We publish below without comment, a reader's letter as a Point of View:

That 'pretty' unwelcome speech

Mr Anura Bandaranaike's 'tough' speech aimed at the 'pretty Indian High Commissioner' needs to be dissected if we want to find out how tough it really is.

By attaching much importance to India and the Indian High Commissioner's purported remarks and conduct on Sri Lankan affairs, it appears that he is apparently, quite unbeknownst to himself, acknowledging in reality that India is our very important neighbour.

Why waste so much time and energy if India was not a power to reckon with?? No Parliamentarian would waste his breath if the remarks and conduct alluded to, were from the envoy of Madagascar, or the Maldive Islands.

Mr Bandaranaike says that 'Sri Lanka can mind her own internal affairs while Mrs Rao should mind the business of the High Commission.' Not a very pleasant thing to say about a country that transported - - free of charge - more than 800 of our domestic workers in Lebanon when they were marooned there after the recent fighting broke out. It's also not a very flattering remark about a High Commissioner who arranged the first and fastest international response to the devastation caused by the Asian tsunami which hit our shores in December 2004.

If Mrs Rao would have "minded the business of the High Commission" in both these instances, Sri Lanka would have been the poorer for it. It seems that it's the fate of being a regional power to be accused of NOT intervening, almost as often as being accused of 'interfering' in the affairs of the smaller countries in the region.

In both above instances, if the "pretty Mrs Rao minded the business of the Indian High Commission" there would have been many Sri Lankans led by the voluble Mr Bandaranaike himself probably, who would have probably been in high-dudgeon about the insensitivity of our regional giant.

So it is best that we consider it mealy mouthed to be unkind to our benefactors. It's tantamount to biting the hand that feeds us, even though India is not among one of our frontline aid giving nations. But the idea is that a historically friendly nation and a long time benefactor such as India should not be brought into disrepute, especially by act of vilifying its representative.

It should also be clear by now that India has not gone against the interests of this nation, certainly not at his time. India has urged, in a very persuasive manner albeit, that Sri Lanka should seek the consensus of all parties to arrive at a political solution to the country's conflict.

'interference'

This sort of exhortation cannot be seen as 'interference' for the simple reason that this is what our own country's leaders including the President wants as a solution to this country's conflict.

If the President wants a political solution, and the Indian High Commissioner endorses his position, wouldn't it be comic to haul the High Commissioner over the coals for recommending just what we want as a remedy for our own problem? So it's best that its recorded that the "pretty" speech about the High Commissioner was a gross over reaction in these times when the Indian state does not allow the LTTE's Anton Balasingham to step into the country for medical treatment.

India is playing the part of the very mature senior partner in regional geopolitics, and is exhorting our country quite sincerely to stick to its own self-prescribed dose of medicine which is to evolve a power sharing arrangement with the Tamil minority.

Now, that surely wouldn't warrant a diatribe against a pleasant lady High Commissioner who is gentle, sensitive and efficient in the discharge of her duties? The Bandaranaike speech also takes a different turn midstream and puts the country on notice about being gung-ho about the Sampur success.

Well, he does not use the words 'gung-ho', but it appears that this is pretty much the idea that is conveyed.

Its relevant with regard to this comment to point out that nobody is 'gung-ho' because if that was the case, there would not be one very eager President who is drumming up support for a consensus-based all party solution to the national question. As Mr Bandaranaike himself says, his invitation to the UNP in this context is exemplary.

To say in the context of recapturing Sampur, as Mr Bandarnaike did, that that "a wounded Tiger is more dangerous because it bites" is almost in poor taste, because it seems to seek to panic the people of this country when that's the last thing needed.

Mr Bandaranaike said that ''though we took control of Sampur we will not be able to hold on to it. "He had quoted Napoleon saying 'its easy to conquer a nation but difficult to hold on to it." Seems he is rambling out of context, as recapturing Sampur is not remotely comparable to the 'conquering of a nation', as it is but the regaining of our own national territory.

Holding on to Sampur

As for holding on to Sampur, nobody said it's a walk in the park, but if we are going to do it, that's not going to be accomplished with the undue and uncalled for pessimism of Mr Bandaranaike when the Sri Lankan troops are very effectively beating back the Tigers going by every assessment, even of foreign journalists.

In all, particularly in the context of the remarks made about the Indian High Commissioner Rao, and by extension our neighbour India, and the remarks made about re-gaining Sampur and the possible retaliation that might follow, it begs the question 'whose side is Mr B on?' Maybe it was his off day.

This is not my view alone. The Sri Lankan government has, at Ministerial level, indicated that his remarks about India would not be touched by the Sri Lankan government with a bargepole, so to say. Need I say more? This was unfortunately an ill-considered speech, which was unfortunate in its timing and inexplicable in terms of its content.

It's a speech that the Sri Lankan people would probably in their wisdom soon disregard in almost its entirety.

by P. N. C. Silva