A Brief Colonial History Of Ceylon(SriLanka)
Sri Lanka: One Island Two Nations
A Brief Colonial History Of Ceylon(SriLanka)
Sri Lanka: One Island Two Nations
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Thiranjala Weerasinghe sj.- One Island Two Nations
?????????????????????????????????????????????????Friday, June 23, 2017
A Sri Lankan In Drawing
At
the start of 2017 the President’s Office and the Office for National
Unity launched a campaign to raise awareness of “Sri Lankan Shared
Values”. The proposed aim is to bring together the people from each of
the individual ethnic groups in Sri Lanka and create a “unified national
identity”. Given the reoccurrence in extremism emanating from all
groups lately, creating this “unified national identity” is of national
importance.
With this in mind, I wish to demonstrate via a drawing what I believe represents a unified Sri Lankan identity.
Note:
This drawing has been designed and created by myself (the writer of
this article). I apologise that it’s not the best drawn.
The background
The
background is split into two; three quarters being blue and the
remaining quarter being yellow. These colours aim to represent the
sea/sky and the land respectively.
The
background aims to reinforce the concept that we are all living on one
united and indivisible island. It also intends to bring to attention two
of the most important (and historical) jobs that members of all of the
ethnic communities in Sri Lanka partake in; agriculture and fishing.
The 3 headed tree
The
most dominating and noticeable part of the drawing is the ‘3 headed
tree’. Each of the ‘heads’ are different but attached together by the
same trunk which is embedded into the land. The 3 ‘heads’ are the
‘Coconut Tree’ (middle), the ‘Palmyra Tree’ (left) and the ‘Palm Tree’
(right). What this aims to represent, is the different communities i.e.
the coconut tree represents the Sinhalese, the Palmyra tree represents
the Tamil and the palm tree represents the Muslims.
The
Sinhala majority south of the country is dominated by the coconut
trees. As you move north, the landscape takes a drastic change and the
Palmyra trees come to dominate the landscape. The palm tree is heavily
revolved around Islam and can be seen doted around the Muslim dominated
parts of Sri Lanka. As a result, these trees have become synonymous with
each ethnic group and are thus used to represent each community.
Whilst
each of the trees individually is different (i.e. in terms of
appearance and the fruits they provide) they are from the same botanical
family, Arecaceae. In much the same way, whilst a Sinhala, Tamil and
Muslim wear different clothes (appearance), speak different languages,
practise different religions and participate in different cultural
events (fruit), they are all part of the same family, Sri Lanka.
The
3 ‘heads’ are positioned at same height to symbolise that we are all
equal. The ‘Coconut Tree head’ (Sinhalese) is placed in the middle to
symbolise its central role (as the majority). The ‘Palmyra Tree head’
and the ‘Palm Tree head’ are connected by branches to the main trunk to
symbolise the indivisible connection to both the land and the central
‘Coconut Tree’.
Trying
to remove one of the ‘heads’ is impossible. Whilst you could try and
cut off a ‘head’, it will grow back. Thus, the only way to permanently
remove one of the ‘heads’ would be cutting the trunk off the tree.
However, doing this will lead to all three ‘heads’ being destroyed. To
put this idea into perspective, there have been times when one ‘head’
(Sinhala/Tamil/Muslim) has tried to hurt another ‘head’
(Sinhala/Tamil/Muslim) e.g. 1983 riots, LTTE expulsion of Muslims,
Aluthgama riots etc. In all
these cases, while the indicated target was one group against another
group, the end result was all the ethnic groups (the whole tree)
suffered.