Father of the Nation: D.S.Senanayake

*இங்கே நீங்கள் காணும் புகைப்படங்கள் இலங்கையில் விவசாயம் செய்கை பண்ணப்படும் முறையின் ஒரு பொதுவான சித்திரத்தைத் தருகின்றன. இதை 'எருமை விவசாயம்' என வரையறுப்பது விஞ்ஞானத் தகுதியுடையதாகும்.
* தத்துவார்த்த முறையில் சொல்வதானால் 'முதலாளித்துவத்துக்கு முந்திய உற்பத்தி முறையாகும்'.


*ஏன் இந்த நிலை 60 ஆண்டுகள் '' சுதந்திர அதிகாரம்'' பெற்ற பின்னரும் நீடிக்கிறது?
*நமது தேச பிதாக்களும், மாதாக்களும் 60 ஆண்டுகள் என்ன செய்தார்கள்? எவ்வாறு சிந்தித்தார்கள்?


*அந்நிய வர்த்தகமும், அந்நிய நிதிமூலதனமும் உள்நாட்டு மக்கள் உழைத்துப்பெருக்கிய உபரிமதிப்பை சூறையாடிச்செல்ல அநுமதித்ததால் தான் நமது விவசாயம் மூலதன முதலீடின்றி முதலாளித்துவத்துக்கு முந்திய நிலையில் அந்நிய வங்கிகளிடம் இன்னமும் கையேந்தி அடிமைப்பட்டுக் கிடக்கிறது.


*இத்தகைய பொருளுற்பத்தியின்-பிரதானமாக விவசாயத்தின் - பின்தங்கிய நிலைதான் முழு நாட்டுமக்களதும் வாழ்க்கைத் தேவைகள் அரசால் ஈடுசெய்யப்பட இயலாமைக்கான காரணமாகும்.
* இனிமேல் மக்களை மக்களோடு மோதவிட்டு தன்னையும் தனது ஏகாதிபத்திய எஜமானர்களையும் அவர்களது குருதி குடிக்கும் சுரண்டலையும் பாதுகாத்துக்கொள்ள விளைகிறது அரசு.


*இங்கேதான் ஈழத்தமிழ் தேசிய இன ஒடுக்குமுறையின் பொருளியல் அடித்தளம் காணக்கிடக்கிறது.இதுவே தேசிய இனப்பிரச்சனையை வெறும் இனப்பிரச்சனையாகச் சித்தரிக்கும் முதலாளித்துவ -(பெரும் மற்றும் குறும்)தேசியவாதத்தின் மூடு திரையை விலக்கி அது விவசாயப் பிரச்சனை என்பதை இறுதியில் நிரூபித்துத்தீரும் வரலாற்று இயக்கவிதியாகும்.
Remembering the Father of the Nation, D. S. Senanayake
Reprint of an article by H. A. J. Hulugalle
THE 56th anniversary of the death of Sri Lanka’s first Prime Minister, the late D. S. Senanayake, was the 22nd of March.
Today when the country is facing a food crisis as a result of the acute shortages worldwide, the wisdom of the late Mr. Senanayake's agricultural policy, which is the
central theme of this article, needs concerted attention.
Senanayake was convinced that Ceylon's future prosperity depended on the development of her agriculture. He stressed that national honour could not be retained if
a people's food supply was to depend on precarious foreign sources.
As a rebuilder of ancient irrigation works and the reclaimer of the ancient Dry Zone he laid firm foundations for a sound agricultural economy. Gal Oya is symbolic of
the New Lanka and heralded the march towards self-sufficiency in food. The insights articulated in this article written in 1967 by H.A.J.Hulugalle are of immense value even today.


When the late Mr. D. S. Senanayake had just completed his first term of office as Minister of Agriculture in the State Council, he published a book of a little over a
hundred pages entitled "Agriculture and Patriotism".
We knew Mr. Senanayake as a practical politician of high calibre. Did he not pilot the Soulbury Constitution, of which he was in a sense the only begetter, to an
almost unanimous approval by the State Council? We knew him as a man of action and a good administrator. He seemed to know every key public servant,
especially the weaker brethren.
No one would have dared to try a fast one on him. He had the common touch. You never felt in his presence that you were wasting his time and that he was anxious
to get rid of you in favour of a more important visitor or a more compelling constituent. He found time to think about the future of the country and the condition of the
people. He was glad to share his thoughts with anyone who had something useful to offer. Above all, Mr. Senanayake was a man of vision. He perceived, when he
was first elected to the Legislative Council, what recent Governments have been trying to rediscover since and his priorities are valid today as they were then. It
would be quite easy to prove this by quoting from the book mentioned above. This is what he said:-
"It is a remarkable fact that we in Ceylon, while repeating in season and out, that ours is an agricultural country and that her prosperity is inextricably bound up with
her agricultural progress, should yet be apparently content to pay a bill in a year of depression (1933) of nearly 87 million rupees for the imports of our food and
drink."
The bill paid in 1965 for food imports was Rs 908 million. Mr. Senanayake was convinced that the decline in food production was due to the fact that this form of
agriculture was despised by the educated and. well-to-do. The whole burden of food production had been placed on the frail shoulders of the land-starved and debt
-ridden peasant. This is what he said:-
"It is almost as if that sense of inferiority that is sometimes seen to overwhelm a Ceylonese to the presence of his European brother has also attached itself to the
native products. Rice and other grains, eggs, onions, chillies and ginger are humble, though useful, commodities. Fruit has a status only a trifle higher than these. To be
engaged in their production is something to be ashamed of."
Of course the commercial products or plantation crops were not only more respectable. They were also more profitable in good times and commanded credit from
the banks and brokers.
But Mr. D. S. Senanayake had a prophetic vision and he saw the inevitable result of neglecting food production. He said:-
"The greater attraction of the commercial crops, the dignity that seemed to attach to them, the comparative ease with which large returns for outlay came in, blinded
the wealthier Ceylonese to the dangers lying hidden beneath their glamour and drew them away from the essentially safer and sounder, though less splendid,
cultivation of products to provide a direct means of sustenance to the home population. The middle classes emulated their wealthier brethren and the peasant, left to
his own devices, was content to scratch the soil and receive just whatever nature provided."
Today the fundamental problem in Ceylon, as in most developing countries, is the rapid increase of population outstripping economic development. Sir John Hicks,
Professor of Economics at the University of Oxford, after a study of the situation in Ceylon said:
"With birth and death rates as they are at present, the population will go on increasing rapidly, and there is no possible development which could enable an unlimited
population to support itself on the island."
On this subject Mr. Senanayake wrote, before the eradication of malaria which led to a sensational rise in the expectation of life:-
"By all the laws relating to the growth of population formulated by competent statisticians, the rate of increase of the population of this Island will continue to be
maintained. It is obvious, then, that the problem of how to sustain these increasing numbers cannot much longer be ignored: It has perforce to be fairly and squarely
faced, and a solution urgently sought and found."
Lessons of history
Mr. Senanayake urged that the lessons of history and the dictates of policy would both seem to show that the solution of the problem presented by the phenomenon
of a rising population must lie in organizing our agricultural effort primarily for the production of crops to afford us a direct means of subsistence.
When he tried to do so, his political enemies accused him of wasting money and put every obstacle in his way. The race of wreckers is not extinct.
For Mr. Senanayake, in a country as Ceylon is situated, agriculture was the highest form of patriotism. He quoted the following from the report of the Businessmen's
Commission in America-
"Agriculture is not merely a way of making money by raising crops; it is not merely an industry or a business; it is essentially a public function or service performed by
private individuals for the care and use of the land in the national interest, and farmers, in the course of securing a living and a private profit, are the custodians of the
basis of the national life. Agriculture is therefore affected with a clear and unquestionable public interest and its status is a matter of national concern calling for
deliberate and far-sighted national policies, not only to conserve the national and human resources involved in it, but to provide the national security, promote a well-
rounded prosperity and secure social and political stability."
Efficient agriculture is the net result of a number of factors, the most important of which is the attitude we bring to it. "It can scarcely be gainsaid", wrote Mr.
Senanayake, "that one of the most important aspects of the agricultural problem in Ceylon is the necessity for an agricultural bias in the training of our young".
Our educationists are beginning to rediscover this truth. Mr. Senanayake praised the pioneer efforts of that great scientist; Father Le Goc. He said:
"Few unofficials, indeed, have done so much to advance the cause of agriculture in this country as Father Le Goc. Quite apart from the work he is doing in promoting
in the students of St Joseph's College a liking for agricultural activity his researches in the field of biology have been of very great use to the officers of the Government
Departments. It is perhaps little known, for instance, that a long step was made possible in the cultivation of suitable fodder grasses by the results achieved by the
Reverend Father's experimentation. Could we but have a few more in the Island, who would for the love of agriculture and in recognition of its importance in the
scheme of our wellbeing, be prepared to assist us to build our prosperity on the firm basis of tilling and grazing, we should, in truth, have reason to account ourselves
a most fortunate people".
Father Le Goc introduced the intensive method of agriculture which is practised in Japan and China, and which Dr. Spencer Hatch tried out in Martandam. Mr.
Senanayake quotes Dr. Hatch:
"Government demonstrators may have enthusiasm for their work, may be industrious and faithful - still, officialdom is a hindering thing and red tape easily makes a
difficult tangle. The official finds it harder to get really close to the hearts of the people. The non-official agency creates the favourable atmosphere and the relative
confidence, and then calls in the Government experts to help with the demonstrating".
The astonishing successes in crop production, achieved in the United States, Great Britain, and elsewhere, are largely due to efficient extension services. Men of the
highest calibre work side by side with the farmers and not from their offices and laboratories, important as such places are.
"Farmers are not impressed in India or anywhere else with what they see done on Government show farms, operated with public money not intimately connected with
the farmer, and not on a self-sustaining basis. But they are impressed by what they do themselves; and the demonstration agent has brought a high degree of self-
help".
Land tenure and the size of the holding are important factors in the poor returns from subsistence agriculture in Ceylon. Fragmentation and litigation have
impoverished the peasant and created a large class of landless unemployed which offers a thread to the stability of society. Mr. Senanayake quotes from the Royal
Commission of Agriculture in India.
"It is clear that in the adoption of some form of intensive cultivation lies the greatest hope of enabling the cultivator to meet from his small holding his own needs and
those of his family. As a general principle, it may be laid down that the chief solution of the problems of the cultivator is intensification or diversification of his
agriculture".
The problem at the present time has to be attacked from many angles owing to the urgent need for food. The investment of capital by private enterprise on a large
scale, induced by tax exemptions and other attractions, is a hopeful feature of the campaign. But it is more than ever necessary to create a sense of participation on
the part of the millions of peasants in the country.
We have seen the system of marketing such as it is-breaking down with overproduction in some places, with acute shortages in others. Mr. Senanayake gave much
thought to marketing of produce. He devotes a whole chapter to this subject, and another to the co-operative movement.
Had his recommendations been carried out rigorously and conscientiously by those who came after him, the village economy today would be in a much healthier
condition. The banking system has barely touched eighty percent of the people of the Island.
Mr. Senanayake recognised the importance of nutrition and dietetics in a food production policy. His books also contains chapters on land policy colonization,
irrigation, agricultural labour and rural indebtedness.
The smart young men of the bureaucracy will perhaps say that all this is old hat; they know all about it. But by any yard-stick the progress made during the last
decade and more has been disappointing. The promise of Gal Oya was almost extinguished by political malevolence and official inertia.
The shock which have shivered the great Indian National Congress to the roots is due primarily to economic stagnation. Our five per cent middle class town-bred
elite are probably living on borrowed time. Unless they can make a meaningful contribution to the solution of current problems, their days are numbered. Surely the
centre of gravity must move back to where the eighty per cent live.
Past failure to follow a straight course in development without involvement in side issues such as class war, racial jealousies, cultural sentimentality, religious
antagonism and language rivalry have made many people wonder whether any real progress in a developing country is possible under a democratic system of government.
No doubt there is too much politicking in Ceylon as there seems to be in many parts of India. The pattern of bureaucracy is outmoded and imaginative action and
quick decision are often lacking. But whatever the system, success depends ultimately on clear-sighted and bold leadership.
Source:The Island 01/04/08


Deutsche Bank in SL profits up by 178% to Rs.586m
Receives Rs.2.2 billion from head office for expansion
Deutsche Bank Sri Lanka yesterday announced posting of Rs.586 million as profit after tax in 2007 showing an increase in profits by 178% to 211million over
2006. With this positive performance by the Colombo branch, the bank also annouced its Rs.2.2 billion expansion plan in Sri Lanka
The bank also said that the increase in bank’s Sri Lanka's operating profit was manly due to a significant increase in its activity across all business lines.
Chief Country Officer of Deutsche Bank in Sri Lanka Rohan Rodrigo, said that Deutsche Bank has built a strong all-round client franchise, which is delivering leading
capital markets trading advice, transaction banking, and custody solutions to major local companies as well as multinationals.
The country officer also said that Colombo branch demonstrated strong breadth in 2007. Bank’s trading businesses took the correct positions on local foreign
exchange and interest rate markets, and clients benefited from Deutsche Bank's ability to package these views into products and solutions for their businesses.
"Similarly, our cash management and domestic custody growth is the direct result of the leading technology imported from our global businesses, and the way in which
this has been adapted for clients to suit local market conditions.” He said.
"For 27 years, Deutsche Bank has been an important participant in Sri Lanka's financial markets, and with strong results and a recent 2.2 billion rupee capital
injection from head office, the Bank will continue to invest in the local economy."
Deutsche Bank believes it has a responsibility to invest more broadly in the communities in which it is present. To this end, Deutsche Bank recently supported a
project focused on preserving the rich cultural heritage of Sri Lanka through committing LKR 3 million towards the construction of an "alms hall" in Jethawanaramaya,
which is in the Ancient city of Anuradhapura. Built in 3rd Century AD, Jethawanaramaya is the highest and largest temple dome in the world and a UNESCO world
heritage site.