Government's Mathata Thitha, a cropper   

By Ravi Ladduwahetty-January 7, 2014

The government's much-hyped campaign to abstain from intoxicants (Mathata Thitha) has come a cropper in the light of a startling revelation that the biggest offenders of drugs, in a single segment are school children, both boys and girls.

Statistical reports compiled by the National Dangerous Drugs Control Board (NDDCB) reveal that in 2008, as many as 8,032 people in the Colombo District had been arrested for possessing/using cannabis while 5,843 people had been arrested for possessing heroin. However, in 2012, the number of those arrested for possessing cannabis had risen to 15,516 in the same region, and as many as 13,332 people had been arrested for possessing heroin.

"This is a very serious situation that the Western Province has to grapple with as there are large numbers of school children who are using drugs. They are not only children of the so-called elite schools but also children who attend central schools," the Chairperson of the NDDCB, Leisha de Silva Chandrasena, told Ceylon Today. Commenting on the issue further, she said that the situation in schools in the Central and North Central Provinces is also bleak in this respect.

Chandrasena said that while the children of the elite Colombo schools were smoking and consuming sophisticated narcotics, children of central schools in the Western Province were consuming cannabis. "This is a serious problem which has reached epic proportions and we are attempting to bring the situation under control," she said.

She also said the coastal area between Bambalapitiya and Mount Lavinia – the long stretch of beach, as well as the night clubs in Colombo, are venues where school children visit to consume drugs. "Some of the vendors are three-wheeler drivers and van drivers who operate in the illegal trade directly outside schools," she alleged.

In addition to this problem is the other sordid scenario where pharmacists are dispensing drugs that they are not supposed to dispense without a prescription. These drugs are consumed by schoolboys in copious quantities so as to reach a 'high,' she said. "Some of the other alarming cases are of children who take drugs meant for psychiatric patients and they end up in hospital. Around 35 such children had been sent to the rehabilitation centre in Kandy that the NDDCB runs," she added.

She attributed this phenomenon to children who lack parental love and care and went on to say that there were girls who were also caught up in this syndrome. "The boys definitely have an age limit where those who are below 16 years cannot go to night clubs, but the girls do not have age limits and they accompany the boys, unchecked," she remarked.

In 2008, there were 1,479 people arrested in the Gampaha District for using cannabis; this figure had shot up to 2,269 in 2012. Similarly, 552 persons had been arrested for possessing heroin in the same District in 2008; the figure had gone up to 706 by 2012.

Statics put out by the NDDCB also reveal that in 2008 in the Kalutara District, 1,128 people had been arrested for possessing cannabis; this number had risen to 1,321 in 2012. The number of persons arrested for possessing heroin in 2008 in the same region was 406, which figure had risen to 746 in 2012. In the Hambantota District, there were 921 people who had been arrested for possessing cannabis which figure had increased to 1,800 in 2012. Those arrested for possessing heroin in 2008 was 36; the number so arrested in 2012 was 81 in the same District.