W Wickramasinghe:

Person with selfless devotion and inborn charisma

I wept silently when I spotted the appreciation of W Wickramasinghe in the Daily News September 26. “Wicks” as I fondly called him passed away on August 23, 2011.

My association with him goes back to 1960s when we were colleagues in the Education Department housed in Malay Street then. He was an endearing friend interested in the welfare of his associates. He occupied a house in the national housing scheme, Kiribathgoda, and was very keen in getting a house in the same housing scheme for me. We became close family friends. With the time his spouse Amara became a cherished associate of my ever loving, Yasa.

His degree of softness and gentleness were most remarkable. Harsh words never came out from his lips. His knack of saying things which put people at ease made him an irresistible extrovert. He thus reached the acme of popularity.

He was also a family man and gave the best education to his children in best schools in the island.

I am indeed at a loss for words to express my deep love, regard and respect to my dear friend who is no more. All I have done is to attempt to articulate my inarticulate grief with inadequate words especially in my own deprivation of living in an outstation having left my previous abode at Kiribathgoda due to unfavourable circumstances beyond my control.

The demise of Wickramasinghe is no doubt an irretrievable loss to the members of his family and all those whose lives were enhanced and enlivened by his very generous demeanour.

Dear friend and colleague, may you attain the Supreme Bliss of Nibbana.

Nanda Nanayakkara, Matara

R M A Rathnayake :

Rare kind of a humanist

Rathe was someone who did not care to build an image for him and neither did he worry about what others thought.

The problem with him was that he wanted everything made simple. In law he expected the purest and enforcement of law and where he did not see it happening, he became too outspoken and got into difficulties.

As a person who was a simple and an unsophisticated villager at heart, he was ruthless in criticising as well as very lavish in praising. I think, he was like a person who was climbing towards a summit he never bothered to know as it was the only way he could get away from being stagnated. He was more bothered about the welfare of all around him whether they were in service with him or in the outside civilian world.

He enjoyed his role in Police Public Relations Work and had friends everywhere. While serving in Police Ombudsman’s Division, he did not try to find solutions only within the Police Department. When a relation of a person serving in Ombudsman’s Division was suffering from a cancer he did whatever possible within his reach including religious activities to invoke blessings on that person whom he knew only through the person of his staff.

Because of his outspoken nature, he found himself in the most difficult corners in the disputed areas in Sri Lanka before those areas were liberated by our heroic forces. Even in Thoppur he did not become different and he was with the people, trying to preserve the little faith they had in the government, risking his own life.

When he saw a young soldier who was crying silently, he found out why he was crying. The result was a moving song destined to be sung by a great artiste like Amarasiri Peiris who was a very close friend of his. He met another young soldier who wished him to write a poem for his sweetheart in the village. He wrote what the soldier wanted and it also became another song sung by Amarsiri.

How many more songs did he write ? Few of those sung by famous artistes are “Hadawatha Santhapa Nivaa- by Indrani Bogoda, Saruvee Ethi, Sithaka Senasuma, Udhaara Maeneee and Ruhiru Puthaa by Amarsiri Peiris, Desi Dassan Langa and Sitha Paalu Andure by Neela Wickramasinghe, Mihi Mandale by Edward Jayakody, Budhu Samidhun Siripaa by Victor Rathnayake, Dinidhun Lova Ena by T.M. Jayarathne, Samadhiyata Sama Vedi by Rohana Bogoda, patriotic songs - Dilena Ran Kagha sung by Amarsiri Peiris and Ivor Denis and Maha Vanshaye- sung by Army Band”.

It was an ability he had as a gift and it was definitely polished by his love for the simple and tolerant Sinhala Culture in which he felt that he was a part and felt always that all who come from such a background should preserve those qualities which cannot be separated from the very culture that made our country an unique place.

At Sri Maha Bodhi , he knew more Sthothras than the Kapuralas and he was known by all the Buddhist Clergy in the region for his devotion. He was very sentimental when it came to his religious beliefs.

Rathnayake Mudiyanselage Abeyratne Rathnayake had joined the service as a Sub Inspector of Police and due to some misfortune he had been caused to be away for some time from Police Service and that was when and how he came to my life.

Rathe as we used to call him was very conscious of his family and it was with pride he spoke of all the members and he functioned as a family ombudsman in a way, a role he extended to all he knew including my family and all his friends.

He never grumbled about the misfortunes he had to go through because of other.

Proving the universal truth in Buddhism that there is nothing permanent in this world, he collapsed at a meeting where he was delivering a speech and did not regain consciousness and passed away leaving behind his unfinished struggle. He will never die in our memories.

Ananda Ariyaratne