan into our fold now enjoying equal status with other member countries.

From the eastern sector why are we not extending our warm hands towards our fraternal brethren in Myanmar? They are essentially part of the great South Asian civilization. Some of the earliest bronze technology and probably rice cultivation entered our region through ancient Suvarnabhumi or Myanmar. Sri Lanka enjoyed thousands of years of cultural connectivity with this country. How are we to isolate this land, its people and its culture away from the SAARC?

Thus the physical area demarcated by the Indukush in the west, the lower Himalaya in the north, the Arakanyoma in the east and the Indian Ocean in the south forms the logical and natural and cultural boundaries of the SAARC.

This demarcation of the regional boundary will only enrich us as it did for thousands of years in the past. We will stand politically stronger and economically and culturally richer by this expanded incorporation of the region. To redefine the present boundaries of the SAARC therefore is not only essential but it is a historical reality at this juncture.

South Asia and the Indian Ocean Rim (IOR)

The region thus redefined has to be contextualised within the broader physical scape, which is the Indian Ocean Rim (IOR). The unique formation of the Indian Ocean Rim is little understood by our Region itself. The role of the SAARC and within that the pivotal role played by Sri Lanka, must be situated on this broader canvass of the international cultural and political map.

Firstly, the Indian Ocean Rim countries form an interconnected transcontinental crescent in a most unique fashion. Its component physical entities extend from East Africa along South Asia to South East Asia. Thus it forms an unbroken chain of connected physical and cultural zones that interacted from a very early period in history and nurtured each region through economic and cultural contacts. This region threw up some of the most advanced and spectacular civilisations that enriched the world as a whole.

Quite significantly, the Indian Ocean Rim is also strategically situated in relation to two major World Systems that had a symbiotic relationship with each other from an early period in time.

To the West, the Indian Ocean Rim was connected to the rich civilizations of the lower Nile valley and the Mediterranean Sea. To the East, the Far Eastern region, dominantly identified with the Chinese mainland had a long standing connectivity to the Indian Ocean Rim. This interactive process binding the culturally and resource- rich regions with the Indian Ocean Rim enhanced its value as a melting pot of international connectivity within the World Systems in antiquity.

Personality of the SAARC

Our region has a population of 1.5 billion making up the largest regional entity in the world housing a fifth of its population. This population represents different cultures and different social and economic layers.

The 2008 August issue of the Himal, published out of Katmandu, notes its vision as “to restore some of the historical unity of our common living space without wishing any violence on the existing nation States”.

Thus the personality of our shared region is to be recognised not by looking at its political entities (that came together in 1985), but by touching upon our trans-political commonalities representing this region to the world as a uniquely composite heritage zone. This is aptly stated by the celebrated journalist of India, B.G. Verghese as “South Asia is... not merely a geographical expression, but also an association of ideas, experiences, interactive cultures and aspirations straddling the past and future”.

However, it is ironic that during the very period of globalisation, we have constructed vertically arranged ethno-national compartments and the region as a whole is yet venturing along a painful path coming to grips with the hard realities of social change, identities and access to resources and power in a post Colonial context.

Heritage undoubtedly is the end product of human thought and action essentially reflecting higher achievements and refinements of any society.
Heritage cannot be situated in a vacuum and also its character must be thrust beyond the narrow confines of culture per se.

Compartmentalisation of our society was a legacy of the Colonial rule where ‘imagined’ racial categories, mythic martial races along with policies of divide and rule formed the basis for multiple dichotomies in South Asia. The Post Colonial period witnessed the continuation of such dichotomies resulting in sharper polarisation and marginalisation of communities through imagined categories introduced from above.

One nation or culture cannot exist in isolation because human populations construct their cultures in interaction with one another. Even the Diaspora does not to form an isolated entity.

One of the critical challenges we face in South Asia is bridging national, religious and cosmopolitan identities with a futuristic vision. It is said that even more than the shared past it is allure of the common future that now beacons and binds the SAARC together. It must be our collective endeavour therefore to strive towards our connectivity as a key to sustaining the spirit of the SAARC as a gift to the next generation. This in fact is the tangible and intangible personality of South Asia.

For centuries the rich cultural personality of South Asian countries was based on cross-cultural interactions. We in South Asia are nurtured within a legacy of a shared heritage for over three thousand years and its ethos is a classic representation of diversity and commonalities. Our heritage is essentially inclusive and not exclusive. The shared heritage of the people of South Asia is a key to understanding that diversity, which is the bench-mark commonality in our society.

Redefining heritage

The focus therefore has to be on heritage, as an area of refinement providing the basis for coexistence.

In this discourse Heritage is to be considered as a multifaceted catalyst. Heritage in the main is viewed as a source of people to people connectivity in peaceful coexistence in South Asia. It seeks to understand the Pre Colonial heritage and question exclusiveness against inclusiveness; grass roots level people’s connectivity cutting across ethnic, language, religious and political divides juxtaposed to divisions imposed from above by Colonialism and later by local decision-makers. It looks at heritage as an idiom that expresses a common language of humanity where people reach out to each other for understanding, sharing and coexistence.

Heritage undoubtedly is the end product of human thought and action essentially reflecting higher achievements and refinements of any society.

Heritage cannot be situated in a vacuum and also its character must be thrust beyond the narrow confines of culture per se. We seek to redefine heritage as: culture, environment, knowledge and the next generation as its integral components providing it with a deeper construct.

Heritage cannot be explained simply as the culture that we are born into. Elements representing culture such as food habits, speech, attire, religious beliefs etc. do not stand alone. Culture is essentially situated within a natural environment.

Everything about our past culture and its behaviour within a particular environment, that has shaped our present thoughts and action, is known to us through knowledge.

To be continued

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