Olcott Oration – 2011:

Role of individual in national development - Ananda can show the way

[Continued from yesterday]

Professor CHANDANA WIRASINGHE

By this time fighters for independence including monks had been summarily executed, there were no Buddhist or Hindu holidays, civil marriages could not be registered thus forcing couples to marry in the church and Buddhist schools were impossible to open because the Governor would not issue a permit: Olcott found that there were four Buddhist schools and 805 Christian schools in 1880.

According to Murphet (1) Olcott realized.. “that the real solution to the problems of the Sri Lankans lay in Education.” It is vital to note that this insight is still true today. Olcott returned to Sri Lanka in 1881 and undertook a very difficult eight month speaking and fund raising tour of the island in a bullock cart and in some cases by river raft. The money was for the new Buddhist schools that he was planning to start. He was accompanied on this tour by a young man named Don David Hewawitharana who had resigned his position as a clerical servant in the government to help Olcott. Olcott's protégé later became the legendary Anagarika Dharmapala. Thus Olcott played a role in the development of one of the greatest sons of Sri Lanka.

Ananda College

In 1884, Olcott traveled to London for several reasons and used his network, the British Theos o p h i c a l Society and press connections, to pressure the Colonial Office to allow Buddhist schools to be started in Sri Lanka. We must note that Olcott took the initiative, when no one else did and showed immense leadership.

Olcott’s vision

Eight years after Olcott's arrival in Sri Lanka, the Buddhist English School was opened in 1886 in Maliban Street, Pettah with Charles Webster Leadbeater as the Principal and

37 students. Leadbeater was a former Christian Minister that had joined the Theosophical Society. That small Buddhist English School is today's hallowed 125 year old Ananda College which has been lead by amazingly distinguished principals initially from Western countries and later by Sri Lankans such as D. B. Jayathileke, L. H. Mettananda, A. B. Perera, D. B. Kularathne, G. Malalasekera (who was a Vice principal), and many others. Ananda has certainly fulfilled Olcott's vision of providing a superior education including both the English and Sinhala Languages to rural and urban students with few other opportunities.

One can only imagine the difficulties that the Ananda pioneers: leaders, teachers and students, faced from various reactionary forces, essentially those local groups that were advantaged under colonial rule, when the challenges faced by the College even today are considered. Olcott indeed set up several schools in India too and today they are still ordinary schools. Something special happened at Ananda that we must continue to foster.

Visiting Ananda

It is no accident that Mohandas Gandhi and Rabindranath Tagore chose to visit Ananda College when they came to Sri Lanka. Ananda has had superior principals, amazingly dedicated teachers and a clear mandate: To provide a superior secondary education, including the English and Sinhala languages, to rural and urban students with few o t h e r opportunities. It is a n u n d e r - s t a t e - ment to s a y t h at Ananda alumni have gone to do great things. It has produced great leaders in every sector one can think of Ananda produced politicians such as Dr. N. M. Perera that rallied the masses for independence, as well as some of the leaders of the conventional independence movement such as D. B. Jayathileke; Ananda gave leadership to the teaching of science and higher mathematics in Sinhala; we gave leadership along with others to Sri Lankan cricket culminating in the World Cup victory led by the Anandian Arjuna Ranatunga. Needless to say, it was several Anandian's lead by Gotabhaya Rajapaksa that provided the historic military leadership to win the war on terror with outstanding supreme political leadership from our sister school Nalanda. Ananda has produced leaders among academics, businessmen, civil servants, industrialists, the military, monks, politicians, teachers and various professionals such as physicians and chartered accountants both in Sri Lanka and overseas. It is clear that we have done many things right in the last 125 years. Something special happened at Ananda that we must continue to foster. Having studies Olcott's life in some detail, from birth to death, I can say that he had many accomplishments,

but the establishment of Ananda College is without any doubt his greatest and most lasting achievement. Let me summarize Olcott's most admirable traits that could inspire all Anandians and Sri Lankans: Mindful, honest, enthusiastic and reliableSelf taught Took calculated risks Faithful to duty Fought corruption

Worked rapidly (Ananda motto:Appamado Amathapadan)

Took initiatives Was entrepreneurial Showed leadership Never gave up These are also many of the characteristics of the majority of people in a developed country. These characteristics are already evident in very many Sri Lankans.

However we need many more of us to emulate Olcott. We need a critical mass of Sri Lankans to be such people. Cynics will say that “this is Sri Lanka” and development of such a critical mass is 'impossible'. However, cynicism is also something we must

jettison on the way to development. How much 'foreign aid' do we need to emulate the above characteristics? At this crucial time in our history, when under attack from former colonial powers and various other quarters, including the 'new East India companies', namely some international NGOs that are answerable to no one, should we not take our development into our own hands?

Developed countries

Developed countries are characterized to various extents by a free society, stable governmental structures, independent judiciary and police, reasonable public health care, an excellent education system including tertiary education, commitment to sustainability, a culture of saving hard earned monies, an outstanding civil service, a vibrant private sector with significant capital investment, and excellent infrastructure. Only a few of these require 'foreign aid' and couple will require 'international investment'.

The rest are 'free' as long as we are willing to work toward those goals. However, the most important characteristic of a developed country and a main reason for the above achievements, is that a critical mass of its men and women are reliable, responsible, self-reliant, self-motivated, productive and peaceful people who have many of Olcott's characteristics. In addition, a significant fraction of such people will also show leadership and/or entrepreneurial abilities. While many Sri Lankans have these characteristics, we do not have the critical mass that we need. At this time in history when we are under pressure, sadly even from some former colonies, it is crucial that we take our development into our own hands. Thus, if people in Sri Lanka can be educated to emulate Olcott's characteristics the rest will follow over time.

It is worth nothing that North America has historically had a majority of such people. In my view, they are still a majority but a slowly shrinking one. There is an increasingly large group that believes that further economic and social development is in supernatural hands, and that is in part one of the causes of the slow decline of the North American economy. For example such groups are against the inoculation of children against deadly diseases such as HPV. Another major reason is that many other countries have caught up to the North American science and engineering educational system. Bill Gates has said repeatedly that the future of the US is in a much better educational system. In the case of Canada, I believe that many Canadians exhibit Olcott's characteristics, but perhaps are not as entrepreneurial as they could be.

Buddhist philosophy

There are good reasons why Olcott adopted the Buddhist philosophy to apply to his life on Earth. A Buddhist way of lie is also a guideline for purposes of development. It is important to note that such a way of life should include avoidance of wrong beliefs or mithya drusthti (michcha dhitti in Pali), nepotism, and corrupt practices. Let me expand on how these practices impact the development of the country.

The key to development are productive people. People become disgruntled if they are talented and work hard but are not recognize and appropriately rewarded. In other words they become unproductive. Thus if we practise nepotism, we are not supporting national development. We all point fingers at others, at politicians in particular, but we must look within ourselves. Let us not throw stones if we live in a glass house. It is not that we should not help our friends or relatives, but that we must not do so in an unfair manner that will hurt others. Thus I argue that we must not help an Anandian simply because he is an Anandian. This applies more to a few other schools in Sri Lanka that have made school based nepotism a fine art. This is an area where we can learn from Canada. Most Canadians are extremely fair minded people and generally support excellence. That is why so many immigrants have succeeded in Canada. When it comes to bribery, Sri Lankans love to spread rumours about how X or Y is a great taker of bribes.

The fact is that giving of bribes is as bad as and arguably worse than, taking a bribe. Who is worse, the poor peon who accepts five hundred rupees or the executive who gives it to gain an advantage over the others in the queue? If foreign companies vying for contracts do not give bribes, then decision-makers have no choice but to choose the best bid. For every single taker of bribes, there are many givers. Obviously, bribery in all its forms hinders sustainable development because it causes unfairness in society and inefficiencies in the economy.

Let us stop giving even small bribes, and looking for inside connections, before we criticize others. This is another area where Canadians set a good example, though there have been a few notable and recent counter examples. Finally I come to wrongful beliefs. The Buddha was very clear that one of his main goals was to guide people to live this life without following wrongful beliefs because he was born at a time when superstition was widespread. Buddhism as propounded by the Thathagatha was devoid of supernatural beliefs; it was a grounded philosophy based on the four noble truths and the eightfold middle path. Why do we waste productive time and resources pursuing miracles, instead of seeking, as the Buddha has said, appropriate earthly advice? It is a function of the human condition that we remember only the random successes from our wrongful beliefs and related actions and forget all the failures.

Buddhism does not support this practice. Indeed given the advances made by science in the last 2500 years that helps us to better understand nature, for example: life, illness and death; the biological processes that caused homo sapien sapien to evolve over; the role of the brain; that 50 percent of our genes are shared with plants; the movements of the sun, our planetary system and other stars in our galaxy; and other natural phenomena; in other words that there is only a natural world, it is unfortunate that we are so full of superstition today. I must say that it was my mother Pearl Wirasinghe and the late Ven. Kotagama Vachissara, who taught Buddhism in the Upper School at Ananda in the 60s, that influenced me the most in this regard. To be continued