Cover: Smiles of innocence

The Meeriyabedde landslide was an unimaginable tragedy where many lives were lost. Today we feature in our cover page child victims of the tragedy who lived to tell the tale. These children who attended school in the landslide area are now attending Meeriyabedde Maha Vidyalaya, sans basic facilities. They have no chairs or tables and are forced to do their studies sitting on mats. Some of them don't even have the bare essentials but they are full of smiles and happy to be in school. Our photographer Sudam Gunasinghe captured this endearing smiles of innocence.