Public Servant - Extraordinary

Young Devendra awoke in the morning. It was a new day at yet another new school. Yet another group of boys and yet another group of teachers. This constant movement would hold him in good stead for in the future his life would be one of constant movement. Reminiscences of Gold met with this man who is a distinguished public servant and a prolific writer.

“My father D.T. Devendra was a famous archaeologist but before that he was a teacher in a number of Buddhist schools. I was born when he was teaching at Nalanda College. He was one of the pioneer teachers at Nalanda College. My father went with G. P. Malalasekera to start Nalanda College. For about a year I studied at Nalanda in the Kindergarten. Then my father was asked to teach at Dhamaraja College, Kandy, where P. de S Kularatne was the Principal at that time. He knew Kularatne and had been greatly influenced by him. I was at Dharmaraja till 1943. After that my father became Principal of Anuruddha, Nawalapitiya , and I studied there for about a year. Then he was appointed Principal of Sivali Vidyalaya, Ratnapura. I have two sisters and a brother. Wherever my father went, we also went with him. I passed my SSC in 1945 at Sivali. “Then I joined Royal College to do my university entrance. I must admit I never excelled in anything and never played any games. I had no strong loyalty to any school because I have been to so many schools,” said Devendra.

He entered the University of Ceylon, Colombo, and followed a degree in English with French as his Subsidiary. “I thoroughly enjoyed life at university. Professor Ludowyk was my professor and I acted in university plays. I was a very active member of the University Dramatic Society and I held office as Secretary as well as president during my undergraduate career. I had plenty of friends and our relationships continued even after university.”

Kachcheri system

His long career in the public service started in 1953 as a District Land Officer. He has spent most of his working life in kachcheries in many districts of the island. As he explained, in the early days he was transferred to so many places because he was a bachelor and was always available to be transferred. He married when he was in the Nuwara Eliya kachcheri.

In 1968, he got a scholarship to join the Cambridge University. Before that he had the experience of studying the Gal Oya Project with Professor D.H. Farmer of Cambridge for about a year. “I was the secretary and Farmer was the chairman. He was at St. John's College in Cambridge and he got me into St. John's. It was a very interesting and rewarding year. After finishing the course, my wife and I and a few friends took a car and a tent and did a tour of Western Europe. We were short of funds at that time, so we camped at camp sites. It was a pleasant trip of three weeks.”

“In 1969, I came back and took over responsibilities as General Manager of the River Valleys Development Project in Walawe. After one year I was appointed the Government Agent of Matara. After an year there I was transferred as the Government Agent Trincomalee which position I held for about six years. During the 1971 JVP insurgency the Kantale police station came under attack by the insurgents. I was appointed Competent Authority for the Trincomalee District with authority over the Army, Navy, Air Force and Police.

No other civil officer was given that authority. I chaired the Security Council which met at the Kachcheri attended by all Service Heads in the district. For about two weeks we were isolated from the rest of the country but we coordinated the security situation as well as humanitarian problems quite well. Our experience demonstrated that the kachcheri system functioned very effectively in a crisis situation.”

Interesting experience

At one time Devendra was dubbed “the flying G.A.” because of his constant air travel between Tricomalee-Jaffna-Colombo. “While I was in Trinco, the government asked me to take over duties as G.A. in Jaffna. By this time I had spent about 22 years in the provinces and I was waiting for an opportunity to get back to Colombo with my wife and children. Therefore, I was not inclined take up the new offer.

However, I agreed to act in Jaffna in addition to my work in Trinco until they found a suitable replacement. Mrs. Bandaranaike approved this interim arrangement and I was running both Jaffna and Trincomalee. Monday mornings I used to leave Ratmalana airport for China Bay; after working two days in Trinco, I flew to Jaffna on Wednesdays to work there for three days and returned to Colombo to stay with the family during the weekend at Mount Lavinia. This routine continued for some time till they made a permanent arrangement. I had a hectic time but it turned out to be a very interesting experience.” “When I was in Jaffna, Mr. Alfred Durriappah, the mayor of Jaffna, invited me to dinner and we had a long chat.

He was a person who wanted to develop close ties between the Tamil and Sinhala people and he was very supportive of the government. He briefed me about the political situation in Jaffna and the constant death threats he had. It was in mid-July in 1975 that I bade farewell to my friends and colleagues in Jaffna and returned to Trinco.

The same day I had a phone call from Mrs. Bandaranaike who informed me of the assassination of Durriappah. She asked me to return to Jaffna immediately to make arrangements for the funeral. A large number of VIPs, including the Prime Minister, Cabinet ministers, and diplomats attended the funeral. Alfred Durriappah had been shot by young Prabhakaran. His father Velupillai had worked under me as the head clerk of the land division of the Puttalam kachcheri.”

Public service

During his 40 years in the public service and in the UN agencies, Devendra has held many positions of crucial importance. Towards the end of his career, he served as chairman, Public Service Commission, Salaries Commission, and National Council for Administration (NCA). He always acted independently and fearlessly not because there was an ‘independent’ public service in the country but he always wanted to do the right thing irrespective of the consequences. Looking at the present situation, he is saddened to observe “the culture of sycophancy now deeply rooted in the psyche of government servants.” It seems that writing is in the blood of the Devendra family.

“I have always been interested in writing. My father wrote a lot of books and a tremendous amount of articles. We are a family who have done a lot of writing.” He has so far written five books: Sri Lanka: The Emerald Island (1994); Tales from the Provinces (1998); On Horseshoe Street (2005), Memoirs of a Penpusher: Kachcheries and Commissions (2010); Quest for Shangri-La: Stories and Diversions (2011). These books are not fiction; they contain his childhood impressions as well as accounts of personal experiences in his long career in the public service.

As he said: “I m not capable of writing fiction or seeing myself in other people’s boots.” However, in these books he talks about a “world and a way of life now lost in time.” Such accounts of a bygone era constitute an invaluable source of information for many generations. We have only a handful of senior public servants who have left their experiences and reminiscences recorded in the form of either novels or autobiographies. Devendra has authored books for children too.

His book on Princes, Peasants and Clever Beasts (2002) has won him an award from the National Book Development Council. He has an abiding interest in the culture, history and folklore of Sri Lanka. His children’s books in English are translations of Sinhala folk tales. What is the motivation behind introducing children to that kind of literature?

As he explained: “I realized that many of the children who undergo English education in International Schools don’t know enough about our folk stories. So I got hold of Sinhala folk stories and rewrote them in modern English.”