I was taken aback when I saw Mr. H. L. D. Mahindapala's article "Why
I am proud to be what I am - A Sinhala Buddhist." Other than Mr.
Mahindapala, the only other person who hints that he is a Sinhala
Buddhist (SB) is Mr. Mahinda Rajapaksa, our President.
The threat to the SB is not the non Sinhala, non Buddhist forces. The
threat is from the SB who is SB only in name. This includes a vast
majority of monks whom I call the yellow robed ones and not monks in
word or deed.
Right throughout our long history the 100 per cent SB saved our
country and our religion from all the enemies and left it to us to be
the proud owners of a heritage not second to any in the world.
I'm a product of a Roman Catholic school. Only their religion was
taught. After graduation from the University of Ceylon I joined the Army
in 1963.
We were taken to fill the vacancies that occurred as a result of the
1962 coup. We had a tough time in the Army 'cos we lived as SBs. We
ensured that the Army was maintained to protect the SB of Sri Lanka.
Hence I have vast experience about the plight of the genuine SB.
Many would have written to your Editor praising your article but only
one appeared in the papers.
There may be many genuine SBs in the country and overseas. Hence may
I suggest to think of some system where these genuine SBs can come to
the forefront to help the downtrodden genuine SB especially in the North
and the East. The Rupavahini Ape Gama programme is indirectly building
this SB concept. The Buddhist Times the Dhamsara monthly papers too are
attempting to awaken us.
Walter Ranawana
I refer to that very illuminating and timely article written by R. S.
Karunaratne: "Ssh, 'Singlish' is expanding" in that section VIGNETTES.
I do sincerely hope that the idiocy of people shown in this article
is given wide publicity especially in the Sinhala Media - Newsprint,
Radio and TV since it is such a shame to note the Sinhala language with
its grace and expression is being "bastardised" by most media.
Item One - Listen to any Sinhala Radio Station and note for yourself
the utter madness of those DJ's, mostly women, who use both languages in
a horrible mix just to get listeners' attention.
A language - any language for that matter is a means of communication
and a speciality to each ethnicity. It's such s shame that most of the
politicians too, cannot speak fluent Sinhala when they have to be quoted
on programmes.
Item Two - The Sinhala TV dramas are also a crying shame. There is
one particular drama featuring very famous stars of yesteryear who are
cajoled into speaking "Achcharu"! Do they see how degrading it is for
these grand stars to act with utter apprentices who can't even be
natural? Why go to all the trouble to call it a Sinhala teledrama when
it is neither Sinhala nor English?
Item Three - TV stations have now reached the height of their
inefficiency! One station has over six hours of advertising only
exercise machines of a showing time of 11 hours! Most programmes have
hit gutter level with those lewd men and women in 'semi-nude' attire
gyrating in sexual positions and they call it music.
Just note for yourself some of the glaring spelling mistakes in the
slides. The Bollywood films are just loaded with violence, murder and
crime that now local teledramas borrow from!
The writer, indeed has done much research going even to other
countries. It's quite well-known how Indians use the English language.
But need we imitate them? This all reflects one factor-the fleecing done
by teachers in the name of tuition - SPOKEN ENGLISH!
This is a ridiculous method as it makes a direct transliteration of
the language. Advertisers too add to all this confusion with un-educated
sign writers making a hash of the English language! But who cares?
Having a Board of Public Censors has not been useful at all - not even
the Cultural Ministry, who certainly can take up matters to stop the
bastardising of languages.
Brian Jansz.
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