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| Sunday, 18 December 2005 |
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Division on language basis by Prof. P. A. de Silva, Emeritus Prof., University of Moratuwa. For a long period of time in the history of this country the Siv Helas has allowed most visitors to make this resplendent isle their home. The language of the Sinhalese was Sinhala from time immemorial. It is quite distinct from any language in India. sinhala names for India were Jambudvipa, Dambadiva or Barathaya. We have assimilated words from Sanskrit and all other languages. This is common to all languages that had any visitors from any other part of the world. I was once in Poland and went to a place called 'Suko pani'. I asked my friend what it means. "Good water" he said. I told him that in Sinhala, Pali or Sanskrit it will mean the same thing. Esther Hautzig a Polish Jew in her book 'My Siberian Childhood' uses the word Tata for father and she says that it means Papa. In 1966 at a British Council party in London, my wife and I were talking in Sinhala. We noticed that an elderly English lady was watching us. In a few minutes she walked up to us with a smile on her face. We could never fathom what the next step was. So we got up with great respect for her. She said in very good clear Sinhala "Mama Sinhala egane gatte oya lamai ipadenta issela'. I learnt Sinhala before you two were born. We were delighted and she told us about how her father was a working in Ceylon. Professor Wilhelm Geiger Ph.D. the German scholar who translated the Pali Mahawansa to German and later to English had learnt Sinhala and spoke the language as well as any native. All these prove that Sinhala language is not a difficult or impossible language to learn. If such be the case it is difficult to understand why the Tamils of Sri Lanka do not make any attempt to learn the language of their adopted country of over 2000 years. They who go to England, France, Italy and Germany learn those languages with ease. We can recall thousands of incidents that prove that the Sinhala language is not a difficult language to learn at least for the purpose of day-to-day communications. They should make an effort at naturalization as it happens in the European countries. Instead the Tamil self-seeking politicians insisted on various impossible demands starting with the 50:50 claim. Now what is asked is one third of the land and two third of the coast to be controlled by perhaps 10,000 terrorists at most, basing the claim on language. For a long time we had no politicians who had the guts to say "I will do any-thing but will not break up my mother country." Now we have a person of that caliber in President. Mahinda Rajapakse who openly said in Jaffna itself that he will solve all problems within his capacity but will not carve out the mother country. A very interesting example of language assimilation is in United States of America. During the years 1830-1930 there was large-scale population influx to America. The data is given in the book, 'The American Union' by H. G. Nicholas, first published in 1948. Germany ........... 5,900,000 Italy ........... 4,600,000 Ireland ........... 4,500,000 Great Britain ........... 4,500,000 Australia-Hungary ......... 4,000,000 Russia including Poland.... 3,300,000 Scandinavia ........... 2,000,000 Taday the USA boast of over 230 million citizens who's language is American English. How and why is it that the Federal country of over 50 different states started using English, a language of only a small group. Do others have any language rights in USA? |
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