The Hindu Business Line : Lankans seek solace in religion and astrology

When one landed in Colombo this Wednesday, on the drive from the airport into Colombo city, one saw excited groups of people thronging Buddhist temples. Later, talking about all the excitement a friend in Colombo - an NGO representative - said scathingly: "My dear, this is Sri Lanka's response to the phenomenon you had in India years ago, when Ganesha was found drinking milk. In our version, we had luminous rays emanating out of the Buddha statues in temples."

Dismissing the whole thing as "bunkum and utter nonsense" the woman, who wishes to remain anonymous, said, "this is what happens when you can't give the people their most basic right - the ability to live their lives in dignity and peace."

The prices of petroleum products, which were revised once again in Sri Lanka earlier this week, have added to the general feeling of disenchantment with the state of affairs. The cost of living has gone up and the outbreak of military conflict between the Sri Lankan administration and the LTTE in Trincomalee district has only heightened the sense of insecurity. An escalation in military action, as fighting rages in the east between the Sri Lankan armed forces and the LTTE, has resulted in tighter security in Colombo. The road barricades are back, and so are gun-toting security men who regularly stop vehicles and pedestrians and seek ID cards. The sense that one had got during the last few years of some sort of peace having returned to this island-nation at long last is no longer there. Even at 9 p.m. the roads are almost bereft of pedestrians, and the vehicles plying the near-empty roads are less than half the number one had normally found in this laid-back but fun-loving city. "So in this state of insecurity and a high level of disenchantment, all you have to do to get a huge response is trigger this drama of Buddha statues emitting rays," said my friend, a Sinhalese, by the way.

She said evening messages and phone calls flew all over the city with excited people asking one another if they had witnessed the miracle. "Now if you're honest and say that you can't see any colourful rays, you'll be dubbed a sinner. And temples, whose priests say that their Buddhas are not emitting these magic rays, will lose patronage, as people will say these places are not holy enough. So everybody played along."

Faith In astrology

Like many easterners, Sri Lankans too set great score by not only religion but also mythology, and are greatly interested in astrology. Prof Jayadeva Uyangoda, Head of the Department of Political Science at the Colombo University, while discussing with Business Line the serious need for politicians in Sri Lanka and India to visit their counterparts in the neighbouring country, said acidly, "The problem is that we live in a small island, so our ruling classes have the small island mentality. At the moment, we have the most politically immature ruling stratum that has come into power after independence. They are very isolationist, they want to isolate themselves not only from the world but also from south Asia."

Commenting on the failure of Sri Lanka to leverage from India's economic boom, he said the former Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe had "the vision to integrate the Sri Lankan economy with that of southern India -

Tamil Nadu Andhra, Karnataka and Kerala; the UNF government was pursuing that strategy." On the feeling most Sri Lankans have towards India, he said there is a very "mixed and ambivalent attitude towards India. They have been trying to get India to fight their dirty little war and when India refuses to do that, they feel India is letting them down. That is the feeling among the Sinhalese nationalist forces."

Pointing out the irony of a political divide or indifference between Sri Lankan politicians and those in south India, Prof Uyangoda said, "Look at the state of affairs between our two countries; no Tamil Nadu or Karnataka, or Andhra Chief Minister visits Sri Lanka. Sri Lankan leaders do not go to Tamil Nadu, Karnataka or Kerala except to consult astrologers. They don't meet political leaders." On why the craze for Indian astrologers, he strikes a poignant note, when he says, "There is a deep sense of insecurity among the political and military leaders here. They live in constant fear of being assassinated. The cease fire agreement in a way ensured that the Tamil Tigers would not kill political leaders, but when the cease fire itself is in danger, people are really scared about their lives."

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