Whose success is IIFA? Sri Lanka government or Tamil nationalist lobby?

They will miss photo opportunity
with many Bollywood stars

(June 03, 2010, Colombo - Lanka Polity) Eleventh ceremony of Indian International Film Academy Award (ITFA), the Indian equivalent of the Oscars, is to be held in Sri Lanka since today.

However, the event in Colombo is similar to a wedding without bride and bridegroom, when paraphrased according to Sinhala folklore.

Many of the Bollywood super stars have boycotted the awards ceremony although they have used other words to describe their absence.  With this, inevitably marred by politics, the 11th IIFA has become the most controversial awards ceremony of entire world in the recent history.

Selecting Colombo as the venue for IIFA was initially a success to the Sri Lankan government. Sri Lanka had hoped to repair its battered international image and revive its tourist industry by hosting the IIFA. Indian government assisted Sri Lankan authorities to sort out the matter as a goodwill gesture to help the nation trying to mark its presence emerging from the debris of three decade war.

But since the venue was announced in April, the Tamil nationalist lobby in South India made the event a success for them using it to raise voice against Sri Lanka government over the woes of the Tamils battered by war in the northern and eastern parts of the island reinforcing the war crime charges haunting intermittently against Mahinda Rajapaksa regime in international politics.

Top Bollywood stars that have pulled out from the IIFA 2010 are too shiny to be absent and the ceremony sans them will definitely be less glamorous posing a threat to the organizers that the event can be an economical loss.

Most damaging of all is the apparent withdrawal of Amitabh Bachchan, the IIFA’s brand ambassador and patriarch of Bollywood’s first family, who met Sri Lanka’s President, Mahinda Rajapaksa, in Colombo in April to help promote the event.

Although the “Big B” has yet to officially announce his absence, industry sources say he will not attend the ceremony for the first time in several years following protests from Tamil groups outside his residence in Mumbai.

His latest postings on his blog and on Twitter say that he is busy shooting an advertisement to promote tourism in the Indian state of Gujarat.

His son, Abhishek Bachchan, and daughter-in-law, Aishwarya Rai, will also be absent officially because they are tied up with promoting their forthcoming film Raavan, according to Indian media reports.

Mani Ratnam, the director refused to show the film in Colombo parallel to the ceremony citing its production work is not yet finished. But, it is well known that Mani, a Tamil, is willingly or unwillingly giving in to the Tamil nationalist lobby.

Eventually, Raavan, the pre-historic king of Lanka who abducted Sita will surrender and play in Rama's side.

Shah Rukh Khan who had been due to captain a team in a celebrity cricket match in Colombo announced his absence in a recent posting on Twitter, saying: “…dont think i will be able to come for iifa..too much work here, will miss Colombo.”

Two people were killed when a Khan concert in Colombo was bombed in 2004, and he vowed at the time that he would not visit Sri Lanka again.

Others likely to be absent include Katrina Kaif, Deepika Padukone, Ranbir Kapoor, Imran Khan and Aamir Khan, according to Indian media reports. Last minute attempts could be observed to prevent Salman Khan playing cricket in Sri Lanka in the cricket match of the cricketers and the film stars scheduled to play tomorrow at Sinhala Sports Club grounds.

Tamil film stars such as Rajnikanth, Kamal Haasan, Mani Ratnam, Vijay, Ajit and Surya are also thought to be staying away.

Namitha, a star of Tamil cinema, issued a statement saying she had turned down an invitation to perform at the ceremony. “How can I attend even after knowing the existing problem? It is the Tamil people who made me what I am today,” she said.

Some second tier stars, including Vivek Oberoi, have already arrived in Colombo for the event, including many of those nominated for awards. “Come to Colombo,” Mr Oberoi told reporters in Colombo today. “I don’t believe in boycotting the awards. Bollywood films are about building bridges, not putting up walls against people.”

Applying more pressure, the South Indian film industry bodies met hours ahead to reiterate their threat to prevent the release of films featuring actors and technicians who attend the awards ceremony in Colombo. “We expect the Bollywood film industry to respect the sentiments of Tamils and refrain from participating in the event,” said L. Suresh, secretary of the South India Film Chamber of Commerce.

The SIFCC is backed by the Film Employees Federation of South India, the Tamil Nadu Theatre-Owners Association and Tamil Nadu Producers’ Council.

South India is a big market for Bollywood after all than Sri Lanka where authorities have restricted the countrymen's access to Indian audio visual art.

Law makers worried as ordinary citizens hopeful with Sri Lanka's reduction of import duty on motor vehicles

(June 01, 2010, Colombo - Lanka Polity) The reduction of duties on motor vehicle imports has pushed the law makers of Sri Lanka to exhaustion, sources say. The axe came as most of them were preparing to import cars for reduced taxes. Earlier the MPs could import a car once in five years totally duty free but now the government has planned to impose a tax of around 15%.

it is open secret that most of the MPs either ruling party or opposition sell their vehicle permits to a handsome easy income that ran into several millions of rupees. With the reduction of taxes bt 50%, the MPs also lose half of their quick bucks from vehicle permits.

The government reduced the excise duty on imported vehicles by 50% and removed a 15 percent surcharge on all imports while reducing duty on electrical appliances since June 01.

With effect from yesterday, a car such as an Indian-made Maruti, which had attracted excise duties of up to 183% of its value, would now be charged a duty of 90%, Director General of Fiscal Policy S. R. Attygala said.

Cars attracted over 300% in excise duties, import duties, value added taxes, port and airport development levies and national security levies.

The government hopes the tax cuts will pick up the imports and help revive revenues which had suffered due to high taxes last year. The trend was out in the open in Colombo Bourse in which the share prices of companies importing motor vehicles were upbeat.

The finance ministry in a report issued under country's fiscal responsibility law in February said excise taxes on motor vehicles alone which had been 18 percent of the total in 2007 had fallen to 3 percent by 2009.

In 2007, the government had raised 17.4 billion rupees in motor vehicle excise duties. In 2008 car excise had fallen to 11.06 billion rupees and in 2009 to 3.25 billion rupees.

In November 2007 Sri Lanka had registered 26,100 new vehicles including 2,300 motor cars. In November 2008 only 20,500 vehicles were registered and car registrations had fallen to 965.

In November 2009 vehicle registrations had stabilized at 19,300 but cars had plummeted further to 329.

How Sri Lanka President Mahinda Rajapaksa can stop war crime charges keep haunting

(May 30, Colombo - Lanka Polity) In a recent interview with Al Jazeera, Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa displayed how weary he is over the allegations against his government regarding the war crimes during the war against the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Ealam (LTTE).

The President perturbed by the repeated questioning by Al Jazeera correspondent Fouziah Ibrahim, lost his temper and asked why Al Jazeera repeatedly harassed Sri Lanka with war crimes charges just because the country defeated terrorism, while sparing countries like the USA and Britain.

On May 27, Sri Lanka's Minister of External Affairs, G.L. Peiris, who was on a public relations tour through the United States, left a scheduled meeting with journalists at the National Press Club Thursday morning without speaking.

It is learnt that he was advised not to meet media at the National Press Club that recently awarded the organization's 2009 International Freedom of the Press Award to slain Sri Lankan journalist Lasantha Wickramatunga, editor of the Sunday Leader.

Meanwhile, Amnesty international website says, "One year after Sri Lanka's civil war came to a bloody end, the evidence that both parties to the conflict committed serious human rights violations, including war crimes, continues to pile up. Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, the International Crisis Group and the US State Department have compiled extensive reports on the human rights violations that were committed by both the Sri Lankan army and the armed Tamil Tigers. To date, not one single individual has been held accountable for the crimes committed."

During a talk at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), Minister Pieris stubbornly refused to answer a question of a representative of an Amnesty International that questioned about the human rights impact of the most recent presidential commission of inquiry (established in 2006) into several high level human rights cases, including the execution style murder of 17 aid workers of the French organization Action Contre la Faim (ACF). The question was on how many individuals were actually tried as a consequence of the work of the commission, or why the findings that were sent to the President have not been made public to this day.

President Mahinda Rajapaksa has to understand that the pressure on his government over war crime charges will last until when or if he will change the sense of euphoria of his rule following war victory into a more down-to-earth policy especially towards Tamils.

Although he defeated the Tamil militancy in Sri Lankan soil, he is yet to apprehend the full potential of the powerful Tamil Diaspora which is far beyond his simplistic version of a people that want to extend their stay in green pastures of developed West as he suggested in the Al Jazeera interview.

The Tamil Diaspora is too well able to keep the fires of the campaigns on war crime charges against him burning within the framework of Western democracy subtly manipulating the numerous international human rights organizations and even the UN. No power has ever undermined the mandate of these organizations to appear for human rights and the Rajapaksa's are far inadequate to do so. The ability of the Tamil Diaspora to sustain the lobby is free from their internal divisions.

If he is unwilling to deal with the mighty Tamil Diaspora, what he can do to regain the due respect for his defeat of terrorism is to establish good relationship with at least the local Tamils whose lives are in complete disarray as a result of war. The President and his government are in the vision that rapid economic growth facilitated by infrastructure development and private sector engagement will demoralize the Tamil nationalist sentiments.

Even for this, he needs some kind of meaningful power sharing with the leaders of local Tamil community. The undeclared 'Give Nothing to Tamils' racist Sinhala chauvinist policy that is masterminded by the ultra nationalist elements in his government will not lead him anywhere.

Power sharing with Tamils is a taboo subject among many of the Sinhala nationalist elite. Rajapaksa is in a powerful position and he can break it, if the pragmatic leader, as identified by Velupillai Prabakaran in his Mahaviru speech in 2005, can see beyond his nose tip, the time is ripe for reforms since the Sinhala racists have lost to him.

Development plus power sharing will make him really closer with local Tamils, not in the superficialway of meeting and talking with them when he visits north and east, as he said to Al Jazeera.

This is the only way available for him to widen the gap between the local and Diaspora Tamils. Only then, he will be able to actually delegitimize the din of the war crime charges against him. Sheer rhetoric against Diaspora Tamils will lead him nowhere.


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Sri Lanka President's move to levy tax from MP's vehicle import permit is a sham

Hummer H2 off roader valued at over US$ 55,000
without duty in Sri Lanka for a VIP son

(May 28, Colombo - Lanka Polity)  Sri Lanka President has proposed to levy a tax of 18% to 20% from the parliamentarians privileged so far to import vehicles once in five years.

This proposal appears outwardly as a progressive move although it actually increases the amount of taxes the politicians can evade. On the other hand, it will also provide an argument for the rulers to rationalize increase of taxes.

The cabinet approved to increase the maximum value of a motor vehicle imported by MPs from $ 35,000 to $ 45,000.

An MP can import a vehicle that is close to the market value of Rs. 20 million in Sri Lanka. It is a public secret that many MPs sell the licence to import a vehicle tax free and pocket a handsome income scot-free.

Average citizens of Sri Lanka have to pay more than 100% tax for motor vehicles. In some instances the tax is close to 200%.

High taxes on buses cause lack of development in Sri Lanka's public transport.

Bloody funny politics of Jaffna

Jaffna Mayor

(May 23, Colombo - Lanka Polity) 
I know the gravity of my crimes and how serious they are.
-WANDA BARZEE, speaking Friday in court, where she was sentenced to 15 years in prison for the 2002 kidnapping of then 14-year-old Elizabeth Smart.

Fifteen years for kidnapping a child! In Sri Lanka, you believe, especially in the Northern Province, this is not a crime but a part of normal life. Yes, even in the post-Prabakaran period.

Sometimes, you even elect child killer suspects to represent you. T. Illango, Sri Lanka's ruling coalition Deputy Mayor of Jaffna is an example. He was arrested along with several others for alleged complicity in the abduction and brutal murder of a 17-year-old school boy in a botched ransom bid. He was later given conditional bail and told to appear in courts every Monday.

Later, he was found outside the Magistrate Chavakacheri Magistrate T. J. Prabhakaran's house armed with a pistol along with one of the suspects involved in the abduction and murder. Now he is in remand for threatening the Magistrate.

Meanwhile, the Mayor of Jaffna, Ms. Patkunaraja Yogeswari, a mother too, placed an advertisement in a local newspaper calling for the dropping of the charges against Deputy Mayor T. Illango. Jaffna Chief Magistrate A. A. Anandaraja has severely reprimanded the Mayoress for interfering in judiciary matters.

It is bloody funny to see how things happen in liberated Jaffna under the democratic rule of the Colombo government.

Disaster capitalism and Sri Lanka government's moves to resettle Colombo flood victims

(May 20, Colombo - Lanka Polity) Sri Lanka Ministry of Irrigation and Water Resource Development has taken swift action to identify land to resettle the dwellers of canal banks in Colombo city. Most of these canal side dwellers are displaced now due to floods.

While the Minister of rrigation and and Water Resource Development is attending in the World Health Assembly in Geneva, the Secretary of the Ministry Ivan de Silva says that the land is being identified now on the instructions of the President Mahinda Rajapaksa. He said that the President instructed the officials to find them land close to Colombo city.

Perhaps the President might have understood that these people had dwelled in the city for a long time and their livelihoods are connected to it. Most of the people of these low income groups render a yeoman service in city cleaning and other services hard work is needed. Nice words of the President we have to wait and see the realization. Hope the 30,000 plus families now in camps will not be chased away when they go back to their houses once the floods recede.

Colombo Municipal Council Chief Engineer said recently that the sudden flow of water due to downpour is beyond the capacity of drainage channels of the city. The drainage system of Colombo city was constructed by British colonial rulers in 1910 and it has been used with slight improvements.

The unauthorized slum dwellers on canal banks actually contribute to pollution and blockade of water flow in canals while living in most unhealthy conditions. They are needed to be resettled in better places with better livelihoods for them.

But, the government has to really show that it is going to uplift their lives. This should not be another action similar to the uprooting of Colombo payment hawkers without providing them alternative to make a living.

Sri Lanka government is busy in its attempts in making Colombo city attractive for tourists and foreign direct investors. In this process, the government has forgotten the basic fact that Colombo is a traditional native place of diverse communities. Colombo is not only buildings and roads. Colombo residents and other people are also a part of Colombo. Developing Colombo should be developing its people too. Real city beautification is beautifying the lives of the city dwellers, especially the poor masses, whom the government always claims to be representing.

In her book THE SHOCK DOCTRINE, Naomi Klein explodes the myth that the global free market triumphed democratically. Exposing the thinking, the money trail and the puppet strings behind the world-changing crises and wars of the last four decades, The Shock Doctrine is the gripping story of how America’s “free market” policies have come to dominate the world-- through the exploitation of disaster-shocked people and countries.

"At the most chaotic juncture in Iraq’s civil war, a new law is unveiled that would allow Shell and BP to claim the country’s vast oil reserves…. Immediately following September 11, the Bush Administration quietly out-sources the running of the “War on Terror” to Halliburton and Blackwater…. After a tsunami wipes out the coasts of Southeast Asia, the pristine beaches are auctioned off to tourist resorts.... New Orleans’s residents, scattered from Hurricane Katrina, discover that their public housing, hospitals and schools will never be reopened…. These events are examples of “the shock doctrine”: using the public’s disorientation following massive collective shocks – wars, terrorist attacks, or natural disasters -- to achieve control by imposing economic shock therapy. Sometimes, when the first two shocks don’t succeed in wiping out resistance, a third shock is employed: the electrode in the prison cell or the Taser gun on the streets." (http://www.naomiklein.org/shock-doctrine)

Beware! Talks about resettling Colombo canal bank dwellers that are now displaced due to floods can also be a move of this disaster capitalism.

He was legendary Volleyball Sira of cricketing Sri Lanka

No action photos for media
Only this one with his son

(May 18, Colombo - Lanka Polity) W.L. Siriwardhana of Gampaha, who was known as legendary ‘Volleyball Sira‘ bade farewell to Sri Lanka.

Mr. Siriwardhana was the captain of Sri Lanka’s national volleyball team for 12 years in 1950s and 60s. He was renowned in the Asian region as a gifted dasher. He was popular among Sri Lankans as much as the brilliant cricketers were among cricket fans. However, he was not among the sportsmen the President Mahinda Rajapaksa recently awarded for their lifetime achievements. His funeral was also unattended by political bigwigs.

Volleyball is still the national game of Sri Lanka although it never reached to professional level.

Volleyball is a sport Sri Lankans can play anywhere in the island with low capital cost since the equipments and standard courts do not cost a fraction of expenses for a game like cricket.

Cricket is the most popular sport in Sri Lanka although less than thousand people play standard cricket. Few turfs are available even in Colombo except what are available the international cricket grounds. Most of the outstation schools and clubs play cricket on matting made of coir string. Tennis ball cricket that is played by the majority of the ordinary cricketers is far below cricket standards.

Most Sri Lankans do not play any kind of cricket although they are ardent fans of the game. Most of these fans are not healthy people since they do not play or exercise at all. One of them died in a heart attack recently when Sri Lanka beat India in a thrilling match to enter the semi-finals of T-20 World Cup.

Sports must be promoted as a human exercise and not as a way having sheer thrill or betting if a nation needs healthy and fit populace.

Sri Lanka can promote volleyball among people easily if it really needs it to be made the national sport. The chairmanship of Sri Lanka Volleball Federation itself reflects the pathetic situation of the national sport. The federation has failed to seek a powerful person to lead it.

Present Chairman Dilan Perera is a Deputy Minister of the government and he laments he has been denied a cabinet portfolio despite his presence in the parliament since 1994. Sri Lanka's national sport is also like him.