cat'S eye

A news full Thursday

This cat purred with pleasure that things are moving; people concerned are sitting up and the malaise that critics accused Yahapalanaya of shrouding itself with seems to have been perforated.

One definite judgment

On Thursday, October 15, newspapers screamed in bold type on page one that Gampola Withanage Samantha Kumara alias Wele Suda was sentenced to death by the Colombo High Court Judge, Preethi Padman Soorasena.

The drug kingpin deserves the punishment meted out, and it could really lead him to the gallows, for he flooded the country with narcotics and dangerous drugs. These do not confine their evil merely to the drug taker and abuser but nets in parents, families and friends. Due to one person being addicted to drugs so many suffer untold sorrow, pain of mind and deprivation. Drugs cost so much.

So Wele Suda is guilty of killing many and sending thousands of others to misery. But seeing his face, this feline, though supposed to be cruel and a sibling to the ferocious tiger (animal), felt sad in heart. The man looks OK and had an expression of sorrow. Others who aided and abetted and gained from him should be caught too, powerful whales though they be with wealth or political clout.

Little Seya's murderer too seems to be netted. Thank goodness for DNA testing for otherwise that 17-year-old boy who inadvertently had a photograph of the little girl in his cell phone or the Kondaya chappie who seems to be in dire need of psychiatric help would have ended up being labelled the perpetrators of the heinous crime. Kondaya needs help.

Was he completely willing to sacrifice himself for the sake of his brother by admitting to the crime? Or was it unadulterated sick vicarious joy that made him describe a crime he did not commit, in such graphic detail as we were made to believe?

Bold and strong

Sarath Fonseka was/is both these - bold and strong - and he did have a penchant for speaking out loud and clear, earlier in his political career rather injudiciously, one must admit. This time he announces for all to know: "The government seems to be conniving with big crooks. The government has let big crooks off the hook while punishing the ordinary people for minor offences." And then the broadside: "Attorney General doesn't know the law."

Yes, Sir, make them sit up and do their work in a straight manner. We share his views and there has been much belly aching by people who love the country. Complaining for all to hear is done now since no white vans are feared. What Menika noticed in the item on what the Field Marshal said on Wednesday was that the reporter in one newspaper wrote thus: "Addressing the media at the DP Office at Battaramulla, the war winning former Army Commander ...."

Now that is excellent. He is acknowledged to be the winner of the war. We whispered this, shouted it out, but during the last regime it was a totally different picture after he decided to contest the Presidency in 2010; he was only fit for being framed on this frivolous charge and that.

The war, according to what we had to believe was won solely by the two Rajapaksa brothers: Mahinda and Gotabhaya. We never denied they deserve kudos and hosannas but what we could not stomach was that General Fonseka who led the army and his men were not mentioned in the glory list. Only the two brothers. Coming back to the point he made, we are sure the AG's Department officials will sit up!

A newspaper on this same Thursday had an article on Indian independence titled 'Gandhi, Jinnah tried to avoid partition, says Kasuri'. Former Pakistan Foreign Minister Khurshid Mahmud Kasuri (2002-2007) made this statement to reporters when he visited Mani Bhavan, the nerve centre of Gandhi's activities in Mumbai from 1917 to 1934.

What we had heard and read was that Jinnah was always for the creation of a State for the Muslims of India and that had to be through partition. So this cat very irreverently wondered who would spin more in his grave at this little perversion of the truth - Gandhiji or Ali Jinnah? Gandhi of course was cremated so no - you know what.

Maybe the ex FM means that very early on, when both the Muslim leadership and the Indian - Gandhi-Nehrus and others - were being non-cooperative and non-resistant to the British, they entertained no idea at all of separation.

History books and historical creative writing all point to the fact that when independence was brightening the horizon, Jinnah came up with the creation of a separate state for Muslims and insisted on it until the British Home Office, influenced by Mountbatten and Nehru's hand being forced, partition was agreed upon, done so hurriedly causing rivers of blood to flow, Muslim and Hindus from either side displaced and Gandhi fasting almost unto death to stop the racial riots that engulfed the country.

Thus was Pakistan born. Then Mountbatten and all others learnt that Ali Jinnah was dying of tuberculosis, a secret closely kept with maybe only his sister and a doctor or two knowing about it. If partition could have been delayed, it may never have occurred since no other Muslim leader was so unmoving, so against compromise and so demanding as Jinnah.

A nasty addendum to this visit of the Pakistani ex FM is that Sudheendra Kulkarni who invited the Pakistani to a book launch was given a black paint bath by members of the Shiv Sena. Racial and religious hate seem to be ever inflammable in India. Mercifully we in Sri Lanka are peaceful and no longer appear to be seated on a volcano ready to erupt, since those who would have called for an eruption are no longer in power.

Menika