Reviving Lanka’s ancient glory

Repairing tanks brings new life to Trinco :

Dharman Wickremaratne

The sun over the Thambalagamuwa Secretariat Division in the Trincomalee district appears brighter than before. The hitherto drab-looking village of Galmitiyawa South seems to have got a new lease of life after steps were taken to repair the Kudagalmitiyawa tank. During the course of this year, 25 tanks in the Trincomalee district have been selected for repairs at a cost of Rs 200 million. Twenty-seven more tanks will be repaired under the second stage of this project in 2012. The ceremony inaugurating the project to repair a total of 52 tanks was held near the Kudagalmitiyawa tank on April 22.

In the coming years 2,000 tanks will be repaired under Economic Development Minister Basil Rajapaksa’s direction in accordance with Mahinda Chinthana. Most of these tanks had not been repaired for hundreds of years. They include those the Portuguese destroyed over four centuries ago. The floods of December, January and February severely damaged some of these tanks.

Development schemes

The legends associated with them are many. The Trincomalee district is one of the areas symbolizing this unique heritage of Sri Lanka which was known in ancient times as a kingdom of tanks. Previous governments were focused almost entirely on launching giant development schemes as the Mahaweli. Hardly any attention was paid to complaints of farmers whose livelihood was linked to the ancient tanks and irrigation channels. Now, Minister Basil Rajapaksa has raised their hopes as never before. The minister’s efforts towards making rural communities beneficiaries of the government’s development policies are now bearing fruit. Foreign invasions and pernicious policies of foreign rule destroyed many tanks, which were like the nation’s soul. The jungle crept over a greater number of breached tanks. According to the agro-based ancient culture the tanks fell into three categories - the smallest was the Gaamika wewa, which served a single village. The medium was the Daana wewa which catered to several villages while the largest was the Maha wewa which covered a large area known as a koralaya - a division of a province.

The Economic Development Ministry and the Agrarian Services and Wildlife Ministry are jointly repairing 2,000 tanks in 17 districts. This programme was inaugurated at Mahakalugolla village in the Siyambalanduwa Divisional Secretariat, Moneragala District on February 7. It commenced with a ceremony to repair the Kivuleara wewa. Already repair work is underway in seven districts - Moneragala, Anuradhapura, Batticaloa, Ampara, Mulaitivu, Puttalam and Trincomalee. Repairs to tanks in the remaining 10 districts of Mannar, Polonnaruwa and Vavuniya will begin in the next few days. Project director of the Economic Development Ministry’s Yali Pibidemu (Reawakening project), S K Liyanage - an engineer by profession - is directing all the repair work done by hundreds of workers who appears like a beehive trying to meet the deadlines.

Historical sources

The following day we were at the Kantale tank bund. Many historical sources state King Agbo II (604-615 AD) had built this tank. But according to a book R L Brohier wrote it was King Mahasen (274-305 AD) was the builder. This was told to us by Pathmasiri Jayasekera, Executive Officer of the Livestock and Rural Community Development Ministry, when we were walking along the tank bund. A great calamity occurred when the Kantale dam burst on April 20, 1986 causing the deaths of 178 people and destroying 20,000 acres of paddy land. When we visited the place there was not even a trace of the 300 odd houses that were swept away in that disaster. The total cost of repairs to the Kudagalmitiyawa tank in the Thambalagamuwa Secretariat Division, Trincomalee is Rs 19 million. Arable land in the area is 140 acres and the beneficiaries after completion will be 130 families. The work is scheduled to be completed before October 21, according to Assistant Engineer T Raghunathan. Wearing a straw hat he looked like a Vietcong soldier who fought against American troops in the Vietnam War. It is sad to see the tank full of silt in its present condition although at one time it channeled water to a large area of paddy land through three sluices.

Paddy cultivation

Galmitiyawa South belonging to the Seruwila seat is home to around 1,200 families whose chief livelihood is paddy cultivation. Kudagalmitiyawa tank gets water from the Mahagalmitiyawa tank into which water flows from streams in the surrounding hills and the Morawewa tank across which a dam has been built for the purpose.

The floods of February this year destroyed the dam and inundated the village. Two persons drowned in the six feet deep floodwaters. One of the victims, H M Tikiri Banda (45), died while doing some minor repairs to the dam. This was told to us by his younger brother Ajith Kumara (36) when we met him at his house. He and his mother Koyin Menika is expressed joy at seeing the bund being repaired at last and without delay.

Nearly 9,000 small tanks have been identified in Sri Lanka’s Dry Zone while the West Zone has only about 3,000 of them. Altogether there are 20,000 rural tanks, including those that have been abandoned. If water can be supplied from all these tanks, a total of around 175,000 hectares of paddy land can be cultivated. This makes it clear the extent to which these tanks contributed to the country’s prosperity and agro-based civilization in ancient times. Minister Basil Rajapaksa is a result-oriented politician up with the challenge of economic development in many spheres. He believes in innovation to broaden ownership to the participation of the people in development.

National income

Agriculture occupies the most important position in Sri Lanka’s economy. It contributes to 25 percent of the gross national income. Fifty percent of the population is employed in the agricultural sector. Since 80 percent of the people are in the rural areas the country needs to obtain the maximum benefit from agriculture. Sixteen fishermen make a living from the Galmitiyawa tank and they have formed a fishery society to look after their interests. After the floods destroyed the tank they have not been able to do any fishing. All the different species of freshwater fish have perished. We met one of the fishermen, Samantha Rupasinghe (38) a father of two children - Lahiru Dilshan (12) and Rukshan (3). Lahiru is a student of Mollipathana school. The work undertaken to repair the tank has raised Rupasinghe’s hopes for a bright future for his sons.

Heavy rains and floods caused extensive damage to the Puttalama, Anuradhapura, Polonnaruwa, Batticaloa, Trincomalee and Ampara districts. Never before had farmers in these areas faced such suffering. Only three times - 1878, 1913 and 1957 - Sri Lanka had experienced devastating floods, previously. They destroyed all tanks farmlands, irrigation channels and thousands of homes, causing many deaths. About 300,000 people were displaced. The loss to the agro-economy was incalculable.

Irrigation channels

We met Kekulandara Mudiyanselage Punchibanda (81), the senior most farmer of Mollipatahana Village, Galmitiyawa South. He is a father of six and has 18 grandchildren. He is the real creator of the Kudagalmitiyawa tank the story of which he recalled along with his wife Dingier and grandson Canada Kumara. To Punchibanda those early days are a fond memory.

Punchibanda who hails from Hanguranketha was first appointed to work on irrigation channels in Hingurakgoda. From there he had come to Kantale in 1951 when a day’s wage was Rs 8. In 1956 the Government Agent, provided 312 families with blocks of land of two-and-a-half acres each under the Mahaweli System. Punchibanda had settled in Kantale in 1958 when he and others came to know that the Parepannam tank was being newly built.

The villagers immediately rushed to Colombo and met Minister C P de Silva. Eight of them went in a lorry belonging to Wilson Mudalali of colony 96 since they could not afford the bus fare of Rs 6. As a result of their meeting with the Minister, he ordered his officials to start repairing the Mahagalmitiyawa tank as soon as the work on Parepannam tank was finished. Accordingly, the Mahagalmitiyawa tank was completed in 1962. This story was related by Ediriweera Patabendige Mithrapala (76), a senior farmer who came to Trincomalee from Weligama in 1948.

The history of Kudagamitiyawa tank begins in 1972. Punchibanda - the man behind it - says that having seen the continuous flow of streams from the hills he built an anicut eight feet long and 200 meters long. It provided water for cultivating four acres of paddy land during September.

Although many letters were written to the authorities since 1977 urging them and various top politicians to make the anicut a tank, the appeals were not heeded. Eventually help came in the form of Irrigation Engineer who came to repair the Kantale Dam in 1986. After repairing the dam he and his workers, using the machinery they had brought, completed the Kudagalmitiyawa tank in 48 days. As the number of paddy lands began to expand the water supply became insufficient. Although water levels in the tank were raised there was no water management causing various problems. Finally the floods in February completely destroyed the tank. The inclusion of Kudagalmitiyawa in the list of 2,000 tanks selected for repairs is the realization of a dream.

Poverty is the biggest challenge mankind faces today. There is no doubt that the programme to repair 2,000 tanks Economic Development Minister Basil Rajapaksa has initiated in accordance with the Mahinda Chinthana will go a long way in overcoming poverty in the rural areas.

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