Sri Lankan Islamophobia: Encroaching the Mainstream?

In this Daily News article penned by one Shenali Waduge on Muslims in Sri Lanka and why Buddhists should be scared of their ‘encroachment’, she displays a high level of confusion, connecting disparate events in the Muslim world (fabricating where it suits her), taking them out of context and then applying them to Sri Lanka.

Particularly absurd is her apparently iron clad statistical theory of Muslim’s 4 phased strategic and collective effort to ‘take over’ the locality, wherever they are, and install an Islamic ‘theocracy’ whatever that may mean.

Ms. Waduge, I WISH the Muslim community was as united as you appear to think it is. Even if you appear to think that such unity is always used for nefarious aims. I WISH our leaders were half as focused on the problems affecting the community as you appear to allude. At least you seem to have more faith in their selflessness that I.

While she appears to think that Saudi Arabia and the rest of the Gulf States are synonymous with Muslims everywhere in the world, as if they are the ideal representation of what Sharia law and collective Muslim life is like, when it suits her, she likes to equate all of us with ‘extremist terrorists’, taking an about turn, since most of these ‘extremists’ are extremely anti-Saud. I wish she’d make up her mind.

She also doesn’t seem to have heard of a little event they call the Arab Spring where millions of Muslims stood up to depose tyrannical rulers, oppressing them since their so-called independence from the West. There’s a lot of dissent against existing rule in Gulf States too, but this writer doesn’t seem too interested in specifics, sweeping generalizations are her forte.

Around 1400 people have liked it on Facebook. And at least two of them are people I actually know. This is almost as hard to stomach as the fact that this bit of rubbish journalism was actually published in the Daily News. Which, while not exactly a journalistic stalwart, is significant in its position as the closest thing we have to a state sanctioned English language newspaper; are we to assume that this anti-Muslim vitriol is also state sanctioned? Or at the very least published with the assurance that no one up there is going to seriously mind?

The Daily News is legitimizing this garbage by publishing it. Is this is a glimpse of the next wave of erosion in Sri Lanka’s print media, heralding the advent of anti-Muslim sentiment from the underground world of pithy Facebook groups and into the edges of the mainstream? Stuff like this is dangerous, when you have a climate of growing social unrest. People susceptible to hate are not going to verify things that confirm their bias, especially when it’s published in a leading newspaper.

Conspiracy theories that gain a widespread following don’t just pop out of nowhere. If anti-Muslim sentiment finds an ever broadening audience it’s because it actually perceives what it takes to be a very real indication of ‘Muslim supremacy’ happening in society. But this can be based on misinformation and bias.

I was chatting to Indi about this, and he talks about this a little in his post as well. He thinks Muslims have increasingly appeared to distance themselves from the rest of Sri Lanka. Case in point the niqab or the veil.

While I sympathize with his argument; I do think that without the veil’s modern connotations (a misconceived notion that it symbolizes gender abuse, repression and Islamic extremism) it would have been much easier for people to accept it as a personal choice of consenting individuals in society. Indi to his credit, doesn’t think this warrants racism against Muslims.

Halal food does not mean that some secret chemical compound is inserted into all items certified Halal in some underground plant in the Empty Quarter (although admittedly this would make for excellent dystopic fiction). Halal just applies to the way food is prepared, according to certain standards of religious guidelines which include hygene and ethics.

Paying to obtain the Halal certificate is a decision purely based on choice and the profit motive. No one is compelling anyone to eat Halal. There’s plenty of non-Halal choice out there. No one is shoving Halal meat down feebly protesting throats.

Quite the contrary to what Ms. Waduge states, non-Muslims have full legal rights in Sharia courts by Islamic law. In fact, just consider that in the UK, non-Muslims are also turning to Sharia courts to settle some disputes in certain cases. If anything, it is a parallel system of law, and does not contradict the integrity of the country’s main legal system in any way.

In Sri Lanka, Sharia courts are merely a legal support structure for the Muslim community. There are no widespread plans to convert everyone to Islam and forcibly make them accept sharia law. And neither is here any such thing happening in France, England or anywhere else with a minority Muslim population.

To dissect the full scale of half truths, convolutions, blatant fabrications and outright lies in Ms Waduge’s article would take reams of text, and the question arises if it is actually worth refuting, as most of what she says in my eyes reeks of hate-speech and blatant fabrication, hardly the sign of a person looking openly for honest feedback. But if anything, it’s a good place to go for to get a gist of the prevalent misconceptions that are driving this new wave of Sri Lankan Islamophobia.

Muslims, Animal Sacrifices and Racial Tension in Sri Lanka

Image from the BBC: Hajj 2011

It’s Hajj season again. From all over Sri Lanka, a few thousand fortunate Muslims have already left to perform the actual pilgrimage, a once in a lifetime obligation for those who can afford it, to join hundreds of thousands more in Mecca. The Hajj is the pilgrimage of Abraham and has been followed by the ‘people of the book’ ever since the time of that illustrious prophet, may peace and blessings be upon him.

But the time of Hajj is also especially significant to those who remain at their homes. According to Muslim belief; good deeds carried out in the first ten days of the month of Hajj bear great merit in the eyes of Allah.  Aside from fasting, charity and reflecting on the Quran; a special good deed carried out by Muslims is the Uduhiyyah or the Hajj sacrifice.

Racial tensions

In Sri Lanka where Muslims are a minority, the sudden influx of animal slaughter during Hajj has sometimes drawn the ire of Buddhists and attracted a lot of bad publicity over the years. This is especially significant now in a climate where certain political opportunists are spurring ethnic rivalrybetween Muslims and Sinhalese.

Here in Sri Lanka animals are killed on a daily basis for meat, and this goes largely uncontested. The majority of Buddhists also eat meat, though many abhor beef. The beef industry is largely monopolized by Muslims and has always been a target for elements seeking political gain.

Lately Sri Lanka has seen a range of anti Muslim activity. The Dambulla mosque attack is the most illustrative. And this has been followed up by pockets of unrest in various parts of the country evidently carried out under the leadership of certain members of the Buddhist clergy. Leading to speculation of a rise in ‘Buddhist extremism’ in Sri Lanka.

But to paraphrase Indi, the ‘beef with beef’ has long been an endearing locus of political opportunism. Notorious thug/politician Mervyn Silva for instance, famously demanded the closure of all beef stalls in his district last year, claiming they offended his Buddhist sensibilities (the same minister has no objection to liquor shops being open. In this case his religious sensibilities are overshadowed by the need to sustain a lucrative source of income). In the same year Silva was warned about creating trouble during the Hajj sacrifice.

Furor also rose in recent times in Sri Lanka over ritual sacrifice of animals in the Hindu Kovil of Munneswar, again led by the same minister, but backed by a faction of Buddhist clergy. The sacrifice was allowed to go ahead despite protests as the penal code in no way prevents the slaughter of animals in the country.

The issue to my mind is not the slaughter of animals per se, since by and large this seems to be OK. But the high sensitivity of the majority of Buddhists to graphic display of slaughter that can sometimes take place during Hajj, or other religious festivals that can be used by opportunistic forces to stir up trouble in the name of religion. And when Muslims themselves neglect to follow proper Islamic protocol in carrying out the sacrifice, the issue is only exacerbated.

Openly displaying the animal to be slaughtered, letting its dying cries be heard by neighbors and unhygienic disposal of waste matter is guaranteed to rub people up the wrong way. These practices are frowned upon in Islam in accordance with the Prophet Muhammad (May peace and blessings be upon him)’s example of respect for the faith and sentiments of non-Muslims. And of course hygiene is a central tenet of Islam (the Prophet said ‘cleanliness is one half of faith’). The above was highlighted in Friday sermons throughout the country on the Friday preceding Hajj, the All Ceylon Jamiyyathul Ulama (ACJU), the country’s collective of Islamic scholars has a nose for this sort of thing.

To conclusively sort out the issue once and for all and immunize ourselves to forces trying to sabotage peace both Muslims and Sinhalese must try and understand where the other is coming from. Muslims must understand that religious obligations can still be fulfilled without hurting the feelings of non-Muslims, actually they are probably better fulfilled that way, and non-Muslims must understand the significance of the act and the importance Islam gives to animal rights. And not be led astray by misconceptions and political opportunists.

Animals in Islam

The Quran explicitly states that animals can be used for human benefit (Qur’an 40:79-80)* and it stresses equally that animals have their own lives and existences that must be respected and honored by man (Qur’an 6:38, 24:41). This may appear contradictory, but Islam teaches that all objects, from plants to stars, exist in submission to the will of Allah. And on Earth, man is the ‘vice-regent’ of Allah and can use the planet’s resources in accordance with Islamic law. This law is strict on preventing abuse however, and when it comes to animals prohibits overworking, overburdening and the infliction of cruelty on them and allows hunting only for the sake of food.

An animal that is to be killed for meat must be treated in kindness and given food and water; it is prohibited for instance, to sharpen a knife or to slaughter another animal in front of it. The knife must be as sharp as possible so as to make the death as quick and painless as possible. The meat sacrficed by Muslims does not go to waste, all of it is either given away or consumed.

Some accuse that the Islamic method of slaughtering animals is cruel. Actually, you’d be hard pressed to find a method of killing anything, even a tree, that someone somewhere will not call cruel. But that aside, the Islamic way is proven to be a humane and hygienic method of killing a beast. The cutting of the throat, windpipe and the blood vessels in the neck (the spinal cord is kept intact) prevents the flow of blood to the nerves that cause the sensation of pain in the brain (the animal struggles and writhes due to muscular contraction). All the blood is drained before the head is removed, blood being a medium for germs and bacteria. This ensures that the meat is clean and stays fresh far longer.

The significance of the Hajj sacrifice

The significance of the Hajj sacrifice is the commemoration and remembrance of the devotion of Abraham (may peace be upon him). In a divinely inspired dream, Abraham saw himself sacrificing his oldest son Ismail to Allah. When he told this to Ismail, Ismail asked him to obey the command and said that he would be patient with the will of God. But when the blade descended upon Ismail’s neck, it failed to cut; Allah did not take the life of Ismail, providing a ram to be sacrificed in his stead.

This act of complete submission on the part of Abraham is remembered by Muslims worldwide by sacrificing a lamb, cow or another suitable animal. They keep one third of the meat for themselves, give one third to neighbors and friends and the final third to the poor, ensuring that no one goes hungry during the feast of Eid-Ul-Adha, the Hajj festival.

The day starts with a congregational prayer in the mosque. Muslims celebrate by visiting family and friends, exchanging gifts and remembering and thanking Allah for His blessings. The sacrifice of an animal is purely a measure of faith, as the Qur’an says “it is not their meat nor their blood, that reaches Allah: it is your piety that reaches Him..”(22:37).

*Refer Quran.com for the translation of verses

A version of this post was originally published in The Platform blog

How Can Sri Lanka Grow?

What Growth is Good Growth?

Standard Chartered’s 2010 report titled ‘The 7% Club’, examined how merging nations can achieve sustained 7% growth levels. Any economy growing at 7% a year on average stands to double its economy in roughly ten years. And if your domestic economic mix is good enough to hit 7% on a sustained basis, you’re on the path to the big time.

Since the second world war, all countries known for outstandingly rapid development like China, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand have recorded growth levels of 7% or more for 25 years. Botswana and Vietnam have growth at 7% for more than 15 years.

Before we start slavering at the prospect let’s start by looking at how Sri Lanka can get this ‘mix’ right. There are four ways an emerging market can reach growth levels of 7%, based on historical evidence.

One is through a commodity boom, Angolia, Tajikistan and Azerbaijan are examples of countries that joined the 7% club this way. But reliance on commodity exports can often cause negative effects on other parts of the economy. Although rumors that Sri Lanka could hit oil next year are beginning to excite certain circles, the discovery of oil could just as easily become a curse as a blessing if it is badly managed (and similar experiences in other countries, most famously in Africa, show that it doesn’t really take much to badly manage a resource windfall).

The other is through a ‘Recovery Bounce‘.Basically coming off a ‘low base’ from a very bad situation. Take Sri Lanka’s growth over the last two years; above 8%. That was a recovery bounce. Emerging solely from the end of the war, increased optimism in investment and productivity gains from the North and East. However, that kind of growth is largely a thing of the past. Most predictions put Sri Lanka’s growth in 2012 around the 6-7% mark, our ‘Recovery Bounce’ might keep us afloat for a little while longer, but unless we enact the measures needed for serious sustained growth, it’s only going to be a temporary bubble.

That brings us to the next two methods of growth,‘Overheating Booms’ are purely debt and spending driven nightmares, guaranteed to crash and burn and bring about Apocalypse Now.

However, what Sri Lanka can aim for is a model based on ‘Industrialization oriented for exports‘. That is, fast growth based on mobilizing savings towards manufacturing and exports. The idea is to start off with basic products and then gradually move up the value chain. At the high end of the value chain you have industries like electronics, shipbuilding and cars. Japan, the Asian Tigers and more recently China and Vietnam have followed this model with great success. But Sri Lanka’s manufacturing share of GDP is just 16% and the sector is plagued by high protectionism, dominant State Owned Enterprises and ranks behind regional competitors in ‘technological readiness’ for FDI and technology transfer.

How Does Sri Lanka Get There?

Standard Chartered’s October 2012 report ‘Economic Reform: The Unfinished Agenda’ highlights a few key areas for Sri Lanka to improve on. However, it’s rather positive on Sri Lanka’s reform trend so far and actually says that with speedier reform Sri Lanka will grow at 8%, as opposed to the 7% growth it is already forecasting for us.

A lot of this has to do with a stable government. Say what you like about the autocracy of the Rajapakse’s, but they’ve bought one thing that Sri Lanka has been lacking for ages; political stability. By effectively converting the Sri Lankan government from a faux public owned entity to a privately owned entity it is setting itself up for the long term. And so is less likely to use up current resources at the expense of their long term benefit. And hopefully, its degree of economic exploitation will tend to be much less than that displayed by the several short termist Sri Lankan governments seen over the few decades after the war.

Though Sri Lanka’s economy continues towards greater freedom (Sri Lanka is the 97th freest out of 179 countries) taxation (both rates and regulation), inflation, bureaucracy, transparency and policy instability, corruption, lack of sufficient infrastructure, access to financing and labor issues are still a major problem. The government is making clear progress on some of these issues, but is stagnant on others.

Anyway, we still have a few worrying areas to fix. The primary factor is trade and domestic investments. Trade has been on a declining trend as a share of GDP and domestic investments which are at roughly 29% need to increase to at least 35%. The biggest hindrance here is high state involvement in the business sector, painstaking bureaucracy and corruption is turning away many domestic and foreign investors who would otherwise be contributing to long term growth.

Though Sri Lanka’s economy continues towards greater freedom (Sri Lanka is the 97th freest out of 179 countries) taxation (both rates and regulation), inflation, bureaucracy, transparency and policy instability, corruption, lack of sufficient infrastructure, access to financing and labor issues are still a major problem. The government is making clear progress on some of these issues, but is stagnant on others.

How the government approaches these problems in the next few years will be key in determining Sri Lanka’s growth.

What Sri Lanka Traded So Far in 2012 (Infographic)

The Central Bank just released the first six months of trade data for Sri Lanka. Trade is an important component of the Balance of Payments  (BOP). Which computes the sum of a countries transactions with the rest of the world.

Sri Lanka’s BOP is perpetually in the red. In 2011, massive imports in consumer durables and investment goods made the negative balance worse.  High imports last year were facilitated by low interest rates and a propped up exchange rate. But this year the government has tried to discourage imports by floating the rupee, increasing interest rates and actively discouraging banks from lending with a lending cap. There’s also the new taxes on vehicle imports that, together with other restrictions have just begun to impact durable imports in a big way.

The revenue the government gets from vehicle imports is important for its budget deficit (which is total government revenue less its spending). An increase in taxes like we’ve just seen is likely to actually reduce government revenue even further because potential vehicle owners will be completely discouraged to buy.

But so far this year, imports have failed to ease up as much as they were hoped to. And floundering global economies have reduced the demand for our exports. Globally, fuel prices are looking to rise but this will impact fuel imports less than local demand which is likely to increase the more we use thermal power in response to our ongoing electricity problem.

Jobs in Sri Lanka

Are a thorny topic. officially the unemployment rate is pretty low. But unofficially people are just not happy with their jobs, or employers are not really happy with the type of people who work for them. This is underemployment, or mal-employment and im not sure the latter qualifies as a proper economic term.

Add to this, there are the myriad economic factors that affect education. How dynamic is our tertiary education system, How much money is pouring into the system, Is the money pouring being used properly, Is the government really focusing on developing human resources, what are the other policy measures the government can and must take and what if anything, is wrong with the people?

On the latter, more than you think. Or just as much as you think. Sri Lankans have propensities to either engage in government bashing or people’s-attitude bashing seemingly based on their mood. But actually the government and the people are highly intertwined within the issue of education. And word on Intelligentsia Avenue apportions equal blame to both.

The government can initiate reform. But the people are just too damn backward and intent on handouts to brave the new world of competitive spirit. Kishu Gomes, at an IPS organized panel discussion on the topic (accompanied by a Twitter discussion) yesterday, voiced the opinion that Sri Lankans have knowledge, but that knowledge is not ‘commercially viable’. While this might seem like blasphemy to puritans who believe in knowledge for its own sake, Gomes has a point. Economically speaking, within the traditional measures of wealth such as GDP, knowledge that cannot make money is of no use.

Another interesting point that Gomes raised was that people here don’t aspire enough. They aren’t motivated for progress. Sri Lankans are much less inclined to want great things out of their lives than workers from countries like India, China or the US (examples are my own). I agree, we do have this islander tendency to kick back. And personally i find the idea of converting myself into a sweating, steaming corporate machine geared to achieve a definition of greatness outlined by materialistic frameworks of human well being repulsive (some might read this as: But I’m just a lazy bugger). But wanting some downtime in your life doesn’t mean you can’t be a productive citizen.

And here’s the other point, on the employee’s side there is sentiment that the jobs available don’t really accommodate their needs. They aren’t customized to their skill sets or they don’t respect their knowledge levels. This ties in with Gomes’ first argument. Knowledge does not match job availability. And the unemployed graduates can scream all they want, those empty board room seats (I’m assuming) aren’t getting filled. But it isn’t only because graduates are under qualified. Many people who are more than qualified and have shining skill sets to boot, leave the country in droves because the job market here simply cannot offer them what they want. This results in maybe more foreign remittances to the country, but betrays a chronic inability for it to hang on to its most valuable human resources.

One of the biggest drivers of the economy, what am i saying, THE biggest driver of the economy, is business. And how easy is it for people to start businesses in Sri Lanka? Given that Sri Lanka ranks 89 in the world for doing business, starting a business especially for a young person out of school with only a plan and no capital is like climbing a grease pole during Avurudu, you deserve a prize for doing it. At least that’s what young entrepreneur Gayan Panditharathne says. He started a drink bottling business but received virtually no help from the government, his many approaches to various government offices proving useless. The one’s who’ve somehow managed, have a hard time doing their first year taxes, for instance. Sri Lanka ranks a shocking 173 globally in the efficiency of paying taxes, and has actually slipped two places in 2012.

Another big issue is stigma. Parents don’t like their kids venturing into business. It is seen as risky and crass. The riskiness can be improved. With proper policy reform and support mechanisms, but for this the government has to really get involved. But the image problem of business is not something that policy can cure. Being a lawyer, doctor or an engineer is seen as infinitely more respectable than being a wheeler dealer bringing in the millions.

Talking about tertiary education and ‘education sector reform’ almost seems useless. The topic has been bandied and boxed around for fifteen rounds. And like a doddering prizefighter with nerves of steel, is refusing to go down. On both sides there is inertia and unwillingness to change. I sympathize with FUTA’s call to increase spending on education to 6% of GDP (this interesting slide set from Moratuwa University claims to make a case, well worth a read) but do not sympathize with how the local education system is run. And i think feeding more money into a broken system is pointless.

More money going into education is all very well. But i worry when i see protests, seemingly based on nothing but vested interest, denying the implementation of a private medical college for instance in the country. The opposition to private education from the so called ‘free education’ system and its politicized left wing student unions is nothing short of irrational and downright scary.

Add to this a government that wants to make the country an ‘education hub’ but displays absolutely no intention of investing in any form of research whatsoever and allows its best academic minds to leave the country in flocks for want of sufficient benefits and you have an ‘education system’ that reads like an analysis of one of Freud’s most difficult patients.

So what’s the alternative? The market. The economy, if it keeps doing well, will attract more investment, and people will do whatever it takes to get those jobs coming in. We already have ample private education in IT, design, tourism, finance, marketing and business. Vocational training isn’t doing too badly either i hear. All being said though things right now are a bit of a Charlie Foxtrot.

Sri Lanka’s First Quarter GDP (Infographic)

Sri Lanka’s GDP increased by 7.9% in the first quarter of 2012. But what does this mean exactly? I made the following infographic to explain. Click to see a larger and clearer image. I used data from The Department of Census and Statistics, The World Bank and Trading Economics. (*Image updated to correct a mistake in Sri Lanka’s annual GDP, which was showing the 2010 figure – 50bn).

UPDATE – Small error on the 4th tier where it says ‘Rupees Million’, Read that as ‘Rupees Billion’. Until I get around to editing it (Corrected – Jul 19).

To My Sinhala Friends

For minorities to know their place in this country all they have to do is to look at its national flag. Here’s a picture. There are the minorities colored in green and orange, and the Sinhala have a big patch of red.. Hey that’s fine, proportional representation ain’t no crime, but what’s that there in the red patch? is that… A lion? wielding a drawn sword..? Roaring in the general direction of the minorities? Keep out, its saying. This is my turf I’ve pissed all over it, one foot where it doesn’t belong and you’ll soon be ingesting several feet of sword.

No matter.. Minorities here know their place. The Muslims especially have always known their place. In Sri Lanka it seems to me that it is patriotism that is the opiate of the masses. and the Middle classes the biggest consumers. The rich are too busy getting richer, the poor are too busy being poor, but the middle class is upwardly mobile.. Asiff Hussein the anthropologist mentioned this in passing once and the thought has been running around in my head and gelatinizing and taking shape.

The middle class want wealth, the politicians and oligarchs steal that wealth and direct middle class anger towards the Muslims. It’s a classic strategy. Take the USA that stronghold of democratic justice, despite all the problems its people face what do they argue about the most come election time? Gay marriage, abortion and yeah, Muslims. Everything else is secondary. The whole political-media mechanism gears itself around these issues and the people are nicely distracted from the real issues. The wars the corporate abuse the widening wealth gap.

The war here is done.. The upwardly mobile middle classes are hungry, educated and success has been long in coming and now they won’t let anything stop them. They’re really starting to chew on what’s stopping them but it would be disastrous if they start chewing on how their leaders are screwing them out of so much money and opportunity.. So the Muslims, probably the most peace loving people in this country are painted black.

Easy job right? global propaganda is already helping them along. All they need to do is translate books of Ayaan Hirsi Ali or of some incident of barbaric cruelty perpetrated against a woman that has nothing whatsoever to do with Islam and sell them on the pavements of Nugegoda. All that needs to be done is to channel the appropriate funds to bhikkus and organizations willing to sell their souls and you’ve got a racist ‘movement’ that operates in increasing legitimacy.

Facebook statuses I see, pictures being shared around by educated Sinhala youth, sometimes even my direct friends and people I like and who I think like me.. They are all wasting their youthful exuberance. Muslims aren’t the enemy. Muslims in Sri Lanka have made it a habit of living off local prosperity. If you the majority aren’t rich then who will buy our goods? We’ve never had any political ambitions that threaten your sovereignty. If you prosper, we prosper and vice versa. In the past we both prospered by working together against the Portuguese, Dutch and English. Crack open a history book, a real history book, not the one you get from school.

Something is sucking your energy, young people here have always been activists, always headstrong and now something is trying to make you blind. The drug that does it is patriotism, in a context far removed from any form of economic prosperity, which is to say a bastardized form of patriotism. You are blind to the social injustice around you.. That effects you everyday. That shuts you out and closes the door; that invisible barrier beyond which true power and wealth lies in this country.

So wake up and smell the plain tea… It’s got a coating of grime on it called patriotism, but actually it’s just trickery.

Poverty, Damned Lies And Statistics

Sri Lanka’s poverty line uses somewhat of an outdated system to calculate poverty. But of course, to be fair, the whole world uses an outdated system to calculate poverty. I was at a forum organized by the Center for Poverty Analysis (CEPA) yesterday and a few interesting things were voiced.

Poverty

The Department of Census and Statistics (DCS) takes a value of how many calories a person needs to consume; 2030 calories per day in 2002. Then it looks at how much money you need to buy this many calories and arrives at the food poverty line.

Add to this the estimated costs of other requirements and you have the official poverty line. In 2002 this was Rs. 1423 per person per month. This is inflated every year to reflect the change in price levels. By that measure, it should currently be something like Rs. 3646 per person per month. Successive Household Income Expenditure Surveys (HIES) done by the DCS has revealed the number of poor people as a percentage of the population to have dropped as follows.

By the standards of nutritional measure at least, living seems to have gotten better here. Although the statistics do appear a little fantastic. Harsha De Silva for example asked how poverty levels of Estate workers could have sunk from some 30% in 2002 to something  like 12% in 2009. Admittedly Sri Lanka has gone through some serious socio-economic changes since the ceasefire. And while i doubt the DCS would put a number in public view without reasoning to back it, paranoia and doubt is warranted because it certainly does behave very suspiciously at times.

Lies and Statistics

The CDS remains incredibly cagey and protective about its statistics. When i say ‘incredibly’ however, i mean marginally. But even marginal cageyness when it comes to statistics can render any objective party almost impotent when it comes to interpreting economic numbers for itself.

Take inflation for example; inflation is calculated by tracking the prices of a ‘basket’ of consumer goods that a household is typically assumed to consume. The items in this basket is divided into broad categories (food and beverages, clothing and footwear, education, transport etc)  and further divided into subcategories (like the food category would contain, beets, beans, samba rise, anchor milk etc). These items are then assigned weights based on their relative importance (e.g. food would have 40% of the basket while clothing has 10%). A survey is done on weekly prices and the prices are multiplied by the weights to arrive at the overall inflation figure.

Now i might sound pedantic, but bear with me here. While the CDS gives the weights for the broader categories it fails to give the weights for the sub categories in the basket. And sub-categories are the most important thing here because knowing the relative importance of Anchor milk in the index is the only thing that allows us to accurately calculate the real impact of a milk price hike to inflation.

When i asked why the CDS isn’t transparent about inflation, especially when the government has repeatedly come under fire of accusations of manipulation, Suranjana Vidyaratne, Director General of the CDS, dodged my question. I suppose there is no smoke without fire.

Government data in Sri Lanka is generally like this though. A lot of the Central Bank data that comes out suffers from mysterious lags and occasional omissions and corrections that raise the eyebrow.

What is Happiness?

But is money and food a sufficient measure of poverty? And should we be measuring poverty in the first place? Traditional measures of poverty fall a little short of conveying the real deal of what it means to be poor and human by their valuation of poverty via a measure quantified purely in terms of money.

Since the seventies however, a movement towards including more dimensions into how we measure poverty has been gathering force. The Multidimensional Poverty Index attempts to incorporate factors like education, health and standards of living into a numerical measure of poverty that tries to be sort of more holistic.

Countries like Bhutan are already way ahead in measuring what they like to call ‘happiness’ using their GNH (Gross National Happiness). It takes data that can be quantitatively measured such as health and education but also gives importance to culture, spiritual progress, good governance and other qualitative, and critics accuse; subjective, measures.

(Literally) Hanging At Lakegala

“Hanging by my fingers and toes, looking for purchase on a near vertical surface of rock. Jerry is behind me, KP below him,  then Indi and a fall of a few thousand feet after that” Probably would be a good tweet to describe this moment, if i’m in a position to tweet, which i’m not.

Lakegala is in the depths of  Deaneston, in the South Knuckles area. It is famous for its rumored place in Ravanic legends. At this very moment however, Ravanic thoughts are not on my mind. Because at this very moment I’m grappling with the ultimate understanding of the cliched phrase ‘don’t look down’. I’m pep talking my mind, telling it to be strong, while simultaneously trying to get comfortable with the immediacy of my own death. Wondering if Allah will disapprove that it came about as a result of purely recreational pursuits.

See that little line on the rock up there? That's what you need to climb up to get to the top

Punchi Banda from Meemure is our guide. He is now a few feet above me in the narrow crevice in the rock face that we are climbing. We soon realize that our preparations for this climb are woefully inadequate. We have only thirty feet of rope, while we actually need like, two hundred. We were supposed to do religious rituals to appease the mountain gods (and i think, our guide). The guide is supposed to be a master climber. He is supposed to negotiate some three hundred feet of precarious free climbing to get to the top and send us down a rope.

But after having scaled the mountain some three times in his life, Punchi Banda has only deep respect mixed with fear for it. He had promised himself to never climb it again before we came along. And now he’s kind of freaking out. Mostly because he thinks that we can’t make it there and back alive.

Jerry and Punchi Banda

The balance tips when we have to stop, and wait till a bunch of university students about twenty feet ahead of us send us down a bit of their rope. Waiting is slow torture. The rock is sharp and unforgiving, it is hard to stand comfortably for extended periods of time. We slowly begin to feel more and more fatigue and the hot midday sun isn’t helping.

After asking us what religions we belonged to, and making us panic, Punchi Banda decides to take this moment to start chanting pirith. This is a Very Bad Idea. The lilting tones of mournful Pali verse only succeed in driving home the cold reality of our situation. We are stuck thousands of feet in the air, in a narrow crevice in a vertical rock face. this is not a casual weekend adventure. Mortality stares me in the face, a small slip on the rock, an unsteady toehold and we’re all crashing down to the fishes. I glance down at KP, I can see him thinking about his family. Jerry’s face is impassive, but i can tell he’s under quite a bit of strain. Indi is below us, apparently comfortably wedged between rock taking pictures, assures me later that he was only fervently thinking about his mother.

Where we were supposed to get to

We would have still gone on. But when the students above us announced that they were giving up and were coming back down, we had no choice but to turn back; only a hundred feet from that taunting peak that has been on my mind ever since we first stepped into the beautiful, unforgiving landscape of Deanston. I think we were all secretly relieved. in the words of KP; ‘there is a very narrow line between being courageous and being stupid’ and i think we almost crossed that line on this rock. Below is a pic from that trip, from the Sinhalaya Travels post. Lakegala is the triangular peak at the top left, in case you missed it.

The rock was a monster, and i can see why King Ravana would choose it as his love nest/ palace/ garage (depending on which version of the legend you believe). One version of the story says that his private jet is still hidden somewhere up there in the mountain. The retired postmaster whose hospitality we enjoyed told us that there is a cave on the other face, virtually inaccessible, that seemingly has some mysterious signs of Ravana’s existence, but he has only heard it from people who claim to have stumbled upon it.

The villagers are uniquely protective of the mountain. They strongly discourage people from going up there. They lie about the conditions (too slippery, too hot) and withhold guides if they can. They claim that is is because its too dangerous. Yet, once, practically the whole village went up there for an overnight pirith session (a Bhuddist religious service). It must have been quite the venture, priests, disciples, mothers, kids, grandparents and even electric power generators making that grueling trek and climbing that rock face to spend the night up there. Its obvious that they consider the rock to be sacred for some reason. Its not something that even the village boys climb for fun (our guide didn’t climb the peak until he was in his late thirties, despite having spent his whole life there). The thought of legions of outsiders making their way up Lakegala just for kicks is probably repulsive to them.

Not that its easy to get there, oh no. To get to the rock you must first get to Meemure, a village at the very bottom of the basin of Deanston. Most cabs won’t go there if they know the quality of the roads. The driver that took us ended up demanding much more than the agreed price to make up for vehicular damage. the journey takes all of three hours and involves a lot of cussing, mostly from the driver.

And if you thought getting to Meemure was a challenge, wait until you start the trek up to the rock. After a little while, we literally had to cut our way through the scrubby, thorny jungle. The ground is very steep and covered in loose rock. Any paths that exist have been created by buffalo roaming in search of grass. On the way down its even harder, we got disoriented and lost. Lucky thing we had a guide. The whole place is smothered in a deadly, wild beauty. Nature here has not been tamed, and you put a foot wrong and there’s no one to help you, then you’re in trouble.

Meemure itself is idyllic. A small village of a hundred families, time passes at a different pace. Apparently the village was founded because a princess belonging to one of the Rajasinghe kings was brought here to be hidden, some two hundred years ago. This makes sense, as Meemure doesn’t seem like a place people would just stumble upon and decide to stay in. Don’t go here looking for creature comforts; they have no hotels or rest houses here. But ultimately we didn’t do to badly. We got a temple floor to sleep on, a nice rivers and water pools to bathe in and wonderful home cooked rice and curry to eat. Here in this place in the depths of a mountain range, original Sri Lankan hospitality still survives.

The nearest town to Meemure is Hunnasgiriya and the only way back there is in either a rickety van or truck, we took the latter. It bounced along and they kept packing people in, and we kept finding room for them. At tough uphill bends, of which there were many, we had to get down to allow the truck to be able to negotiate the turns. We then had to cut across the road through leech infested jungle paths to catch up with it as it sped ahead. The whole journey takes about three hours.

All in all it was a wonderful experience, barring the fail at the top of the rock. All the more reason to go back (insha Allah).

How My Maruti Raced Another Maruti.. And Won

It was late, the roads were empty, and I was cruising with my arm on the window sill. I’m approaching the Dehiwala flyover when I see him. A pair of headlights, their proximity indicating that they belonged to a car of Indian make, appears behind me and to the left. I am now really close to the flyover and am reaching the barricade separating it from the rest of the road.

Suddenly, the guy behind cuts through in front of me, in what is an insane maneuver, and just manages to edge past in between me and the barricades without causing an accident. He then zooms triumphantly off up the flyover, only to come up short at the top behind an old, rickety lorry (which shouldn’t have been there in the first place).

According to Scott (2000) road rage is ‘quite unlike other forms of interpersonal violence’ and therefore leaves ‘conflict resolution practitioners’ in a fix. And why is this? Three reasons

1) It involves strangers,

2) It’s related to a driving incident and

3) It hinges upon invasion of personal ‘space’ and thereby is a challenge to identity.

Anyway, after a kilometer or so I roll up next to him, we’re both caught in a patch of traffic as someone makes a right turn into a by lane. My initial instinct is to be superior and above it all. So I ignore him. At first. But then I can’t resist taking one look at this belligerent idiot who almost killed himself and took me with him. So I turn my head and take a look. He is about my age, arrogant looking and is staring me back right in the eye. And upon contact I swear our eyes narrowed, and we coldly assessed each other for a split second, and in this split second we exchanged a mountain of information, most of it not good. The outcome then is predictable.

As soon as the patch of traffic clears up. We’re off. He’s driving what looks like a late model Alto, while i drive a 2005 Zen. He gets a head start because he obviously raced off the first gear. I let him get in front, and use the opportunity to scope out the path ahead. There’s just a slow moving Honda Civic on the road in front of us. The roads are wide in this part of Mt. Lavinia so there’s plenty of room. All I need to do is pass the Civic on the outside, and I have passed my newfound enemy. My car has good acceleration and weighs less than his. So it’s no contest, after a few seconds, I’m ahead of him.

But he doesn’t give up. He’s dogging my tail. This is one determined belligerent idiot. So I go faster. My eyesight narrows into tunnel vision and I only see what is ahead. A yellow crossing materializes, and a pedestrian appears in my line of sight, I slow down slightly and swerve a bit to give him room to walk. Whether he avoids my tail is not my problem. But my tail is still on me. If anything, my slowing down has given him an edge. And now he’s catching up.

I accelerate some more. We are both probably traveling at near optimum speeds. He keeps up, and is now scoping out a way of passing me on the inside. I am calm. My mind is on a different plane, detached, observant and analytical. We are reaching the junction at Templers Road when I see an opportunity ahead.

The man is on a bicycle, and he’s slowly crossing the road on a yellow line. He approaches the middle of the crossing. And I slow down just a bit in order to let him pass in front of me. I know my pursuer can’t see the bicycle but he must know that I slowed down for a reason,  but still he insists on making the mistake of accelerating and trying to pass me on the inside despite this, but now the bicycle is directly in his path, and his only options are either to brake hard or to kill someone, possibly himself.

As I reach the junction, now accelerating again, I don’t hear a crash. And I don’t see my tail anymore. I have won. Despite myself, this makes me feel good. What I did was absolutely stupid. Several people could have died. But the soaring feeling of triumph in my gut is not going away.

But after a while I feel a little shame. And in response my mind becomes analytical again. I suppose that’s why I wrote this post. Because this little drama that went through last night is played out over Sri Lankan roads on a daily basis. Tuk tuks, buses, Marutis, Hondas, Defenders they all do it. Uncles, mallis, thathhaas and Guney aiyyas. We all get a thrill out of the occasional road race. The rage of being wronged is hard to contain. And righteous victory must always be ours.

I was in Japan two months ago and it’s impossible to imagine something like this happening there. The Japanese are immeasurably polite, pedestrians would rather wait five minutes until the ‘don’t walk’ sign turns green rather than violate social protocol. And mind you this is when the street is absolutely empty of cars. Drivers respect pedestrians even more than pedestrians respect drivers, and they will stop abruptly well in advance of almost breaking your knees (which is how lowly pedestrian are treated here).

In Japan they don’t appear to dehumanize other people on the roads. Over here other people are just inanimate objects. As if we are all playing Need For Speed. Because you know, if we die, we can just hit the restart button.